USA > Connecticut > The history of Connecticut, from the first settlement of the colony to the adoption of the present constitution, vol. II > Part 55
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BRACE, JONATHAN, was born in Harwinton, November 12, 1754, graduated at
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Yale College in 1779, and studied law with Oliver Ellsworth. He commenced the practice of his profession in Manchester, Vermont, and while there he held the offices of justice of the peace, state's attorney, and member of the council of censors. He subsequently settled in Glastenbury, Connecticut, and represented that town in the General Assembly several times, until August, 1794, when he removed to Hartford, where he continued to reside until his decease. He was state's attorney for the county of Hartford, judge of the county court, judge of probate, assistant, and member of Congress. After the adoption of the constitu- tion of the state, he was twice elected a member of the state senate. He was also frequently elected a member of the common council and board of aldermen of the city of Hartford, and held the office of mayor for nine years. He died in Hart- ford, August 26, 1837.
BRADLEY, STEPHEN R., LL. D., was born in Cheshire, October 20, 1754, and graduated at Yale in 1775. He was the aid of General Wooster, when that officer was slain. He settled in Vermont, and became one of the most popular men in that state. In 1791, he was elected to the Senate of the United States, and continued a member of that body for sixteen years. He died at Walpole, New Hampshire, December 16, 1830, aged 76.
BUEL, JESSE, was born in Coventry, January 4, 1778, and having learned the trade of a printer, he commenced the publication of the "Troy Budget," at Troy, New York, in 1797. He subsequently, for ten years, published a paper called " The Plebeian," at Kingston, Ulster county. In 1813, he removed to Albany, and commenced " The Albany Argus," and during the following year was appointed state printer, a lucrative office, which he continued to hold until 1820, when he sold out the Argus and abandoned the printing business. He now turned his attention to other matters. Having purchased a farm of eighty-five acres in the vicinity of Albany, he soon converted it from " sandy barrens" into what has long been favorably known as "The Albany Nursery." In 1834, he commenced the publication of "The Albany Cultivator," a valuable agricultural periodical, which under his management soon had a list of twenty-three thousand subscribers. While residing on his farm, Mr. Buel was several times elected a representative from Albany county to the legislature ; was a judge of the court of common pleas, and a regent of the state university. In 1836, he was the regular whig candidate for the office of governor of New York. He died at Danbury, Connecticut, while on his way to Norwich and New Haven, October 6, 1839. Besides, the periodi- cals already named, Judge Buel was the author of a volume on agriculture, pub- lished by the Harpers, New York, and "The Farmers' Companion," published under the auspices of the Massachusetts' Board of Education, and constituting one of the members of their District School Library.
BURR, AARON, was born in Fairfield in 1714, and graduated at Yale in 1735. In 1742, he was settled as the pastor of the presbyterian church in Newark, N. J. From 1748, until his death, (which took place September 24, 1757,) he was pre- sident of New Jersey college, at Princeton. He was an accomplished scholar and an able divine. He married a daughter of the great Jonathan Edwards, and had two children-a daughter who married Chief Justice Reeve, of Litchfield, and Aaron Burr, who became Vice President of the United States.
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CHAUNCEY, CHARLES, LL. D., was born in Durham, June 11, 1747, and studied law with James A. Hillhouse, Esq., of New Haven, where he continued to reside until his decease. He was not only a sound and able lawyer, but was learned in various departments of literature, history, civil policy, and theology. In 1789, he was appointed a judge of the superior court. Judge Chauncey died in New Haven, April 18, 1823. His son of the same name, graduated at Yale in 1792, and became an eminent lawyer in Philadelphia. He died in Burlington, New Jersey, August 30, 1849, aged 73. Both received the degree of doctor of laws.
CHIPMAN, NATHANIEL, LL. D., was born in Salisbury, November 15, 1752, graduated at Yale in 1777, and settled as a lawyer in Tinmouth, then the capital of Rutland county, Vermont. In 1786, he was elected a judge of the supreme court ; in 1789 he was chosen chief justice ; and two years after, he received the appointment of judge of the United States district court. He was subsequently again elected chief justice, and in 1797, he was chosen United States senator. For twenty-eight years he was professor of law in Middlebury College. He re- ceived the degree of doctor of laws from Dartmouth College, in 1797.
In 1793, Judge Chipman published a volume entitled " Sketches of the Princi- ples of Government," and another entitled, " Reports and Dissertations." The first of these works, with additions, was revised and republished in an octavo volumes, of 333 pages, in 1833. He died at Tinmouth, February 15, 1843, in the 91st year of his age.
