History of Tioga, Chemung, Tompkins and Schuyler counties, New York, Part 60

Author: Peirce, H. B. (Henry B.) cn; Hurd, D. Hamilton (Duane Hamilton)
Publication date: 1879
Publisher: Philadelphia : Everts & Ensign
Number of Pages: 1112

USA > New York > Chemung County > History of Tioga, Chemung, Tompkins and Schuyler counties, New York > Part 60
USA > New York > Schuyler County > History of Tioga, Chemung, Tompkins and Schuyler counties, New York > Part 60
USA > New York > Tioga County > History of Tioga, Chemung, Tompkins and Schuyler counties, New York > Part 60
USA > New York > Tompkins County > History of Tioga, Chemung, Tompkins and Schuyler counties, New York > 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).

1877, the society was reorganized, and an amended constitu- tion adopted. The last canvass of the city was made in 1878 ; 3591 families were visited, 241 found destitute, 173 of whom and 21 individuals were supplied with the Scriptures; 40 books were sold, amounting to $28.43, and 176 donated, eost- ing $74.37. Expenses of canvass, 78 days, $117. Revs. Jervis and Grandine were the canvassers. The presidents of the society have been as follows : 1835-39, Samuel Tuthill ; 1839-68, Simeon Benjamin; 1869, Rev. Geo. C. Curtis ; 1870-72, Rev. W. E. King; 1873-74, Rev. Thomas Toncey ; 1875-76, David Decker; 1877-78, N. P. Fas- sett. Present officers : President, N. P. Fassett ; Vicc- Presidents, Revs. S. T. Clark and E. Horr, Jr .; Secretary, Robert A. Hall; Treasurer, Solomon L. Gillett.

CHIEMUNG COUNTY SUNDAY-SCHOOL ASSOCIATION

was organized about 1870, but has not been in active ope- ration all of the time since then. A few institutes have been held,-one very successful one in Elmira City, in the winter of 1878, and one good one at Horseheads in 1876. The principal workers of the Association are Professor Dan- forth, Colonel H. M. Smith, Asher Frost, John Brown, A. I. Decker. The present offieers are Stephen Rose, Presi- dent ; A. I. Decker, Secretary and Treasurer.

CHAPTER XLI.

THE LEARNED PROFESSIONS.

The Bench and Bar-The Medical Profession-Medical Societies- The Clergy.

THE Bench and Bar of Chemung County has contained many able lawyers and some profound jurists. Leading the procession which has worn the ermine is the veteran who, Cincinnatus like, has left the ranks of publie life and returned to the plow, and is now enjoying his otium cum dignitate on his farm, just beyond the limits of the beauti- ful city he has seen expand from a hamlet to a thriving metropolis of trade and manufactures. We allude to HON. HIRAM GRAY, of Seotch-Irish parentage, who was born July 20, 1801, in Salem, Washington Co., this State, the then and continued residence of his parents, each of whom lived beyond threescore-and-ten, and died in the profession of that Christian faith "whose mission it is to impart health and soundness to the race of man."

His father, John Gray, was by occupation a farmer. in pursuit of which he acquired the wherewith to place him- self and family, while under his guardianship, beyond the reach of reasonable want ; a man of firmness, integrity, and marked strength of mind, enjoying the respeet and con- fidence of his fellow-citizens, by whom he was in 1808 elected to the Legislature of this State, and from time to time placed in other stations of public trust. His son, the leading incidents of whose career are the subject of this nar- rative, received his education, preparatory to entering col- lege, at the Salem Academy, in the town of his birth. In 1818 he entered the sophomore class of Uuion College, and graduated in 1821. His attendance at college was required

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during only a portion of his senior year, and in December of that year he entered the office of the late Chief-Justice Savage (then a practicing lawyer of Salem) as a student- at-law. Judge Savage was soon after appointed Comp- troller of this State, and then under his advice he entered, in September, 1822, the office of the firm of Nelson & Dayton, consisting of the late Samuel Nelson, Associate Justice of the United States Supreme Court, and Nathan Dayton, late Circuit Judge and Vice-Chancellor of the Eighth Judicial District of this State, then practicing law in Cortlandville, Cortland Co.

