USA > Maine > York County > History of York County, Maine, with illustrations and biographical sketches of its prominent men and pioneers > Part 22
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From the Memorial of Judge Howard in the sixty- seventh volume of the Maine Reports, we select a few ex- tracts bearing upon his life and character.
Hon. N. S. Littlefield said,-
"The circumstances of his death were peculiar. On an early day in the month of December last he left his home in this city with the intention of spending the balance of that day with his only brother and family, on the old homestead in Brownfield, and of spending the next day in Fryeburg, where the Oxford County December term of this court (Supreme Judicial) was being held by Judge Virgin. Ar- riving at Brownfield about noon, he went to his brother's home, and after dinner, it being pleasant, he went out alone and went over the farm on which he was born. Failing to return as soon as expected, search was made, and his lifeless body was found not far from the dwelling-house. It was evident that death overtook bim while on his return from his excursion. He had in his hand a bunch of evergreen, emblematical of his memory, which will twine around our hearts till they cease to beat. . . .
" As a son, as a brother, as a husband, as a father, as a friend, as a man, and as a gentleman, he was all that could be desired ; he was as near perfection as humanity will allow. As a counselor he was in all respects reliable and safe. As a prosecuting officer he was energetic and thorough. As a judge he was patient, affable, untiring, and an earnest seeker after truth. He would rule a point against counsel in so kind and conciliatory a manner that the disappointment would be shorn, to a great extent, of its unpleasantness. His opinions on questions of law are models of conciseness, not at the expense of per- spienity. He never buried his ideas in words."
Sewall C. Strout, Esq., said,-
" I had the pleasure of his intimate acquaintance for thirty years, nine of which I was his partner in the practice of law. This asso- ciation taught me to revere his character, and to love the man as a father. Few men possess the power of self-control which he habitu- ally exercised. . .. His tastes were pure and elevated. . . . In his friendships he was tender and unselfish. His charities were numerous. . . . As a judge he worthily maintained the dignity of the bench."
Judge Barrows said,-
" I miss his presence and his cordial greeting, and in their stead I receive the funeral garland wbich your affectionate respect devotes to decorate his tomb; and I listen to the tribute you pay to departed
worth, and strive to recognize the fact that in these scenes where he has so long been busy he will appear no more forever."
GEORGE W. WALLINGFORD.
George Washington Wallingford was born at Somers- worth, N. H., Feb. 19, 1778. Left an orphan in infancy, he was compelled to struggle through many hardships and trials. He took his first degree at Harvard in 1795, and studied law with Dudley Hubbard, at South Berwick. Being admitted to the bar in 1798, he established himself in the practice of law at Kennebunk in 1800. Joseph Thomas was the only practitioner in the village, then a part of the town of Wells. But two years later Mr. Wal- lingford encountered a competitor, in all respects his equal as a lawyer, an advocate, and a man, in the person of Joseph Dane, of whom more will be said hereafter. Pos- sessing strong will and determination, together with his pleasing address and five qualities as an advocate, he soon attained high rank in the profession. He was a Federalist, and took a prominent part in the contests which fiercely raged in the early part of the present century. In 1813 he was elected one of the representatives of Wells to the General Court, and was successively re-elected till Maine was admitted as a separate State, in 1820. He was a mem- ber of the convention which formed the constitution of Maine, in October, 1819, and had taken a leading part in the preliminary convention held at Brunswick in 1816. When the constitution was drawn up he did not, however, sign it, but stood with the thirty-one other objecting mem- bers, the principal objection being the apportionment of representatives, which was considered by the minority as unjust towards the larger towns, in that it deprived them of an equal proportion of the members in the legislative body. He was likewise opposed to the separation from Massachusetts till Maine should acquire greater wealth and importance; but still represented his town in the State Legislature in 1823, which was the last public act of his life. He died Jan. 19, 1824, at the age of forty-eight, in the midst of his vigor and usefulness, having in a large measure the confidence and esteem of his fellow-citizens. His first wife was Abigail Chadbourne, of Berwick, whom he married in 1806, by whom he had one daughter, who married and died without issue. His wife died in 1808. He married, for his second wife, Mary, daughter of Dr. Jacob Fisher, of Kennebunk, by whom he had one son and four daughters, who survived him.
NICHOLAS EMERY.
