In the summer of 1862, however, Brice enlisted and served three months in the 86th Regiment of the Ohio Volunteer Infantry, seeing action in West Virginia.

[1] In 1863, he returned to and graduated from Miami University with high honors[1] and worked as a schoolmaster, before he joined the army again in 1864, this time serving as captain to a company of volunteers he recruited for the 180th Ohio Infantry.

Around 1880,[dubious – discuss] with his law practice proving unsuccessful and his mother's home at risk of foreclosure, Brice offered to attend to any legal interests with which the mortgage lender needed help.

The lender, then-Governor Charles Foster, declined the legal help but offered to pay Brice five hundred dollars to negotiate a business deal with Wall Street on his behalf.

In 1871, Brice traveled to Europe to secure funding for a foundering railway running from Toledo to Ohio's coal fields, impressing Foster once more.

[6] In the late 1890s, he began an attempt to build a railroad between Canton and Hankou on mainland China,[1] but he died before the project was completed.

According to historian James White, Brice did not accept much compensation for his services during a business transaction and often held himself accountable to the public by "stripping a proposition of every incumbrance and laying it bare for inspection.

Brice was subject to media criticism, including over claims that he was not an Ohio resident, having lived in New York in the previous years.

[8] Heavy campaign spending secured the election of a Democratic majority to the Ohio General Assembly, enabling Brice's selection.

[9] Though Brice fended off a censure motion at the 1894 Democratic party state convention, he lost his bid for reelection to Republican Joseph B. Foraker three years later.

His efforts in 1885 and 1888 to provide funding for the university were largely responsible for its survival, and a science building, Brice Hall was named in his honor.