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 60
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
675
ALPHABETICALLY.
He was successful as a lawyer, and was noted for his eloquence, which was inherited by his descendants. He rendered invaluable service to the cause of independence and to his State in critical emergencies, and his fame should be guarded as a precious posses- sion by every true son of New Hampshire.
He was married, about the year 1760, to Lydia Worcester, who outlived him a quarter of a century. They had three sons, of whom the youngest, George, was a lawyer ; as was Jonathan Steele, the husband of their daughter.
JOHN SULLIVAN.
Son of Hon. George and Clarissa (Lamson) Sullivan ; born, Exeter, May . 3, 1800 ; admitted, 1825 ; practiced, Exeter ; died there, November 17, 1862.
In Phillips Exeter Academy John Sullivan was a student from 1813 to 1820 ; then he began the study of the law in his father's office. His life-long home was in Exeter. Very soon after his admission as an attorney, he was engaged against Oliver W. B. Peabody in the discussion before the court of a point of law, which Edward Cutts of Portsmouth pronounced to be the ablest of the term. When a practitioner of three years' standing, he was made solicitor of the county, and served ten years, after which he was commissioned Judge of Probate. When he had filled that office ten years, the appointment of attorney-general for the State was conferred upon him, and renewed by repeated appointments till the time of his decease.
In his thirty-four years' tenure of public offices, he was dis- tinguished for faithful and efficient service and uprightness. As a lawyer he was careful, exact, and painstaking. No indictment or other instrument that passed under his official inspection was lacking so much as a letter. He allowed no personal feeling to affect his action. He strove to mete out equal and exact justice to all. His conduct of public prosecutions was so manifestly im- partial that it was subject to almost no criticism. But his feel- ings and sympathies were never hardened towards weakness and inexperience, and more than one reclaimed offender had occasion to remember his clemency with gratitude.
He had inherited the mellifluous voice and well-rounded peri- ods that distinguished his father. His forte was the presentation of evidence. The logical chain that he riveted for the jury was
676
DECEASED LAWYERS
seemingly irrefragable, and it was rendered doubly strong by his earnest manner, his well-chosen language, and his melodious tones. He did nothing by indirection, and had all his father's scorn of a mean action. His word was as good as his bond. He may be said to have been as perfect a prosecuting officer "as the lot ·of humanity will admit."
He was married, September 3, 1823, to Olivia, daughter of 'Samuel Rowe of Exeter. Two of his sons followed the law.
FREDERIC AUGUSTUS SUMNER.
Son of Benjamin and Prudence (Hubbard) Sumner ; born, Claremont, May 11, 1770 ; Harvard College, 1793 ; admitted, 1796 ; practiced, Charlestown ; ¿died there, August 13, 1834.
Mr. Sumner entered Dartmouth College in 1789, but after partially completing the course migrated to Harvard. He read law with Benjamin West in Charlestown, and practiced there. In 1802 he was appointed postmaster; in 1803 he was chosen town clerk, and was annually rechosen for fifteen years. His period of service as selectman was of about equal duration, be- ginning in 1804. In 1817 he was county treasurer ; in 1823 he was appointed register of Probate for Cheshire County, and in 1827, on the division of that county, he was appointed to the same office in the new county of Sullivan. Of the latter county he was commissioned Judge of Probate, June 16, 1829.
He was mainly a business lawyer, and a good one. He had no fluency of speech. But when he prepared himself carefully be- forehand to speak in public, he was capable of acquitting himself handsomely, as he is said to have done in the National Democratic Convention of 1832. As is usual among the better class of law- yers, he was no adviser of litigation.
Apparently he was somewhat easy-going in his habits, and made no scruple of locking up the post-office in the middle of the day, if his business called him elsewhere. But that was in the early quarter of the century, when time was less valuable and let- ters fewer than now.
He married, May 6, 1801, Mrs. Abigail (Bailey) Stone, at Charlestown, and had six children.
677
ALPHABETICALLY.
JAMES INGALLS SWAN.
Son of Joshua and Mary (Ingalls) Swan ; born, Haverhill, c. 1779 ; ad- mitted, 1803 ; practiced, Bath ; died there, April 8, 1820.
