The twentieth century bench and bar of Pennsylvania, volume I, Part 1

Author:
Publication date: 1903
Publisher: Chicago, H. C. Cooper, jr., bro. & co.
Number of Pages: 1102

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GENEALOGY COLLECTION

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THE

TWENTIETH CENTURY

BENCH AND BAR

PENNSYLVANIA

V.I

VOLUME I

ILLUSTRATED -

CHICAGO H. C. COOPER, JR., BRO. & CO.

1903

Brown-Cooper Typesetting Co., Chicago, Ill.

1406387

PREFACE

T HE difficulties eneountered in the preparation, or rather in the super- vision of the preparation, of this work were vastly underestimated. Many of these difficulties were insurmountable without the aid of others, which aid, in many eases, eould not be obtained. Nevertheless, what- ever of merit the work may possess, is largely due to the unselfish eo-operation of a goodly number of the members of the bar to whom cordial aeknowledg- ment is hereby made. Besides the information obtained in the way suggested, all other known means of seeuring it have been resorted to.

In the compilation of what follows, the right to praise has been exer- eised with mueh greater freedom than the right to blame. The work treats of professional men from a professional viewpoint. True in some eases the line is not very elosely drawn, but in many eases it is. No unfavorable in- ferenee should be based on the absence of remarks eoneerning the eharaeter or habits of any individual treated of in this work. We have aimed to faith- fully represent the Legal Fraternity of the State of Pennsylvania, and the interest which many of the profession have shown in the publishers' undertak- ing has been a souree of gratifieation to them, and at the same time convineed them that the result of their labors eannot help but supply the demand of an urgent need. Nothing herein has been prompted by eonseious malice or recognized partiality, and the publishers take pleasure in expressing their grateful acknowledgment to those who have contributed so largely to these pages, and have lent the influence of their names thereto as Advisory Editors and Contributors. An attempt has been made to keep within the reeord; to present the faets as they exist, and the errors in this direetion are in under- statement rather than in over-statement; but generally, where no contrary desire has been made known the purpose has been to add to the ehronological faets a fair estimate of ability based upon achievement.

That the work is faultless, we do not presume; that it will meet with unqualified approval, we dare not hope. We have eonseientiously performed our task, and hope we have done it well.

1 (mevz) 19-57-4 52.05 121

ADVISORY EDITORS AND CONTRIBUTORS

ARCHIBALD BLAKELEY.

IIENRY HICE.

A. L. HAZEN

S. R. MASON.

JOSHUA DOUGLASS.

JAMES SILL.

SAMUEL HI. ORWIG.

FREDERICK W. NICOLLS.

W. I. LEWIS.

J. O. PARMLEE.

E. W. BIDDLE.

A. W. SCHALCK.

B. D. HAMLIN.

HARRY W. BROWN.

FREDERIC O. DUFFIELD.

J. CALVIN MEYER. SAMUEL T. WILEY.

LEO WISE.

GEORGE B. KULP.

JOHN M. KELLY.

E. MERRIFIELD.

R. M. STOCKER.

C. G. BEITEL.

J. H. LONGENECKER.

S. HOLMES.

E. O. KOOSER.

W. H. KOONTZ. JNO. N. BOUCHER.

S. A. DOUGLASS.

W. C. GILMORE.

B. I. BELLMAN.

DANIEL K. TRIMMER.

WILLIAM S. DILL.

W. SCOTT ALEXANDER.

JOHN G. FREEZE.

B. F. JUNKIN.

W. E. LITTLE.

R. H. WILLIAMS.

SAMUEL M. ISRAELI.

FRED W. WILLIAMS.

JAMES DENNY DAUGHERTY.

RICHARD B. TWISS.

R. B. M CORMICK.

D. M. JOHNSON. J. H. VAN ETTEN.

HORACE ALLEMAN.

T. C. CAMPBELL.

JAMES T. MAFFETT.

S. A. CRAIG.

J. B. M'ENALLY.

HON. D. C. HENNING.

WILLIAM M. HARGEST.

C. M. CLEMENT.

ANDREW BANKS.

INDEX TO COUNTIES

PAGE

Adams

157

Lackawanna

179

Allegheny

805

Lancaster

679

Armstrong

1145

Lawrence

354

Beaver

450

Lebanon

Lehigh 703

1040

Berks

Luzerne

1105

Blair

1021

Lycoming

405

Bradford

163

McKean

Bucks

675

Mercer

611

Butler

461

Mifflin

424

Cambria

657

Monroe 560

Cameron

625

Montgomery

1142

Carbon

1139

Montour 1164

Centre

490

Northampton

721

Chester

800

Northumberland

685

Clarion

296

Perry

502

Clearfield

398

Philadelphia

1047

Clinton

430

Pike

648

Columbia

281

Potter

170

Crawford

240

Schuylkill

565

Cumberland

Snyder

597

Dauphin

737

Somerset

1166

Delaware

626

Sullivan

557

Elk

446

Susquehanna

661

Erie

258

Tioga

433

Fayette

605

Union

651

Forest

418

Venango

332

Franklin

711

Warren

316

Fulton

276

Washington

511

Greene

1039

Wayne

375

Huntingdon

.343

Westmoreland

100

Indiana

362

Wyoming

553

Jefferson

386

York

518

Juniata

419

Bedford

PAGE

THE

BENCH AND BAR OF PENNSYLVANIA

CUMBERLAND COUNTY

BY BENNETT BELLMAN

PROVINCIAL PERIOD.

