USA > New Hampshire > The bench and bar of New Hampshire : including biographical notices of deceased judges of the highest court, and lawyers of the province and state, and a list of names of those now living > Part 11
Note: The text from this book was generated using artificial intelligence so there may be some errors. The full pages can be found on Archive.org (link on the Part 1 page).
Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4 | Part 5 | Part 6 | Part 7 | Part 8 | Part 9 | Part 10 | Part 11 | Part 12 | Part 13 | Part 14 | Part 15 | Part 16 | Part 17 | Part 18 | Part 19 | Part 20 | Part 21 | Part 22 | Part 23 | Part 24 | Part 25 | Part 26 | Part 27 | Part 28 | Part 29 | Part 30 | Part 31 | Part 32 | Part 33 | Part 34 | Part 35 | Part 36 | Part 37 | Part 38 | Part 39 | Part 40 | Part 41 | Part 42 | Part 43 | Part 44 | Part 45 | Part 46 | Part 47 | Part 48 | Part 49 | Part 50 | Part 51 | Part 52 | Part 53 | Part 54 | Part 55 | Part 56 | Part 57 | Part 58 | Part 59 | Part 60 | Part 61 | Part 62 | Part 63 | Part 64 | Part 65 | Part 66 | Part 67 | Part 68 | Part 69
Judge Bell was an early member of the State Historical So- ciety, and a steady supporter of it throughout his life. Once, when its very continuance was threatened for want of means, he gave the society a new lease of life by taking upon himself the pecuniary burden. He was vice-president of the society four years, president two, and a member of the publishing committee through the issue of two volumes of collections. He prepared and delivered before the society two elaborate addresses, contain-
1 N. H. Repository, i. 122 ; N. H. Historical Collections, viii. 305, etc.
104
DECEASED JUDGES
ing the essence of long study and reflection. He was also an associate and state vice-president for New Hampshire of the New England Historic Genealogical Society for a number of years, up to the date of his death.
Judge Bell owed his acknowledged preeminence not alone to his intellectual power and the fullness of his learning; these were backed by personal qualities and character that commanded con- fidence and respect. Senator William E. Chandler bears the fol- lowing testimony to his worth : " This clear-headed, strong-minded, noble judge was most kind and considerate to all young lawyers. He took pains to soften to them all his adverse nisi prius de- cisions, and to expound to them the law as if giving a lecture for the instruction of students. He never abated a young lawyer's suit without giving him a better writ. As state reporter I had much intercourse with the Chief Justice, and I wish to place on record not only my own admiration and love for this kind and courteous instructor, but also my opinion that he was one of the purest and ablest of the judges who have graced the New Hamp- shire bench."
His treatment of others was uniformly kind and fair. To all his engagements he was punctuality itself. Though sometimes disappointed by others, he was no martinet, but could make due allowance for the infirmities of human nature. His conduct was always governed by the principles of justice and right, and his life was as blameless as it was filled with usefulness. A familiar and favorite line of his gives an index to the framework of his character : -
" Justum et tenacem propositi virum."
Judge Bell's marriage with Mary H., daughter of Newell Healey of Kensington, took place August 8, 1826. Of their six children three lived to adult age, John J. and Samuel N., who both became lawyers, and Mary, whose husband, John P. Newell, was of the same profession.
105
CHRONOLOGICALLY.
IRA PERLEY, LL. D. J. 1850-1852. C. J. 1855-1859 ; 1864-1869.
Son of Samuel and Phebe (Dresser) Perley ; born, Boxford, Massachusetts, November 9, 1799 ; Dartmouth College, 1822 ; admitted, 1827 ; practiced, Hanover and Concord ; died, Concord, February 26, 1874.
The death of Ira Perley's father, who was a farmer in moderate circumstances, left the son at the age of seven years under the care of his mother, a superior woman. She encouraged his taste for reading, and stimulated his ambition for a liberal education and a professional life. At sixteen he was sent to Bradford Academy, Massachusetts, to be instructed by the keen-witted Ben- jamin Greenleaf, who prophesied great things for his pupil, among other reasons because he never whistled !
He entered college at the top of his class, and always stayed there, and is said to have been one of the very few Dartmouth graduates who throughout their college course were perfect in de- portment and scholarship. He found time to read a good deal, also. A year after his graduation he was complimented with the appointment of tutor, and filled the position two years. His pu- pils portrayed his character pretty justly in their college song : -
" A giant in learning, a giant in mind, A lion in temper, both savage and kind."
