Joshua Douglass    

Joshua Douglass, son of Joshua and Martha Douglass of New England, attorney and counselor at law, was born in Rochester, New York, August 1, 1826. His parents moved to Meadville, Pennsylvania, in 1832, and settled on a tract of heavily timbered and unbroken land near Meadville. Joshua worked with his father, clearing and cultivating the land, attended district school winters and later the Meadville Academy. Was married in 1848 to Calsina L. Finch, who died in 1849. In 1850 he went overland to California, returned in taught district school in winter of 1851-2, and read law under the preceptorship of Hon. A. B. Richmond.

He was married in October, 1853, to Lavantia, daughter of Joel and Sophia Densmore of Blooming Valley, Pennsylvania. They have had five children: Marian, born in February, 1855, married December 7, 1875, Charles W. Lane, and they have two children,—Ralph Douglass, born May, 1877, and Elsie Britton, born December, 1878; Mrs. Lane and the two children reside in Brooklyn, New York; Ellen, born in July, 1856, in June, 1879, married Cornelius Van Horne, an attorney at law, and they have had five children,—Robert T., Cornelius (who died young), Richard, Ralph, and Douglass; the family reside in Tacoma, Washington; Robert, born in November, i86i, died in October, 1862; Mabelle, born in February, 1864, and married John C. Burns, a merchant of New York city, in August, 1892; and Gertrude, born in November, 1866, married Percy Vernon Greenwood in May, 1891, who died in November, 1891. She has a daughter, Persilia Vernon, born February, 1892. Gertrude married again, this time wedding George W. Douglass, one of the editors of the Brooklyn Eagle, in December, 1895. Mr. and Mrs. Douglass are members of the Unitarian congregation of Meadville. Mr. Douglass has long been one of the trustees of the Meadville Theological School, also one of the promoters and directors of the Meadville Library, Art and Historical Association.

Mr. Douglass was admitted to the bar in Crawford county in April, 1854, to the supreme court of the state in to the United States circuit and district courts in 1858. and later to the United States supreme court. He has enjoyed a large and active practice in the several courts named and many others in Pennsylvania and other states, and at this writing, in his seventy—third year, continues in practice with vigor. He was a delegate- to the Free-soil convention at Pittsburg in 1852 that nominated John P. Hale for President of the United States, and continued actively in the party until merged into the Republican party in 1856, and has continued a stalwart Republican to the present time, being now an active supporter of the administration, especially in its expansion policy.
Mr. Douglass is of Scotch origin. and has in his possession a carefully written history of the family, prepared by a member of the same, which embraces many eminent names. The late Hon. Stephen A. Douglas (who dropped one s from his name) is a member of the family.

Our county and its people: a historical and memorial record of Crawford County, Pennsylvania by Samuel P. Bates, 1899, pages 707-708.

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