Mr. Swan received his education at the academy in his native town, then under the charge of Moses P. Payson, who recognized the abilities of his pupil and encouraged him to pursue his stud- ies. He read law in the office of Alden Sprague of Haverhill. After a short stay at Lisbon (then Concord) he established him- self, in 1807, in Bath, where Mr. Payson, his former preceptor, was already in practice. For the remaining thirteen years of Mr. Swan's life they were constantly pitted against each other in pro- fessional encounters, yet " never did an unkind word pass between them," a remarkable fact in those days when personalities were so much in vogue, especially in the lower tribunals. The two Bath lawyers were both superior men, and the difference in their men- tal characteristics was thus described by Mr. Sprague, their law instructor : " Payson," he said, " had more learning and acquired talent, but Swan more brilliancy of imagination and native force."
Mr. Swan was especially noted as a lawyer for his power with the jury. He seemed to be able to sway them at his pleasure, with very little regard to the law or the evidence. Members of the bar who knew his power have said that if they were to be tried for their lives, they would as soon that he should be their advocate as any man they ever knew.
Tradition has preserved the memory of some of his signal tri- umphs before "The Twelve." There was a famous series of actions for trespass on certain meadows in Piermont, brought by Joseph Bell of Haverhill, and defended by Swan. Apparently the plaintiff had the strict legal right, but there were equities on the side of the defendants. Mr. Swan called to his aid every circumstance that could tell on the jury. A chief question was whether a right of way across the meadows was one or two rods in width. The plans shown on the trial represented the way, some of them by a dotted line, others by two dotted lines. "These latter," the specious advocate gravely argued, " prove that the way must have been two rods wide - one for each line of dots !" Several of the actions were tried, and the defendants always gained the
AT
678
DECEASED LAWYERS
verdict, though against the able and pertinacious efforts of the plaintiff's learned counsel. The Court, however, would not permit the law to be nullified by the eloquent sophistries of the advocate, and ordered judgment for the plaintiff, non obstante veredicto.
Like many others of his profession, and of other professions, in his day, Mr. Swan was a boon companion and given to convivi- ality. He made no secret of his preference for " a short life and a merry one." He wanted to enjoy all the good things of this world, and then shuffle off the mortal coil before they palled upon his taste. And he squared his actions with this philosophy. He did not live to be a burden or a reproach to his friends. On a Monday morning he bade his old companions at the tavern a last farewell, went to his home and took his bed, and before the week ended, his mortal life was over. His requests to a neighbor about his funeral were characteristic. He did not wish to burden his bearers with the weight of his heavy body, but desired that it might be drawn to the grave by his horse ; and directed that a bugler should be employed to play a dirge while his funeral pro- cession should move on its way to the burial-ground. His wishes were respected.
In his person Mr. Swan was large and imposing. He was of amiable disposition and equable temperament. His natural quali- fications for his profession were very great. He was quick to observe, ready to seize every advantage, vehement in declamation, magnetic in speech. He is represented as having certain man- nerisms in the use of language and in his intonations that were peculiarly effective. He had to win his way in a bar of no mean strength, for the circuits were traveled in his time by the leading lawyers of all parts of the State. These he was accustomed to meet, even while he was a young practitioner ; and notwithstand- ing his want of a thorough early training, he is said to have held his own against all comers, and fairly earned the title of a leader of the Grafton County bar.
He had many winning traits of character. He was generous and hospitable, and especially attractive to the young. He was styled one of " Nature's noblemen." He was not a religious man ; but by an eloquent speech that he made in the town meeting of Bath, he induced the people to increase the salary of their min- ister by a half. When he died he left behind him no enemies, but many friends.
679
ALPHABETICALLY.
His wife was Betsy, daughter of Alden Sprague of Haverhill. They had two or three children, who all died in infancy.
NATHAN C. SWEAT.
Born, Canaan, May 11, 1836 ; admitted, 1862 ; practiced, Lebanon ; died there, May 31, 1871.
Mr. Sweat received an academical education in Malone and Potsdam, New York, and studied for the bar with Lyman D. Stevens in Concord. On his admission he established himself in practice in Lebanon, as a partner of Aaron H. Cragin. A clerk- ship in the Treasury Department attracted him to Washington in 1865, and occupied him two years. Thence he went to practice in Toledo, Iowa ; but ill health compelled his return to Lebanon, where he died of consumption.
On December 28, 1863, he married Lora T. Kingsbury of Hanover. They had no children.
MASON WEARE TAPPAN.
Son of Weare and Lucinda (Atkins) Tappan ; born, Newport, October 20, 1817 ; admitted, 1841 ; practiced, Bradford ; died there, October 24, 1886.
Mr. Tappan attended the academies in Hopkinton and in Meriden, but never took a collegiate course. His legal education he obtained in part in his father's office, and afterwards with George W. Nesmith at Franklin. He commenced practice in Bradford in 1841.
