West Feliciana-East Baton Rouge County Louisiana Archives Biographies.....Smith, Matt
March 12, 1881 -
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Author: Henry E Chambers
Matt G. Smith has been engaged in the real-estate and insurance business in the
City of Baton Rouge, where his operations have become of broad scope and
representative order and where he maintains his offices at 307 New Reymond
Building, 00 Third Street.
Mr. Smith was born on a plantation in West Feliciana Parish, Louisiana, March
12, 1881, a son of Courtland B. Smith, who was born in that parish in the year
1852 and who was a son of John W. Smith, who there passed his entire life and
who was one of the extensive planters of that section of we state. The Smith
family, of which the subject of this review is a scion, was founded in Virginia
in the colonial period of our national history, and the lineage traces back to
sterling English origin. Courtland B. Smith, like his father, became a
representative of extensive plantation industry in West Feliciana Parish, and
there he passed his entire life, which came to an end when he was a young man
of thirty-three years, in 1885. He was a loyal supporter of the cause of the
democratic party, and he was serving as sheriff of his native parish at the
time of his death. Mr. Smith was affiliated with the Masonic fraternity, the
Knights of Pythias and the Independent Order of Odd Fellows, and his religious
faith was that of the Methodist Episcopal Church, South, of which his wife
likewise was an earnest member. He married Miss Mary Elizabeth Smith, the two
families having no kinship, though of the same name, and she long survived him.
She was born in Pointe Coupee Parish, January 10, 1851, and passed the closing
years of her life in the home of her daughter, Anna Jane (Mrs. Henry N. Pharr),
near New Iberia, this state, where her death occurred November 13, 1911. Of
the children the eldest is Courtland B., Jr., who conducts an art studio in the
City of Galveston, Texas; Anna Jane is the wife of Henry N. Pharr, and they
reside at Olivier, Iberia Parish, Mr. Pharr being one of the progressive sugar-
planters of that parish ; Ventress J. is junior member of the representative
law firm of Burke & Smith of New Iberia, that parish ; Mary Charlotte is the
wife of John A. Pharr, a sugar-planter at Berwick, St. Mary Parish; Kemp C. is
engaged in the real-estate business, at Baton Rouge; Matt G., immediate
subject of this sketch, was the next in order of birth; and Joe Jones, who was
born in 1884, died in the year 1919, at New Iberia, where he was a bookkeeper
by vocation.
Matt G. Smith proved a most receptive student, as is shown in the fact that he
was only sixteen years old when he withdrew from the junior class in Centenary
College at Jackson, Louisiana, to initiate his association with practical
business affairs. He became at that time a clerk in the establishment of the
Fuqua Hardware Company of Baton Rouge, and with this concern he continued his
connection until 1909, when he here established himself independently in the
real-estate and insurance business. His success in this field of business
enterprise has fully justified his choice of vocation, and he has built up one
of the substantial agencies of this order in East Baton Rouge Parish, with the
best of facilities for the handling or both city and rural realty and for the
underwriting of insurance through the medium of leading insurance
corporations. As a democrat he was elected a member of the police Jury,
representing the Second Ward of Baton Rouge, and he is the incumbent of this
position at the time of this writing, in the spring of 1924. He is a member
and trustee of the First Methodist Episcopal Church South, in his home city, is
actively identified with the local Chamber of Commerce, is a member of the
Baton Rouge Golf and Country Club, is past exalted ruler of Baton Rouge Lodge
No. 490. Benevolent and Protective Order of Elks, and is affiliated also with
Capital Lodge No. 29, Knights Of Pythias.
A service of loyalty and patriotism was that rendered by Mr. Smith in the
period of American participation in the World war. On the 6th of May, just one
month a after the nation formally became involved in the great world conflict,
he volunteered for service in the United States Army, and at Camp Logan H.
Roots, near little Rock, Arkansas, he Won his commission as second lieutenant
of artillery. He received this commission August 15, and was then assigned to
the quartermaster department at Camp Pike, near Little Rock, where January,
1918, he was promoted to the rank of Sr. Lieutenant and where in the following
August received commission as Captain. He continued in service for some time
after the armistice brought War to a close, and remained at Camp Pike until he
received his honorable discharge, May 15, 1919. Captain Smith showed fine
military ability, but he has not yet proved sufficiently intrepid to leave the
ranks of eligible bachelors in his home city.
Additional Comments:
A History of Louisiana, (vol. 2), pp. 116-117, by Henry E. Chambers. Published
by The American Historical Society, Inc., Chicago and New York, 1925.
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