He studied law with Benjamin J. Gilbert of Hanover, and with Daniel M. Christie of Dover, and established himself as a prac- titioner in Hanover, being also chosen the treasurer of the college. From Hanover he was twice sent as representative to the state legislature. As a young man he apparently had no little popu- larity among the members of the bar, and often contributed to their pleasure during the terms of the court by his interesting dis- course about the great lights of the profession in England, with whose history and characteristics he was familiarly conversant, and by singing to them, - an accomplishment which, more 's the pity, has almost fallen into desuetude in our prosaic generation.
In the nine years that Mr. Perley practiced in Grafton County, he tested his mettle against some of the best inen there and else- where, and proved himself to be a learned lawyer, a keen and skillful pleader, and an advocate of great force. In 1836 he
106
DECEASED JUDGES
removed to Concord, a wider field of practice, and went at once to the head of the profession, receiving engagements in the most important causes, and matched against the strongest practitioners in this and other States.
In 1850 he was appointed an associate Justice of the Superior Court, but gave up the office two years afterwards. When the courts were reorganized in 1855, he became the Chief Justice of the same (then Supreme Judicial) court, till his resignation in 1859. Again appointed Chief Justice in 1864, he served until he reached the age of seventy ; thus occupying the seat of justice, in the aggregate, nearly twelve years.
The essential qualities of a great magistrate were happily com- bined in Judge Perley, - quickness and clearness of perception, a memory with the grip of a vise, a powerful, logical understand- ing, and a conscientious sense of justice. And to these he added immense learning, general and professional, and a thorough train- ing, development, and mastery of his intellectual resources, as it were in a mental gymnasium. Naturally he was at his best while sitting in banc. The slow, inch-worm progress of the trial term was often irksome to one of his rapid mental constitution. He must have been continually annoyed by the dull fumbling of inferior men after points that were visible as the sun to him. Everything of an ad captandum nature was his aversion, and whatever savored of sharp practice was pretty sure to receive his castigation. He was easily roused to sympathy or to resentment, and was sometimes unpleasantly outspoken, though he never meant to be unjust, or to cherish hard feelings.
He handled questions of jurisprudence with the ease of a mas- ter. He had no need, in ordinary cases, to refer to books; his familiarity with principles gave him the key to most of the prob- lems that came before him. He talked law, out of the abun- dance of his knowledge, in the consultation-room, often better than he wrote it out for the reporter. His printed decisions are mod- els. In point of manner and matter, of style and substance, they have been pronounced unsurpassed in our judicial reports, and it may not be saying too much to add, in any judicial reports, at home or abroad. By the common consent of the profession, Judge Perley takes rank with the great jurists of the land, - the Mar- shalls, the Kents, and the Parsonses.
At the bar his characteristics were displayed no less markedly.
107
CHRONOLOGICALLY.
He believed in the justice of his clients' cause ; he would not enlist in it, otherwise. Once, when a sharper tried to retain him, after smoothing over his crooked conduct as well as he knew how to the Judge, the latter astounded him by answering : -
" I think you have acted like an infernal scoundrel, sir."
"Is there any charge for that opinion ?"
" Yes, sir, five dollars."
But when he engaged in a cause, he put his whole soul into it, always in fair fighting, however. His addresses to the jury were pointed and forceful. They carried demonstration with them, and if he had occasion to administer a rebuke to meanness or dishonesty, it was with a veritable whip of scorpions.
It was as a scholar that he is entitled to admiration only sec- ond, if second, to that which he merits as a lawyer and judge. I fear that few of the " college-learned " professional men make any pretense of keeping up in after life their acquaintance with the studies which they pursued with much expenditure of time, and which so rapidly slip from the loosened hold. But Judge Perley suffered none of his acquisitions to be lost through disuse. He found time for everything. The rapidity of his mental work made his office hours short, and he had the more leisure for his garden and his library at home. Throughout life he maintained his familiarity with the ancient classics in the originals. He read Cicero and Horace much ; and the French and Italian authors in their own tongues. Shakespeare, Milton, and the best English writers were familiar to him, and he kept up with all desirable contemporary literature with a scholar's interest.
He wrote not much for the press beyond his judicial opinions. A charge to the Grand Jury, a eulogy on Daniel Webster, and an address at the Dartmouth Centennial on the Relations of the College to the Law are all his productions of that class that have been published. He was not destitute of lighter accomplish- ments. He was fond of conversation, liked to hear a good story, and was noted for his own humorous sayings ; as for example, when some member of the bar asked him to look at an absurd brief : "No," answered the Judge, " I am like the boy that had lived on woodchuck so long that it made him sick to see a hole."
