USA > Missouri > Cole County > Jefferson City > The Bench and bar of St. Louis, Kansas City, Jefferson City, and other Missouri cities : biographical sketches > Part 13
USA > Missouri > St Louis County > St Louis City > The Bench and bar of St. Louis, Kansas City, Jefferson City, and other Missouri cities : biographical sketches > Part 13
USA > Missouri > Jackson County > Kansas City > The Bench and bar of St. Louis, Kansas City, Jefferson City, and other Missouri cities : biographical sketches > Part 13
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above the average In collection with la profession he has dealt extensively in land, though not as an agent, and fatterly he has made real-estate law a specialty. He is one of the fortunate ones, and placed himself years ago in very comforta- be circumstances Prennianily his helder has had the happy faculty of multiply- ing its rounds from time to time until then number is quite respectable.
Mr. De France is trying to work his way out of practice, and does nothing except for old clients, whom he does not like to refuse.
Mr. De France was for some time one of the regents of the North Missouri Normal School, at Kirksville, and president of the board, and for a period of ten years he was attorney for the Quincy, Missouri and Pacific Railroad Company.
He is a strict constructionist democrat of the stanchest kind, but has lost no flesh in pining for office. He is a Royal Arch Mason and a Knight Templar.
Mr. De France was first married November 4, 1856, the day that James Bu- chanan was elected president, to the oldest daughter of Wesley Halliburton, now state senator from Sullivan county, she dying in 1876, leaving two children, and two having preceded her to the spirit world; and the second time in December, ISSI, to Mrs. Mary Jane Thompson, widow of Major John Thompson, of the regular army.
HON. THOMAS L. ANDERSON. DI WYR.I.
T' HOMAS LILBOURNE ANDERSON, the oldest lawyer in practice in Marion county, was born in Giren county, Kentucky, December 8, 1808. His parents were David and Jane K. ( Bullock) Anderson. His maternal grand- father, John Bullock, was a captain in the war of the revolution. His father, a native of Virginia, was a farmer, and reared his family in habits of industry. The subject of this sketch read law at Bowling Green, Kentucky, and was there admitted to the bar in 1829, before he was of age. After practicing at Bowling Green a few months, he left Kentucky for Missouri, and practiced two years at Saint Charles.
In October, 1832, over fifty years ago, he settled in Palmyra; and in north- eastern Missouri was often pitted against some of the ablest lawyers in the state, such as James S. Green, Uriel Wright, Samuel T. Glover, John D. S. Dryden, James S. Lindley, and others. Colonel Anderson, so called because he was once on the governor's staff, has long been the Boanerges of the Marion county bar, being a splendid advocate, an able expounder of the law, and in all respects a manly man, as well as successful attorney. In 1846 he was elected to the legis- lature as a whig, and served one ferm. In 1845 he was a member of the consti- tutional convention, but refused, with a few others, to sign the new constitution, and it was rejected by the people.
In 1856 Colonel Anderson was elected to congress as an American, and was reflected, leaving the national legislature on the breaking out of civil war. Since
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that time he has acted at times with the democrats, and later with the green- backers. He is an independent thinker, and carries his conscience into politics and everything else
" Forty years ago," writes a former resident of Marion county, " and down to the period of the rebellion, Hon. Thomas I. Anderson had no peer in northeast Missouri as a jury advocate and popular speaker. He was a man of excellent moral character; was possessed of great exuberance of spirit, and was a genial, mirthful man, and you may well imagine, therefore, that he was a power with the masses of the people. As a speaker he was vehement and declamatory, and wore an carnestness of manner that to the common mind was simply irresistible."
Colonel Anderson is a Royal Arch Mason, and has been a member of the Presbyterian Church nearly fifty years. He is a generous-hearted man, a strong advocate of temperance, and one of the most eloquent speakers on that subject in north Missouri.
He has been twice married, first at Saint Charles, in 1832, to Miss Russella Easton, daughter of Colonel Rufus Easton, attorney general of Missouri before it became a state. She died in isto, leaving three children, only two of them now living, both being lawyers, Rufus E. at Hannibal, and William R. at Palmyra. His second marriage was in 1843, to Miss Fanny M. Winchell, of Palmyra, and a native of Hampden county, Massachusetts. By this wife he has had eleven chil- dren, only six of whom are now living Four died in infancy.
WILLIAM R. ANDERSON.
