_George ESPY ________+
| (.... - 1761)
_James ESPY _________|
| (1727 - ....) |
| |_Jean TAYLOR ________
|
|
|--James Pollard ESPY
| (1796 - 1860)
| _____________________
| |
|_ UNKNOWN ___________|
|
|_____________________
[3768]
1.) James, b. May 9, 1786, in Westmoreland county, PA. His father
removed to the State of Kentucky when James was in his fourth year.
His thirst for knowledge was from his childhood insatiable, and his
means being limited, he began, while yet in his teens, teaching during
a portion of each year, to pay for the instruction received in the
Transylvania University, Lexington, where he graduated at the age of
twenty-one.
The following year he was invited to Cumberland, MD., to take charge
of a classical academy at that place, then newly endowed by the
Legislature. His zeal for instructing the young was such that he soon
made it a well-known institution, to which students came from every
part of the country. In the meantime he studied law, went to Bedford,
PA, and was admitted to the bar there, subsequently going to Xenia,
Ohio, whither his father had previously removed [?], where he
practiced law four years. His profession did not seem to accord with
the literary and scientific tendencies of his mind, and he accepted,
in 1817, a call to the classical department of the Franklin Institute,
Philadelphia, and that city became his home for twenty years.
During this period he published several pamphlets reviewing and
rejecting the theories of storms and currents which prevailed, and
these attracted the attention of the scientists of America. Professor
Espy, having formed his own theory, brought it practically to the test
of many storms. In 1841 his published his great work, "The Philosophy
of Storms." Prior to its publication in this form, the new theory had
caused a sensation in the principal cities of England and France, and
Professor Espy was invited to visit Europe and compare his results
with those which had been reached by Redfield, Forbes, Pouillet,
Fournet, and others. He accordingly visited Europe, and in September
1840, the British Association appointed a day to entertain the
professor's statement which was made in the presence of Professor
Forbes, Mr. Redfield, Sir John Herschel, Sir David Brewster, and other
eminent naturalists. The discussion which followed was one of the
most interesting ever reported in the journals of the association.
In the Academy of Sciences at Paris, the interest was equally great,
and a committee, consisting of Arago and Pouillet, was appointed to
report upon Espy's observations and theory. They were satisfied of
the importance of the theory at once, and so reported. It was in the
debate which took place in the Academy at this time that Arago said,
'France has its Cuvier, England its Newton, America its Espy.' On his
return from this satisfactory visit, Professor Espy was appointed
corresponding member of the Smithsonian Institution.
In 1843 he was employed by the War Department, in the Washington
Observatory, to prosecute his investigations and collate the reports
from the different observers throughout the country. Several quarto
volumes of this matter were published by the department.
The remainder of his life was spent at the National capital, although
his vacation days were enjoyed at Harrisburg, amid the society of
endeared friends. On the 17th of January, 1860, while on a visit to
Cincinnati, Professor Espy was stricken with paralysis, from which he
died on the 24th of the same month. His remains rest in the Espy
burial lot in the Harrisburg cemetery. He married, at the age of
thirty-seven, Margaret Pollard, of Cumberland, MD., born September 28,
1795, whose maiden name, for some fancied reason, he assumed, and was
ever afterward known as James Pollard Espy. She died May 30, 1850,
and is buried by the side of her husband at Harrisburg, PA. They left
no issue" (PENNSYVLANIA GENEALOGIES, "Espy of Derry," 216-17).
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