USA > Connecticut > Biographical encyclopaedia of Connecticut and Rhode Island of the nineteenth century > Part 8
USA > Rhode Island > Biographical encyclopaedia of Connecticut and Rhode Island of the nineteenth century > Part 8
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On the 1st of January, 1849, Mr. Sanford was admitted to the bar, and opened 5
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HIPMAN, NATHANIEL, of Hartford, Judge of the United States District Court for Connecticut. Born in Southbury, New Haven County, Connecticut, August 22d, 1828. His father, Thomas L. Shipman, was a native of the same State, and was an excellent Congregationalist divine. His mother, née Mary T. Deming, was also born in Connecticut.
Judge Shipman received his preliminary education in the academies at Norwich and Plainfield, then matriculated at Yale College in 1844, and graduated with the class of 1848. Choosing to identify himself with the members of the legal profession, he commenced the study of law under the tuition of Thomas B. Osborne, in Fairfield County, and was admitted to the bar in the fall of 1850. Selecting Hartford as the seat of practice, he associated himself with H. K. W. Welch in legal business, under the firm-title of Welch & Shipman, and continued in that relation until the death of his partner in 1870.
In 1857 Judge Shipman served one term in the lower house of the State Legislature, to which he had been elected by the Republican party. From 1858 to 1861 he was the executive secretary of the noble and patriotic Governor Bucking- ham. On May ist, 1873, his talents and services received fitting recognition in his appointment as Judge of the United States District Court for Connecticut-a position he still retains. The office itself is of national character, and is identified with that peculiar duplex judicial system which differentiates the United States civil polity from that of all other nations. This duplex judicial system corresponds with our duplex political system, under which has been established a national government for national purposes-for duties of common concernment to all the States-and a government by States for objects of purely local interest. In like manner, "by the constitutions and laws of the States the people have created courts adequate to the administration of justice in all matters intrusted to the States. By the national Constitution they have created a Supreme Court of the United States, clothed with power to try originally certain controversies of high political importance, and also, what is of more general interest, to review and correct the decisions of subordinate courts. " By acts of Congress they have created, for the ordinary administration of justice throughout the States in controversies coming within the national jurisdiction, a system of district and circuit courts. The controversies intrusted to the national tribunals-omitting to mention some of rare occurrence-are of three kinds: cases arising under any law. of the United States ; cases of admiralty jurisdiction, that is, arising at sea, or immediately connected with maritime matters; and cases between citizens of different States."
" These judges hold United States Circuit and District Courts at designated places, throughout the States, systematic provision having been made for court-rooms,
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clerks, marshals, and records, wholly independent of State legislation or control; so that everywhere individuals concerned in controversies depending on national laws or arising upon matters of maritime origin, or in which citizens of one State arc pitted against those of another, may seck justice in a court of the Union, free, by its creation and surroundings, and by all its precedents and traditions, from any undue influence or bias arising from differences among the States." Vide Abbott's American Jurisprudence. The functions of the United States District Court judges -as well as those of the higher courts-demand ripe learning, comprehensive knowledge, catholic spirit, uncommon fairness and impartiality, and an independency of spirit that reveals no affinities in discord with concrete justice. The appointment to such a dignified office implies appreciation of no mean order.
Judge Shipman was married on the 25th of May, 1859, to Mary C. Robinson of Hartford.
ANFORD, EDWARD ISAAC, LL.B., of New Haven, Senior Judge of the Superior Court of Connecticut. Born in New Haven, July 4th, 1826. His father, Elihu Sanford, removed thither in childhood from Woodbridge, subsequently entered into the West India trade from New Haven, conducted an extensive business, amassed a considerable fortunc, and died in 1866. His paternal grandfather, Elihu Sanford, was a native of Woodbridge, Conn., and was occupied by agricultural pursuits. Elihu Sanford, his great-grandfather, was also a native of Connecticut. His mother, née Lucinda Howell, was the daughter of Leverett and Lucinda Howell of New Haven.
Primarily educated at private schools in his native city, young Sanford graduated from them to Fairfield Academy, in which he passed four years-from the age of ten to that of fourteen. Thence he repaired to the celebrated Hopkins Grammar School at New Haven, and prepared for matriculation at Yale College. Entering that institution in 1843, he graduated from it with the class of 1847. Electing the profession of law, he next entered the office of Henry White, a prominent con- veyancer in New Haven, prosecuted his studies under the direction of that gentleman, and also received a full course of instruction in the Law Department of Vale University.
