Woodbury, Roger Williams, 1841-1903

Roger Williams Woodbury was born March 3, 1841 in Francestown, New Hampshire. Following the first battle of Bull Run, in July 1861, he enlisted into Company A, Third New Hampshire Infantry, and was promoted to sergeant prior to that unit's assignment to the field. He was commissioned and promoted to captain in his company, taking part in the expedition to Port Royal, South Carolina, the capture of Morris Island and reduction of Fort Sumter. After a brief campaign in Florida, his unit was transferred to General Benjamin F. Butler's command, participating in the battles around Petersburg, Ft. Darling and the James River in Virginia in 1864. He participated in General Butler's Fort Fischer Campaign on the cape Fear River. Woodbury went west to Colorado in the spring of 1866 where he panned in the streams of Summit County until he withdrew from mining and went back to Journalism with the Golden Transcript, the Denver Daily Tribune, and The Denver Daily Times and Denver Evening Times. He rose to be managing editor and proprietor of the Tribune until he sold his interest in 1871 and purchased the Times. He was its influential editor until 1882. Woodbury was president of the Denver Chamber of Commerce and Board of Trade and was elected president of the Union Bank of Denver from 1886 to 1893. He invested in railways, milling, and other Colorado industries. He was instrumental in the founding of the first free public library in Denver, now the Denver Public Library. He was elected to the Board of Regents of the University of Colorado for a term from 1884 to 1890. He was a Brigadier General in the Colorado National Guard and a prominent member of the Colorado Republican Party. In 1870, he married Ann M. Koons. They had one son, Frank S. Woodbury who followed in his father's journalistic and banking footsteps. Roger Williams Woodbury died in 1903.