Elliott Fitch Shepard

Elliott Fitch Shepard (July 25, 1833 – March 24, 1893) was an American lawyer, banker, and owner of the Mail and Express newspaper, as well as a founder and president of the New York State Bar Association. Shepard was married to Margaret Louisa Vanderbilt, who was a member of the Vanderbilt family. Shepard's Briarcliff Manor residence Woodlea and the Scarborough Presbyterian Church, which he founded nearby, are contributing properties to the Scarborough Historic District.

Shepard was born in Jamestown, New York. He graduated from the University of the City of New York in 1855, and practiced law for about 25 years. During the American Civil War, Shepard was a Union Army recruiter and subsequently earned the rank of colonel. He was later a founder and benefactor of several institutions and banks. When Shepard moved to the Briarcliff Manor hamlet of Scarborough-on-Hudson, he founded the Scarborough Presbyterian Church and built Woodlea; the house and its land are now part of Sleepy Hollow Country Club.

Shepard was born July 25, 1833, in Jamestown in Chautauqua County, New York. He was the second of three sons of Fitch Shepard and Delia Maria Dennis; the others were Burritt Hamilton and Augustus Dennis. Fitch Shepard was president of the National Bank Note Company (later consolidated with the American and Continental Note Companies), and Elliott's brother Augustus became president of the American Bank Note Company. Shepard's extended family lived in New England, with origins in Bedfordshire, England. Fitch, son of Noah Shepard, was a descendant of Thomas Shepard (a Puritan minister) and James Fitch (son-in-law of William Bradford). Delia Maria Dennis was a descendant of Robert Dennis, who emigrated from England in 1635. Elliott was described in 1897's Prominent Families of New York as "prominent by birth and ancestry, as well as for his personal qualities". He attended public schools in Jamestown, and moved with his father and brothers to New York City in 1845. He began attending the college-preparatory University Grammar School (then located in the University of the City of New York building), and graduated from the university in 1855. Shepard began reading law under Edwards Pierrepont, and was admitted to the bar in the city of Brooklyn in 1858.

From January 1861 through the outbreak of the American Civil War and until 1862 Shepard served as an aide-de-camp to Union Army General Edwin D. Morgan with the rank of colonel. During this time Shepard was placed in command of the department of volunteers in Elmira, and enlisted 47,000 men from the surrounding area. In 1862 he was appointed Assistant Inspector-General for half of New York state, reporting to New York's governor on troop organization, equipment, and discipline.

In 1862 he visited Jamestown to inspect, equip and provide uniforms for the Chautauqua regiment, his first return since infancy, and was welcomed by a group of prominent citizens. Shepard recruited and organized the 51st Regiment, New York Volunteers, which was named the Shepard Rifles in his honor. George W. Whitman, brother of the poet Walt Whitman and a member of the regiment, was notified by Shepard of a promotion; Shepard may have influenced his subsequent promotion to major in 1865. In addition, Shepard was involved in correspondence with Walt Whitman. Although President Abraham Lincoln offered him a promotion to brigadier general, Shepard declined in deference to officers who had seen field service; Shepard himself never entered the field. From 1866 to 1868 Shepard served as aide-de-camp to Reuben E. Fenton.

In 1864, Shepard was a member of the executive committee and chair of the Committee on Contributions from Without the City for the New York Metropolitan Fair. He chaired lawyers' committees for disaster relief, including those in Portland, Maine and Chicago after the 1866 Great Fire and the 1871 Great Chicago Fire respectively, and was a member of the municipal committee for victims of the 1889 Johnstown Flood.

In 1867 Shepard was presented to Margaret Louisa Vanderbilt at a reception given by Governor Morgan. Their difficult courtship was opposed by Margaret's father, William Henry Vanderbilt. A year later, on February 18, 1868, they were married in the Church of the Incarnation in New York City. After an 1868 trip to Tarsus, Mersin he helped found Tarsus American College, agreeing to donate $5,000 a year to the school and leave it an endowment of $100,000 ($3.5 million in 2024). He became one of the school's trustees and vice presidents.

In 1868, Shepard became a partner of Judge Theron R. Strong in Strong & Shepard, continuing the business after Strong's death. He continued to practice law for the next 25 years; he helped found the New York State Bar Association in 1876, and in 1884 was its fifth president. In 1875 Shepard drafted an amendment establishing an arbitration court for the New York Chamber of Commerce, serving on its five-member executive committee the following year. In 1880, the New York City Board of Aldermen appointed Shepard and Ebenezer B. Shafer to revise and codify the city's local ordinances to form the New-York Municipal Code; the last revision was in 1859.