He became warmly interested in politics as early as the cam- paign that resulted in the election of President William H. Har- rison in 1840. Years afterwards he used to sing, in memory of that rousing contest, with great sweetness and unction, " Tippeca- noe and Tyler too," the lilt of which long survived the occasion for which it was composed. His father was an original abolition- ist, and his hatred of slavery descended undiminished to his son, so that when the Free Soil and later the Republican party were formed, both stood naturally in the foremost ranks of each.
Mr. Tappan represented Bradford in the legislatures of 1853, 1854, and 1855, and was a very prominent member. In 1854 he received the nomination of his party for the speakership, and failed of an election by only two votes. In 1855 he was chosen
.37 -17
680
DECEASED LAWYERS
a member of Congress, and served six years. He was in the win- ter of 1860-61 a member of the committee, consisting of one from each State, to which was referred that part of the President's message relating to the disturbed condition of the country. Upon the presentation of the reports he made an extraordinarily able and patriotic speech, which was widely circulated. Upon quitting his congressional seat he was commissioned colonel of the First Regiment of New Hampshire Volunteer Infantry, and served three months in the field.
He then returned to his law practice, which became very exten- sive. A number of years his office was really in the state capital, to accommodate the demands of his business, though his residence remained in Bradford. His law learning was ample, and his judg- ment and knowledge of men rarely erred. Earnest and deter- mined in behalf of justice, with a native eloquence that made its way to the hearts and consciences of men, he was a powerful advocate.
In 1876 he accepted the post of attorney-general of the State, and continued to administer the office, under successive appoint- ments, to the time of his decease. There were during that time several important capital cases, which he managed with his ac- customed skill and power. The duties of the place required discretion and acquaintance with the springs of human character, quite as much as legal knowledge and ability. A large propor- tion of the criminal business of late years consists in alleged vio- lations of the prohibitory law and other enactments of a character somewhat similar. An attorney-general unfriendly to such legis- lation, or even one who lacked discrimination, could easily deal with such cases so as to make them a stumbling-block and a rock of offense to the cause of reform. But Colonel Tappan, while never failing to enforce the laws, avoided all unnecessary friction. He performed his duty, but added no needless drop of bitterness to it. His sympathies also often lent a helping hand to those who were reclaimable.
His temperament was genial, his manner hearty, his disposi- tion generous and public spirited. Every good cause found in him a ready champion ; he never hesitated to defend the true and the right as he understood them. Dartmouth College gave him the honorary degree of A. M. in 1860.
He was married, first, May 2, 1848, to Emeline M. Worth of
681
ALPHABETICALLY.
Bradford ; second, June 4, 1871, to Mary E. Jenkins of Boston, Massachusetts ; and third, to Imogene B. Atwood of Lisbon. A son and a daughter survived him.
WEARE TAPPAN.
Son of John and Abigail (Weare) Tappan ; born, East Kingston, March 3, 1790 ; Dartmouth College, 1811 ; admitted, 1818 ; practiced, Newport and Bradford ; died, Bradford, April 6, 1868.
Mr. Tappan received his education preparatory to his college course at the Phillips Exeter and Atkinson academies. He read law awhile with Caleb Ellis of Claremont, and then found em- ployment as a teacher two years in Maryland. Two other years he spent in mercantile business, and then resumed his legal studies with Baruch Chase of Hopkinton and with Hubbard Newton of Newport. For some months after his admission he remained in Newport as a partner of Mr. Newton, but in Jan- uary, 1819, he fixed his residence in Bradford.
As a lawyer Mr. Tappan is described by those who knew him as diligent in his professional work, set in his opinions, and in his cases exhibiting notable " staying" qualities. He was equally decided in his views upon political matters. . Early imbued with a hatred of the inhumanity and wrong of human slavery, he was all his life a determined opponent of the system. His house was always open to the abolitionist lecturers, even when they could hardly find an avowed friend and sympathizer elsewhere. And the slave escaping from bondage was sure of aid and concealment under his roof, notwithstanding the act had the sanction of only " the higher law."
Mr. Tappan preserved the traditions of the earlier great lights of the law, and maintained much of their high sense of the dig- nity of the profession. He was an especial admirer of Jeremiah Mason, and gave his eldest son his name. He was conscientious and upright, though perhaps a little austere, a sound and careful practitioner, and among the latest of the lawyers bred in the old school.
He married Lucinda Atkins of Claremont, December 25, 1816. They were the parents of five children, of whom the eldest was of his father's profession.
682
DECEASED LAWYERS
NOAH TEBBETS.