He had a laconic style of pronouncing his judgment of men and their actions, that would cling to the memory like a bur.
A gentleman who had held high office in the republic, but was
108
DECEASED JUDGES
suspected of undue subservience to Southern influence, in 1861 made a Union speech, long after the effective moment had gone by. Some one asked Judge Perley what he thought of it. "Late ; reluctant ; unimportant," was his reply.
Judge Perley was exemplary in his private life, as a husband, father, friend, and neighbor. He was scrupulous in observing every civic obligation. His honesty and perfect uprightness were beyond the reach of question. He received his degree of Doctor of Laws from Dartmouth in 1852.
In June, 1840, he was united in marriage with Mary S., daugh- ter of John Nelson of Haverhill. They had a son and two daughters.
GEORGE YEATON SAWYER.
J. 1855-1859.
Son of William and Mary (Yeaton) Sawyer ; born, Wakefield, December 5, 1805 ; Bowdoin College, 1826 ; practiced, Meredith and Nashua ; died, Nashua, June 15, 1882.
Judge Sawyer was among the ablest lawyers, advocates, and judges of the State. He inherited the manly independence, good judgment, and legal aptitude of his father, and joined with it a keener discrimination, more critical study, and great readiness and force of statement.
He laid the foundation of his classical education at Phillips Exeter Academy, studied law under his father, and settled in Meredith in 1830. After practicing there four years, he removed to his permanent home in Nashua, where he became the partner of his uncle, Aaron F. Sawyer. It was remarked of him that he never manifested any professional immaturity, but from the start took his place as a thoroughly equipped, ripe practitioner. For fifty years he was an active member of the bar, and then died with the harness on. He was employed in a large proportion of the important causes of his time and vicinity, and few men have had more to do with ascertaining and shaping the law of the State than himself. He was twice placed upon the judicial bench, first, as a Circuit Justice of the Court of Common Pleas, July 7, 1851, resigning the office September 15, 1854; and second, as a Justice of the Supreme Judicial Court, July 20, 1855. From this po- sition, too, he withdrew, November 1, 1859, for the reason that
109
CHRONOLOGICALLY.
his private practice was more lucrative and less exacting. As a judge he was dignified, learned, and able. While he had great respect for the traditions of the profession, he had no scruples against ransacking the grounds on which they were based. He did not shut his eyes to mischiefs simply because they had the glamour of age and the approval of past generations ; nor was he afraid of novelty, when it commended itself to his understanding and sense of right. The general voice of the profession pro- nounced him a judge in every way worthy to uphold the credit of the State.
As early as 1839, and the two following years, he was elected to the state legislature, and again repeatedly in later life. In 1836 he was chairman of the committee on the Judiciary, and took the leading part in the debates. In 1875 he was named chairman of a special committee to consider the present system of taxation. His report was marked by his customary thorough- ness and sound sense, although its conclusions would innovate upon the long-established system of the State too greatly to admit of any expectation that they will soon be adopted here.
In 1865 he was appointed commissioner with Samuel D. Bell and Asa Fowler to revise the laws of the State. The chief part of the work was performed, by reason of the sickness of Judge Bell, by Judges Sawyer and Fowler, and their report was adopted with very slight modifications by the legislature at the annual session of 1867, and was generally highly approved. The citizens of Nashua availed themselves of Judge Sawyer's learning and experience, by making him city solicitor in 1862 and the two following years, and again in 1873 and 1874. He was also appointed by the Court to perform the duties of county solicitor during the absence of that officer in the army.
Judge Sawyer was decided in his political views, though by no means an offensive partisan. In middle life he was a candidate of the Whig party for a seat in Congress, but, perhaps fortunately for his professional career, failed of his election by a few votes. President Pierce, who knew and highly esteemed Judge Sawyer, offered him the governorship of a Territory, it is said, but the lat- ter declined it on the ground that his political sympathies were not with the administration.
As a lawyer Judge Sawyer stood in the highest rank. It hap- pened repeatedly that when some new or difficult question arose
110
DECEASED JUDGES
in a trial in which he was not employed, the Court inquired of him as amicus curia, what was his understanding of the law in the case. He was often applied to by younger members of his profession for advice and help in their causes, and however much engrossed in his own business he might be, he cheerfully put every- thing aside and patiently listened to the recital of their difficul- ties, and gave them wise counsel. It is pleasant to be assured that he set a high value upon the estimation in which his younger brethren of the bar held him by reason of his kind professional intercourse with them. A few years before his death he said to a friend : "When I am gone I hope some one will say of me, 'He was always kind and considerate to the younger members of the profession !'" His wish was granted. His ready, gratuitous kindness to his juniors earned him the lasting love and gratitude of his professional brethren.
