DOSTIE, Anthony Paul, dentist, born in Saratoga County, N. Y." died in New Orleans, La., 5 August 1866. He was a barber in early life, but became a dentist, and removed to Chicago, and subsequently to New Orleans. He was an active Union man during the civil war, and by his fearlessness gained both warm friends and bitter enemies. On the reorganization of the Louisiana government, during the war, he was appointed state auditor, and he was also a member of the constitutional convention of 1864. Dr. Dostie, in company with a Republican minority in New Orleans, was anxious to extend the suffrage to the freedmen, and to deny it to all those who had taken part against the national government in the civil war. The convention of 1864, in adjourning, had resolved that it should be the duty of the president to recall it "for any cause, or in ease the constitution should not be ratified, for the purpose of taking such measures as may be necessary for the formation of a civil government in Louisiana." Dr. Dostie and his associates now began to agitate the recall of the ohl convention. The project was at first received everywhere with derision, being regarded as a revolutionary movement, since it was claimed that the resolution above quoted gave the convention no power to amend the constitution that it had adopted. Finally, however, the president pro tempore of the convention issued an order re-convoking it on 30 July 1866.

On 27 July a meeting was held, which adopted resolutions calling for the enfranchisement of the Negroes, and at the same time speeches were made to a large assembly of freedmen outside. That of Dr. Dostie asserted that, if the convention were interfered with, "the Streets of New Orleans would run with blood." This ;speech was afterward spoken of as "intemperate" by General Sheridan. the City authorities now threatened to break up the convention as an unlawful assemblage, but the mayor was told that this would not be permitted by the U. S. forces then in the City. Part of the convention assembled on 30 July and, while a recess was taken for the purpose of obtaining a quorum, a conflict between a body of Negroes and the police occurred outside of the building. This precipitated a riot, and the Negroes took refuge in the building, and were attacked by the police and by a mob, which also wreaked its animosity on members of the convention. Dr. "Dostie was one of its first victims. Although unarmed, he was shot and beaten till he was supposed to be dead, and thrown into a cart with the dead bodies of other victims of the riot. He was finally taken to the hospital, where he died six days afterward in great suffering. See "Life of A. P. Dostie, or the Conflict of New Orleans," by Emily H. Reed (New York, 1868).