Nicholas Emery, the classmate of Judge Dana, opened his law-office in Parsonsfield at the same time his friend established himself at Fryeburg, the autumn of 1789. Mr. Emery was born in Exeter, N. H., Sept. 4, 1776, and was prepared for college at the far-famed Phillips Academy of that place. After graduating at Dartmouth College, in 1795, with the honors of his elass, he studied law with Edward St. Loe Livermore, of Portsmouth, and was admitted to the bar in the autumn of 1798. His accomplishments as a lawyer, and his easy, pleasant manners soon brought him into notice, and after seven or eight years' successful prac- tice in Parsonsfield and in the adjoining county of Straf- ford, N. H., he removed to Portland, in the spring of 1807.
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HISTORY OF YORK COUNTY, MAINE.
In the autumn of the same year he married Ann T., eldest daughter of Governor Gilman, of New Hampshire. His career in Portland was one of uninterrupted success in his profession, although brought into competition with the finest legal talents of the time.
In 1834, on the retirement of Chief Justice Mellen, Judge Weston was promoted to his place, and Mr. Emery was appointed to fill the vacancy on the bench of the Su- preme Court. With honorable fidelity and capability he discharged the duties of his office through the constitu- tional term of seven years. His opinions during this period are recorded in the eight volumes of the Maine Re- ports from the 12th to the 19th, inclusive, and evince care- ful and diligent research and sound and just conclusions. He never took much part in politics, although he was a delegate to the convention of 1816, and also to that which framed the constitution of Maine. In 1832 he was ap- pointed one of the commissioners of the State to negotiate with the United States government for a cession of the dis- pnted territory, under the treaty of 1783. ITis public life closed with the termination of his judicial office, but he lived to be past eighty-four years old, and died Aug. 24, 1861.
JUDAH DANA,
Judah Dana settled at Fryeburg in September, 1798, when that town was included in York County. He was a son of John Winchester Dana and Hannah Pope Putnam, a daughter of Gen. Israel Putnam, and born at Pomfret, Vt., April 25, 1772. He graduated at Dartmouth College in 1795, studied law with Benjamin I. Gilbert, of Hanover, and was admitted to the bar in Grafton Co., N. H., in Sep- tember, 1798. He practiced law at Fryeburg nearly half a century, having, besides his practice in York and Cumber- land Counties, a large practice in New Hampshire. He be- came a leading advocate, and, as he was a careful and labori- ous student, he acquired a high reputation and a lucrative practice.
His first competitor, who settled in a neighboring town, was his classmate, Nicholas Emery, at Parsonsfield. Jacob McGaw, from New Hampshire, and two years after him in college, settled in the same town in 1801, and a sharp rivalry and competion sprang up between them. Two years later Mr. MeGaw removed to Bangor, and was succeeded by Samuel A. Bradley, a graduate of Dartmouth in 1799, who for a long series of years was a competitor both in law and politics with Mr. Dana. After Oxford County was erected, in 1805, both lawyers found places in the Probate Court,-Mr. Dana as judge, and Mr. Bradley as register.
Mr. Dana continued in active practice for many years, with increasing success both in the Common Pleas and the Supreme Court, and was appointed to several political of- fices. In 1833 he was one of the Executive Council in the administration of Governor Smith. In 1836-37 he was one of the bank commissioners. In 1836 he was appointed by Governor Dunlap United States senator for the re- mainder of Judge Shepley's term, who resigned that office on being appointed judge of the Supreme Court. An in- timate friend of Judge Dana gives the following estimate of his character and abilities :
" He was a ready speaker, urbane and conciliating, but of unques- tioned firmness. In all public positions he was true and faithful, and fully equal to the demand upon him. In private life no gentleman could be more genial. Time and chance were never wanting with him to say and do kind things to every one within his cirele. In a large sphere of professional life. Judge Dana could have acquired a more brilliant reputation, but he loved the country and its retirement, and there chose to act his part, keeping fresh, however, in the world's his- tory, living and past."
He was one of the trustees of Bowdoin College from 1820 to 1843, and a member of the convention at Portland to form the constitution of Maine.
Among the students in his office were Daniel Webster, for a short period, Gen. Samuel Fessenden, Peter C. Vir- gin, of Rumford, Gen. Eleazer Wheelock Ripley, Joseph Howard, Philip Eastman, of Saco, Henry B. Osgood, and several others. Mr. Webster graduated at Dartmouth in 1801, and in the latter part of the same year took charge of the academy at Fryeburg. While occupying this posi- tion he was reading law in Mr. Dana's office. An interest- ing correspondence between the great statesman and Mr. Dana took place on this subject in 1804 .*
Mr. Dana's first wife was Elizabeth, the youngest daugh- ter of Prof. Sylvanus Ripley, of Dartmouth College; his second wife was the widow of Gen. John McMillen, of Fryeburg. His only son who survived infancy was Hon. John W. Dana, one of the Governors of Maine. Of his several daughters, one married Judge Howard, of Portland ; another Judge Goodenow, of Alfred.
