Webster Family Genealogy

"Henry Whitney, b. at 25 Pearl St., New York, 23 Aug. 1812; was graduated at Yale College in 1830, and settled in New Haven, Conn., in 1837, where he continued to reside until his death, living for a year in "Maple Cottage", Trumbull Street, until the fine mansion which he built for himself on Whitney Avenue (now occupied by his son Stephen) was completed; married, 27 Jan. 1835, by Rev. Dr. Lyell, at the residence of her parents, 498 Broadway, N. Y., to Hannah Eugenia Lawrence, born in New York, 27 Jan. 1815, dau. of Isaac Lawrence and his wife Anna, dau. of Rev. Abraham Beach, D. D., minister of Trinity Church, New York. She died, 16 March 1844, in New Haven, and was buried in the New Haven Cemetery. He married (2d), 25 July 1850, at Norwich, Conn., Maria Lucy Fitch; and died in New Haven, 21 March 1856, and was buried in the New Haven Cemetery. . . . . She married (2d), 20 Nov. 1862, at New York, Nathan Adolphus Baldwin, of Milford, Conn., where they resided in June 1877. They have one child, Natalie Augusta Baldwin, born at Milford, 26 Dec. 1864."

"The History of the Old Town of Derby, Connecticut 1642-1880" by Samuel Orcut t and Ambrose Beardsley, M.D. 1880 p779 "Stephen..was a merchant in New York city..He died Fe b 16, 1860; buried in Greenwood, of which cemetery he was one of the original incorporators , and a director through his life. He went to New York when 18 or 20 years of age, having had only ordinary advantages at Derby, and engaged himself as clerk to the firm of Lawrence and Whitney, shippers, in which his brother Henry was a partner. By energy and business talent he soon acquired means to enter copartnership with John Currie, a Scotchman, in the wholesale grocery trade. He traded largely in wines, then in cotton, then engaged in ship-building and the shipping trade to nearly all parts of the world; then in canals and railroads, and finally in banks, accumulating great wealth."

He set himself in business as a liquor retailer and later wholesaler in 1805 at Nr 4 Stone Street, New York. Stephen Whitney's fortune grew heavily thanks to some large and fortunate speculations in cotton. In the 1830's he was among New York's richest men. His fortune was doubled by shrewd investments in city real estate. Second in wealth to John Jacob Astor, Whitney's fortune was estimated between 5-10'000'000 dollars at its height.

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