Hovey

Although a wider understanding of the old
masters and of the men who continue their art in
modern times has at present discredited literary
pictures such as Hovenden painted, his patient
study gives value to his work as a historical rec-
ord of the manners and appearances of his time.
He is typical of the sincere toilers of a school
based on nineteenth-century photographic real-
ism. The sentiment which he offered as a sub-
stitute for the craft of the painter was genuine
and could well be appreciated by a public un-
aware of the slender artistic basis of the work.

[W. G. Strickland, A Diet, of Irish Artists (1913) ;
Samuel Isham, The Hist, of Am. Feinting (rev. ed.,
1927); Press and Public Ledger, both of Phila., Aug.
IS, i895J W.P.

HOVEY, ALVAH (Mar. 5, iSso-Sept. 6,
1903), Baptist clergyman, educator, traced his
ancestry back to Daniel Hovey, son of Richard,
a glover, of Waltham Abbey, Essex, England.
Daniel emigrated to America and settled in Ips-
wich, Mass., in 1635. One line of his descend-
ants, migrating through Connecticut, established
themselves in Thetford, Vt. Here Alfred, of
the sixth generation, married Abigail Howard.
With three daughters they moved to Greene,
Chenango County, N. Y., but soon after Alvah,
their fifth child, was born, they returned to Thet-
ford, which remained the family home until after
the mother's death in 1837 and the father's re-
marriage. Charles E. Hovey [#.£>.] was a young-
er brother. Alvah attended local schools and at
the age of sixteen secured his father's permission
to seek broader educational opportunities. Dur-
ing the next twelve years, three of which were
spent in teaching to gain necessary funds, he
studied at Brandon, Vt., and pursued the courses
at Dartmouth College and Newton Theological
Institution, graduating from the former in 1844,
and from the latter in 1848. For a year he sup-
plied the Baptist Church of New Gloucester, Me.,
but was not ordained until Jan. 13, 1850.

In 1849 he was called back to Newton as as-
sistant instructor in Hebrew, beginning a fifty-
four-year term of service in that institution,
where he taught, at one time or another, church
history, theology, ethics, and Biblical interpre-
tation. From 1868 to 1898 he was its president
He was by nature stanchly conservative, but
spoke and wrote with candor, believing that truth
would ultimately bring its own vindication. This
conviction created an irenic atmosphere even
when he dealt with controversial subjects. Prob-
ably no other American Baptist ever spoke with
more ex cathedra influence than he, yet he was
the least assertive of any such authority. His
publications include Outlines of Christian The-

Hovey

ology ( 1861 ) , for the use of his students ; Manual
of Systematic Theology, and Christian Ethics
(1877) ; Manual of Christian Theology (revised
edition, 1900) ; God With Us (1872) ; Studies in
Ethics and Religion (1892), a collection of es-
says ; A Memoir of the Life and Times of the
Rev. Isaac Backus (1858) ; and Barnas Sears, A
Christian Educator, His Life and Work (1902).
He was editor of the American Commentary, for
which he wrote an introduction to the New Tes-
tament and the commentaries on the Gospel of
John and the Epistle to the Galatians. With his
wife, Augusta Rice, whom he married Sept. 24,
1852, he was long and constructively influential
in the foreign missionary enterprise. He served
as trustee of Worcester Academy from 1868 ; of
Wellesley College from 1878; and as fellow of
Brown University from 1874.

[The Hovey Book (1913) ; G. R. Hovey, Alvah Hov-
ey: His Life and Letters (1928) ; Gen. Cat. of Dart-
mouth Coll. . . . 1769-1925 (1925) ; The Newton TheoL
Inst. Gen. Cat. (1890) ; Who's Who in America, 1903-
05; Watchman (Boston), Sept. 10, 17, 1903; Boston
Herald, Sept. 7, 1903 ; Boston Evening Transcript, Sept.

W.H.A.

HOVEY, ALVIN PETERSON (Sept. 6,
i82i-Nov. 23, 1891), jurist, Union soldier, gov-
ernor of Indiana, was the youngest of the eight
children of Abiel and Frances (Peterson) Hov-
ey, and the grandson of Rev. Samuel and Abi-
gail (Cleveland) Hovey. His father, a native of
New Hampshire, was descended from Daniel
Hovey who settled at Ipswich, Mass., in 1635 ;
his mother was a native of Vermont The Hov-
eys moved to Indiana in 1818, and Alvin was
born in that state, near Mount Vernon, Posey
County. Two years later his father died, and
when he was fifteen, his mother also died. He
was apprenticed to his brother, a brick-layer,
but at nineteen years of age had so improved his
meager opportunities for study that he began
teaching school, and two years later, having read
law in the office of Judge John Pitcher, was ad-
mitted to the bar. He became at once a success-
ful lawyer, winning considerable local fame by
ousting the executors of the estate of the eccen-
tric philanthropist, William McClure of New
Harmony, and himself becoming the administra-
tor. On the outbreak of the war with Mexico he
became first lieutenant of a company of volun-
teers but never saw actual service. He was elect-
ed a member of the Indiana constitutional con-
vention of 1850, and from 1851 to 1854 served as
circuit judge under the appointment of Governor
Wright. In the latter year he was chosen a mem-
ber of the Indiana supreme court, to fill a va-
cancy, being the youngest man, up to that time,
to serve on the Indiana supreme bench. During

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