During his clerkship in their office, in April, 1823, Samuel Nelson, one of that firm, was appointed Circuit Judge and Vice-Chancellor of the Sixth Judicial District of this State; the business of the office being continued at the same place by Dayton, with whom he continued his clerkship until the October term of the Supreme Court, held in the city of Albany in 1833, when he was admitted to practice as attorney of that court. After a short visit to his parents in his native town, he received from the late Chief-Justice Savage, with whom he commenced his clerk- ship and by whom his license to practice as an attorney at the Supreme Court was signed, a kinsman and true friend of his father, a letter, addressed to all whom it might con- cern, vouching for his good character and qualifications as a lawyer. With these testimonials he returned to Cortland village, intending there to pursue his studies until he could find a more suitable location for the practice of his pro- fession. In November of that ycar Judge Nelson, who continued to reside in Cortland, loaned him a few elemen- tary law books, such as the judge could spare, with which, and the first edition of Cowen's Treatise as a text-book, he repaired to the neighboring village of Dryden, Tompkins Co., where he remained until the spring of 1824, trans- acting business in the line of his profession sufficient to defray his expenses.

In the spring of 1824 he entered into partnership with Townsend Ross, of Homer, Cortland Co., an old prac- titioner,-not, however, with a view of remaining in Cortland beyond the time he could avail hinself of a more eligible situation. In the spring of 1825, upon the invitation of Theodore North, Sr., a counselor-at-law of experience, learning, and skill in his profession unsurpassed, if it was equaled, by any member of the profession in the county of Tioga, he came to Elmira, then Newtown, an inconsiderable village of less than six hundred population, and entered into partnership with him in the practice of the law.

The business of Elmira and its vicinity did not then warrant the hope of any considerable profits from legal pro- fessional services ; it was the prospect of the then future growth of Elmira and its surroundings that induced him to accept the invitation. Soon after he came here he was admitted to the Court of Common Pleas of Bradford County, Pa., where he practiced to his advantage, not only by an increase of his income, but by coming in contact with such lawyers as Horace Williston, George Dennison, Garrick Mallory, John N. Coyningham, and Edward Overton, of acknowledged eminence in their profession.

While retainers were few, as well as inconsiderable in amount, in Tioga County, an amendment of the constitution

of 1821, adopted in 1826, went into effect, authorizing jus- tices of the peace to be elected by the people. Under this provision four justices of the peace were to be elected in each town. The nomination and election took place in 1827. Political parties were then designated as the Jackson and Adams parties. North and three others were placed in nomination by the Adams party, while Gray and three others were placed in nomination by the Jackson party. The result was that both North and Gray were elected. One of those nominated upon the ticket with Gray being defeated, this led to the dissolution of the firm of North & Gray, which occurred shortly prior to the 1st of January, 1828, when the duties of their office commenced. Gray drew the two years' term, at the expiration of which he was re-elected for four years. The increase of his professional business, and the duties of his office, so engrossed his attention that he necessarily discontinued his practice in Pennsylvania ; and before the expiration of his four years' term his pro- fessional business increased to an extent that compelled him to decline, so far as it was practicable, all applications for process for the commencement of litigated suits. He was now engaged in an earnest and successful professional career, and soon attained a high standing in the front rank of his profession ; insomuch that for several years prior to entering upon his duties as member of Congress, in 1837, he was en- gaged on one side or the other of nearly every action tried in the courts of record in the western jury district of Tioga, comprising the present county of Chemung and the prin- cipal portion of Schuyler, as well as in many tried in ad- joining counties.

In 1828, when the Anti-Masonic excitement ran high, it was assumed by the Anti-Masonic Convention of the county of Tioga that young Gray, who was not a Mason, was, of course, an Anti-Mason, and upon such assumption that body nominated him for member of Assembly ; but enter- taining the opinion that Masonry or Anti-Masonry was not a proper element in State or National politics, he promptly declined the nomination.

In 1830 he was married to Aurelia Covell, eldest daughter of Robert Covell, who was one of the oldest and most time- honored citizens of Elmira. She is an estimable lady, who has contributed her full share to his happiness and conse- quence.

In 1836 he was elected to the Twenty-fifth Congress, which held its first session in September, 1837, and was placed upon the Committee of Claims. Although he was up to this time without legislative experience or famil- iarity with parliamentary law, having devoted himself ex- clusively to his profession, he discharged his duties on the committee to which he was assigned with ability, and sustained himself in other respects as a member of Con- gress creditably. At the termination of that Congress he returned to his profession, and was not again a candidate.

After his election to Congress he received into partner- ship Samuel G. Hathaway, Jr., a former student in his office, then a brilliant young lawyer of great personal pop- ularity, who also soon became a distinguished and almost unrivaled advocate.

Judge Gray had then, as he has now, likes and dislikes; his convictions were then, as now, thorough ; and he ut-

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tered, with perhaps too little reserve, what he thoroughly believed to be right ; and although it cannot be said that he was universally popular, it is nevertheless true that those who knew him longest and best were his best friends.

