Richard Tylden Auchmuty was an American philanthropist and architect.
Background
Richard Tylden Auchmuty was born on July 15, 1831 in Manhattan, New York, United States to Robert Nicholas and Mary Allen Auchmuty.
Robert was an officer in the United States Marine Corps, through whom Richard inherited the Scotch blood and family name of the Auchmutys of Fifeshire. Robert was married to Mary Allen, great-grand-daughter on the paternal side of Chief Justice Allen of Pennsylvania and, on the maternal side, of Philip Livingston, one of the signers of the Declaration of Independence.
Education
Auchmuty entered Columbia College at the age of sixteen, withdrawing in his junior year on account of ill health and spending some months in European travel.
On coming home he studied architecture in the office of James Renwick and in a few years was admitted to partnership.
Career
At the outbreak of the Civil War he was commissioned a captain in the Federal army, and as an officer of the 5th army corps took part in a number of important battles. Colonel by brevet for gallantry at Gettysburg, he was transferred, because of impaired health, from field service to duty in the War Department at Washington, assisting the next year (1864) in the defense of the city against Early's attack.
The war over, he resumed residence in New York City, but established a summer home in Lenox, Massachussets, where he interested himself in local affairs and held various public offices. He was one of the pioneer members of the summer colony there, and his influence contributed much to its growth.
Retiring from the architectural profession, Auchmuty gave more and more of his time to his interests in Lenox and to the trade school which in 1881 he opened in New York City.
In establishing this school the founder sought to provide an opportunity for mechanically inclined young men in poor circumstances to learn a trade without having to submit to the conditions imposed by the labor unions in the matter of apprenticeship. He felt that the length of the apprenticeship period and the limited number of apprentices allowed by the unions were keeping many young men out of fields, particularly in the building trades, of which immigrants trained in Europe were taking possession.
The curriculum of the New York Trade School combined theoretical instruction and shop practise in a manner which was then new to American education. Until 1892 the institution was maintained solely through the liberality of Auchmuty and his wife (formerly Ellen Schermerhorn).
In this year it was incorporated under the state laws and a board of trustees appointed. J. Pierpont Morgan donated a large sum to the endowment, and the school operated under its original charter, with nominal tuition fees, "neither in the interest of, nor in opposition to, any trade organization, whether it be employers or journeymen" (Forty-sixth Annual Catalogue, 1926-27).
Achievements
He was actively engaged in local affairs in Lenox, and established the New York Trade School for young men in poor circumstances.
Religion
Auchmuty was Christian and served as a vestryman of Trinity Church, New York City.
Personality
From available accounts Auchmuty seems to have been a man of strong opinions and vigorous personality, conservative in belief and conscientious in speech and action. In addition to these qualities his friends found in him a strain of gentleness.
