William Goddard
(1825-1907)
William Goddard was born at Potowomut Neck in Warwick on December 25, 1825, to William Giles Goddard and Charlotte Rhoda Ives. After graduating from Brown University in 1846, he traveled to Europe; during the 1848 Revolutions he carried secret dispatches from Paris to Rome. Back in Providence, he and his brother Thomas established Goddard Brothers, working as agents for the textile mills owned by their uncles, the partners of Brown and Ives. During the Civil War, Goddard served as a major in the First Rhode Island Regiment under Ambrose Burnside and a colonel and aide-de-camp on the staff of Governor Sprague.
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After his wartime service, Goddard continued to run Goddard Brothers, and later Brown and Ives as well. In the 1880s and 90s, he served as President of Providence Bank and Chancellor of Brown University and became philanthropically involved in several cultural and social organizations. Often he also took a leadership position, for example serving as chief benefactor and president of the Arion Choral Society (or Arion Club). The Arion was merely one of many such organizations to emerge in the growing metropolis during the late 19th century. Societies and clubs devoted to art and music proliferated in Providence as the city and its people experienced dramatically increased wealth.
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Katelyn St. George, Undergraduate Student, Rhode Island College
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William Goddard (1825-1907)
William Goddard, the son of Charlotte Rhoda Ives and William Giles Goddard, was born in Warwick, RI on December 25, 1825. His mother hailed from the prominent Ives family of Providence and was part of the second generation of partners at the firm of Brown and Ives. His father was a well-known writer and professor at Brown University. William attended public school as a child before entering Brown University. After graduating in 1846, William occupied his time by traveling and involving himself in various businesses, particularly the manufacturing and mercantile trades. He acted as a courier during theRevolutions of 1848 in Europe, “ carrying secret dispatches from Paris to Rome .” Goddard returned to Providence to study law at Brown University in the early 1850s, though he never practiced law afterwards. Instead, he and his brother Thomas established Goddard Brothers, working as agents for the textile mills owned by their uncles, the partners of Brown and Ives.
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Goddard volunteered in the Civil War as an aide-de-camp to Governor William Sprague, and later to General Ambrose E. Burnside. He held the rank of Colonel in Battery A of the First Rhode Island Light Artillery. William fought in a number of significant battles during the course of the war, most notably participating in the Battle of Bull Run, where he was commended for gallantry, and the Battle of Fredericksburg. Two of Goddard’s brothers, Moses Brown Ives Goddard and Robert Hale Ives Goddard, also fought for the Union during the war, as did his cousin Robert Hale Ives, Jr., who was killed in the Battle of Antietam.
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On September 19, 1861, Goddard was appointed as one of a handful of members for a new Military Central Committee, which worked to improve the organization of the troops. Just over a year later, on December 11, 1862, he received his promotion to Major. He left military service shortly thereafter so he did not fight with his former unit at Gettysburg the following summer.
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After leaving the Army, he returned to his life and business in Rhode Island. Though his most notable residence was a farm at Potowomut Neck in Warwick, RI called “Hopelands,” he also held property of the same name in South Carolina, as well as a home in Providence now used by Brown University to house the Maddock Alumni Center. William continued to oversee Goddard Brothers, and later took over management of Brown and Ives as well. In 1875, he became the president of the Providence National Bank. This position was unpaid but prestigious, and he continued to hold it for the remainder of his life. The $100 “Brown Back” notes issued by the bank in 1882 bear his signature.
In 1888, William Goddard became the tenth Chancellor of Brown University, another position he would hold until death. He served as president of the music organization known as the Arion Club, as president of the Hope Club, and was a founding member of the Narragansett Yacht Club. His philanthropy included support of St. John’s Episcopal Church, where he and other family members donated a window in memory of his parents, and Butler Hospital . William Goddard passed away on September 20, 1907. His obituary was posted in the New York Times that evening, and he was laid to rest in Providence’s North Burial Ground. His headstone was engraved with a verse from Psalms: “The righteous shall be in everlasting remembrance.”
Katelyn St. George, student, Rhode Island College, and Erik Christiansen, PhD
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Further Reading
Spicer, William A. History of the Ninth and Tenth Regiments Rhode Island Volunteers, and the Tenth Rhode Island Battery, in the Union Army in 1862. 1892.