Several years prior to the resignation of Judge Robert Monell of the office of circuit judge and vice-chancellor of the Sixth Judicial District, it was believed he would soon resign.

William Woods (since deceased ), then a prominent mem- ber of the Steuben County bar, who was the earliest com- mon-school instructor of Judge Gray, and had known him well from that time, was desirous he should succeed to the office then (as he supposed) soon to become vacant. Unso- licited, he addressed Judge Nelson, then of the Supreme Court of this State, on the subject. The ineome of the office was then comparatively small. The answer of Judge Nelson was remarkable for the interest he manifested for the welfare of his early student, and sensible suggestions made by him as to what might be the consequences of re- tiring from his practice so early. It reads as follows : "I think our friend Gray mistaken in desiring the place, if he is yet to make his fortune; it is the last place of respeeta- bility to be sought for by him; it will keep him poor through life ; it ties up the hands and eramps the energies of youth, because the business of making money is incom- patible with the duties and character of the office, and none is to be made by its income. I know, by experience, that it is gratifying to youthful aspiration to receive the ap- pointment, but if he is like me he would regret the step in a year, as I did. He had better keep himself uncommitted in regard to any permanent place until he has placed him- self in independent circumstances.

" There is no position in the world more uneomfortable than splendid poverty, from which one can neither advance or retreat. He is now prosperous, and if he goes on- preserves his character and habits-every year will add to his consideration and ease, and he may at any time, in this free land, command whatever he may wish on the score of office. . . .

"I have thrown out these considerations, which please communicate to our friend, for I have a sineere attachment to him, and properly estimate his worth. I know there is no danger in this course if he will keep contented and lay his foundation broad and solid. If at a later period of life he should make a mistake it is not so material, but one at his present time of life, and prospeets in his profession, might be felt for years."

The office did not become vacant as soon as expected, nor until the spring of 1845, when the Senate was not in session. Silas Wright was then Governor.

The names of several gentlemen of the district, with ample testimonials of their undoubted qualifications, were . presented to him and their appointment solieited, and among them the name of Judge Gray. At the time one of them was presented a gentleman was sitting with the Governor in the executive chamber, to whom he remarked after the party presenting the petition had retired, that he not only knew of Mr. Gray but knew him personally ; that he had all the requisite qualifications for the office, and, unless he changed his mind before the Senate convened, he should, if

the Senate eoneurred, appoint him to the office; and when the Senate convened, in January, 1846, he nominated, and the Senate, on motion of the celebrated Joshua A. Spencer, since deceased, then a member of the Senate and a political opponent of Judge Gray, at onee, and without the usual reference to a committee, unanimously consented to the ap- pointment. Mr. Hammond, in his " Political History of New York," said, " The appointment of Judge Gray was decidedly popular. He had been a member of Congress for the dis- triet in which he resided, and sustained himself creditably in that station, and was a man of remarkable urbanity in his social intercourse, and a sound and able lawyer."

By a change in the organic law of the State the office was soon after abolished, and its powers and duties conferred upon Justiees of the Supreme Court to be elected in June, 1847.

He was elected one of those justiees, and drew the four years' term, at the expiration of which he was re-elected for the full term of eight years, which expired with the year 1859, and was not a candidate for a renomination or election.

Between the elose of his term as Justice of the Supreme Court and his appointment as Commissioner of Appeals in 1870, he devoted a portion of his time to the disposition of issues referred to him and the trial of issues and argu- ment of cases as counsel. In 1867 Union College con- ferred upon him the honorary degree of Doctor of Laws.

Under a change of the constitution of this State adopted in 1869, a new Court of Appeals was organized, and such eauses as were pending in this Court of Appeals on the first day of January in that year were to be heard and deter- mined by five Commissioners of Appeals, to be composed of the outgoing members of the Court of Appeals, and a fifth Commissioner to be appointed by the Governor and Senate, who were also authorized to fill such vacancies as might oecur in the commission. Under this provision of the con- stitution Judge Gray was nominated by Governor Hoffman as Commissioner of Appeals, and unanimously confirmed by the Senate, a decided majority of whom were his politieal opponents. In this eapacity he served from July, 1870, to July, 1875, when the business of the commission was completed and the commission terminated.

These testimonials of the esteem in which he was held by distinguished men, high officials, and the public, increas- ing with his years from early manhood to old age, with his judicial opinions published in the reports (remarkable for clear and condensed statement, concise and logieal reasoning, and just application of the law), constitute a worthy me- morial to an able jurist and upright judge.