Son of James and Mary (Nutter) Tebbets ; born, Rochester, December 26, 1802 ; Bowdoin College, 1822 ; admitted, 1825; practiced, Rochester ; died there, September 9, 1844.
Mr. Tebbets spent two or three years at the academies in Wakefield and in Saco, Maine, and then entered Dartmouth University ; but when that institution was discontinued upon the adverse decision of the Supreme Court of the United States, he finished his course at Bowdoin. Qualified for the law in the office of Jeremiah H. Woodman at Rochester, he was admitted to the bar of York County, Maine. He went into practice in Parsons- field in that county, and remained seven years, his practice extending also into this State. In 1835 he returned to his native town.
He had no desire for public office, but consented to be a candi- date for state representative in 1842 as a friend of temperance legislation. His effective performance of his duties in the two laborious sessions of that year probably paved the way to his appointment in January, 1843, as a circuit Justice of the Court of Common Pleas .. He was soon called on to hold the court, in Grafton County, at which William F. Comings was tried for murder. It was a difficult and exhausting case, lasting twenty- one days. Though the junior of the two justices on the bench, he apparently took the onus of the trial, and delivered the charge to the jury. His conscientious exertions and the confinement and vitiated atmosphere of the court-room combined to sow the seeds of disease in his constitution, from which, though he lingered several months afterwards, he never recovered.
He was a scholar, and never lost his love for the Latin and the English classics. A thorough lawyer, he uniformly gave his advice in favor of peaceable settlement of disputed questions ; of even temper and modest disposition, he was firm in his convictions of right and wrong. In the temperance reform he was active and earnest, before the time when it had become popular to be so. His chief characteristic has been pronounced to be integrity, so complete as to be absolutely beyond suspicion.
He married, June 3, 1828, Mary Esther, daughter of Jeremiah H. Woodman of Rochester, and left several children.
683
ALPHABETICALLY.
SAMUEL TEBBETS.
Son of Major Ebenezer Tebbets ; born, Dover, 1780; Harvard College, 1799 ; admitted, 1802 ; practiced, Dover ; died there, April 6, 1810.
Mr. Tebbets entered the Phillips Exeter Academy in 1794, and there remained until he went to college. He studied law in Strafford County, and practiced in Dover until his death, - a period of only eight years. The most that we of this generation know of him comes from a few lines in one of Henry Mellen's poems, " The Old Bachelors of Dover," which ran as follows : - "Just entered the list we behold Brother Tebbets, Courteous and neat as a newly made glove, In manner and sentiments still he exhibits A genius for learning the lessons of love."
Mr. Tebbets, however, never married, and died a victim of that insidious disease of Northern climes, - consumption.
ANDREW GILMAN TEBBETTS.
Son of David C. and Deborah (Gilman) Tebbetts ; born, Gilmanton, Jan- uary 1, 1843 ; practiced, Dover ; died, Kanawha County, West Virginia, April 29, 1890.
Mr. Tebbetts obtained his instruction at the academy in Gil- manton, and studied for his profession in the office of Ira A. Eastman of Manchester, who is said to have been the means of his getting an education. He entered the practice in 1864 at Dover, as the partner of Edward B. Knight, and stayed there a year or two. Then he passed a year in Washington, District of Columbia, as librarian in the Navy Department. From there he went to West Virginia, and practiced law in Union, Monroe County, in connection with A. T. Caporton, for nearly twenty years. His last place of residence was Charleston, in Kanawha County.
He was a good lawyer, but very retiring and unobtrusive, and his practice was largely in office business. His memory of per- sonal history was peculiarly retentive, and in conversation he was . very entertaining. He assisted in the preparation of several vol- umes of the state law reports, and was commissioner of school lands for Kanawha County.
He never married.
684
DECEASED LAWYERS
GEORGE TENNEY.
Son of Benjamin and Betsey (Taylor) Tenney ; born, Groton, February 12, 1821 ; Dartmouth College, 1847 ; admitted, 1850 ; practiced, Bristol and Concord ; died, White River Junction, Vermont, April 11, 1880.
Fitted for college at the academy in Hebron, Mr. Tenney after his graduation chose the profession of the law, and started in prac- tice in Bristol in 1851. About the year 1859 he exchanged that place for Concord, where he remained two or three years, and then removed to Hartford and White River Junction, Vermont. It is said that he was not very successful in his profession.
He married Eleuthera M., daughter of Isaac Bissell of Hano- ver, June 23, 1852.
WILLIAM TENNEY.
