April 10.—Sudden death of Hon. Elbridge Gerry of Portland, Me. He was born in Waterford, Oxford county, Me., Dec. 6, 1815. He received an academical education. After its completion he studied law, and was admitted to the bar in his twenty-fourth year. In the following year he was appointed clerk of the House of Representatives of Maine. At twenty-seven he was chosen state attorney for his native county. At thirty-one he was elected to the State Legislature as a Democratic representative. In 1849 his political career culminated in his election to Congress. He retired from public life in 1851, and settled down to the practice of his profession in Portland. His son is vice-consul at Havre, France.
April 10.—Sudden death at Dallas, Texas, of John T. Ferris, manager of the Union Mutual Life Insurance Co., of Portland, Me. He was a man greatly esteemed in his large circle of acquaintances.
April 12.—Death of Thaddeus Fairbanks of St. Johnsbury, Vt. He was born at Brimfield, Mass., Jan. 17, 1796, and went with his father to St. Johnsbury when he was twenty years old. His many inventions in the line of weighing-machines are too familiar to need enumeration. He was the only American who was honored at the Vienna Exhibition by being made a Knight of Imperial Order of Francis Joseph. To his munificent gifts the academy at St. Johnsbury owes its worth.
April 12.—Dr. Abram M. Shew, superintendent of the Connecticut Hospital for the Insane at Middletown, died suddenly at the age of 45. He was appointed assistant physician of the New York Asylum for Insane Convicts at Auburn in 1862; in 1866 he went to Middletown, to superintend the building of the Connecticut Hospital for the Insane, and had since remained in charge of that institution. He was a native of Watertown, N.Y.