Hoffmann

this appointment he began a diplomatic career
which continued until his retirement only a few
years before his death. Appointed first secretary
of the legation in 1867, ne served in Paris in that
capacity for seven years, being resident there
through the siege by the Prussians in 1870 and
during the days of the Commune. In December
1874 he was transferred to London as secretary
of the legation, and in 1877 he was ordered to St.
Petersburg. After some six years in Russia he
was appointed, in February 1883, United States
minister to Denmark, and from this position he
retired to private life in 1885. Meanwhile he
had written two volumes of memoirs. The first,
Camp, Court, and Siege (1877), was a per-
sonal account of his experiences in the Civil War
and in France under the Empire and through the
siege of 1870. In 1883 he published Leisure
Hours in Russia, a chatty narrative of his ob-
servations and experiences in the East. He died
at Atlantic City, N. J. He had married, in Bos-
ton, May 14, 1844, Elizabeth Baylies, daughter
of Edmund Baylies of Taunton, Mass., and
grand-daughter of Hodijah Baylies, an officer in
the Continental Army.

[E. A. Hoffman, Geneal. of the Hoffman Family
(1899) ; Harvard Grads.* Mag.f Sept. 1900; F. B. Heit-
man, Hist. Reg. and Diet, of the U. S. Army (1903),
vol. I; N. Y. Times, N. Y. Herald, May 22, 1900.]

Y TT TT

HOFFMANN, FRANCIS ARNOLD (June
5, i822-Jan. 23, 1903), clergyman, lieutenant-
governor of Illinois, agricultural writer under
the name Hans Buschbauer, was born at Her-
ford, Westphalia, the son of Frederick William
and Wilhelmina (Groppe) Hoffmann. After at-
tending the schools of Herford, he fled to Amer-
ica to escape conscription. Reaching Chicago in
1840, he served for a time as a hotel bootblack;
then became the teacher of the pastorless Lu-
theran church at Dunkley's Grove (now Addi-
son), 111. The following year he studied for the
ministry in Michigan. Returning after ordina-
tion, he was given charge of the Lutherans of
northeastern Illinois. On Feb. 22, 1844, he mar-
ried Cynthia Gilbert, an American of English
ancestry. While zealously ministering to his
scattered flock and insisting on the exclusive use
of German in his home, he soon mastered the
English language and became active in public
affairs as town clerk, postmaster, member of the
school board, and contributor to the Chicago
Democrat and the Prairie Farmer. In 1847 he
was elected representative from Du Page County
to the River and Harbor Convention held in Chi-
cago. The same year he became pastor of the
church at Schaumberg, 111. In 1851 he quit the
ministry, moved to Chicago, studied law, and

I

Hoffmann
was admitted to the bar. He also engaged suc-
cessfully in the real-estate and insurance busi-
ness and was the first editor of the Illinois Stoats
Zeitung. In 1852 he was elected to the city coun-
cil. By organized efforts he attracted German
immigrants to Chicago and Illinois, and, being
entrusted with their money, as well as with capi-
tal from abroad for investment, he started a bank
in 1854 with immediate success. He was appoint-
ed consul for several German states and in rec-
ognition of the services rendered his countrymen
he was decorated by the Duke of Saxe-Coburg-
Gotha.
When Douglas* Kansas-Nebraska Bill made
the extension of slavery the dominant issue in
politics, Hoffmann and his countrymen, thereto-
fore Democrats, immediately protested. This
was followed by an immense demonstration, Feb.
8, 1854, at which he took the leading part, his
sensational speech predicting the defection of the
Germans should the measure pass. When the bill
became a law, he proved a strong factor in win-
ning an Anti-Nebraska majority in the legisla-
ture which elected Lyman Trumbull to the
United States Senate in 1855. A friend of Lin-
coln, he was one of the organizers of the Repub-
lican party in Illinois and in 1856 was unani-
mously nominated for lieutenant-governor, but
he proved ineligible because not yet of constitu-
tional age. He spoke and wrote effectively, both
in English and German, in 1856, 1858, and in
1860, when he was again nominated for lieu-
tenant-governor and duly elected, serving with
credit for four years. After the outbreak of the
Civil War his bank failed owing to the repudia-
tion of the bonds of the Southern states. Later,
when he became commissioner of the Foreign
Land Department of the Illinois Central Rail-
road, settling thousands of persons on their grants
in the state, he used his large earnings mainly
to liquidate obligations incident to the bank fail-
ure. In 1866 he established the International
Bank, which soon took a leading place in busi-
ness affairs. After the great fire of 1871, Hoff-
mann was chairman of the committee of bankers
through whose efforts the banks were promptly
reopened, thereby averting a panic. He was like-
wise prominently active in restoring Chicago's
necessary business establishments.
His health failing, Hoffmann retired in 1875 to
his estate on Rock River near Jefferson, Wis.
He had been an assiduous student of agriculture
and horticulture since boyhood, and he devoted
the rest of his life to the instruction of his coun-
trymen in farm economy. He became editor of
Der Haus und Bauernfreund, an agricultural
supplement to Die Germania of Milwaukee; Die
18