On the 1st of January, 1849, Mr. Sanford was admitted to the bar, and opened 5
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his office in New Haven, where he successfully practised the duties of his profession for twelve years-until his election to the office of County Judge in 1861. For four years he exercised the functions of that position with distinguished ability and acceptance. In the legislative sessions of 1864-5 Judge Sanford served as a member of the State Senate, to which he had been chosen by the suffrages of the Republican citizens. In 1867 he was elevated to a seat on the bench of the Superior Court, and has since held it with dignity and beneficence to the present hour.
Judge Sanford was married on the 19th of June, 1849, to Sarah J., daughter of Hanford Lyon, of Bridgeport, Conn. One daughter and one son constitute the issue of the union.
EARDSLEY, SIDNEY BURR, of Bridgeport, Justice of the Superior Court of Connecticut. Born in Monroe, Fairfield County, Conn., August 20th, 1822. His father, Cyrus H. Beardsley, was a lawyer, and for a number of years held the office of County Judge. He also represented his district in both branches of the Legislature, and in 1846 was Speaker of the House. Politi- cally, he was identified with the Democratic party. He graduated at Yale College in 1818, and died at Fairfield, Conn., in 1852, in the fifty-third year of his age. The mother of Judge Beardsley, nee Maria Burr, was the daughter of Timothy Burr, of Hartford, Conn., a merchant by vocation, who died in 1799, aged about 47 years. Mrs. Beardsley still survives, and spends her advanced life in the town of Fairfield.
The Hartford branch of the Burr family, with which Judge Beardsley is mater- nally connected, is descended from Benjamin Burr, an original settler of Hartford, in 1635, who was in Massachusetts for some time before his migration to Con- necticut, and who may have been one of the eight hundred who came to America with Winthrop's fleet, in June, 1630. Although an active, energetic, and thorough business man, he seems to have taken but little part in public affairs, and therefore does not figure prominently in colonial records. He was the first of his name in Connecticut, was admitted a freeman in 1638, received an allotment of land in 1643, and another in 1666. Thrifty and prosperous, he acquired additional property in the village, and also houses and lands at Greenfield and in Windsor. He gave his name to one of the city streets, and died at Hartford, March 31st, 1681. His
S. R. Brandday.
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memory, together with that of other primal settlers of Hartford, is preserved by the monument erected in the cemetery of the Central Congregational Church; but the fittest memorial of himself and associates, of their genius and energy, is the city itself-a city around which cluster the most venerable associations; a city which is the mother of cities and communities, and the social, financial, and political capital of the State.
Benjamin Burr and his wife Annie were the parents of four children, of whom Thomas, the second, was born January 26th, 1645, in Hartford. Hc, in turn, became the father of twelve children, of whom Moses, the fourth, was born in January, 1715. He married Eliza King, by whom he had seven children, was a successful business man, and left a large estate. He died January 13th, 1792. Timothy Burr, the father of Mrs. Beardsley, was his eldest son.
Judge Beardsley matriculated in Vale College in 1838, and at the close of his collegiate carcer commenced the study of law under the direction of the late David C. Sanford, of New Milford, who was afterward Judge of the Supreme Court of Connecticut. At a later period he studied in the law office of Reuben Booth at Danbury.
Admitted to the bar of Fairfield County in 1843, he immediately began prac- tice at Norwalk, and continued therein until 1846, when he removed to Bridgeport, where his pursuits were purely professional until his elevation to the judicial bench, in June, 1874. His official life in political relations has been limited to one year as Judge of Probate, to which he was appointed by the State Legislature while a resident of Norwalk, in 1845, and to one year's term of service in the State Senate, to which he was elected by the Republican party of his district in 1858. During the latter term he served as chairman of the Committee on Banks, and also of that on Federal Relations. In 1869 he was a candidate for Congress in the Fourth District, in competition with William H. Barnum. That district was then a Demo- cratic stronghold, and preferred Mr. Barnum. Its political character has since somewhat changed-partly through Judge Beardsley's efforts-and were the old opponents again arrayed against each other, the issue would probably be different, inasmuch as the district is now Republican.