CHIPMAN, DANIEL, LL. D., brother of the preceding, was born in Salisbury, Octo- ber 22, 1765, graduated at Dartmouth College in 1788, and having studied law, he was admitted to the bar in 1790. He commenced practice at Rutland, Vermont, and in 1793, he represented that town in the convention held at Windsor for amending the constitution. During the following year he removed to Middlebury. He was frequently elected a member of both branches of the legislature, and in 1813 and 1814, he was chosen speaker of the House. In 1815, he was elected to Congress ; was subsequently reporter of the supreme court ; and in 1836, was chosen a member of the constitutional convention. He was also professor of law in Middlebury College, and a fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences.
In 1822, Mr. Chipman published an "Essay on the Law of Contracts for the Payment of Specific Articles ;" and has since published a volume of "Law Reports ;" "The Life of Nathaniel Chipman, LL. D., with selections from his miscellaneous Papers ;" "The Life of Colonel Seth Warner ;" and "The Life of Governor Thomas Chittenden." In 1848, he received the degree of doctor of laws from Dartmouth College.
CHITTENDEN, THOMAS, was born in East Guilford, in 1730. At the age of twenty years he married a sister of the Rev. Samuel Johnson, D.D., of Stratford, and soon after settled in Salisbury, in the north-west corner of the colony. While a resident of that town, he was commissioned as a colonel of militia, and was elected a representative at thirteen sessions, between the years 1764 and 1772, inclusive. In 1774, he removed to Williston, on Onion river, in the " New Hamp- shire Grants," so called. He was a member of the convention which, January
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16, 1777, declared Vermont an independent state, and was appointed one of the commissioners to negotiate for her admission into the Union. From 1778 to 1797, with the exception of a single year, he was annually elected governor of Vermont. He died August 24, 1797. His son, Martin Chittenden, was a member of Con- gress from 1803 to 1813, and governor of Vermont in 1813 and 1814.
CHURCH, SAMUEL, LL. D., was born in Salisbury, February 4, 1785, and graduated at Yale in 1803. He studied law with the Hon. Judson Canfield, of Sharon, and at the Litchfield Law School, and was admitted to the bar in Septem- ber, 1806. In the spring of 1808, he commenced the practice of law in his native town; was appointed postmaster in 1810, a justice of the peace in 1818, and during the later year he was chosen a delegate to the convention which formed the present constitution of this state. He was subsequently a member of the house of representatives six sessions, judge of the probate court eleven years, state's attorney ten years, and in 1832 was chosen a judge of the superior court, and of the supreme court of errors. In May 1847, he was appointed chief judge of the supreme court, and at the following commencement of Trinity College he received the degree of doctor of laws. He died in 1854.
CHURCH, LEMAN, brother of the preceding, was born in Salisbury, and pursued his professional studies at the Litchfield Law School in 1815 and 1816. Soon after his admission to the bar, he took up his residence in Canaan, where he con- tinued to reside until his death. He became one of the best criminal lawyers in the state, and had a very extensive practice. He was occasionally a representa- tive from Canaan; for several years he held the office of state's attorney ; and in 1835, he was appointed by the legislature, in connection with the Hon. Royal R. Hinman and the Hon. Elisha Phelps, a commissioner to revise the public statutes of Connecticut. He died in Canaan, in 1849.
CUSHMAN, JOHN PAINE, was born in Pomfret, graduated at Yale in 1807, mar- ried a daughter of the Hon. Benjamin Tallmadge of Litchfield, and settled in Troy, N. Y., in the practice of the law. He was elected to Congress, was recorder of Troy, a judge of the circuit court, and a regent of the university. He was a man of eminence in his profession, and discharged the duties of these various offices with fidelity and ability. He died, September 16, 1848, aged 64.
DAGGETT, DAVID, LL. D., was born in Attleborough, Mass., December 31, 1764, graduated at Yale in 1783, read law with Charles Chauncey, Esq., and settled in New Haven. He was frequently a representative and speaker of the House, and member of the council. From 1813 to 1819, he was a senator in Congress ; from 1826 to 1832 he was a judge of the supreme court, and was chief judge from the latter date until he reached the age of 70 years-December 31, 1834. He was also state's attorney, mayor of New Haven, and professor of law in Yale College. He died April 12, 1851.
