Welles, Gideon
journalist, state legislator, author, was born July 1, 1802, in Glastonbury, Conn. From 1827 to 1835 he was a member of the Connecticut legislature; and was subsequently appointed comptroller of public accounts. From 1836 to 1841 he was postmaster of Hartford; and in 1842 was made comptroller of the state. In 1846 he took charge of a bureau in the navy department, where he remained until 1849. In 1861 he went into President Lincoln's cabinet as secretary of the navy. For thirty years before becoming secretary he was an occasional contributor to the Hartford Press, the New York Evening Post, and the Washington Globe and Union; and was the author of Lincoln and Seward. He died Feb. 11, 1878, in Hartford, Conn.