Brewster is descended from Elder William Brewster, who came to this country with the Puritans in the "May flower." His father was the celebrated physician, Dr. Elisha Brewster, who moved from Norwich, Conn., to White Plains, N. Y., early in the century. Dr. Brewster married Mary Burling, of u family famous in the Revolutionary history of Westchester County, and Joseph B. is the second of their nine children. He was sent at the age of thirteen to a boarding-school at Jamaica, Long Island, and among his earliest recollections is that of crossing the East

] River in a sail ferry-boat. After spending one year at school he was obliged by the death of his father to return to New York. He entered the hat-store of his

' cousin, Joseph Brewster, where he continued as a clerk for nearly ten years, when he engaged in the

PELHAM.

business on his own account at No. 57 Bowery, New York City.

Mr. Brewster remained in this pursuit for fortythree years, steadily maintaining the wliile an integrity and fixedness of purpose which formed the ground-work of his financial success. He was at one time a large property-holder in New York, and the spot upon which the Oriental Bank stands was formerly in his i)Ossession. In 1869 he retired from business, having meanwhile purchased from Charles Van Benscoten the beautiful residence at New Rochelle which he now occupies. ^

Mr. Brewster is a director in the Westchester Fire Insurance Company. In politics he was formerly a Whig, but is now a stanch Republican. He was a member of the Lafayette Guards, and was with them at the reception of the distinguished Frenchman upon his second coming to this country, in 1824, when it was also his pleasure to shake the Marquis by the hand. He married Miss Sarah Ann Hutchinson, of Huguenot descent, whose mother died in the ninetythird year of her age, at the residence of ^Ir.