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MARSHALL COLLEGE
Class of 1840 Obituaries
Rev. Theodore Christian William HOFFEDITZ, A.
M., the youngest son of the Rev. Dr. Theodore Ludwig
Hoffeditz, and his wife Julianna Roth, was born at Upper Mount Bethel, Northampton county, Pa., December 26, 1818. Out
of a large family of sons and daughters Theodore was chosen as the proper one to succeed the father in the office of the
holy ministry. Accordingly he was sent to Lafayette College, Easton, Pa., to commence his classical studies, where
he remained till he was prepared to enter the Sophomore class of Marshall College. He was probably the first young
man that went to a college from the German population of his part of the State. He was graduated in 1840, and three
years later received his master degree. He was a Diagnothian. He pursued his theological studies in the
Seminary at Mercersburg for a year, and then, owing to impaired health, under the private direction of his father. In
the spring of 1842 he was licensed and ordained to the Gospel ministry by the Classis of East Pennsylvania, and
installed pastor of the Hamilton charge, Monroe county, Pa. He preached with much acceptance to the people for
three years, and was then compelled by failing health to retire from active pulpit ministrations.
November 10, 1842, he married Miss Louisa Hoke, daughter of Mr. Adam Hoke, of Mercersburg, with
whom he had six children, of whom the following are living: John Calvin, Adam Hoke, and Albert Augustus
Rauch. After he was unable to preach he removed to the neighborhood of Mercersburg and there taught a private
school. Tall in stature, fine in appearance and neat in personal habit, Mr. Hoffeditz, with his fine literary tastes, had
much influence among his fellow-students in college and seminary, among the members of his congregations, and
among the pupils whom he taught. Being of a highly sensitive nature, he found the paths of life annoyingly rough at
times. He died near Mercersburg, Pa., February 3, 1859.
[The Fathers, 4: 336; Rev. Theodore Appel, D. D.; A. R.
Hoffeditz.]
David Harry HOFIUS, Esq., A. M., son of Dr. John H.
Hofius, at one time postmaster of Bedford, and county treasurer of Bedford county, Pa., was born in that town,
August 4, 1818, and died at Hollidaysburg, Pa., July 25, 1859. He matriculated as a student of Marshall College in
September, 1836, took his A. B. in 1840, and his A. M. in course. He was a member of the Diagnothian Society.
Subsequently he read law in his native town with Wm. Logan, Esq., and was admitted to the Bedford county bar,
November 29, 1842. In 1847 he removed to Hollidaysburg, Blair county, where on July 27, that year, just after the
county's organization, Judge Jeremiah S. Black swore him and eleven others to the new bar as the first lawyers. Mr.
Hofius continued in active practice there till the time of his death, except for a short period during the Mexican War,
when, from May to November, 1847, he served as second lieutenant in Co. L, 2d Reg. Pa. Vols.
When the new courthouse in Hollidaysburg was
dedicated, July 2, 1877, Judge Dean, in his retrospect of the bar, said this of Mr.
Hofius: " He was a man of most brilliant
parts; a most effective advocate before a jury, clear, logical, and at times emotional. He had wonderful power. Judge
Black once said of him that he was the most effective crossexaminer he ever heard interrogate a witness." Mr. Hofius
never married. He was fond of society, and possessed in a marked degree the graces of culture and refinement. He
was tall, straight and of a handsome, manly build. His face and head indicated the professional student—a man of
intellect. He was conscious of his powers, but not arrogant, not offensive. He was not only experienced in his
profession, but learned also in its lore. He died in the possession of a magnificent legal equipment and fitted for a
brilliant subsequent career. Whilst sitting on the veranda of his hotel reading a newspaper, his head was seen to fall
upon his breast and his body convulsed with a tremor. In a few minutes he was dead.
[Hon. Augustus S. Landis; Hon. Wm. P. Schell.]
William MAYBURRY, A. M., M. D., was born in
Marlborough township, Montgomery county, Pa., June 3, 1816. He was the son of William Mayburry, proprietor and
worker of the well known Green Lane Iron Works on the Perkiomen creek, at its junction with the Macoby creek.
These works were for a long series of years in the ownership of, and worked by, the Mayburry family, having been
handed down from father to son. Before her marriage his mother was Catherine Acker.
At the tender age of three years, Dr. Mayburry lost his
father. From this time his training and the direction of his education devolved entirely upon his mother. He
received his preliminary education at the school of Mr. Huff, at Hatboro, Pa.
