Background
He was born on February 8, 1833 in Abbeyleix, Ireland.
He was born on February 8, 1833 in Abbeyleix, Ireland.
In 1847 he emigrated to the United States, and settled with his mother at Albany, New York. After studying anatomy in the office of a physician, Dr Armsby, he spent nine years in the studio of the sculptor, Erastus Dow Palmer.
In 1857 he opened a studio in New York, and in 1862 became a National Academician. He visited Rome in 1868-1869, and from 1875 to 1887 was again in Italy, living for most of the time at Florence. He died at Middletown, New York, on the 26th of September 1894. Among his important works are : "Napoleon the First, " at the Metropolitan Museum, New York; "Abraham Pierson, " first president of Yale University, New Haven, Connecticut; an equestrian statue of General A. E. Burnside, Providence, Rhode Island; "General Winfield Scott, " Soldiers' Home, Washington, D. C. ; "Admiral S. F. Du Pont " (Washington, D. C. ); "General John Sedgwick " (West Point, N. Y. ); a medallion portrait of General John A. Dix; and portrait busts of James Gordon Bennett, William Cullen Bryant, S. F. B. Morse, Edwin Booth as Hamlet, Stephen H. Tyng and Robert B. Minturn.