In the trial of causes he exhibited great skill and strength. He possessed too much dignity and self-respect to descend to any in- direct methods. He confined himself to the law and the evidence, treated witnesses fairly and according to their deserts, and sought his verdict by clean arguments, and not by the arts of a petti- fogger. His addresses to the jury were logical, strong, and con- vincing. He rarely attempted to appeal to the sympathies. The causes that he brought into court never lacked substantial merits. He felt the full responsibility of his position as an attorney. On one occasion he appeared for a prisoner under indictment for murder. The judge who presided at the arraignment was dis- posed, in the counsel's opinion, to push matters with undue haste. In a discussion which arose respecting the arrangements for the trial, the Court made some suggestion for the avowed pur- pose of " saving time." "Saving time, your Honor," responded Judge Sawyer in impressive tones, "does the Court realize that with this respondent the issue is for time or eternity ! "
The single criticism which is remembered to have been passed upon Judge Sawyer's judicial qualifications is that he was some- times discursive in his opinions and instructions to juries. In laying down general propositions he was perhaps sometimes led aside to explain the various exceptions and limitations, which, however important in a treatise, were liable to confuse and mis- lead a jury. But this, if a failing, was a trifling one. His readi- ness of resources and learning, his intellectual power, his profes-
111
CHRONOLOGICALLY.
sional honor and zeal for the cause of right and justice, were never called in question.
Judge Sawyer was social and companionable among his chosen friends. Like his father, he was partial to a game of whist, and his tenacious memory, well stored with racy anecdotes, enabled him to contribute his full quota to the evening's enter- tainment. He was no perfect man, and had his share of human failings, but they were the failings which accompany a robust and generous nature. We may well bury them in oblivion, and remember, for our improvement, his excelling merits.
Judge Sawyer's wife was Emeline, daughter of Daniel Tucker of Meredith. They had one son, bearing his father's name, who was a member of the bar in Nashua.
ASA FOWLER.
J. 1855-1861.
Son of Benjamin and Mehitable (Ladd) Fowler ; born, Pembroke, February 23, 1811 ; Dartmouth College, 1833 ; admitted, 1837; practiced, Concord ; died, San Rafael, California, April 26, 1885.
Up to the age of fourteen young Fowler labored upon his father's farm, with only the educational advantages that the dis- trict school a part of each year yielded him. A serious fit of ill- ness, which for a time incapacitated him for manual exertion, led to his being placed as a student in the Blanchard Academy in his native town, that he might qualify himself for a common-school teacher. But his ambition grew to the determination to gain a liberal education, and in sixty weeks' study after beginning Latin, he qualified himself to enter college with the sophomore class. It is said that he exhibited his characteristic diligence and punctu- ality while in college by never being absent or unprepared at any recitation.
After his graduation he was principal of the academy at Tops- field, Massachusetts, for a single term, and then commenced the study of the law, first with James Sullivan in Pembroke, and afterwards, in the spring of 1834, with Charles H. Peaslee of Con- cord. Mr. Peaslee had no liking for the drudgery of his office, and that fell naturally upon his student, whose capacity for hard work was unbounded. In 1837 Mr. Fowler opened an office in Concord, and after a year and a half became a partner of Frank-
112
DECEASED JUDGES
lin Pierce. During the six years and upwards that they were together, their practice was very extensive. Mr. Pierce's services were in wide request as an advocate, and Mr. Fowler attended to the business of the office, prepared causes for trial, and briefs upon questions of law. He acquitted himself well in oral argu- ment, but had no liking for it. Subsequently he was senior partner of John Y. Mugridge and of William E. Chandler, each, for a short time.
Mr. Fowler's public service began with his election to the clerkship of the state Senate in 1835. He held the office until 1841. In 1845, 1847, 1848, 1871, and 1872, he was a represen- tative in the legislature, and the last of those years Speaker. August 1, 1855, he was appointed a Justice of the Superior Court, and resigned after five and a half years' service. In 1861 he accepted the solicitorship of Merrimac County, and performed the duties till 1865, when he was selected as one of three commis- sioners to make a revision of the state laws. This duty, with the labors of printing and explanation which it entailed, occupied him two years or more. In 1861 he received the appointment of delegate to the Peace Congress at Washington, District of Co- lumbia, the last and fruitless attempt on the part of the Northern States to avert the secession of the Southern. In addition to these burdens of a public nature, Judge Fowler was a member of the school committee and of the board of education of Concord above twenty years, was a director of the State Capital Bank, president of the First National Bank, and of the Manchester and Lawrence Railroad.
