Benson John Lossing

Photo and info ref.: < https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/61135260/benson-john-lossing >, Poughkeepsie rural cemetery, Poughkeepsie, Dutchess County, New York. Plot Section 12.

Author, Noted Historian. Benson Lossing was born in Beekman, New York. He was orphaned in 1824 and later moved to Poughkeepsie where he began a seven year apprenticeship as a watchmaker and silversmith. During the years of his apprenticeship, he spent his spare time studying history and journalism. In 1838, he moved with his first wife to New York City where he edited and illustrated J.S. Rothchild's weekly Family Magazine. His illustrations appeared in the New York Mirror and several other publications. He began his career as an author with the publication of "Outline of the History of Fine Arts" in 1840. Around 1848, Lossing got the idea to write a narrative sketchbook on the American Revolution. The first installment was published in Harper's New Monthly Magazine in 1850; the completed "Pictorial Field-Book of the Revolution" was published in 1853. To gather material for the work, Lossing traveled throughout the United States and Canada. During the years that followed he was either author or editor of more than 40 titles. Among them were two more of the pictorial series, covering the War of 1812 and the Civil War. Lossing's first wife died in 1855 and in 1856 he remarried. He and his wife moved to a residence in Dover Plains, New York that his wife had inherited from her family. They called the property The Ridge. Lossing had a fireproof library built at The Ridge to house his collection of over five thousand books and documents associated with the American Revolution and the framing of the Constitution. This collection is comprised mostly of correspondence related to his career as an engraver, illustrator, author, editor and publisher. His correspondents include Henry B. Dawson, John A. Dix, Theodore Dwight, Harvey Gridley Eastman, Abraham Bruyn Hasbrouck, Joel Tyler Headley, Franklin B. Hough, Samuel F. B. Morse, Horatio Seymour, and Washington Hunt. He was a founding trustee of Vassar College in 1861 and remained an active member on the Board of Trustees until his death. In 1860-1861, the London Art Journal featured a series of his articles describing the history and scenery of the Hudson Valley. The articles, with pen-and-pencil sketches, were published in 1866 under the title "The Hudson: From the Wilderness to the Sea". From 1872 to 1874 he was editor of the American Historical Record and Repertory of Notes and Queries. He died at his home.