While practicing his profession (from the praetiec of which he has now retired) he frequently became the unpaid counsel of elients without means, and advocated their rights with all the zeal and ability of well-paid counsel.

The Common Pleas of Tioga and Chemung was presided over more frequently by farmers than by lawyers. The first judge of the Court of Common Pleas of Tioga County was a farmer of Chemung ; he was succeeded by a non-pro- fessional man when a son of the first judge, also a farmer, was appointed to the beneh. Coryell was a farmer, Barstow a doctor, and Burrows, the seventh in the succession, was

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the first lawyer called to the bench of the county. Bald- win, another lawyer, succeeded, and then non-professionals held it in Tioga till after Chemung was ereeted; and the first judge of the new county was from the same class, though subsequently admitted to the bar. Dunn was the only lawyer judge the Common Pleas of Chemung had. The county judges have all been gentlemen of the profes- sion.

The first judge of Tioga County was ABRAHAM MILLER, of what is now known as the town of Southport. He was a native of Germany, and emigrated therefrom to North- ampton Co., Pa., with his parents, when but a child. Hc was accorded but slender educational privileges, and made but a fair use of them ; but his years gave him experience, and his common sense and sense of justice made him an impartial and, for the times in which he served, a good judge. He served as a private in the French and Indian war of 1754-60, and was captured with his mother and some of his neighbors by the Indians, who carried them away to Niagara, with the exception of Miller and two other men, who escaped while the party lay encamped near the head of Seneca Lake. Mrs. Miller was taken into the family of one of the French settlers near Niagara, where she died, her son never seeing her after his escape. He served through the Revolutionary war also. as a colonel in command of a regiment of Pennsylvania troops. He located in Southport in 1788, where he, with others, bought a large tract of land. Ile was a blacksmith and wagon-maker by trade, but followed farming as a business. He was appointed first judge Feb. 17, 1791, and held the position until March 27, 1798. He was the father of a fine family of four sons and eight daughters, all of whom werc settled about him at one time. He was born in 1735, and died July 25, 1815.

JOHN MILLER, a son of Abraham Miller, was appointed first judge April 3, 1807, and held the office until March 31, 1810. He received a fair common-school education, and made the most of it, being well informed, and for a time was a prominent politician. It is said he was en- tranced by Aaron Burr, and went to the Southwest in his ill-fated enterprise. He lived for many years in Clark Co., Ind., with an only son, and was prominent in the politics of the Hoosier State for a time. He returned thercfrom and located in Ithaca, where he died in 1833, and was buried beside his father, the veteran of two wars. Hc made a very fair judge, and was popular with the people.

GRANT B. BALDWIN, admitted to the bar in 1814, was appointed first judge Feb. 5, 1828, and held the position until March 27, 1833. He was, at the time of his appoint- ment, a leading lawyer of Chemung, had considerable in- tellect, and had he given his full attention to the profession would have ranked among the foremost men in it. As it was, he was comparatively prominent, and was a good and capable judge.

JOSEPH L. DARLING, the first judge of Chemung County, was appointed May 4, 1836, and held the position until Jan. 24, 1844, and was reappointed May 4, 1846, and filled the office till the same expired by constitutional limitation, in 1847. He was not a lawyer, though admitted to the bar in 1841, ex gratia. He made a good and popular judge.

JAMES DUNN, appointed first judge Jan. 24, 1844, and filled the office till May 4, 1846, was an able lawyer and an impartial judge. He was a student of Aaron Konklc, and was also in the office of Baldwin & Maxwell, entering the latter office when but fourteen years of age. He was admitted to the bar in 1826, and was surrogate of the county from 1840 to 1844. He was not sueeessful in his practice, and left it several years before his death. He was an ardent politician of the Clintonian-Adams school, and later, as a Whig and Republican. He ran for Congress in 1838, but was defeated, the party being in the minority in the district.

Photo. by Larkin.

Aaronkoukle

AARON KONKLE was one of the old lawyers of Elmira, admitted to the bar in the year 1805. He was the son of John and Anna Wurtz Konkle. John Konkle, his father, was born in the eity of Philadelphia, June 3, 1755, whose parents were John and Elizabeth, who were emigrants from Germany. John Konkle's children besides Aaron, the subject of this sketch, were Anna, wife of the late John Hughes, of Elmira, and inother of Commodore Aaron K. Hughes, at present residing in Greenwich, Washington Co., N. Y., and Elizabeth, wife of Thomas M. Perry, formerly and for many years one of the old merchants of Newtown Point.