The bar of Cumberland county is more than a century and a half old. It had its birth in the colonial period of our history, when Pennsylvania was an English province and when George II was the reigning king. His imbecile successor, George III, whose stubborn policy provoked the colonies to assert their rights, had not yet ascended the throne of England, and the Revolution was yet as a cloud unseen, afar.

Courts of justice had been established by the proprietaries in the earliest settled por- tions of the province, at first under the laws of the Duke of York, and subsequently un- der the rules of the common law, but the necessity for them became greater as the population increased, as new sections were settled, and it was this necessity for a court of justice nearer than Lancaster which was the principal reason for the formation of Cumberland county in 1750. From this period begins the history of our bar.

For nearly a hundred years succeeding the settlement of Pennsylvania, few of the Justices who presided over our courts knew

anything of the theory or practice of law until after they had received their commis- sions from the king. The courts of that day were presided over by the justices of the peace of the respective counties, all of whom were ex-officio judges of the Courts of Com- mon Pleas and Quarter Sessions, any three of whom were a quorum to transact business. They were generally chosen because of their well-known integrity of character, extended business experience and sound common sense, and by close observance and long experience became well acquainted with the duties of their positions and fitted to adjudicate the important interests committed to their charge. Nor was the bar inferior. Gentle- men eminent for their legal abilities and oratorical powers practiced before them, and by the gravity of their demeanor and re- spectful behavior shed luster upon the pro- ceedings and gave weight and influence to the decisions rendered. Great regard was had for the dignity of the court and great reverence feit for forms and ceremonies, and woe to the unlucky wight who was caught in a contempt or convicted of speaking dis- respectfully of the magistrate or of lis sovereign lord, the king.

THE BENCH AND BAR OF PENNSYLVANIA

At the time of its formation, Cumberland county was large, but it was thinly inhabit -. ed, and most of the earliest practitioners who traveled upon this eircuit were not res- idents of the new eounty, but of York or Laneaster.

THE FIRST COURTS.

The first four terms of eourt were held at Shippensburg from July term, 1750, to and including April term, 1751; but as soon as Carlisle had been laid out by the proprieta- ries and ehosen as the county seat, the courts were removed to that plaee.

At the first term of court in Shippensburg, Samuel Smith, who had been a member of the colonial assembly, and who had been commissioned as a justice March 10, 1750, with his associate justiees, presided. Born in the North of Ireland about 1700, he eame to Pennsylvania and settled in Hope- well township. For more than seven years he presided over our earliest eourts. Ile died in 1780 at the age of four seore. John Potter, who had been appointed the first sheriff, also appeared, and Hermanus Al- ricks, of Carlisle (a grandson of Peter Al- ricks who came from Holland in 1682 with dispatches to the Dutch on the Delaware), and who was himself at this time (1750) the first representative of Cumberland county in the Assembly, produeed his commission from the governor of the prov- inee, under the great seal as elerk of the peaee for the said eounty, which was read and recorded.

FIRST COURT AT CARLISLE.

The first eourt held at Carlisle was in the year immediately succeeding the formation of the county. It was "a court of General Quarter Sessions held at Carlisle for the county of Cumberland the 23rd day of July, 1751, in the twenty-fifth year of our Sover- eign Lord, King George, the Second, over Great Britain, etc., before Samuel Smith, Esq., and his associate justices." The first

eourts of Shippensburg were probably held in a hostelry or inn; those in Carlisle in a temporary log building on the northeast corner of the publie square, upon which was also a whipping post and pillory.

THE FIRST CASE.

George Ross and James Smith, of whom we shall speak later, were the two attorneys who were engaged in the first ease ever brought in Cumberland county. It was an aetion brought by James Allen against Rob- ert Hamilton and Christian, his wife, to re- cover two hundred pounds damages for in- juries alleged to have been inflieted by an assault, the summons of which was issued by Hermanus Alrieks, clerk and prothono- tary, on March 12, 1750. George Ross filed the deelaration on behalf of the plain- tiff, and James Smith entered an appear- ance for the defendant. Both were then young men who had just been admitted to the bar, Smith at Philadelphia and Ross at Laneaster. Smith, who was also a surveyor, had settled some time previously in the neighborhood of the little frontier town of Shippensburg, and was consequently there when the first eourt was held. One aecount states that Mr. Ross, who had been a friend of Mr. Smith's in early and in later life, went with him to that plaee. At any rate both were upon the ground and both prob- ably began their legal praetiee in that first court. It is reasonable to presume that Mr. Ross was the prosecuting attorney for the Crown in that first eourt at Shippensburg, insomuch as he appears as such in the first court held at Carlisle in the following year and for a number of years after.

