University of Virginia Library

COLONEL HENRY DE B. CLAY,

Resident of Newport News, and clerk of county and circuit courts, Warwick
county, was born in Cincinnati, Ohio, June 22, 1843. He went to
school in Cincinnati, then to the Mt. Pleasant Military Academy, Sing
Sing, New York, where he was graduated in 1860. On May 14, 1861,
he was appointed captain, 14th U. S. Infantry; in 1866 was transferred
as senior captain 23d U. S. Infantry. He served through the
war between the States in the Army of the Potomac, and was wounded
at battle of the Wilderness. In the fall of 1865 accompanied his regiment
to the Pacific coast, and served in Arizona, California, Oregon
and Washington Territory. He resigned from the army in 1870, and
in 1871 settled at Jamestown, James City county, Virginia. In 1876
he was chief of the Department of Protection, and colonel commanding
Centennial Guard of the International Exhibition held at Philadelphia.
In 1883 he was appointed collector of customs at Newport News, Virginia.
Elected to his present position in 1886, for the term of six
years. Colonel Clay is Past Master Bemond Lodge 241, A. F. & A. M.;

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He is a son of Ralph A. Clay, who was born at Newark, New Jersey,
August 7, 1816, and died July 29, 1860; is grandson of Ralph Clay,
of Georgia, whose father was Joseph Clay, paymaster general of
Georgia in the Revolutionary war, coming from England. The mother
of Colonel Clay, was born July 16, 1816, died July 5, 1873; she was
Lucy Ann Gassaway, born in Baltimore, Maryland, daughter of Henry
and Rachel Gassaway, of Maryland, whose parents came from England
and Wales. Colonel Clay has been twice married, his first wife Hattie
Fields, of New York City, whom he wedded in 1871, who bore him two
children, a son, Ralph, born in New York April 5, 1872, and a daughter,
Ethel, who was born in New York October 2d, 1873. He married again
in 1887, Miss F. A. Eager, of Montgomery, New York.