DEANE, SILAS, was born in Groton, graduated at Yale in 1758, and became a resident of Wethersfield. In 1774, he was chosen a member of the Continental Congress, and continued in that body until he was appointed as a political and commercial agent from the government of the United States to the court of France, to endeavor to obtain her assistance. He arrived in Paris, in June, 1776. Through his efforts, Lafayette, Rochambeau, and others, were induced to
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engage with us in the cause of independence. With Dr. Franklin and Arthur Lee, he was a commissioner for negotiating treaties with foreign powers. He died at Deal, in England, August 23, 1789.
DICKINSON, DANIEL S., was born in Goshen, September 11, 1800, and at the age of twenty-five years commenced the study of the law in the office of Messrs. Clark and Clapp, Norwich, New York. In 1829, he was admitted to the bar, and after practicing his new profession for a short time in Guilford, in that state, he removed to Binghamton, Broome county, his present residence. Here his busi- ness increased, and he soon became a favorite with his political party. In 1834, he was elected president of the village of Binghamton, and in 1836 he was elected a member of the senate of New York for the term of four years. In 1840, he was nominated for the office of lieutenant-governor, but was defeated at the general election ; in 1842, however, he was elected to that honorable post by a majority of about twenty-five thousand. In 1844, he was elected one of the two presiden- tial electors for the state at large, and cast his vote for Mr. Polk. About the same time, he received from Governor Bouck the appointment of United States Sena- tor, to fill the vacancy occasioned by the resignation of Mr. Tallmadge. On the assembling of the legislature, he was duly elected for the unexpired term; and was subsequently reelected for the full term of six years-which expired on the 4th of March, 1851.
DWIGHT, TIMOTHY, DD., LL, D., was born at Northampton, Massachusetts, May 14, 1752. His father was Colonel Timothy Dwight, who graduated at Yale College in 1744, and became a merchant in Northampton, where he married Mary, daughter of the celebrated Jonathan Edwards. The subject of this sketch gradu- ated at Yale in 1769; and was a tutor in that institution from 1771 to 1777. In the last year, he served as chaplain to Parsons' brigade at West Point; and dur- ing that period he wrote several patriotic songs, the most celebrated of which was entitled "Columbia." On the death of his father, he took up his residence in his native town, in 1778, where he spent about five years ; and was chosen a repre- sentative in 1781 and 1782. On the 5th of November, 1783, he was ordained as pastor of the church in Greenfield, Connecticut, where he remained for twelve years. In 1785, he published his celebrated poem, "The Conquest of Canaan," which was written eleven years before; and in 1795, he published another poem entitled " Greenfield Hill." On the death of President Stiles, he was chosen Pre- sident of Yale College, and was inaugurated in September, 1795. In this office he remained until his death, which took place at New Haven, January 11, 1817. In March, 1777, he had married a daughter of Benjamin Woolsey, of Long Island, by whom he had eight sons, six of whom survived him. One of these was the Rev. Sereno E. Dwight, D.D., President of Hamilton College, who died in 1850. The principal prose works of President Dwight, are his Travels, in 4 octavo volumes; and " Theology Explained and Defended," in 4 volumes.
He was succeeded in the Presidency of Yale College, by the Rev. Jeremiah Day, D.D., LL. D., who had been professor of mathematics and natural philoso- phy for the fourteen years next preceding ; in 1851, President Day resigned, and Professor Theodore D. Woolsey, D.D., LL. D., was elected his successor, and still remains at the head of that venerable institution.
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DYER, ELIPHALET, LL. D., of Windham, graduated at Yale in 1740. In August, 1755, he was commissioned as a lieutenant-colonel of one of the Connec- ticut regiments designed for the reinforcement of our army in the vicinity of Crown Point; and in March, 1758, he was appointed colonel of a regiment raised for the service against the French in Canada. In 1762, he was chosen a mem- ber of the council ; in 1765, he was chosen a delegate to the General Congress in New York; from 1766 to 1789, he was a judge of the superior court ; and from 1789 to 1793, he was chief judge of that court. In 1774, he was elected a mem- ber of the Continental Congress, and continued in that body, with the exception of one year, until 1783. Judge Dyer received the degree of doctor of laws from Yale College in 1787. He died May 13, 1807, aged 86 years.