PALMYRA
W ILLIAM RUSSELL ANDERSON, son of Hon. Thomas L. Anderson, whose biography appears preceding this, was born in Palmyra, March 15, 1835. He was educated at the University of Virginia, Charlottesville, being graduated in the classical department in (857. He read law with his father; was admitted to the bar in 1860, and since that date has been in practice in his native city, the shire town of Marion county. He was with his father the first three or four years, and since then has been alone. As a lawyer he has always maintained a high character for integrity, and an excellent position at the bar of his county. He knows nothing of the tricks of small-minded men, and is above them, and is fair in his dealings with everybody.
Some years ago, Mr. Anderson served as city attorney two or three terms; was a member of the board of school trustees several years, and of the twenty- ninth and thirtieth general assemblies. In the twenty-ninth he was chairman of the democratic caucus; was chairman of the committee on retrenchment and reform in the thirtieth; and also in the thirtieth was a member of the special committee appointed to revise the statutes; was a member of the so-called slush committee, and conducted the examination of witnesses in that case. He made
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himself a very useful member of the legislature, but declined to serve any longer. Since leaving that body he has devoted his time exclusively and very attentively to the practice of his profession
Mr. Anderson is a ruling older of the Presbyterian Church, and a man of irre- preachable character. He was married May 30, 1800, to Miss Annie McPheeters, a native of Marion county, and they have three sons and three daughters living, and lost their oldest daughter at the age of twelve years.
GEORGE R. BALTHROPE. EDIN.I.
G I
GEORGE ROBERT BALTHROPE, prosecuting attorney of the county of Knox, is a Virginian by birth, a son of Napoleon B. and Elizabeth ( Mar- shall) Balthrope, and was born in Fauquier county, forty- five miles from Washing- ton, District of Columbia, August 22, 1Sp. Both parents were also born in the "Old Dominion." His grandfather, John Balthrope, was from Glasgow, Scotland, and a captain of Virginia troops in the second war with England. The father of Elizabeth Marshall, who was a relative of Chief Justice Marshall, was also in the war just mentioned. She was a sister of Hon. James M. Marshall, minister to Belgium under President Lincoln, and first assistant postmaster general under President Grant. Captain Balthrope was the inventor of the axle-tree of field artillery, which we understand is still in use, and the double shovel plow, having a good deal of inventive talent.
George Balthrope came to this state with the family in 1857, and finished his literary studies at the Hannibal Institute. He was engaged with his father in farming until 1801, when he joined the confederate army as a private in Colonel Carter's regiment of General J. B. Clark's brigade. In the spring of 1862 he went to Virginia, and became lieutenant of company A, Major Richardson's bat- tation of scouts, guards and couriers, serving in that capacity until the war ended.
Mr. Balthrope returned to Missouri in the autumn of 1800, having previously read Law at Winchester, Virginia; was licensed to practice at Palmyra, and settled in Knox county in January, 1867. He worked up a fair business in the course of four or five years, and took a respectable stand at the Knox county bar. His reputation in all respects is commendable
In ISSo Mr. Balthrope was elected to the county office already mentioned, was reflected in 1882, and in the performance of the duties of that office is exhibiting his fine legal talents to the very best advantage. As a prosecutor, he is above the average in the state, and is rising.
Mr. Balthrope is a democrat, like his father and grandfather before him, the principles of that party being thoroughly ingrained in his nature. During an important election he usually takes the " stump," and he does yeoman's service in the interest of his party. He is a Royal Arch Mason, and a member of the Knights of Honor.
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Ile was married May 20, 1868, to Miss Elizabeth V. Pierce, daughter of Michael P. Pierce, of Knox county, Missouri, and sister of John W. Pierce, attorney at law, Abilene, Kansas. They have five children, three sons and two daughters.
Mr. Balthrope has a dark complexion and hazel eyes; stands perfectly erect; is six feet tall; has a somewhat military air and commanding appearance. A stranger passing him would be tempted to take a second look at him.
WORDEN C. HOLLISTER. EDINI.
W JORDEN CADY HOLLISTER is a son of Hugh and Maria (Cady) Hol- lister, and was born in Tompkins county, New York, December 2, 1833. For further particulars of the family, see sketch of his brother, Mortimer D. Hol- lister, elsewhere mentioned in this work. Worden went with the family to De Kalb county, Illinois, in 1847; was educated at the Aurora Seminary, and the Rock River Seminary, Mount Morris, and taught, off and on, for eight or nine years. Ile read law at Knoxville, Illinois, with Hon. A. M. Craig, now of the supreme court of that state; was admitted to the bar of this state at Mexico, before Judge Campbell, in the autumn of 1865, and has since been in practice at Edina, the shire town of Knox county He has good legal attainments, as well as talents; reasons with clearness and candor, and as an advocate he is above the average. He is very good on facts, and in working them up in a case in such an adroit and admirable manner as to win.