In 1836 he entered the Freshman class of Marshall. College, graduating in due course. He was a
member of the Diagnothian Society. Having finished his academic studies he chose the medical profession for his
life work. He commenced his medical readings with Dr. R. D. Corson, of New Hope, Pa., and finished them with
Dr. W. H. Horner, then professor of anatomy in the University of Pennsylvania. In due season he entered the
Medical Department of the University of Pennsylvania as a student. The degree of Doctor in Medicine was conferred
upon him in March, 1843. Delirium Tremens was the subject of his graduating thesis.
Immediately after graduation he commenced the practice
of his profession in Philadelphia. April 29, 1852, he married Miss Amanda Audenried, daughter of George
Audenried, Esq., of Northampton county, Pa., by whom he had seven children; one only survives him, William G. Mayburry
(1883).
Dr. Mayburry was a member of the College of Physicians,
the Philadelphia County Medical Society, 1849, the Northern Medical Association, the Academy of Natural Sciences,
1866, the Historical Society of Pennsylvania, the Franklin Institute, 1869, a permanent member of the American
Medical Association, and a permanent member of the State Medical Society of Pennsylvania. He was for a term of three
years a member of the Board of Directors of the Girard College for Orphans, receiving his appointment to that position
from the Councils of the City of Philadelphia. He held numerous official positions in these various societies, and
frequently represented them at their conventions.
He was elected by the Board of Managers of the
Protestant Episcopal Hospital, a visiting physician of that institution in 1855. The duties of this position, ever very
exacting, he discharged with satisfaction to the Managers of the Hospital until 1865, when he resigned.
He was a member of Christ Reformed church, Green Street, Philadelphia. In the affairs of the church he took a
deep interest, and was a zealous co-worker with the pastor and members in carrying forward the work of the
congregation.
He was a member of the Board of Trustees of Franklin
and Marshall College from 1853 to the time of his death, serving as first vice-president from 1867.
His published writings are a biography of Dr. Moses B.
Smith, a biography of Dr. W. H. Gillingham, and an address before the Philadelphia County Medical Society,
delivered January 23, 1867, at the close of his term as president of the Society.
In 1869 Dr. Mayburry's health began to fail, so that he
was forced to withdraw from his profession. For many weeks he lay, a helpless but patient, uncomplaining sufferer.
Relief at length came. He passed calmly from time to eternity, November 20, 1873.
[Nebinger, A., M. D. Biography (In Transactions of the Medical
Society of Pennsylvania, 1875, 10: 755-761); President John S. Stahr.]
George Dering WOLFF, A. M., LL. D., son of Bernard
C. and Charlotte (Wolff) Wolff, was born in Martinsburg, W. Va., August 25, 1822. He fitted for college under Rev.
Dr. John Vanderveer, at Easton, Pa., to which place his father had removed in 1833. He entered the Sophomore
class of Marshall College in 1837, and was graduated with high honor three years later. He was an active member of
the Diagnothian Literary Society. He received the degree of A. M. in course.
He studied law at Easton under the Hon. Hopewell
Hepburn and was admitted to the Northampton county bar in 1844, but never engaged in legal practice. In 1844 he began
the study of theology in the Reformed Seminary at Mercersburg, at the same time serving as a tutor in the College.
Upon leaving the Seminary, in 1847, he taught a classical school at Kutztown, Pa. This school was the beginning of
the well-known Kutztown Normal School. During the year 1848 he acted as financial agent of the Theological Seminary,
reviving the " Plainfield Bond Plan." In this he was quite successful. Afterwards he became associated with the Rev.
John R. Kooken in conducting a female boarding school at Norristown, Pa., at the same time acting as pastor of the
Reformed congregation of that place.
On November 1, 1852, he was married to Miss Sarah Jane
Hill, of Norristown, and the same year began a two years' pastorate in Tiffin, Ohio. On account of his wife's ill health
he returned to Norristown and supplied the pulpits of several Reformed churches in the neighborhood.
In 1871 he became a convert to the Roman Catholic Church, and soon afterwards was appointed editor of the
Catholic Standard of Philadelphia, in which appointment he continued to labor to the end of his life. He was also
editor of the Roman Catholic Review. The degree of LL. D. was conferred upon him by a prominent Roman
Catholic institution. His editorials were numerous and always of a scholarly character; his essays and addresses,
models of good sense and pure diction. Roman Catholic journalism lost one of its strongest exponents in the death
of Dr. Wolff. He was a giant in literature, a noble, conscientious gentleman. He died at Norristown, February 3,
1894.
[Rev. Theodore Appel, D. D.]
Source: Franklin and Marshall College
Obituary Record, Edited for the Alumni Association, Vol. 1, No.1, Lancaster,
Pa. Published by the Alumni Association of Franklin and Marshall College,
June 1897.
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