Cleveland Past and Present: Its Representative Men: Comprising Biographical Sketches of Pioneer Settlers and Prominent Citizens
History
Cleveland Past and Present: Its Representative Men: Comprising Biographical Sketches of Pioneer Settlers and Prominent Citizens
Cleveland (Ohio) -- Biography; Cleveland (Ohio) -- History
In the Spring of 1863, soon after his retirement from business, he went to
England with the intention of staying a year or two and then returning to
enjoy the remainder of his life in ease in this country. Whilst in
England he paid a visit to some friends in Southampton, and whilst taking
a bath in a movable bathing-house on the beach, probably was seized with
cramp and suffocated by water getting into his lungs. The news of his
death caused a painful shock in business, social, and religious circles,
where he had been so well known and so highly esteemed.
For a long term of years Mr. Walton was the presiding officer of the St.
George's Society of Cleveland, and that benevolent institution owed its
usefulness in great measure to his indefatigable zeal in the cause, and to
his unstinted liberality. To the distressed of any nation he never turned
a deaf ear, but to the needy and suffering of his native country he was
ever liberal, and accompanied his unostentatious charities with kind words
and manifestations of sincere interest that were frequently as beneficial
to the recipient as the money itself. He was also a valued member of the
Masonic Order.
In religious belief he was an Episcopalian, and was long one of the
leading members of Trinity Church. His devotion was unaffectedly sincere,
and though he made no vaunt of his religious principles or hopes, there
could be no question of his deep, earnest convictions. Kind, courteous,
ever thinking of the good of others, and wholly unselfish, Mr. Walton was
a good specimen of the true Christian gentleman.
Although of English birth, and clinging affectionately to all that
reminded him of his native land, he was a thorough supporter of American
institutions, and an admirer of the American character. Deeply and warmly
as he loved the land of his birth, his affection was even stronger for the
land of his adoption, and it was his purpose to have returned from his
visit to his boyhood's home and settle down in peaceful content in the
chosen home of his manhood, until death should lay him in an American
grave. When the war broke out he was an earnest and unshrinking supporter
of the Government, and his means were freely used for its support, and for
the comfort of the soldiers who were fighting its battles. Though alien
born, and associated intimately with people of like birth, there was no
native American that could surpass him in love for the Union, and few that
exceeded him, in proportion to his means, in contributions to the defence
of the Union.
In the language of his favorite Shakespeare, it might be said of him
His life was gentle, and the elements
So mixed in him, that nature might stand up
And say to all the world, _This was a man_!
George Worthington.
Prominent among the business firms of Cleveland, is that of George
Worthington & Co., a house which stands in the front rank both on account
of the business done, and of its integrity and honorable dealing.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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