Judge Beardsley was married in June, 1846, to Anna Eliza, daughter of William Daskam of Norwalk. Five children, of whom one son and two daughters are now living, were the fruit of their union.
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POVEY, JAMES A., of Norwich, a Judge of the Superior Court of Connecti- cut. Born in Hampton, Windham County, Connecticut, April 29th, 1815. His father, Jonathan Hovey, was a native of the same town, and was engaged in agricultural pursuits.
On both sides of his parentage, Judge Hovey is descended from the best blood of Europe. The Hovey family is derived from a gentleman who emigrated to this country from the Hague, the capital of the Netherlands. His mother, née Patience Stedman, was a native of his own town, and identified by ancestry with the sturdy Puritans who illustrated in Europe and America, as the Dutch Calvinists did in Holland, the virtues of invincible love of liberty and incorruptible patriotism.
The education of young Hovey was acquired in the common and select schools of the neighborhood in which he was reared, and also under the, supervision of a private tutor. Electing the legal profession for the exercise of his mature activities, he commenced the study of its history, principles, and practice on the 4th of July, 1836, in the office of C. F. Cleaveland, at Hampton; and was admitted to the bar of Windham County, in December, 1838. For the ensuing two years, he practised legally in the town of Windham, and in the spring of 1841 removed to Norwich. There, during the eight years following, he was associated in practice with his preceptor, under the firm-title of Cleaveland & Hovey. In 1842-3 he acted as private secretary to his partner, who held the office of Governor of the State throughout that period. In 1850 he received the appointment of Judge of the County Court, of New London County, and discharged its duties for four years; at the end of which term he resumed private practice. In 1859 he was elected to the lower branch of the Legislature, by the Democratic party in the town of Norwich. That election was exceedingly complimentary, inasmuch as it involved the consent and co-operation of political opponents-Judge Hovey being the only Democrat who has been elected to the Legislature from that district since 1837 to the present time. In 1870 he was chosen to the mayoralty of the city. In 1876 he was elevated to a seat on the bench of the Superior Court, and still retains its incumbency.
In December, 1844, Judge Hovey was married to Lavinia J. Barber, of Simsbury, Connecticut.
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OTTER, ELISHA R., of Kingston, Associate Justice of the Supreme Court of Rhode Island. Born in Kingston, R. I., June 20th, 1811. Judge Potter is one link in a chain of eminent men who have borne his patronymic. His father, Elisha R. Potter, was a native of Kingston, a man of unusual ability, and a member of the National Congress in 1799 and 1812. E. R. Potter, Sr., died in Kingston on the 26th of September, 1838. The Potter family in the mother country is also honored by representatives in Parliament, who wield an influence in its councils proportioned to their weight in the manufacturing and commercial interests of Great Britain. The mother of Judge Potter, née Mary Manney, was a lady of French extraction, although a native of Rhode Island.
Young Potter entered Harvard College in 1826, and graduated from it in 1830. Thencc he passed to competent legal tuition, and in October, 1832, was admitted to the bar. Settling in his native town, he has confined professional practice chiefly to it and its vicinage. Like the majority of cultured and public-spirited lawyers, he has rendered considerable and efficient service in the legislative halls of the country. In the General Assembly of Rhode Island he has served through several sessions. In 1835 and 1836 he held the post of Adjutant-General of the State. From 1843 to 1845 hc represented his district in the Congress of the United States. Not less influential for local good was his official action as Commissioner of Public Schools for the State from May, 1849, to October, 1854-the date of his resignation. In March, 1868, Judge Potter accepted his election to the supreme justiciary of the State, and has discharged the duties pertaining to his clevated position with the same dignity, thoroughness, and efficiency that have characterized his private practice.
Judge Potter is a zealous historical student, and by his numerous publications has established a claim to the gratitude of future Bancrofts and Macaulays, and through them of Christendom, inasmuch as his compositions are of the kind that they most highly prized in the construction of their monumental works. The follow- ing is a list of his productions : 1. Early History of Narragansett ; with an Appendix of Original Documents. Providence, 1835; Svo, pp. 315. Also published in R. I. Hist. Coll. vol. iii. Commended by Dr. Usher Parsons. See Hist. Mag., 1863, 44, n. 2. 2. A Brief Account of the Emissions of Paper Money, made by the Colony of Rhode Island. 1837; 8vo. 3. Considerations on the Question of the Adoption of the Constitution and the Extension of Suffrage in Rhode Island. Boston, 1842 ; Svo, pp. 64. 4. Address before the Rhode Island Historical Society, February 19th, 1851. Providence, 1851; Svo. 5. Report on the Condition and Improvement of the Public Schools of Rhode Island, January, 1852; 8vo. 6. The Bible and Prayer in Common Schools, 1854. 8vo. 7. Reports and Documents upon Public Schools and Education in the State of Rhode Island, etc. Svo, pp. 700. For other publications, see J. R.
