HiSTORY OF HENDERSON COUNTY, KY.



80a



is said that whenever there was to be a royal or ecclesiastical festival,
Casper F. Artes was invariably called upon to preside at the organ. A
few years after his arrival in Henderson, Prof. Artes was employed as
organist of St. Paul's Episcopal Church, and, as remarkable as it may
seem, he performed that irksome duty for nearly thirty years, without
missing one single Sunday service from any cause. On the twentieth
day of November, 1886, in the city of Evansville, Prof. Artes departed
this life, leaving a devoted wife and large family of children to mourn
his death. He was a master of the organ, a master of music and a
man of profound intelligence upon all matters requiring study. He
was a man of strong impulses. devoted to his friends, and yet diffident
and deferential. Mr. Charles F. Artes, Evansville's leading and most
successful jeweler, and a gentleman of the highest character, is the
eldest son of Prof. C. F. Artes.

    ALEXANDER BUCHANAN BARRET was born in Louisa
County, Virginia, on the eighteenth day of March, 1811, and proved
to be, in after-life, one of the most successful and notable business
men of America. He, with a limited education at the age of four-
teen years, left home and found employment in the office of his uncle
in Richmond, Virginia, who carried on a large tobacco trade in this
country and Europe. In 1833 he was given a partnership, and sent
by his uncle to Henderson to take charge of his tobacco interests in
that locality. A few years after, this firm was dissolved, Mr. Barret
remaining and retaining the business and reputation of the old firm.
In 1852 he joined with him his younger brother, John H. Barret, and,
in this association, the business continued until his death. He estab-
lished branch stemmeries at Henderson, Louisville, Owensboro, Clo-
verport and other points in Kentucky, at Clarksville and in Missouri,
and was, in his time without doubt, the most extensive tobacco mer-
chant in the world, controlling annually many thousands of hogsheads
in the markets of England. He was the largest planter in Hender-
son County, and invested largely and successfully in cotton, and ranked
as one of the largest land owners and real estate holders in the whole
courtrv. Honor and uprightness were the leading principles by which
he ruled his life, and it seems to have been his highest ambition to prove
to the world, that they were the surest, as well as the best, means to
financial prosperity. At the age of fifty, in New York City, he died June
15th, 1861. His remains were removed to Henderson, where his
memory will long live in the hearts of the people. He died the wealth-
iest citizen Kentucky has ever claimed. He was twice married.
His first wife was Miss Juliana Harris, of Louisa County, Virginia,