TEMPLE HOVEY.
Temple Hovey studied law with Dudley Hubbard, of Berwick, and was admitted to the bar in 1800. He died about two years after his admission to practice. He was a son of Dr. Ivory Hovey, of South Berwick, and a descend- ant of Rev. Ivory Hovey, a learned clergyman of Plymouth and Rochester, in the Old Colony, who died in 1803, at the age of eighty-nine.
JOSEPH DANE.
Joseph Dane, for fifty years a distinguished lawyer at Kennebunk, was the son of John and Jemima (Fellows) Dane, of Beverly, Mass., in which town he was born on the 25th of October, 1778. Ile was a nephew of the emi- nent lawyer and statesman, Nathan Dane, and a descendant of John Dane, born in Colchester, England, in 1613, who came with his parents and two sisters to Roxbury, Mass., in 1636.
Mr. Dane's parents were natives of Ipswich. His father died in 1829, in his eightieth year; his mother in 1827, aged seventy-six.
His preparatory studies were pursued at Phillips Acad- emy, at Andover, after which he entered Harvard College, where he graduated in 1799, and at once entered the office of his uncle, the distinguished Nathan Dane, of Beverly, as a student-at-law. In June, 1802, he was admitted to prac- tice in Essex County, and immediately opened an office at Kennebunk, then included in the town of Wells, where he soon became prominent as a sound lawyer, an able advocate, and an upright man. " He continued to practice till 1837,
# Willis' Lawyers aud Courts of Maine, pp. 260-61.
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BENCHI AND BAR OF YORK COUNTY.
having maintained for more than a third of a century a character for spotless integrity, and for great honor and ability in his profession ; and during the latter portion of the time was a leader at the bar of York County."
Mr. Dane's natural conservatism and high sense of the dignity of his profession kept him, for the most part, out of the political arena. He scorned the tricks of the dema- gogue, and accepted office only at the urgent solicitations of his fellow-citizens. He, however, took a deep interest in ques- tions of public policy, and was active in the measures taken for the organization of Maine as an independent State. He was a member of the preliminary convention held at Bruns- wick in 1816, and of that which framed the constitution, in 1819, and was a member of the very able committee appointed to draft that instrument, in which his judicial and statesmanlike qualifications were brought into appro- priate exercise. In 1818 he was chosen one of the two Executive Councilors of Massachusetts, then allowed to Maine, but he declined the office. In 1820 he was chosen a member of the Sixteenth Congress, for the unexpired term of Mr. Holmes, who had been elected to the Senate. He was re-elected to the Seventeenth Congress, and, having served out his term, declined to be again a candidate. He served his town as representative in the State Legislature in the years 1824-25, 1832-33, and 1839-40, and the county in the Senate in 1829. At the close of the session of 1840 he retired from public life altogether, having de- clined the appointment of commissioner to revise the pub- lic statutes and the office of Executive Councilor, both of which were honorably tendered him. His preference was for the enjoyments of private life, and the repose of his own excellent family, for which he was eminently fitted by his strong domestic attachments and his genial and social qualities. In every public office, and in every act of private life, his conduct was characterized by a firm, undeviating sense of right, and a conscientious determination neither to do nor to submit to what was wrong or unjust. The record for more than half a century, which he left among his fellow-citizens, his neighbors, and his most intimate acquaint- ances, is unblemished.
His wife was Mary, daughter of Hon. James Clark, of Kennebunk, to whom he was united in marriage in Octo- ber, 1808. She was a lady of great excellence of charac- ter, and survived her lamented husband many years. Of the two sons and one daughter, the fruit of this union, the eldest son, Joseph, succeeded to his father's profession and business, in which he is still engaged at Kennebunk. (More will be found of his life on another page.) His sec- ond son, Nathan, a farmer, residing in Alfred, was member of the State Senate from York County in 1857-58, and State treasurer subsequently.
Mr. Dane died at his residence, in Kennebunk, on the 1st of May, 1858, aged seventy-nine.
SAMUEL A. BRADLEY.
