DWC Huntington

Rev. DeWitt Clinton Huntington, DD was born in Townsend, Vermont, 27 April 1830.  His father was a member of the Windham County bar, but owned a farm and gave to each of his boys a practical education in that useful industry.  At the age of seventeen, he connected himself with the Methodist Episcopal Church, and in 1853 was received into its ministry as a member of the Vermont Annual Conference.  In 1857, at the request of a church in Hornellsville, New York, he was transferred to that locality, following which term of service he spent three years in Syracuse, thirteen in Rochester, four in Orlean, and five in Bradford, Pennsylvania.  In the fall of 1891, he accepted the invitation of Trinity Church, in Lincoln, Nebraska, to become its pastor, this being at the present time (1895) his field of labor.  Dr. Huntington has been twice presiding elder, and has served as a member of six general conferences, from 1868 to 1888 inclusive.  In 1881, he was appointed a member of the First Methodist Ecumenical Conference which was held in London, during which year he made a somewhat extended tour through the different countries of Europe.
     The active temperance work of Dr. Huntington began with his election, when but 21 years of age, as a member of the Vermont State temperance convention.  He took an active part in the campaign which followed, and which resulted in giving the “Maine Law” to Vermont.   He has written largely for the religious journals of his own denomination, and frequently for the secular press.  A large number of his sermons have been published, those on “The Death of Abraham Lincoln,’ “The Wrongs of the Liquor Traffic and what Good Men have to do about Them” “The Cotton King and the Rum King,” “The Impudence of the Grog Shop,” “The Tobacco Scourge,.” etc. having been widely circulated and extensively quoted.
     Dr. Huntington cast his first vote for John P. Hale.  He became a somewhat active member of the Republican Party and remained such until 1874, when he identified himself with the Prohibition Party.
     In 1886, Dr. Huntington was nominated for Congress by the Prohibitionists of the 34th Congressional District of New York.  The following year he was nominated for Secretary of State, his vote being a little less than 42,000.

— Data from An Album of Representative Prohibitionists (1895)

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