Rev. ALEXANDER R. ABBOTT, who was somewhat advanced in life when he gave himself to the ministry, was a native of East Livermore, Me. His early life was that of a hard toiler, his advantages for obtaining an education were limited, but his thirst for knowledge overcame his early deficiencies. With little if any aid from others, he became proficient in French and Latin and the mathematics, and for many years was successfully employed in teaching. His first sermon was preached while residing in Lowell, Mass., in 1844, and his ordination took place in the following year. His first settlement was in Bath, N. H. For a time he was employed as a missionary, to preach in destitute places within the limits of the Boston Association. Afterwards he was settled successively in Newburyport, Mass., Pawtucket, R. I., Gardiner, Me., South Dedham, Mass., Hudson, N. Y., and Rockland, Me. He was an indefatigable student, and a clear, strong preacher. No useless verbiage encumbered his discourses. He grappled with the hardest questions in theology, and brought light out of them. His last sermon before the Maine Convention is remembered as a clear and masterly treatment of one of the problems which has greatly occupied the religious thought of the day. He stirred the consciences of his hearers. He was outspoken as an anti-slavery man, when to be so was to incur the hostility of men of both political parties, and endanger his success in the places of his settlement. The temperance cause always found in him a firm, consistent, and able advocate. And while he was thus efficient in performing the more rugged duties of his calling, he was equally well-fitted, by the tenderness of his heart, for the more sympathetic offices of the ministry. The death of Mr. Abbott, at Rockland, Me., in 1869, was occasioned by disease of the heart, aggravated by the fracture of a limb. He was conscious and composed to the last.
Rev. HENRY C. LEONARD came into the ministry at Haverhill, Mass., where he had studied under the direction of Rev. Henry Bacon. He was born in Northwood, N. H., April 25, 1818, and died at Pigeon Cove, Mass., March 7, 1880. His earliest labors were on Cape Ann, at Gloucester and in other neighboring places. He was afterwards settled four years in East Thomastown (now Rockland), Me. He then removed to Orono in 1847, where he remained about eight years, and then went to Waterville, in 1854. At the breaking out of the war, in 1861, he closed his labors in Waterville, and accepted the position of chaplain in the Third Maine Infantry. He was afterwards transferred to the Maine Eighteenth Infantry, and then to the First Maine Regiment of Heavy Artillery, where he remained, greatly beloved by officers and soldiers, till his term of service expired in 1864. He was publicly pronounced by Gen. Howard the most faithful chaplain he ever saw.