EDMOND, WILLIAM, was born of Irish parents, in South Britain (then a parish of Woodbury,) September 28, 1755, and graduated at Yale in 1773. He was a vol- unteer soldier at the burning of Danbury, and received a wound in his leg which made him lame for life. He studied law and settled in Newtown, where he mar- ried a daughter of General Chandler. She having died, he married a daughter of Benjamin Payne, Esq., of Hartford. He was chosen a representative and speaker of the House, member of the council, representative in Congress, and judge of the supreme court. He died in Newton, August 1, 1838, aged 82 years. He was a man of powerful frame and of superior intellectual endowments.
EDWARDS, JONATHAN, D.D., son of the great divine of the same name, was born in Northampton, Mass., June 6, 1745, and graduated at the college of New Jer- sey in 1765. Having studied divinity with Dr. Bellamy at Bethlem, he was ordained pastor of the church at White Haven, in the town of New Haven, January 5, 1769, and remained there until May, 1795. He was soon after set- tled over the church in Colebrook, Litchfield county, and in June, 1799, he was elected president of Union College, and immediately entered upon the duties of this appointment. He died August 1, 1801, aged 56. Dr. Edwards was a man of uncommon powers of mind. He published a large number of sermons and dissertations, and edited several volumes of his father's works.
EDWARDS, PIERPONT, of New Haven, was one of the most successful lawyers of his time. He was speaker of the Connecticut house of representatives, member of the Continental Congress, judge of the United States district court, and mem- ber of the convention which formed the state constitution.
EDWARDS, HENRY W., LL. D., son of the preceding, graduated at the college of New Jersey in 1797, studied his profession at the Litchfield Law School, and settled in New Haven. He was a representative in Congress from 1819 to 1823 ; United States senator from 1823 to 1827 ; member of the state senate in 1828 and 1829 ; speaker of the Connecticut house of representatives in 1830; and governor in 1833, and from 1835 to 1838. He died in New Haven in 1847.
FITCH, THOMAS, born in Norwalk, graduated at Yale in 1721, and settled in his native town. He was chosen an assistant the first time in 1734, and held the office for twelve years. From 1750 to 1754, he was lieutenant-governor of the colony, and from 1754 to 1766, he held the office of governor. He was also chief judge of the colony for four years. In October, 1742, Mr. Fitch was appointed by the legislature, in connection with Roger Wolcott, Jonathan Trumbull, and
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John Bulkley, to make a revision of all the laws of the colony. He died in Nor- walk, July 18, 1774, aged 77 years.
FITCH, JOHN, was born in East Windsor, and became one of the most ingen- ious and celebrated mechanics of the age in which he lived. In the Revolution, he was principally employed in repairing arms for the continental army, residing during the war in New Jersey and Pennsylvania. In 1785, he conceived the idea of propelling water-craft by steam. At that time, he did not know that there was such a thing in existence as a steam-engine. In 1788, he obtained a patent for the application of steam to navigation. During the year previous, he had con- structed a boat which made an experimental trip on the river at Philadelphia, the governor and council of Pennsylvania being present, who were so much gratified with the result that they presented Fitch with an elegant silk flag. The boat at that time went at the rate of eight miles an hour. Mr. Fitch subsequently visited France, for the purpose of introducing the invention into that country ; but as the French were then in the midst of revolutions, he failed in the accomplishment of . his plans. Mr. Vaill, our Consul at L'Orient, afterwards subjected to the examina- tion of Mr. Fulton, the papers and designs of Fitch. Mr. Fitch, in 1790, made still farther improvements in his steamboat, but was unable to obtain the means sufficient to perfect his great invention. He was, however, sanguine of the ulti- mate triumph of his plan of navigation ; and in June, 1792, in a letter to Mr. Rittenhouse on his favorite theme, he wrote-" This, sir, will be the mode of crossing the Atlantic in time, whether I bring it to perfection or not." It is now generally conceded that the honor of inventing and building the first steamboat in the world, belongs to John Fitch.
FOOTE, SAMUEL A., LL. D., was born in Cheshire, Nov. 8, 1780, graduated at Yale in 1797, and commenced the practice of law in his native town. He was chosen a member of Congress in 1819, 1823, and 1833 ; was speaker of the Con- necticut house of representatives in 1825 and 1826; and was a senator in Con- gress from 1827 to 1833. In 1834, he was elected governor of the state, and during the same year he received the degree of doctor of laws from Yale Col- lege. Governor Foote died September 16, 1846.
