Mr. Copley is one of the Senators for 8th district, composed of the counties of Cabell, Wayne, Boone, Logan, Wyoming, Mercer and McDowell, and was born in 1820, in Cabell (now Wayne) county, and was engaged extensively for a number of years in the lumber business. Latterly he has been engaged in merchandizing. The rebellion waged fiercely over that part of the State which he represents; murderers, horse thieves, and criminals, outlawed of God and man, ravaged the country for plunder and rapine; nor has it ended yet. Mr. Copley has been made to feel the weight of its accursed power, being compelled to abandon his business at times. He made himself odious to the rebels by his uncompromising hostility to the ordinance of secession and everything else looking to a dismemberment of the Union, for he used every effort to defeat them all.

He was a member of the convention which reorganized the Government of Virginia in 1861, and was elected to his present position without opposition, by a very respectable vote, considering the fact that a large majority of his district are, or were rebels, though there is quite a large element of loyalty in that part of the district farthest removed from what the celebrated Dr. Ruffner called "the black Vomit."

At the early age of nineteen, he attached himself to the M. E. Church, and has ever since remained firm in the faith, and a consistent and worthy man, temperate in all things. During the past six years he has been a local minister in that denomination.

In his early life he was taught, and believed in the Whig doctrine; voted in 1856 for Filmore and Donelson, and in 1860 for Bell and Everett. In this last election he preferred Mr. Douglas, but voted for Bell in order to carry Virginia against Secessionism, knowing that Douglas was not strong enough in Virginia to defeat Breckenridge.

Mr. Copley has not been extreme in his views upon the question of slavery. While he never owned a slave and never desired to do so, he felt perfectly willing to let others do so, believing the holding of them measurably harmless unless abused by the master. His sympathies have all the time been strongly enlisted in behalf of the new State, which he endeavored to make a free State, and is rejoiced at the success of the gradual emancipation clause in our constitution, and hopes to see other States follow our example. In regard to the Union, he wants it preserved, even at the sacrifice of the last man and the last dollar in the country.

Mr. Copley is a man of medium size, with an open, honest countenance; hair dark brown, eyes blue and deep set; nose prominent; cheeks somewhat sunken; complexion rather fair, and whiskers light colored and thin. He dresses plainly and is rather a good looking man, and attends well to his business. He is a member of several important committees.

Biographies of the First West Virginia Legislature