Founders of Sigma Phi
Charles Thorn Cromwell (1808-1893)
Charles Thorn Cromwell was born on May 8th, 1808 in Mosquito Cove, New York.
Cromwell practiced law and had an administrative position in a law firm in NYC.
He was quite the entrepreneur and was president of several corporations, including
Nassau Bank and two successful insurance companies, and a railroad.
Cromwell presided over the first Sigma Phi National Convention in 1879
and many subsequent conventions that followed. Cromwell died on September 25th, 1893
in Rye, New York.
Thomas Fielders Bowie (1808-1869)
Thomas Fielders Bowie was born on April 7th, 1808 in Bowieville, Maryland.
He studied law, was admitted to the bar in 1829, and commenced
practices in Upper Marlboro, Maryland. He served as deputy attorney
general for Prince George's County from 1833-1842, and as a member
of the Maryland House of Delegates from 1842-1846. He was an unsuccessful
candidate for Governor of Maryland in 1843, and wan an unsuccessful candidate
for election in 1850 to the Thirty-second Congress.
Bowie served as a member of the State constitutional convention in 1851,
as a member of the judicial committee assisting in framing the State's
new constitution, and as presidential elector on the Whig ticket in 1852.
In 1858, Bowie was elected from the sixth district of Maryland as a
Democrat to the Thirty-fourth and Thirty-fifth Congresses, serving
from March 4th, 1855, to March 3rd, 1859. He was an unsuccessful
candidate for the re-nomination in 1859 to the Thirty-sixth Congress.
After Congress, he resumed the practice of his profession. He died
in Upper Marlboro on October 31st, 1869 and is interred in the Waring
family burying ground at Mount Pleasant, near Upper Marlboro.
Thomas Sydenham Witherspoon (1808-1845)
Thomas Sydenham Witherspoon was born on January 28,
1808 in Williamsburgh South Carolina. Witherspoon
devised the name Sigma Phi. He was a clergyman and a teacher.
He was ordained in 1830 in Ouchy Valley, Florida.
John Thomas Bowie (1809-1840)
John Thomas Bowie was born on April 16th, 1809 in
Bowieville, Maryland. Similar to his brother Thomas,
John ventured into a career in law. John Thomas
Bowie died in Grand Gulf, Mississippi in 1840.
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