Perhaps the most marked characteristic of Judge Fowler was the immense amount of work he accomplished. He rose very early in the morning, and at the proper season of the year delved vigorously for an hour or two before breakfast in his garden. The rest of the day he was in his office, and always busy. If cli- ents thronged him, he sent none away to wait for a more con- venient hour, but attended to all comers simultaneously, if neces- sary. Some one observed of him, " He was the only man I ever knew who could do three things at once !" The amount of busi- ness that was transacted in his law office was enormous. And it was not only done, but well done. He was a capital lawyer, of ex- cellent sense, and a thorough man of affairs. As a draughtsman he was unrivaled. His facility in that direction perhaps led to
113
CHRONOLOGICALLY.
his being frequently called on to prepare bills for the action of the legislature. For years a very large proportion of the first drafts of proposed changes of the laws which were presented to the General Court were in his handwriting.
He had no ambition, as some lawyers have had, to be a judge. He preferred to have his business go at his own pace, which was more rapid than that of the court-room, though he did no little to " push things," there. And he undoubtedly succeeded in making the wheels of justice turn more rapidly. His judicial opinions were not treatises, but brief decisions of the bare points sub- mitted, without obiter dicta.
His untiring devotion for upwards of forty years to professional pursuits had, as might be expected, an injurious influence upon his health, and he sought relief in foreign travel and in the relinquishment of all business, except the care of the handsome accumulations of property during his long and successful career. During the residue of his life he gave much attention to literary pursuits, which had always occupied a share of his time, to social enjoyment, and to travel in the newer portions of our own country.
Judge Fowler was married, July 13, 1837, to Mary D. C., daughter of Robert Knox of Pembroke, and had five children. Of the four sons, three became lawyers.
HENRY ADAMS BELLOWS, LL. D.
J. 1859-1869. C. J. 1869-1873.
Son of Joseph and Mary (Adams) Bellows ; born, Rockingham, Vermont, October 25, 1803 ; admitted, 1826 ; practiced, Walpole, Littleton, and Con- cord ; died, Concord, March 11, 1873.
Judge Bellows was sprung from a family of note, and though born on the border of an adjoining State, spent much of his youth as well as all his mature years in New Hampshire. As a child he was delicate, and preferred the society of his elders and his book to the rough sports of boyhood. His education was gained chiefly in the schools of Walpole and the academy at Windsor, Vermont; and at the age of twenty he entered the office of William C. Bradley of Westminster, Vermont, as a stu- dent. Admitted at Newfane, Vermont, he first made a short experimental stay at Walpole, and then fixed himself in Little- 8
114
DECEASED JUDGES
ton in 1828. Erelong he became the leading lawyer in that vicinity. Land titles were then largely litigated in the county of Grafton, and Mr. Bellows made himself thoroughly familiar with that branch of the law, and was engaged in a great number of suits of that character, as well as others of importance.
After twenty-two years at Littleton, feeling that he had out- grown what might be called a provincial position, he removed to Concord, as a wider field of action. Retained at once in a good proportion of the heavy causes for trial in the central part of the State, he measured himself against the strongest men of the bar in that quarter. The comparison put them to the exercise of their best powers. His sound judgment, his extensive legal knowledge, his skillful manner of conducting trials, and his im- perturbable equanimity made him an opponent to be respected as well as feared.
He spared no pains in preparing or in presenting his cases. All that study and consultation and the preparation of evidence could do beforehand, he did with unwearied industry, and during the hearings he was equally diligent, thorough, and faithful. It must be admitted that in his conscientious zeal for his clients' interests he fell into the habit of prolixity. This was his chiefest failing. It was remarked of him by a brother practitioner, that in consequence of his removal into Merrimac County, the average duration of jury trials there had increased by one third. Other members of the bar naturally felt that their clients would expect from them something like the same patient painstaking that Mr. Bellows gave to his; and so all in a degree contributed to the protraction of legal proceedings.
Need help finding more records? Try our genealogical records directory which has more than 1 million sources to help you more easily locate the available records.