Boardman was involved in both Philadelphia’s Institute for the Deaf and Dumb as well as its orphanage. He was honored with the Doctor of Divinity by Marshall College, Lancaster, Pennsylvania in 1844. He was active at all levels of the church courts and it is common to read presbytery, synod, and assembly minutes which include Boardman doing something, even multiple somethings.

Henry Augustus was born January 9, 1808 to John and Clarinda (Starbuck) Boardman at Troy on the Hudson River in New York. His mother had grown up a Quaker but when she married John she became a Presbyterian. John had done well in the mercantile business and at the time of Henry’s birth his business partner was Thomas Hillhouse. Boardman & Hillhouse was located at River and Fulton Streets. When Henry was only five years old his father died. Often when a homemaker’s husband passed away the survivors were left destitute, as in the case of Joseph Caldwell, but income from the mercantile business provided funds for the survivors to live and for Henry to have the best schooling. His early education was obtained at academies in Kinderhook then Troy, and as an adolescent after school he enjoyed visiting the construction site of the Erie Canal. About the time the canal was finished in 1825, Boardman went to New Haven to attend Yale College. He was a diligent and bright student who graduated first in the class of 1829. Boardman immediately began studying law, but during the spring of 1830 he professed faith in Christ in Second Presbyterian Church in Troy. Within a matter of months, he entered Princeton Seminary to prepare for pastoral ministry.

Boardman was licensed by the Presbytery of New York April 17, 1833, then ordained and installed by the Third Presbytery of Philadelphia, November 8, 1833, in Tenth Presbyterian Church, Philadelphia. At the time Tenth was not at its current location in the city. Following the division of the Presbyterians into the Old School and New School in 1837, Tenth Church maintained membership in the Old School General Assembly. Even though Tenth was a member of an Old School presbytery, the sympathies of the congregation lied more with the New School, so one of Boardman’s early challenges was redirecting the congregation’s doctrinal commitment. Tenth was not only Henry Boardman’s first call, it was his only call. He continued ministering to the congregation until presbytery changed his status from pastor to pastor emeritus, May 5, 1876, after nearly forty-three years of service. 

When Boardman married, Archibald Alexander conducted the wedding in Princeton. He married Eliza the daughter of attorney Paul Townsend and Mary Lamboll (Beach) Jones of Charleston, South Carolina. The two coming together from such a distance may raise the question how did the Northeastern man manage to marry a South Carolina woman? Two years after Boardman entered Princeton, Eliza’s brother, Samuel Beach Jones, began studies at the seminary. Whether Eliza visited her brother in Princeton or Boardman visited Samuel in Charleston, the two had the opportunity to meet. Another Charleston connection for Boardman was his classmate Thomas Smyth, who would go on to serve the Second Presbyterian Church of Charleston and like Boardman would have only one pastoral call with his extending from 1834 to 1873.

Henry Boardman and Charles Hodge were great friends. When Dr. Hodge died in l878, the memorial addresses by Dr. Boardman, William Paxton, and Charles A. Aiken were published in Discourses Commemorative of the Life and Work of Charles Hodge, D.D., LL.D. Henry and Eliza Boardman showed their love for Dr. Hodge by naming one of their sons, Charles Hodge Boardman, born May 28, 1838. C. H. Boardman matured to study medicine at the University of Pennsylvania before moving to St. Paul, Minnesota, where he was a member of the State Board of Medical Examiners, President of the City Board of Water Commissioners, Medical Director of the Northern Pacific Railroad, and Professor of Medical Jurisprudence in the University of Minnesota. Charles Hodge must have been touched not only by the Boardmans naming their son after him, but also because the son was a medical doctor like his own brother, Hugh Lenox Hodge.

Henry Augustus Boardman died at his residence on Spruce Street in Philadelphia June 15, 1880. The cause of death was diagnosed as gastritis. He had been visiting Atlantic City when he complained of illness and then returned home where his condition worsened resulting in death the following morning. Eliza had predeceased Henry August 19, 1874. They were survived by three sons and two daughters. The  funeral address was delivered by A. A. Hodge with a commemorative address given by John DeWitt who was Boardman’s successor at Tenth. DeWitt would go on to become a professor at Princeton Seminary. Dr. Boardman was buried in Laurel Hill Cemetery, Philadelphia.

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