Aaron Konkle was born in Sussex Co., N. J., Oct. 5, 1786. He eame with his father to this place, then New- town Point, in 1788. His father was a land surveyor, and as the commissioners for locating lands in Tioga County were that year and thereafter laying off large tracts to actual ' settlers and others, John Konkle's services were called in requisition, and many thousands of acres were surveyed, platted, and subdivided by him.

Aaron Konkle studied law in the office of Mathews & Edwards, two of the most cminent lawyers at that day in Western New York ; became, when he commenced business -

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for himself, agent for many of the large land-holders owning lands in this vicinity for their sale ; and his business for many years was that of an extensive real estate lawyer, which he conducted with marked ability and scrupulous fidelity to his clients. Mr. Konkle in these respects had no superior. Although not occupying a prominent place as an advocate, he always tried his own cases, which he prepared with great care. He was not a politician, and it is not known that he ever held an elective office. He was appointed in 1826 district attorney of the old county of Tioga, by Governor De Witt Clinton, and held the office for three successive terms. IIc afterwards held the office of Supreme Court Commissioner, and after the adoption of the constitution of 1846, he was for a short time judge and surrogate of Chemung County, to fill the vacancy occa- sioned by the resignation of Judge John W. Wisner.

John Konkle, his father, was the first postmaster at Newtown Point, and his son, Aaron, was postmaster from Oct. 1, 1809, till March 21, 1822. Mr. Konkle died at the ripe age of seventy-five years, Oct. 13, 1861. His wife, Mary, daughter of John Sly, survived him, and died April 21, 1870, aged seventy-four years.

The deaths and ages of the children of Aaron Konkle were as follows :

William P., died April 29, 1860, aged forty-three ; Mary Ann, died Nov. 20, 1854, aged thirty-five; Lucy H., wife of R. H. Lawrence, died Nov. 22, 1862, aged forty- one. No descendant of his is now living.

Photo. by Larkin.

ARIEL STANDISH THURSTON was born in Goffstown, N. H., June 10, 1810. His father, Stephen Thurston, was a native of Essex Co., Mass., and the fifth in descent from Daniel Thurston, who settled in Newbury, Mass., in 1638 (a remote relative, Sergeant Abner Thurston, of Exeter,

N. H., was in the regiment of Colonel Cilley, in General Poor's Brigade, and was among the wounded at the battle of Newtown, fought six miles below the now city of Elmira, on Sunday, the 29th day of August, 1779). Judge Thurs- ton derives his middle name from the Standish family, being the sixth in descent from Captain Miles Standish, the military commander of the Plymouth colony.

He was educated in the common schools of New Hamp. shire, Kimball Union Academy, and Amherst College. In November, 1829, he came to Chemung County (then Tioga), and entered the law-office of Judge Gray, as a student, in May following. During the period of his legal studies he taught school, and one year of the time was principal of an academy in Williamsport, Pa. In 1835, at the May term, in the city of New York, he was admitted an attorney of the Supreme Court, and for eighteen months thereafter he remained in that city, passing the summer of 1835 in the office of Benjamin F. Butler, then attorney- general of the United States, and one of the cabinet of General Jackson. In the month of September, 1836, he returned to Elmira, and married Julia C., second daughter of the late Dr. Erastus L. Hart. Shortly after that he formed a partnership with John W. Wisner, which con- tinued till the latter was elected to the county judgeship, in 1847. On the resignation of Judge Wisner, in 1850, Mr. Thurston was elected to fill his unexpired term, and, in November, 1851, was re-elected, and held the office for the full term of four years, discharging the duties of county judge and surrogate. From his admission to the Supreme Court, in 1835, to the present time he has been in active practice, more especially in actions and proceedings con- nected with real estate. Before the titles to land became, as they now are, quieted and settled, many involved cases passed through his hands. Charles P. Thurston, eldest son of Judge Thurston, was admitted as an attorney of the Supreme Court in 1872, and has been since 1873 asso- ciated in the law business with his father, and the firm has a good and remunerative practice.

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History of Tioga, Chemung, Tompkins and Schuyler counties, New York, Part 60

Author: Peirce, H. B. (Henry B.) cn; Hurd, D. Hamilton (Duane Hamilton) Publication date: 1879 Publisher: Philadelphia : Everts & Ensign Number of Pages: 1112

Author: Peirce, H. B. (Henry B.) cn; Hurd, D. Hamilton (Duane Hamilton)
Publication date: 1879
Publisher: Philadelphia : Everts & Ensign
Number of Pages: 1112