GALLAUDET, THOMAS H., LL. D., was born in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, December 10, 1787. When he was thirteen years of age the family removed to Hartford, and in 1805 he graduated at Yale College. He engaged in the study of law at Hartford until he was chosen tutor in Yale College, in which situation he remained for two years. After a short experience in the mercantile business, he studied theology, and was licensed to preach in 1814. He now turned his thoughts to the instruction of deaf mutes, and became a pioneer in that work of benevolence. In 1815, he went to Europe in order to learn the best method of instruction. Soon after his return to this country, and mainly through his influ- ence, The American Asylum for the Deaf and Dumb was opened in Hartford, and he was appointed principal. This was the first institution of the kind in the United States. He subsequently published several works on the subject. From 1838, until his last sickness, he was chaplain of the "Insane Retreat" at Hartford. He died September 9, 1851. A discourse on his life, character and services, was
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delivered by the Hon. Henry Barnard, LL. D., at Hartford, in January, 1852, which was published.
GODDARD, CALVIN, was born in Shrewsbury, Mass., July 17, 1768, and graduated at Dartmouth in 1786. He was admitted to the bar in Norwich, in November, 1790, and settled in Plainfield, from which place he was elected a representative at nine sessions, three of which he was speaker of the House. He removed to Norwich in 1807. From 1801 to 1805 he was a member of Congress ; and from 1808 to 1815, he was a member of the council. He was also state's attorney for the county of New London for five years, and mayor of Norwich for seventeen years.
GOLD, NATHAN, of Fairfield, was chosen a member of the council for the first time in 1657, and held the office for forty-eight years. He was also chief judge of the superior court for ten years, and deputy governor of Connecticut, from 1708 to 1724. Unless there were two persons bearing the same name and residing in the same place, holding office continuously, the period of his official life extended over a period of sixty-seven years.
GOODRICH, CHAUNCEY, was the eldest son of the Rev. Elizur Goodrich, D.D., of Durham, Connecticut, and was born on the 20th of October, 1759. After a career of great distinction at Yale College, where he spent nine years as a student, a Berkeley scholar, and a tutor, he was admitted to the bar at Hartford in the autumn of 1781. It was the leading trait in his character as an advocate, that he studied and applied the law chiefly in its principles. He regarded it as one of the noblest of human sciences, in which no truth stands insulated, but each new case, as it arises, is only part of a great and harmonious system of thought. He was, therefore, a "black letter lawyer ;" thoroughly versed in the writings of the early masters of the profession, whose principles he was continually revolving in his mind, or contemplating under new aspects as presented in later elementary trea- tises down to the day of his death. In studying a subject, lie was remarkable for the tenacity with which he clung to it in its minutest details, until all were ex- hausted; so that an able lawyer once observed, after consulting him for some hours on a point of great importance, "He has given us every thing that can possibly belong to the case ; he has said all that can truly be said by any man, on both sides of the question." One who saw him only while weighing a subject with this extreme nicety, might almost have thought him vacillating in his opinions ; but when the balance turned and his judgment was finally made up, it was immu- table as the law of gravity. In arguing a case, he laid no stress on the minor points. He usually waived them with a frankness which gained him the favor of all ; and taking his stand upon a few great principles, he urged them with a dignity of manner, a candor towards his opponents, a copiousness and force of argument, an evident and most perfect conviction of the truth of what he said, and a calm but deep earnestness of feeling, which gave him extraordinary power over a court and jury.
After serving in the state legislature for a single session, he was elected to Con- gress as a member of the house of representatives, in the year 1794. For this station he was peculiarly qualified not only by the original bent of his mind and his habits of study, but also by the fact that an early marriage into the family of
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the second Governor Wolcott, had brought him into the closest relations with public men and measures, and made him investigate all the great questions of the day with profound interest and attention. His brother-in-law (afterward the third Governor Wolcott,) held one of the highest offices under the General Govern- ment. This led him, from the moment he took his seat in Congress, to become intimately acquainted with the plans and policy of the administration ; and he gave them his warmest support, under the impulse alike of political principle and of personal feeling. A party in opposition to General Washington was now organ- ized for the first time in Congress, as the result of Mr. Jay's treaty with Great Britain. Mr. Goodrich took a large share in the debates which followed ; and gained the respect of all parties by his characteristic dignity, candor, and force of judgment; and especially by his habit of contemplating a subject on every side, and discussing it in its remotest relations and dependencies. Mr. Albert Gallatin, then the most active leader of the opposition, remarked to a friend near the close of his life, that in these debates he usually selected the speech of Chauncey Good- rich as the object of reply ; feeling that if he could answer him, he would have met every thing truly relevant to the subject which had been urged on the part of the government.
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