Mr. Hollister was county attorney two years, and has been mayor two terms, serving efficiently in both positions. He is a republican, but more devoted to his profession than to politics. He belongs to the Ancient Order of United Work- men, and the Knights of Honor.
The wife of Mr. Hollister was Miss Carrie M. Risor, of Knoxville, Illinois. They were married in May, 1865, and have one son, Carl W., aged fourteen years.
THOMAS B. KIMBROUGH.
HUNTSVILLE.
T HOMAS BRUMMELLE KIMBROUGH is a son of John S. and Lucinda C. (Hamilton) Kimbrough, and was born in Randolph county, where we now find him. His father was born in Surrey county, North Carolina; came to Howard county in 1829; settled in Randolph county the next year; took part in the Black Hawk war (1832), and farmed till his death in 1875. His widow, a native of Kentucky, is still living. Her father was in the second war with Eng- land. Thomas B. Kimbrough was reared on the farm till fifteen years old, having meanwhile fitted himself for a teacher, and at that early age took a school, and
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continued to teach more or less each year until past his majority. He is a gradu- ate of Mount Pleasant College, Huntsville, class of 1801; read law in Howard and Randolph counties; was admitted to the bar in 1866, and has been in steady and successful practice at Huntsville, the county seat, since that date. His prac- tice is of all kinds, civil and criminal, and in all the courts. He is studious, painstaking and persevering, doing everything connected with the law with great care, and his clients have full confidence in his thoroughness, faithfulness and in- tegrity. He has many friends in the county
Mr. Kimbrough was attorney for the town of Huntsville four years, and has been a trustee of Mount Pleasant College, and secretary of the board since 1868. He is a democrat in politics, and a third-degree Mason. In local county-seat and court-bill fights, Mr. Kimbrough takes the stump, and does valiant service for his town, which came out victorious in both county-seat contests and one court- bill contest. He is a member of the Baptist Church, and stands well morally as well as legally.
Mr. Kimbrough has been twice married: first, in 1863, to Miss Julia A. Roan, of Randolph county, she dying in 1870, leaving one child, which did not long survive her; and the second time, in 1875, to Miss Carrie L. Vroom, a native of Toronto, Canada, by whom he has had a daughter and son, burying the former. The name of the son is Roscoe Perry Kimbrough.
NATHAN FRANK.
SAINT LOUIS.
N T ATHAN FRANK is a son of Abraham Frank, who was born in Germany;
married Brannetta Weil, and came to this country in 1847. He settled at first at Hopkinsville, Kentucky, and removed to Peoria, Illinois, in 1848, where the subject of this sketch was born, February 23, 1852. In 1867 the family set- tled in Saint Louis, and Abraham Frank is one of the heaviest wholesale dry- goods dealers in the city, being senior member of the firm of A. Frank and Sons. Nathan was educated in the Saint Louis public schools, the Washington Univer- sity (Saint Louis), and Harvard University, receiving the degree of bachelor of laws at the last-named institution in 1871. Mi. Frank spent one year in Cam- bridge as post graduate in the law school, and in 1872 opened a law office in Saint Louis, soon building up an excellent practice. His specialty is commercial and corporation law, and it is doubtful if any other lawyer at the Saint Louis bar is doing a larger business in that line. He has four men at work under him, and is one of the busiest attorneys in the city. During the existence of the bankrupt law of 1867, his practice was largely confined to this branch of the law, and in 1874 he issued " Frank's Annotated Bankrupt Law," which had a large sale. He is of the firm of Patrick and Frank, his partner being William Patrick, a finely educated lawyer, who was for four years (1872-76) United States district attorney
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Nathan Frank
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at Saint Louis, and during the four years immediately prior was assistant attor- ney in the same office.
Mr. Frank has the reputation of having a good judicial mind, and in 1882 his republican friends nominated him for judge of the eighth judicial circuit. He is a man of a good deal of public spirit and enterprise, and is vice president of the Missouri and Kansas Railway Construction Company, which has about three hundred miles of road under way.
Mr. Frank is president (the present term being his third) of the Harmonie Club, one of the largest and wealthiest social clubs in the West, its building in Saint Louis costing 875,000. He is also a member of the Reformed Jewish Church, and his social and moral worth, like his legal standing, is high.
DANIEL MCGOWAN.
SAINT LOUIS.