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Bartlett's Bibliog. of Rhode Island, 1864, 203-209; Circuit Court of the United States, Mass. District, in Equity, W. B. Lawrence vs. R. H. Dana, Jr., et als. Boston, 1867; r. Svo, pp. 147-262 (Deposition of E. R. Potter).
Judge Potter's valuable essay on the Rhode Island colonial emissions of paper money was reprinted in Phillips's Historical Sketch of the Paper Currency of the American Colonies. A new edition, by Sidney S. Rider, was published at Providence in 1879. It contains large additions and illustrations. 8. In the same year was issued the Memoir Concerning the French Settlements in the Colony of Rhode Island, by Elisha R. Potter; Providence, Sidney S. Rider, 1879-being No. 5 of Rider's Rhode Island Historical Tracts-4to; pp. 138.
URGES, WALTER SNOW, Associate Justice of the Supreme Court of Rhode Island. Born September 10th, 1808, in Rochester, Plymouth County, Mass. His father, Abraham Burges, and also his grandfather, John Burges, were natives of the same place, and followed agricultural pursuits. His mother, née Rhoda Caswell, was the daughter of Elijah Caswell, and a native of the same county.
Young Burges was educated in the district schools of his native town until he attained the age of seventeen years, when he entered the old academy at Sand- wich, then under the charge of Prof. Luther Lincoln. When fully prepared for college. yielding to the suggestions of his uncle (the late Hon. Tristram Burges, formerly a professor in Brown University and subsequently, for ten years a dis- tinguished member of Congress from Rhode Island) he entered that institution in 1827, and graduated therefrom with honor in 1831. He then accepted the charge of Thaxter Academy, at Edgartown, Martha's Vineyard, and taught for three or four consecutive years.
During this period he engaged more or less in legal studies, and afterward completed his preparation for the bar in the office of Judge Thomas Burges at Providence. In 1835 he was admitted to the ranks of the legal profession by the Supreme Court, to practice in all the courts of the State of Rhode Island, and discharged the duties pertaining to its practice until his elevation to the judicial bench in 1868, where he has continued to this date, and taken little if any part in mere political contentions.
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The political affiliations of Judge Burges continued from early manhood to the year 1840 in harmony with the Federal, National Republican, and Whig designations of party politics. In that and the following year complaints had become louder, more general, and persistent against the government under the charter of Charles Il., in 1663, and rapidly assumed organized forms of proceeding. What was wanted was a written constitution, notably providing for an extension of the elective fran- chise, not limited, as before, to freeholders and their oldest sons, and an equalization of the Legislature among the various towns, and setting aside the arbitrary appor- tionment of the charter, now come to be enormously disproportioned and unjust.
The old Legislature, of course, would extend no countenance, assent, or authority to any movements of this kind. The Constitutional or Suffrage party, as then called, claimed the right to act without their consent, preserving all the forms of proceeding as nearly as possible to which they had been accustomed.
They called 'a State convention. They framed and submitted to the people a written constitution. It was in due time voted on, and soon after by procla- mation declared to have been adopted by a large majority of the people qualified to vote under it. At an election soon after held the usual State officers and a legislature were duly voted into place, according to the provisions of the new con- stitution. Then followed an attempt to establish and enforce the constitution by a military demonstration. The attempt wholly failed, and was effectually suppressed by the strong resistance it encountered from the State, assisted by the General Govern-
ment. Another constitution, however, was adopted at about this time, promoted by the old Legislature itself, and far more liberal in regard to the elective franchise and the equalization of representation. This Constitution now remains, with its sub- sequent amendments, as the highest law of the State.
With these proceedings, and the reforms sought to be realized from them, the Judge, though always expressing a warm, sympathizing interest, yet never took much active and decisive part.
