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HISTORICAL ENCYCLOPEDIA OF ILLINOIS.
1820; studied law in Troy and removed to Illinois, settling at Edwardsville, and finally at Alton; was a Republican candidate for Presidential Elector in 1856, and, in 1860, a member of the National Republican Convention at Chicago, which nominated Mr. Lincoln for the Presidency. In September, 1862, he was commissioned Colonel of the Ninety-seventh Illinois Volunteers, and participated in the capture of Port Gibson and in the operations about Vicksburg-also leading in the attack on Arkansas Post, and subsequently serving in Louisiana, but died as the result of fatigue and exposure in the service, June 20, 1864, one week before his promotion to the rank of Brigadier-General.-Reuben C. (Rutherford), brother of the preceding, was born at Troy, N. Y., Sept. 29, 1823, but grew up in Vermont and New Hampshire; received a degree in law when quite young, but afterwards fitted himself as a lecturer on physiology and hygiene, upon which he lectured extensively in Michigan, Illinois and other States after coming west in 1849. During 1854-55, in co-operation with Prof. J. B. Turner and others, he canvassed and lectured extensively throughout Illinois in support of the movement which resulted in the donation of public lands, by Congress, for the establishment of "Industrial Colleges" in the several States. The establishment of the University of Illinois, at Champaign, was the outgrowth of this movement. In 1856 he located at Quincy, where he resided some thirty years; in 1861, served for several months as the first Commissary of Subsistence at Cairo; was later associated with the State Quartermaster's Department, finally entering the secret service of the War Department, in which he remained until 1867, retiring with the rank of brevet Brigadier-General. In 1886, General Rutherford removed to New York City, where he died, June 24,1895.- George Y. (Rutherford), another brother, was born at Rutland, Vt, 1839; was first admitted to the bar, but afterwards took charge of the construction of telegraph lines in some of the Southern States; at the beginning of the Civil War became Assistant Quartermaster-General of the State of Illinois, at Springfield, under ex-Gov. John Wood, but subsequently entered the Quartermaster's service of the General Government in Washington, retiring after the war with the rank of Brigadier-General