Among the eminent lawyers who settled at the beginning of this century in Fryeburg was the subject of this notice. He was a college friend of Daniel Webster and two years his senior, and through his persistent efforts Mr. Webster was received into the office of Hou. Christopher Gore, of
Boston, as a law-student. Mr. Webster was then unknown except to a few personal friends and at Dartmouth College, where he had just graduated. Mr. Bradley's application was at first rejected. At last he carried to him one of Web- ster's literary productions (a Fourth of July oration ) and requested Mr. Gore to read and then see if he would not change his decision. Mr. Gore took it with some impa- tience, saying he was very pertinacious, and dipped into it here and there, finally commenced at the beginning and read it through ; then said, " Bring your young friend along and I will see him." Mr. Gore received him into his office, and frequently afterwards, when meeting Mr. Bradley in the street, would speak to him pleasantly for bringing that young man to his office.
We transfer from Mr. Willis' work on lawyers the fol- lowing racy letter of Mr. Webster to Mr. Bradley :
" BOSCAWEN, August 19, 1806. " DEAR SIR,-Circumstances do not permit me to see you this week at Gilmanton. I am late from Boston, and at present am greatly pressed in my time by some little affairs. I have made up my mind to escort you to Commencement, if you desire to take that mode of conveyance. I have a comfortable chaise and an ordinary horse, that can draw us from this to Hanover in a day. If you have a nag to put before him to open the cause, mine, I think, would bring up the rear of the argument pretty well. However, we shall do tolerably well with one horse.
"I shall expect to see you thia way on Friday or Saturday, when we will make a definite arrangement. I should choose to be early at Hanover, and leave immediately after Commencement. Thursday and Friday are languid days. Dr. Perkins is expected this way to- morrow. His wife is at Hanover, and so is Mrs. Ticknor. I hear of many people who think of visiting Commencement,-probably be- cause they know you and I will be there,-and the collection, I fancy, will be numerous.
" Yours, verily, D. WEBSTER. " P. S .- Rebecca-Miss Rebecca MeGaw-has just ridden by my window, going to Commencement. How the girls expect us !"
An ancedote of these two young lawyers and friends is thus related : they had been attending court at Sanborn, N. H. After the adjournment Mr. Bradley took Mr. Web- ster in his sleigh on their return home. He had a fine large horse, justly called " Old Mars." As they were rising a hill towards night, they overtook a feeble old man who was struggling up the hill with a load of wood drawn by a poor, broken-down horse. The man, in turning his horse from the path to let the travelers pass, found his team sunk in the deep snow on the side, from which neither man nor horse seemed able to get clear. Webster and Bradley saw the sad plight and sadder countenance of the poor wood- man, and without a moment's delay they took their power- ful horse off their sleigh, and putting him before the wood- man's load and horse, soon extricated them, and moved the whole safely up the hill, to the infinite joy of the poor old man and their own happy consciousness of a good deed promptly done. They had a hard struggle to get the load out of the deep snow. Mr. Webster used a rail behind the load and Bradley led the horse. The latter, in relating the story in after-years, said, " Webster lifted like a giant."
Mr. Bradley established himself at Fryeburg in 1803 or early in 1804, finding there Judah Dana and Jacob Me- Gaw,-a large supply of legal talent for the small population. But then their practice was extended into a considerable of the adjoining portion of New Hampshire, as well as
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HISTORY OF YORK COUNTY, MAINE.
southward and eastward. Mr. McGaw moved to Bangor in 1805, where he became eminent, and left Judge Dana and Mr. Bradley for some time alone. There was much rivalry between these gentlemen, not only at the bar, but in political life ; for Mr. Bradley was a very ardent Federalist, and Judge Dana, although belonging originally to that party, had zealously espoused the rising Democracy ; and the town in its political character was very nearly equally divided. Mr. Bradley held the office of register of probate from the formation of the new county of Oxford till 1810, when he resigned, and devoted himself with all the ardor and enthu- siasm of his nature to the practice of his profession, and to the discussion of the political issues of his time.
During the exciting periods of the embargo, the war of 1812, and the discussion on the policy of separation, he threw himself with all his warmth of feeling into the con- flicts of the party. He was five years a member of the General Court from Fryeburg, from 1813 to 1818, and was a violent oppouent of the war with Great Britain, and of the erection of Maine into a State. His town voted against the separation in 1816, but in favor of it by a majority of seventy-eight to seventy in 1819, when the measure was carried.
