Elliott Ruggles Corbett II

Biographical Note

The Corbett family first came to Portland, Oregon in 1851, where Henry Winslow Corbett (1827-1903) established himself in the merchandising and railroad business; he also served as a United States Senator for Oregon 1867-1873. His son Henry J. Corbett (1857-1895) married Helen Ladd, and they had three sons: Henry Ladd Corbett (1881-1957); Elliott Ruggles Corbett (1884-1963); Hamilton Forbush Corbett (1888-1966. All three brothers attended Harvard University; during his time at Harvard, Hamilton played on the football team, and was selected as a consensus first-team fullback for the 1908 College Football All-America Team. All were football players at Harvard and also became keen polo players. The three brothers built the first “skyscraper” in Portland the ten story Corbett Building in 1907 and later the ten story Pacific Building in 1925.

Hamilton F. Corbett served in a field artillery unit during the First World War, and was wounded during fighting along the Ourcq River in the course of the Second Battle of the Marne. He returned to the front in time for the Armistice, and served as aide-de-camp to Major General James Harbord with American occupation forces in Germany until his discharge in May 1919. Henry L. Corbett, meanwhile, worked with the War Industries Board and helped increase the output of Portland shipyards. He began training for military service, but the war ended before he was to be commissioned.

Following the First World War, all three Corbett brothers engaged in a number of business and real estate enterprises, including the construction of the 10-story Pacific Building on SW Yamhill Street in Portland. Henry L. Corbett also became involved in local Republican politics, serving in the state senate, where he was President of the Senate for the 1927-1928 legislative session; he unsuccessfully ran for governor in 1931 before returning to the state senate from 1933-1936.

Hamilton F. Corbett married Harriet Cumming in 1922. Henry L. Corbett married Gretchen Hoyt in 1908, with whom he had five children: Helen; Henry Ladd, Jr.; Alfred Hoyt; Elliott Ruggles II; Rosina. The youngest son, Elliott Ruggles (“Yot”) Corbett II, attended the Thacher Boarding School in Ojai, California, before going to his father’s alma mater, Harvard University. He left Harvard to join the military in late 1942, training first with the 10th Mountain Division and then the Army Air Corps, before transferring to an infantry replacement battalion so that he could be sent overseas. He died of wounds received at the Battle of the Hürtgenforest on November 19, 1944, though due to an error by a chaplain’s clerk, there was some confusion as to his fate for a few months in early 1945.

Henry L. Corbett died of a heart attack in April 1957 in Dunsmuir, California, while en route to Portland from Santa Barbara. Hamilton died in 1966 in Portland, Oregon. Henry L. and Gretchen Corbett’s southwest Portland home, built in 1916, is listed on the National Register of Historic Places as the H. L. and Gretchen Hoyt Corbett House.                                                           

 

Source: archiveswest.orbiscascade.org

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