Son of Captain William and Phebe (Jewett) Tenney ; born, Hollis, Septem- ber 12, 1785 ; Dartmouth College, 1808 ; admitted, 1811 ; practiced, Salem and Newmarket ; died, Newmarket, September 13, 1838.
This gentleman prepared himself for the legal profession at the Litchfield Law School in Connecticut, and in the offices of Asa Peabody and William Prescott, Boston, Massachusetts, and was there admitted. After two years' experience in practice in Pep- perell, Massachusetts, he came to Salem in 1813; and thence to Newmarket in 1815. It was said of him that he was more of a politician than a lawyer. He was assistant clerk of the New Hampshire Senate in 1823, and in 1829 was made postmaster of Lamprey River village in Newmarket. The latter office he held to the time of his death.
His wife was Phebe Wheeler, and they were the parents of one son.
ANDREW ELIOT THAYER.
Son of Andrew E. and Lucy (Flagg) Thayer ; born, Nashua, c. 1820 ; Har- vard College, 1842 ; admitted, 1845 ; practiced, Manchester ; died, San Fran- cisco, California, April 21, 1873.
Mr. Thayer prepared himself for the law in the offices of Dan- iel Clark of Manchester and of George Y. Sawyer of Nashua, and at the Harvard Law School, from which he was graduated
685
ALPHABETICALLY.
LL. B. in 1844. The following year he opened an office in Man- chester. But his stay in New Hampshire was short. He went away first to Boston, where he was engaged in commercial busi- ness, and afterwards to California.
He was married, and left a widow with four children.
JAMES THOM.
Son of Dr. Isaac and Persis (Sargent) Thom ; born, Londonderry, August 14, 1785 ; Dartmouth College, 1805 ; admitted, 1808 ; practiced, Exeter and Derry ; died, Derry, November 27, 1852.
Mr. Thom studied law in the office of George Sullivan of Exeter, and began business in that town, in 1808. He resided there seven years, practicing law and a part of the time editing the " Constitutionalist " newspaper. He was a young man of bright parts and popular manners, sang a good song, and was always the "life of the company." In the war of 1812 he was chosen captain of one of the military companies of Exeter, and was ordered with his command to Portsmouth for the protection of that port against an apprehended invasion of the enemy. Their courage was never put to the proof, however, by any real attack, though a false alarm or two startled some of the weak- nerved militiamen, and gave occasion for some amusing stories by the captain, after his return from the seat of war.
In 1815 he removed to Derry. He was a lawyer of capacity and legal knowledge above the average, and was engaged in many contested cases. He was also a man of public spirit, was chosen representative in the legislature for five years from 1821 to 1826, and was active in procuring the incorporation of the Derry Bank in 1829. Of this institution he became the cashier and virtual manager. It was a position of no little anxiety, however, though his sunny disposition and habit of "taking things by the smooth handle " enabled him to bear it better than most. The inner door of the bank vault being covered with the best locks of the time, he felt pretty safe against burglars. One day, however, came a man with a brand new bank lock, which he wanted to sell to the bank. Mr. Thom replied that he had locks enough already for his security. " But," said the man, "suppose I should be able to open all your locks without the keys, would you buy mine ?" " Of course I would," answered the cashier. The ex-
686
DECEASED LAWYERS
periment was tried, and in half an hour the doors of the vault were wide open. "Then," said Mr. Thom, relating the circum- stance afterwards, "I did not let the fellow rest till he had put his lock on the door, also. But when I came to think of it, how could I tell that some other man would n't come along the next day, and pick his lock as easily as he had picked the others !"
Mr. Thom married, May 13, 1813, Harriet Coffin of Glouces- ter, Massachusetts, who died in 1873. He left three sons and two daughters.
CHARLES EDWARD THOMPSON.
Son of Hon. Thomas W. and Elizabeth C. (Porter) Thompson ; born, Salis- bury, June 19, 1807 ; Dartmouth College, 1828 ; admitted, 1838 ; practiced, Haverhill ; died, Schraalenburgh, New Jersey, November 2, 1883.
Mr. Thompson received his education at the military school of Captain Alden Partridge of Norwich, Vermont, and at Dart- mouth College. After pursuing his law studies for a year in the office of his brother, William C. Thompson, at Plymouth, he trav- eled for three years in South America and elsewhere, and then was engaged for a time in trade in Mobile, Alabama. Conclud- ing finally to adopt the profession of the law, he returned home, and completed his preparation in the office of his brother, and in that of Joseph Bell of Haverhill, in which place he practiced his profession from 1840 until 1854. He was a representative in the state legislature in 1851 and 1852.
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.