Robert Barnhill Roosevelt, also known as Robert Barnwell Roosevelt (August 7, 1829 – June 14, 1906), was a sportsman, author, and politician who served as a United States representative from New York (1871–1873) and as Minister to the Hague (1888–1889). He was also a member of the Roosevelt family and an uncle of US President Theodore Roosevelt.
Early life
Robert Roosevelt was born in New York City to businessman Cornelius Van Schaack "C.V.S." Roosevelt and Margaret Barnhill. He had three elder brothers, Silas, James, and Cornelius Jr., and two younger brothers, Theodore and William. He was an uncle of President Theodore "T.R." Roosevelt Jr. and grand-uncle of First Lady Anna Eleanor Roosevelt. As an Oyster Bay Roosevelt, and through his ancestor Cornelius Van Schaack Jr., he was a descendant of the Dutch American Schuyler family.
Career
Roosevelt studied law and was admitted to the New York State Bar in 1850. He commenced practice in New York City.
His first experience in politics was in the organization of the Citizens' Association at the time of the Tweed Ring administration in New York City. For several years, he edited the organ of the Citizens' Association, the New York Citizen, at first with Charles G. Halpine, and after Halpine's death, by himself. He was a founder of the Committee of Seventy, and first vice-president of the Reform Club
Roosevelt was elected as a Democrat to the 42nd Congress (March 4, 1871 – March 3, 1873).
Roosevelt served as trustee representing the city of New York for the New York and Brooklyn Bridge from 1879 to 1882.
Conservation
Roosevelt was an early angler and conservationist. He organized several clubs to restrain the indiscriminate slaughter of game. He is credited with influencing his nephew, Theodore Roosevelt, to become a conservationist. He founded the New York State Fishery Commission in 1867, and was appointed one of the three fish commissioners. He served as fish commissioner for 20 years, 1868–1888,
Writer
Roosevelt was a popular author and a friend of writers such as Oscar Wilde. He sometimes wrote under the pseudonym Barnwell or Ira Zell. He edited Political Works of Charles G. Halpine, supplying a memoir (1869).
Robert's nephew Theodore Jr. credited him with being the first to scribe the "Br'er Rabbit" stories (which had been passed down orally by slaves), publishing them in Harper's, where they fell flat. This was a good many years before Joel Chandler Harris published the stories in The Atlanta Journal in 1879.
Personal life and death
In 1850, Roosevelt married to Elizabeth Ellis (1829–1887), a descendant of the Livingston family who was the daughter of John French Ellis (1794–1853) and Eliza Glen Thorn (1796–1855). Together, they were the parents of:
- Margaret Barnhill Roosevelt (1851–1927), who married Augustus Van Horne Kimberly (1845–1927) in 1889.
- John Ellis Roosevelt (1853–1939), who in 1879 married Nannie Mitchell Vance (1860–1912), daughter of Hon. Samuel B. H. Vance, at the recently built St. Nicholas Collegiate Reformed Protestant Dutch Church, Fifth Avenue and 48th Street, in New York City. Vance, who was active in New York State Republican politics, was a manufacturer who served as Acting Mayor of New York City for the month of December 1874.
- Robert Barnhill Roosevelt Jr. (1866–1929)
Roosevelt purchased the Meadow Croft property at Sayville, New York, in 1873 and it was later developed by his son as the John Ellis Roosevelt Estate. It was added to the National Register of Historic Places in 1987.
After the death of his first wife in 1887, he married his mistress, Irish immigrant Marion Theresa "Minnie" O'Shea on August 18, 1888. Together with Minnie, he was the father of:
- Kenyon Fortescue (1871–1939), who became an attorney. who married Ernest William Sutton Pickhardt in 1900 and moved to London. Pickhardt was the son of Manhattan millionaire Ernest W. Pickhardt and the brother of Baroness Irene von Colberg. They divorced before Pickhardt's suicide in 1909. In 1945, she married Brigadier General Richard L. A. Pennington.
Death and burial
Roosevelt died in Sayville, New York, on June 14, 1906, while his nephew was serving as President of the United States. His remains were interred in Green-Wood Cemetery in Brooklyn. His large estate was left to his family.
Published works
- Superior Fishing; or The Striped Bass, Trout, Black Bass and Bluefish of the Northern States.
- Game Fish of the Northern States and British Provinces. (1862)
- Game Birds of the North (1866)
- Superior Fishing (1866)
- Florida and the Game Water Birds (1868)
- Five Acres Too Much, a satire provoked by Edmund Morris's Ten Acres Enough (1869)
- Progressive Petticoats, a satire on female physicians (1871)
- Fish Hatching and Fish Catching (1879)