1925 Biography - Hopkins P. Breazeale

Capt. Hopkins Payne Breazeale. A list of the connections Captain Breazeale has had with the professional, business, physic and other interests of Baton Rouge and Louisiana reveal a remarkable range of activity for a man of his years. He is one of the able lawyers of the capital city, was an American officer in the World war, getting citations for gallantry, and has shown great capacity for executive action and service in every position he has held since attaining manhood.

Mr. Breazeale has born at Natchitoches, in Natchitoches Parish, October 16, 1886, a member of a family that has been distinguished by many members in Louisiana. The Breazeales lived in France, left that country and settled in Scotland, and one branch of the family shortly after the close of the American Revolution settled in North Carolina. From there some of the family went west and in pioneer times located in Arkansas. The grandfather of the Baton Rouge attorney, Winter W. Breazeale, was born at Hot Springs, Arkansas, in 1816. He spent most of his life in Natchitoches Parish, where he operated an extensive plantation. Though well advanced in years, he served with the rank of Colonel of Second Louisiana Regiment in the Confederate army throughout the war between the slates. He died at Natchitoches in 1891. His wife was a Miss Prudhomme, a native of Natchitoches.

Hopkins Payne Breazeale, Sr., was born at Natchitoches in 1856, spent his life there and was engaged in planting and was also a publisher. He was democrat and a member of the Masonic Order. His death occurred in 1894. His wife was Camilla Lachs who was born at Memphis, Tennessee, in 1867, and now lives at Natchitoches. She became the mother of four children: Hopkins Payne; Wynona, wife of Sidney K. Johnson, an employe of the Los Angeles Times in California; Carmen, with her mother and Seessel J., professor of French at Peabody and Vanderbilt Institute at Nashville, Tennessee, married Marcelle J. Durand.

Hopkins Payne Breazeale, Jr., attended public schools at Natchitoches, graduated from the Louisiana State Normal Schools there in 1905, and in 1910 took his LL. B. degree from Yale University Law School. He is a member of the Phi Delta Phi legal fraternity. Mr. Breazeale was admitted to the bar before the Supreme Court of Louisiana in January, 1911, and in June, 1910, was admitted to practice before the United States Supreme Court. He has maintained law offices at Baton Rouge since January, 1911, and has given his the and industry to the general practice of law there except for the time he was in the army. His offices are in the Triad Building.

Mr. Breazeale since 1919 has served as referee in bankruptcy for the Eastern District of Louisiana, and since 1920 has held the office of city attorney of Baton Rouge. His general practice includes service as local attorney for the Illinois Central Railway Company, the Yazoo and Mississippi Valley Railroad Company, the Texas and Pacific Railroad Company and as district attorney for the N. 0. T. and M. Railway Gulf Coast lines. He is attorney for the New York Life Insurance Company and is secretary of the Capital Finance Company of Baton Rouge. Mr. Breazeale also owns considerable real estate in Baton Rouge, including his home at 437 Menard Street.

He is a democrat, is a vestryman in St. James Episcopal Church at Baton Rouge, is affiliated with St. James Lodge No. 47 of the Masonic fraternity, the New Orleans Consistory of the Scottish Rite, Jerusalem Temple of the Mystic Shrine at New Orleans, is a past exalted ruler of Baton Rouge Lodge No. 490, Benevolent and Protective Order of Elks, and is a member of Nicholson Post No. 38 of the American Legion, is former president of Baton Rouge Chamber of Commerce, is secretary and treasurer of the Baton Rouge Golf and Country Club and a member of the Louisiana State and East Baton Rouge bar Associations.

In August, 1917, Mr. Breazeale joined the Second Officers Training Camp at Leon Springs, Texas, and received a Commission as first lieutenant of infantry in November. He was assigned to the Three Hundred and Fifty-eighth infantry, Ninetieth Division, at San Antonio, and on May 13, 1918, went overseas with the Advance Guard, accompanying Maj. Gen. Henry B. Allen. He was the officer in charge of embarkation at Southampton, England, until July l0, 1918, then rejoining the Three Hundred and Fifty-eighth Infantry in France. His subsequent service took him into some of the hardest fighting on the western front, including the St. Mihiel offensive and the Meuse-Argonne campaign. For gallantry in action on September 13, 14, 15, 1918, he received three citations and on September 17 was promoted to the rank of captain. He accompanied the advance guard of the Army of Occupation into Germany December 1, 1918, and was officer in charge of civil affairs in seventeen towns in Germany. He left Germany June 1, 1919, in command of the First Battalion of the Three Hundred and Fifty-eighth Infantry, arriving in the United States June 19th, and was honorably discharged at Camp Pike, Arkansas, June 30.

Captain Breazeale married at Donaldsonville, Louisiana, November 22, 1916, Miss Nita Sims, daughter of R. N. and Nita (Dalfares) Sims, residents of New Orleans, where her father is vice-president of the Hibernia Bank. Mrs. Breazeale is a graduate of the Washington Seminary at Washington, District of Columbia. They have three children: Nita Sims, Hopkins Payne, Jr., and Robert Phanor. The daughter is now attending public school.

Note: The sketch is accompanied by a portrait of the subject.

Contributed 2021 Nov 04 by Mike Miller, from A History of Louisiana, by Henry E. Chambers, published in 1925, volume 2, pages 334-335.