D ANIEL MCGOWAN was born near the village of Kinlough, in County Leitrim, Ireland, in the year 1834. His father's name was Terence and his mother's name was Barbara, and both of the same family name, though no relationship but that of marriage connections was ever claimed to exist. Their parents were farmers, and their genealogy could be traced to a long line of ancestors by those old residents who took an interest in the traditions of the families.
The subject of this memoir, after obtaining the advantages of a common- school education at his birthplace, entered Queen's College in Belfast as a matriculated student, in the department of civil engineering, in 1853. He ob- tained a scholarship in mathematics the same year, through which half his fees in the college were remitted, and an allowance of thirty pounds a year for ordi- mary expenses. There were thirty three scholarships offered by the faculty of the college for superior excellence in arts, law, medicine and engineering, with the same emoluments attached to each. They were won by competitive examination at the commencement of each term, under the charge of the professors, and were awarded solely upon the merits of the candidates. The old adage,
" As the hurest flower grows on the sharpest thorn, So the hardest labor brings forth the sweetest fruit,"
was never realized more truly than in the experience of the students in their efforts to secure the honors and emoluments of these scholarships.
In 1856 Mr. McGowan finished his course of study, and through the advice of some of the professors went to London with strong recommendations, and ap- plied for an appointment on the engineering staff for the construction of railways in the East India service. There were no vacancies at the disposal of the government for six months, and becoming impatient at so long a delay, he con- cluded to cast his destinies in the free and open field of competition and enter-
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prise among the American people. He left London in May, 1856, and proceeded to Liverpool, where he took passage on a vessel called the Constellation, to New York, and arrived, after a voyage of six weeks, at that point July 4. It was a day of general excitement and rejoicings in the city. Many of the societies were out in full uniform, marching in processions with their regahas and banners. The streets we're all bustle and confusion. Every one took part as usual in celebrating the anniversary of American independence. He stood solitary and alone, and was not very favorably impressed with the display and character of the rejoicings. He retired from the demonstrations, and began to reflect, sorely and sadly, upon the hasty steps he had taken in migrating to a strange land, where all appeared in anarchy and confusion. However, the die was cast, and his fate and fortune must be followed up courageously.
He decided to come west, and arrived at Beardstown, Illinois, where he joined a surveying party who were engaged in locating a railroad between Rock- ford and Rock Island in that state. He remained in this employment until the subscriptions to the building of the road were exhausted. He set out on the world once more and directed his course to Saint Louis. He found employment here, and was chiefly engaged in the civilengineering business till the breaking out of the war. In politics he was a southern sympathiser, and went to Saint Genevieve, a hotbed of secession, to evade imprisonment, until the storms of the times were blown over. In Saint Genevieve he accepted the appointment of a teacher of the English branches in a school or academy which was managed and controlled by a very estimable young Catholic clergyman named Hendricks, who also took charge of a class in French. He, too, was impregnated with southern sympathy, and subsequently removed from the state rather than take the oath of allegiance as prescribed by the Drake constitution, which was soon afterward adopted.
Mr. McGowan devoted himself very diligently to the duties of the academy as teacher, and was induced by one Oliver Harris, owner of a local newspaper called the "Saint Genevieve Plain Dealer," to write some articles for his paper upon the current topics of the day. The articles selected were comments on the merits of the struggles between the northern and southern people, and the cour- age and heroism of the respective armies. These articles attracted the attention of the government authorities in Saint Louis, and in consequence thereof a de- tachment of home guards entered the town of an early morning, in the spring of 1863, and seized all the printing material of the newspaper establishment, carried it off and suppressed the publication of the paper. It was a sad blow to the owner of the paper and to the author of the articles, who was hardly influenced by any motive but to make the paper readable by whimsically indulging in writing vigorous articles peculiar to his own notion of the issues of the day.
Mr. McGowan henceforth renounced politics and occupied his spare time in reading elementary works of law in order to prepare himself for admission to the bar. Hlis reading and studies were directed by Mr. Watkins, a leading
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attorney of the Missouri bar in Saint Genevieve. He was admitted in 1864, and returned to Saint Louis in September, 1865, where he opened a law office and entered upon its practice. He remained here for two years, and refused to take the oath as prescribed by the new constitution. He removed to East Saint Louis, where he opened a law office. He was induced subsequently by the city council of said city to take the position of city engineer. He held this position for four years, and in the meantime made some successful speculations in real estate, when he concluded to resign, and again opened a law and real-estate office in that place.