In 1845 he was appointed United States District-Attorney under the administra- tion of President Polk, and was removed by his successor four years later. He served the State occasionally in one or the other branch of the Legislature, and was elected Attorney-General in 1851, and re-elected in 1852, '53, and '54, and again in 1860 '61, '62, and '63.
Judge Burges was married on the ist of June, 1836, to Eleanor, daughter of the Hon. James Burrill of Providence, who was a member of the United States Senate at the time of his death, in 1820. Mrs. Burges died in Providence on May 21st, 1865. The issue of their union consists of three daughters Cornelia A .. now Mrs. Arnold Green ; Sarah Elizabeth, now Mrs. Charles Morris Smith, and Theodora F. Burges, all now living.
BIOGRAPHICAL ENCYCLOPEDIA.
TINESS, JOHN H., of Providence, Associate Justice of the Supreme Court of Rhode Island. Born in Providence, August 9th, 1840. His father, Philip B. Stiness, of Marblchead, Mass., was a manufacturer, and a citizen of public spirit, who served in the General Assembly of that State. Thc Stiness family is of English origin. The peculiar orthography of the patronymic, as written by the American branch, distinguishes the latter from the parent stock, which retains the ancient form of Staines.
After due academic preparation, young Stiness entered Brown University in September, 1857; remained therein for two years, and then engaged in school teach- ing at North Providence, now the Tenth Ward of the city of Providence. Here he held the position of principal of a grammar school for two years. His pur- pose to return to college and complete the usual course of study was relinquished at the outbreak of the Great Rebellion. Prompt to obey the call of his imperilled country, he accepted a commission as second lieutenant in the Second New York Artillery. In that relation he rendered efficient service up to November, 1862, when he was obliged by illness to resign. The period of his campaigning was not one of the most cheerful and encouraging in the history of the struggle. His experiences were mainly confined to the forts ncar Fairfax, Va., and to the second disastrous battle of Bull Run.
The contests of the cnsanguined field were to be exchanged for the peaceful but not less exciting engagements of the forum. In January, 1863, he began a course of legal study in the office of Thurston & Ripley of Providence, completed it in due time, and was admitted to the bar in March, 1865. From that time onward to October, 1874, he prosecuted professional practice alone, but at the latter date entered into partnership relations with L. M. Cook.
Naturally and properly, Mr. Stiness was called upon to serve in the Legislature of Rhode Island. In April, 1874, he was sent thither by the Republican party, and served one term, during which he was a member of the Judiciary Committee. In the same session he introduced the resolution for the crection of the new court- house, and ably advocated its passage. He afterward succeeded to the place of Dr. Sheppard in the Committee on Construction, after the decease of that gentle- man in May, 1877. His legislative career was also distinguished by his drafting the bill for the admission of North Providence into the civic corporation of Provi- dence. In April, 1875, he was elected an Associate Justice of the Supreme Court.
Judge Stiness was married on the 19th of November, 1868, to Maria E. Williams of Rhode Island.
Charles Matteron
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M ATTESON, CHARLES, Associate Justice of the Supreme Court of Rhode Island. Born in Coventry, Kent County, R. I., March 21st, 1840. His father, Asahel Matteson, is a merchant by occupation, and has served his constituents at Coventry in the State Senate for several different terms. Politically, he is identified with the Republican party. The mother of Judge Matteson was Julia M., daughter of Uzal Johnson, a native of Lyme, Connecticut.
The early education of young Matteson was received in a select school at Providence, taught by Miss Phillips. When five years of age his family removed to Centerville, in the town of Norwich. There he attended the district school for about four years, until the family removed again to Coventry. Afterward he became a student in the Providence Conference Seminary-now called the Greenwich Academy- at Greenwich, R. I., and remained there for several years. His next step was to enter his father's store-that of a general country merchant-at Coventry, as clerk. Two years of dilligent and effective service in that capacity gave him a practical acquaintance with business, and constituted not the least valuable part of his preparation for future legal and judicial dutics. Leaving mercantile pursuits, he re-entered the Greenwich Academy, studied there for a brief period, and then, in January, 1856, entered the University Grammar School at Providence, where he perfected preparation for matriculating at Brown University in September, 1857. At college he bore the reputation of being a close student, and graduated with credit to himself and the institution, as A.B., in 1861.
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