Thomas Poynton Ives

Thomas Poynton Ives (April 9, 1769 – April 30, 1835) was an American merchant and banker from Rhode Island.

Early life Ives was born on April 9, 1769, in Beverly in the Massachusetts Bay Colony in what was then British America, and was baptized on June 4, 1769. He was the son of Sarah ( Bray) Ives and Captain Robert Hale Ives, a master-mariner who was one of the original eighteen members of the Salem Marine Society.

When Ives was just four years old, his father died. Ives was raised by relatives in Boston who sent him to public school. Together, they were the parents of: Hope Brown Ives (1802–1837), who died unmarried at age 34.

Descendants

Through his eldest daughter, he was the grandfather of banker, industrialist, U.S. Army officer, state senator and philanthropist Robert Hale Ives Goddard. he was the grandfather of U.S. Civil War Captain Thomas Poynton Ives (1834–1865) and Hope Brown Ives (1839–1909), who married Henry Grinnell Russell, one of the wealthiest men in Rhode Island. Shortly before his early death while at Le Havre, France, his grandson married Elizabeth Cabot Motley, daughter of U.S. Minister to the United Kingdom John Lothrop Motley. After his death, his widow, who inherited his fortune, remarried to British statesman Sir William Harcourt and became the mother of MP Robert Harcourt.

Residence

Between 1803 and 1806, Ives hired Caleb Ormsbee to build him a family home at 66 Power Street in the College Hill in Providence, Rhode Island. The 3-1/2 story brick house, remained in the hands of the Ives family until 1910. At that time it was sold to Brown University, retaining a lifetime occupancy right for owners. In 1970, the residence was designated a National Historic Landmark.

Ives' desk-and-bookcase is currently in a private collection. It was made by the cabinetmaker James Halyburton in Providence.

Awards and honors Ives was awarded an honorary degree from Brown University in 1864.