In 1825, Mr. Bradley moved to Portland, and engaged in speculations in timber-lands, and other interests outside of his profession, by which he became wealthy. In his prime he was a tall, well-proportioned man, of handsome person and pleasing address.
After his career in Portland he returned to Fryeburg in July, 1841, and died at the house of his brother Robert, September 24, 1844, at the age of sixty-niue years and ten months. He was never married.
EDWARD EMERSON BOURNE, LL.D.
Edward Emerson Bourne, LL.D., was born at Kenne- bunk, then a part of the town of Wells, in the county of York, March 19, 1797. His father was John Bourne, born at Wells, Aug. 14, 1759, a soldier of the Revolu- tion, and son of Benjamin Bourne (1st), of the same place. Early in the war,-in the fall of 1775,-when only sixteen years of age, John enlisted in the service of the country, and marched in company of Capt. - Sawyer, to Lake Champlain. He was stationed at the village of St. John's, at the outlet of the lake, during the principal part of the year 1776. His mother died when he was seven years of age, and his father subsequently married Hannah Sewall, of York. His father dying when he was eighteen years old, the care and responsibility of the family devolved upon him. He at one time embarked on a three-months' cruise on board the privateer "Sullivan," but the voyage, financially considered, was a failure, no prizes being taken.
Feeling the importance of doing something by which a comfortable maintenance might be assured, he learned the trade of shipwright. Having perfected himself in the trade, he commenced business at the landing in Kennebunk. There he built many ships for Theodore Lyman, Esq., a wealthy ship-owner, then a resident there, but subsequently removing to Boston, Mass.
On the removal of Mr. Lyman, Mr. Bourne bought his homestead, and continued building ships on his own account,
in most of which he retained an interest ; so that previous to the war of 1812 he had acquired a comfortable compe- tency.
Mr. Bourne was thrice married. His first wife was Miss Abigail Hubbard, to whom he was married Feb. 6, 1783, who died Dec. 10, 1787. Their children were Olive, born July 10, 1784; Samuel, born Dec. 1, 1785; and Benjamin, born Sept. 3, 1787.
His second wife was Sally Kimball ; married June 19, 1788; died May 29, 1794. Their children were John, born Nov. 1, 1799 ; James, born Aug. 5, 1792; Charles, born Dec. 10, 1793.
His third wife, to whom he was married Sept. 10, 1794, was Elizabeth, widow of Israel Wildes. (Her maiden name was Elizabeth Perkins. They had three children,-Susan, born June 26, 1786; Eliza, born Nov. 5, 1787 ; Abigail, born June 6, 1790.)
The issue of this third marriage were Israel W., Edward E. (the subject of this sketch), Thomas P., George W., Julia A., and Olive. The sons have all deceased. The daughters survive,-Julia A., as the wife of Henry Kings- bury, who succeeded Mr. Bourne in business, with his son, George W. Bourne, under the firm-name of Bourne & Kingsbury, and who still occupies the old homestead; and Olive, the widow of the late Capt. Ivory Lord, also living at Kennebunk.
Mr. Bourne, fully appreciating the importance of a good education, which the early death of his parents and the unsettled state of the country had precluded him from en- joying, determined that a portion of the fortune which he had accumulated in his manhood should be devoted to a liberal education of the children then growing up; and although by the time the sons were old enough to enter college the war had made sad inroads upon his estate, pre- venting the prosecution of his ordinary business,-his ships lying idle at the wharves,-he still adhered to his cherished object of investing a portion of what remained in a colle- giate education of his sons, where, safe from the contin- gency of material mishaps, it should continue to yield to them, through all their lives, its fruits of increased useful- ness, joy, and satisfaction.
Israel, Edward, and Thomas were educated at Bowdoin College. George, preferring a more active life, remained at home, and on becoming of age, entered into the business of ship-building with his father, under the firm-name of John Bourne & Son.
Preparatory to entering college, Edward was sent to South Berwick Academy in 1811. At the commencement in September of the next year he was admitted to Bowdoin College, graduating from that institution at the age of nine -. teen. Among his classmates were John Searle Tenney, chief justice of the Supreme Court of Maine, Prof. Al- pheus S. Packard, of Bowdoin College, and the late Ran- dolph A. L. Codman, of Portland, Me., one of the most brilliant lawyers of his day.
Immediately after graduation, Mr. Bourne entered the office of George W. Wallingford, Esq., at Kennebunk, and prosecuted his legal studies there, and at the office of Thomas Bigelow, Esq., at Philadelphia, during the term of three years then required of law students, and at the October
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