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MARION COUNTY WEST VIRGINIA
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Submitted to the West Virginia Biographies Project by:
PJSTON@aol.com
December 15, 1999
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The History of West Virginia, Old and New
Published 1923, The American Historical Society, Inc.,
Chicago and New York, Volume II
pg 197 + 198
James Hustead Brownfield, M. D., was a man whose professional and civic
stewardship was of the finest type, and at the time of his death he was the
dean of his profession in the City of Fairmont, Marion County, where his name
and memory are held in lasting honor. He was born in Fayette County,
Pennsylvania, July 5, 1836, and his death occurred January 19, 1921.
Thomas Brownfield, a representative of one of the pioneer families of Western
Pennsylvania, crossed the Alleghany Mountains and settled in Fayette County.
One of his sons, Rev. William Brownfield, became a distinguished Presbyterian
clergyman and was a contemporary of Rev. Alexander Campbell in effective
Christian service in the State of Pennsylvania, Mr. Campbell having been
founder of the Disciples or Christian Church. Another son, James, married
Hannah Bowell, and among the children of this union was Judge John Brownfield
who was born in Fayette County, Pennsylvania, and who there became a
successful merchant, besides which he served ten years, 1851-61, as associate
judge of that county. Judge Brownfield married Belinda, daughter of John
Hustead, and she died July 2, 1882, at the age of seventy-two years. They
were the parents of the subject of this memoir, Dr. James H. Brownfield. In
his native state the Doctor received the advantages of old Lewisburg College,
now Bucknell University, and thereafter he read medicine under the
preceptorship of Dr. H. B. Mathiot at Smithfield, Fayette County. Thereafter
he took one course of lectures in historic old Jefferson Medical College,
Philadelphia, and in 1860 he established his residence at Fairmont, West
Virginia. Here he was retained as a contract physician for a time, and when
the Civil war began he tendered his services to the Union. He became
assistant surgeon of the Fourteenth West Virginia Volunteer Infantry, and
served in this capacity until the close of the war. He then returned to
Fairmont, and for many years thereafter he held inviolable place as the
leading physician and surgeon in Marion County. The Doctor was one of the
organizers of the West Virginia State Medical Society in 1867, and was a
member also of the American Association of Railroad Surgeons and the American
Public Health Association. He received the thirty-second degree of the
Scottish Rite of the Masonic fraternity, was a member of the Mystic Shrine,
and was a republican in politics. From 1867 to 1884 he was elected a
representative in the State Legislature. In all the relations of life he was
loyal, earnest and helpful, and he was held in affectionate esteem in the
community which was long the stage of his labors.
October 18, 1866, recorded the marriage of Doctor Brownfield and Miss Ann
Elizabeth Fleming, daughter of Matthew Fleming, and her death occurred in
1903. Of the children the eldest is John M., a banker at Fairmont; Clark B.
died in January 1909, leaving one son, James H. (II); Dr. George H. is the
subject of a personal sketch following; and Arch F. is engaged in the jewelry
business at Fairmont.
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