In 1874 a city court of record was established in East Saint Louis, having concurrent jurisdiction with the circuit court in all civil cases. He was elected judge of that court In 1879 Mr. McGowan returned to Saint Louis, and was united in marriage the same year to Miss Mary Anne Fallon, a worthy com- panion, whose estimable qualities make the home and its associations happy and cheerful. She was a resident of Saint Louis, but born in New York, to which her parents emigrated many years ago from his own native county in Ireland.
Since his return to this city Mr. McGowan has devoted himself exclusively to the practice of the law in the civil courts, and has always maintained an irre- prochable reputation for integrity and attention to business. He has been a commissioner of deeds and notary public, the only offices which he has held in this city. His politics are democratic, and his religion Roman Catholic, but his feelings and wishes are equally true for the welfare and happiness of all.
WILLIAM H. WOODSON.
LIBERTY.
W WILLIAM IL. WOODSON is the descendant in a direct line of a family of lawyers. His great-grandfather was Hon. Tucker Woodson, member of congress trom Virginia, and his grandfather was Hon. Samuel H. Woodson, Sr., who was elected to congress to fill the seat made vacant by the election of Henry Clay to the United States senate. His father was Hon. Samuel H. Woodson, a member of congress from Missouri, and late judge of a circuit court in western Missouri. Judge Woodson was born in Jessamine county, Kentucky, in 1815; was educated at Center College, Danville, being graduated in 1838 with first honors of his class. He married Miss Margaret J Ashby, of Richmond, Madison county, Ken- tucky, in 1838, and had by her eleven children. She is still living, and retains the vigor and ability for which she has been known throughout life. The success of Judge Woodson as a politician, lawyer and judge is said to be in a measure due to her aptness and kind assistance. She is a lady of fine intellect and accom- plishments. Judge Woodson removed to Independence, Missouri, in 1840; was elected to the constitutional convention in 1845; was the whig candidate for
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congress in 1848, and made the race against John S. Phelps, in 1852; was elected from Jackson county to the legislature, and was the whig candidate for speaker in 1856. In 1858 he was reflected to congress over General John W. Reed and General George R. Smith. He went to Texas in 1862, and remained there until the close of the war. He then returned and renewed practice with his old part- ners, under the firm name of Woodson, Chrisman and Comingo. He canvassed every county through which the Missouri Pacific railroad passed before its loca- tion, and through his influence and efforts, more than those of any other man, it was laid out where it now runs.
Judge Samuel 1, Sawyer, of the Kansas City judicial circuit, having resigned his office on account of ill health, Governor Charles HI. Hardin appointed Mr. Wood- son to fill his place. He was reflected in 1880, and died in June, 1882. On the day of his death he held his court until four o'clock in the afternoon, and he died at eleven the same night.
Judge Woodson had a remarkable memory of faces, names and dates. It has been said that if he was once introduced to a man he could always remember him and call him by name. He had no enemies, and as an electioneering cham- pion he had few equals. There is not a public school building in western Mis- souri that he did not give from fifty to five hundred dollars to. No worthy man in need ever appealed to him in vain for assistance. He was a generous, whole- souled, noble man, and an upright judge. His kindness of heart endeared him to his sadly bereaved family, his professional brethren, and a large circle of friends. His is the true fame, based upon good works, upon duty done, and a lite beyond reproach.
William H. Woodson, the son of Hon. Samuel H. Woodson, whose brief me- moir precedes this sketch, was born January 6, 1840, at Richmond, Madison county, Kentucky. He removed, with his parents, to Independence, Missouri, shortly after his birth. He was educated at Center College, Danville, Kentucky, and graduated in June, 1800. He studied law at Lexington, Kentucky, under Hon. George Robertson, formerly chiet justice of the supreme court of Ken- Lucky, being the same man under whom his father had studied law nearly thirty yours before. William was made assistant adjutant general for the state of Missouri in 1861. After the close of the war he was married in Platte county, Missouri, to Miss Cora A. Winston, daughter of Colonel John II. Winston, of Platte county. He commenced practice in 1865 in Platte county, and removed to Liberty, Clay county, in the spring of 1866. In 1870 he received the dem- ocratic nomination for state senator, and was defeated. In 1876 he was elected prosecuting attorney of the district, and in 1878 was reelected by the largest vote ever given for any officer in Clay county. During the four years that he was prosecuting attorney there were more convictions of parties charged with felony than there had been in that county from the time the county was organized, in 1822, to 1876, the time he was elected. In 1882 he Jacked but a few votes of a nomination by the democrats for congress.
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