In 1866 a correspondent of the Philadelphia Telegraph, who was traveling in Virginia, wrote the following, which appeared in that paper under the head of "Ramblings in the Old Dominion:"

"An ancient tombstone on a plantation nearly opposite Jamestown, bears the following inscription: 'Here lies ye body of ye Colonel Thomas Swann, who departed this life ye 4th day of November, 1680.' Immediately above the inscription is a coat-of-arms, representing a lion and a swan, separated by a shield. The stone or slab is broken in two, but the inscription is plain and perfect. Horses and cattle have trampled upon it, but have not considerably defaced it. The name of the deceased gentleman was evidently one of the few 'that were not born to die.' An ancient cedar, four and a half feet in diameter, stands near the head of the grave. It has been 'belted' and is dead, and all the surrounding country is green with 'waving corn.' In a few years, perhaps, the same hand that belted the ancient tree may upturn the slab of slate and drive the ploughshare through the grave of the unknown 'Colonel Swann.'"

Colonel Thomas Swann's two brothers, who fled with him from Cromwell and came to America, settled, one in Virginia, on the waters of the Potomac, and one in Massachusetts. Their descendants are numerous, who, like their ancestors, are men of mark.

The subject of this sketch was liberally educated at the Amelia Academy, Virginia. For some time after graduating from the academy he taught school at Orange Court House, in Orange county. While engaged in teaching he chanced upon a law book and became greatly interested. At once he began a systematic course of study in legal text-books under the direction of Attorney William Greene. He received license to practice within sixty days after he began to read Blackstone's Commentaries. After obtaining license as an attorney, he laid aside all other duties and commenced studying in earnest to equip himself for the profession upon which he was then entering. On the 18th of March, 1849, in company with his brother, John S. Swann, he removed his residence to Charleston, Kanawha county, where they entered upon their professional career. They have constantly resided at Charleston ever since, and have attained an eminent rank at that distinguished Bar.

Mr. Swann was a Whig prior to the Civil War. He took an active part in the Scott campaign of 1852. He however soon found that politics and law would not work smoothly together, and accordingly abandoned the former that he might give his undivided energies to the latter and thereby achieve success. This was the course of wisdom; and many, many times in after years he has rejoiced that he was thus guided.

Being a member of a volunteer company at Charleston when the war came in 1861, he, with the rest of the organization, was ordered into camp by Governor Letcher, and thus entered the Southern army, although he was at the time an outspoken opponent of secession. He believed in the Union, but, like thousands of others who resided in the South, could not resist the temptation, when Virginia seceded, to go with his State. The fact is now patent that thousands of people in the South were then alarmed at the common cry that the General Government was centralizing power, and were forced, even against their better judgments, to support secession as the only cure for such centralization. Mr. Swann was one of this class. Soon after the South had launched into revolution, and at the time when the Conscript law was passed at Montgomery he said to Governor Floyd and Colonel D.S. Houshell, of Virginia, that "the South had nothing left to fight for - that all power was centralized on the James, and if we must have centralized power upon this continent, it had better be on the Potomac, where we were known to the Nations, than on the James, where we were not known." He, however, continued in the Confederate army, for awhile as Captain of a company, and afterwards Colonel of a batallion, until the close of hostilities.

Immediately after the surrender of General Lee, Colonel Swann returned to Kanawha county and resumed the practice of his profession. The writer, then a boy, heard him say to a friend the day after he reached Charleston in 1865, "I have come home to stay. In the past I was a Whig; in the future I shall connect myself with the political party that represents the greatest liberty to the greatest number." The circumstance indelibly impressed itself upon my mind. He accordingly became an ardent Republican, and up to this time he's been a leader in that party's councils. He has been a delegate at large from West Virginia to every National Republican Convention since the war, except two, and has several times been an elector for the State on his party ticket. He has many times been urged to accept office, but he always positively declined. He prefers private life to public position. For his home and his law office he has unusual attachment and love. When not in court, he can nearly always be found at one or the other of them.

Col. Swann, shortly after his return from the war, married Miss Mary Tompkins, daughter of Mrs. Rachel M. Tompkins, who was an aunt of General U.S. Grant. They have lived all these years in happy wedlock in their pleasant mansion on the banks of the Kanawha river in the city of Charleston.

Col. Swann is one of the most indefatigable students the writer ever knew. He revels in books. Being naturally religious, he loves theology. You can scarcely mention a book of any value that he has not read. Such men are rare. He has been a member of the Protestant Episcopal Church for forty-five years (a member of the Vestry of St. John's Parish in Charleston), and is an earnest worker in the ranks. The State of West Virginia has no worthier, more exemplary citizen thatn Col. Thomas B. Swann.