OUR venerable brother was born in Fincastle, Botetourt County, Va., on the 6th of August, 1806. His parents removed to Hawkins County, East Tennessee, where he was reared and educated.
After the close of the wars with Great Britain, and with the red men of the South, in 1812 and 1815, the Tennesseans, who played so conspicuous a part in both, kept up the regular military drill by the entire body of the militia, for a series of years: and a knowledge of military tactics was sought as a part of business education. Hence, he devoted a part of his time to the acquisition of that branch of knowledge, while engaged in the regular Academic course.
As a reward for his assiduity, he was offered; and accepted, a First Lieutenancy in his seventeenth year. At nineteen he was elected Captain; at twenty-three, First Major; and at twenty-six was elected Colonel Commandant. Meantime, in 1831, having accomplished the study of law, he removed to Nashville, where he found congenial companionship in his profession, and ready promotion to offices of both honor and emolument.
He was elected clerk of the Legislature, and shortly thereafter was appointed Attorney-General of the 12th Judicial District, by Governor Carroll.
Having filled with honor and usefulness the responsible offices conferred by generous compeers of his adopted State, he fixed his eye on the inviting champaigns and rich alluvial bottoms of North Mississippi, and in the year 1837, removed to Oxford, the site of the University of the State, where he has since resided.
Here he got into a lucrative practice in his profession, and a successful career was opened before him. And after five years' practice, both remunerative and promisory of still greater results in the future, the successful lawyer and advocate was induced to submit his name, to be run for Circuit Judge. The result was he had to exchange the bar for the bench; by the faithful and efficient discharge of the duties of which, he took rank with the great jurists of the State; and henceforth, became a prominent leader in the civil and judicial policy of the country. He, nevertheless, speaks of this event as having taken its initiative in an evil hour; and seriously advises young men of the legal profession, not to seek the honors of the judicial bench, until age and experience have ripened their knowledge and matured their judgments.
When the University of the State, located at Oxford, was organized and officered, among the charter members of the Board of Trustees, we find the name of Judge J. M. Howry. And with that noble body of men, as a select from among compeers, he served in the double office of Secretary and Treasurer of the Board for over thirty years. During this time the University buildings were erected, and apparatus, Chemical and Philosophical, and Astronomical, together with cabinets of Natural Science, were collected and purchased. The money thus expended, together with the other finances of the institution, amounted to near a million. All this amount passed through his hands. And the entire satisfaction and hearty approval of his co-laborers in the responsible guardianship of that great interest, is evidence sufficient of the incorruptibility of the man. Thirty years is no mean probation in testing character.
While bearing the burdens above named, he was called to the further responsible office of State Senator, the duties of which he sustained with honor to himself and usefulness to the State, guarding especially, the interests of the University, which he both served and conserved, with the devotion of a foster-father.
There is still another item in the history of his labors in behalf of education. He has been a trustee of Union Female College from its foundation, and is still one of its most devoted guardians, having stood up for its interests through all the vicissitudes of its history, and it still finds in him a wise counselor and an unflinching friend. The alumni of Union Female College will remember the name of J. M. Howry, as one of the principal guardians of their Alma Mater, and with a generous pride will cherish his memory.
In the year 1841, Judge Howry made a public profession of religion, at a protracted meeting held in Oxford, by Rev. Messrs. W. S. Burney, Samuel Dennis, D.D. and Reuben Burrow, Jr. In March, 1842, he united with the Cumberland Presbyterian church in that place, and was soon after elected a Ruling Elder, and in that capacity has served the church ever since, with the reputation of a worker. Amidst the multifarious duties of his official and domestic life, whether at home or abroad, he always found time to attend the delightful services of the sanctuary.
While away holding court, or at the bar, he always esteemed it the highest privilege to attend the courts of the Lord's house. And now, when the frosts of seventy winters have settled on his brow, nothing so much delights him as the sweet reminiscences of the sanctuary; and he never grows weary of conversing of those days of wonder, and of those men of might, ordained of God, to effect the wonderful work.
He has attended more of the judicatories of the Church, from the church session to the General Assembly, than almost any other ruling elder in it. He has also been a frequent, and almost constant contributor to our religious journalism, especially our weeklies. With an untiring zeal, he has advocated the cause of missions and the Board of Publication. He has shown an especial interest in home missions, as being indispensable to the evangelical life of the Church. And having been from his first connection with the Church, a counselor with his brethren in the ministry, he has expressed himself with great freedom on the duties of their office. And having caught the spirit of the founders of our Church, he is an unyielding advocate for traveling evangelists in the churches; and not, by any means, a lenient critic on the sloth and dull spirit of those who are at ease in Zion. Nevertheless, his brethren in the ministry are pleased to regard him as an earnest co-worker in the common cause. His views on the subject of missions and missionary work are clear and distinct. They are set forth at length in a series of articles in the Banner of Peace, under the title, Macedonia.
Brother Howry combines with his long experience and observation in the Church, a good deal of "Young America." That is, he is a man of progressive ideas, but discriminates in keeping up a proper equilibrium between the hallowed past and the growing tendency to change. In other words, he believes the great principles of the divine economy are immutable; but that our knowledge of those principles is progressive. Hence, he was and still is a friend to Revision: believes our Book could be greatly improved by a judicious committee; especially by extracting the element of Calvanism which is found lurking in many of the questions and answers of the catechism. He would, probably, with many others, vote to rescind not a few of those questions, which embody an amount of detail that would be better left to the individual mind. He has lived and thought enough to convince him, that one generation of men cannot think in detail, on the great subjects of Religion and Ethics, for those who shall come after them, without clogging the wheels of progress, which this age will not bear. In compliance with the spirit of the age, therefore, he believes that all books, except the Bible, may be compelled to pass the furnace of criticism and yield their dross to the flames, while the pure gold will shine all the the brighter therefor. These were his sentiments in 1854, when the Committee's report on Revision was presented to the Assembly, in Memphis.
Brother Howry is deeply penetrated with the spirit of lay evangelism: believes it to be a power which casts its shadow before, indicating coming events by which this world shall be turned upside down. He, with others who believe the sure word of prophecy, thinks the great harvest time is upon us, when the sheaves shall be threshed and the wheat gathered into the garner, while the chaff shall be burned with unquenchable fire.
Brother Howry's Masonic character has the endorsement, Past Grand Master of Mississippi. He has been a Mason through his long and eventful history, a devoted Mason, eminent in every department of the work, and not less distinguished as a writer on Masonic Jurisprudence. His reports to the Grand Lodge of the State of Mississippi will rank among those of the standard writers of the Order.
His connection with the craft began with his legal majority. When he was twenty-one years of age, he went to the city of Knoxville, Tenn., and received the Blue Lodge degrees, thus consecrating the first and fresh hours of the morning of life to the obligations and duties of the order. He learned to bear the yoke when young, and most faithfully has he borne it since. Its impress is upon the entire history of the man, the citizen, the jurist, the Christian husband and father, the companion and fellow among equals; adding dignity, courtesy, amenity, and generous and noble bearing in all the walks and relations of life.
The companionship of the mystic tie will ever cherish his memory and revere his name, as one long tried, true and trusty. And in the archives of the Order of Free and Acceptable Masons, his name will remain embalmed, until the Grand Master of the Celestial Lodge shall call true and worthy Masons from labor to eternal refreshment, where labor and toil shall be no more forever.
[Source: Crisman, E. B. Biographical Sketches of Living Old Men, of the Cumberland Presbyterian Church, in Six Volumes. Vol. I. St. Louis, Mo.: Perrin and Smith, Steam Book and Job Printers, 1877, pages 107-115]