Walker Fearn

J. Walker Fearn was an accomplished and highly educated gentleman, of the attractive Southern type familiar to us a generation ago, winning and masterful in its personality, and captivating from its qualities of mind and heart. He was born in Huntsville, Alabama, a center of refinement and cultivation; graduated at Yale College in 1851, and was admitted to the bar in Mobile. His polish and attainments were excellent qualifications for the diplomatic service, which he entered as Secretary of the American Legation at Brussels, and he was afterwards Secretary of the United States Legation in Mexico. He was prominent in the Confederate service as one of the successors, with the late Justice Lamar, of Mason and Slidell, as Commissioners to the European Powers. He served on the staff of General Joseph E. Johnston, in Virginia; and as Adjutant-General of the Trans-Mississippi Department, under General Kirby Smith. At the close of the war he resumed the practice of law in New Orleans, and later was professor of the French, Spanish and Italian languages, in the University of Louisiana.

Under the first Cleveland administration he was appointed United States Minister to Greece, Roumania and Servia; and under the second, Judge of the International Court at Cairo, Egypt. From this varied and important service can be determined the high ability and wide influence of the man.

He was endeared to all who knew him by his gentle nature, his many and varied accomplishments and his noble character.

Henry E. Howland
1900 Century Association Yearbook