Ross was aged then only twenty, had a high, protuberant forehead, a handsome but elongated oval faee, arehed eyebrows and long hair worn in the fashion of the day. There is no deseription, of which we are aware, of Smith's appearance, but he was a jolly, jovial soul, with "a spark of drollery

CUMBERLAND COUNTY

in his disposition,"* who, although learned and well read, by his incongruous compari- sons, his odd humor and uncouth gestures, often set the court and the spectators in a roar.

At the beginning of our history, the pub- lic prosecutor was the Crown, and all crim- inal cases are entered accordingly in the name of the king. The form of the plead- ings at this earliest period may be consid- ered interesting :

The King VS. Charles Murray.

Sur Indictment for Assault and Battery.

Being charged with, avers he is not guilty as on the indictment is supposed, and upon this he puts himself upon the court and upon the king's attorney likewise. But now the defendant comes into court and retracts his plea, not being willing to contend with our sovereign lord, the king. Protests his innocence and prays to be admitted to a small fine. Whereupon it is adjudged by the court that he pay the sum of two shil- lings, six pence. October Term, 1751.

Besides the ordinary actions of trespass, slander, assault and battery and the like, there were actions in the early courts in which there was imprisonment for debt, the settling of boundaries, the binding of bond servants, term of redemptioners, and quite a number of cases against various persons for "settling on land unpurchased from the Indians," and for "selling liquor to the Indians without license." For the lighter offenses, there were fines and imprisonments, and for the graver ones, ignominious punish- ment of the whipping post and pillory. The whipping post seems to have been abandoned at the close of the Revolution, as we find the last mention of it in the records of our court in 1779.

FOUNDATION OF THE COURTS.

In order that we may get some idea of the foundation of the courts in Cumberland county-of the authority from which their powers were derived,-it may be interesting to turn to the old commissions, in which the power of the early justices was more or less defined. A royal commission issued in October, 1755, appointing Edward Shippen, Sr., George Stevenson and John Armstrong, justices, is in part as follows :

A ROYAL COMMISSION.

George II, by the Grace of God, of Great Britain, France and Ireland, King, Defender of the Faith, etc., to Edward Shippen, Sen'r, of the County of Lancaster, George Steven- son, of the County of York, and John Arm- strong, of the County of Cumberland, in our said Province of Pennsylvania, Esqrs.

GREETING: Know ye that reposing special trust and confidence in your Loyal- ty, Integrity, Prudence and Ability, we have assigned you, or any two of you, our Jus tices, to Enquire by the Oathis or affirmation of honest and lawful men of the said Coun- ties of York and Cumberland * of all Treasons, Murders, and such other Crimes as are by the Laws of our said Providence made Capital or felonies of death ** to have and determine the said Treasons, Murders, etc., according to law, and upon conviction of any person or persons, Judg- ment or sentence to pronounce and execution thereupon to award as The Law doth or shall direct. And we have also appointed you, the said Edward Shippen, George Stevenson and John Armstrong, or any two of you, our Justices to deliver the Goals of York and Cumberland aforesaid, of the prisoners in the same being for any crime or crimes Capi- tal or Felonies aforesaid, and therefore we commend you that at certain times, which you, or any two of you, shall consider of,

*See Graydon's Memoirs.

THE BENCH AND BAR OF PENNSYLVANIA

you meet together at the Court Houses of the said Counties of York. The first (Quarter Sessions) court in York was held October 31st, 1749, and Cumberland, to deliver the said goals and make diligent inquiry of and upon the premises and Hear and Determine all and singular the said premises and do and accomplish these things in the form aforesaid, aeting always therein as to Jus- tiee according to Law shall appertain. Sav- ing to us the Amercements, and other things to us thereof Belonging, for we have eom- manded the Sheriffs of the said County of York and Cumberland, that at certain days which you shall make known to them, to eause to come before you all of the prisoners of the goals and their attachments, and also so many and such honest and Lawful men of their several Bailiwicks as may be neces- sary, by whom the truth of the matters con- cerning may be the better known and in- quired. In testimony whereof we have caused the Great Seal of our Province to be hereunto affixed. Witness, Robert Turner Morris, Esq., by virtue of a commission from Thomas Penn and Richard Penn, Esqrs., true and absolute Proprietaries of this Prov- inee, with our Royal approbation Lieutenant Governor and Commander-in-Chief of the Provinee aforesaid and counties of New Castle, Kent and Sussex on Delaware.

At Philadelphia, the ninth day of October in the year of our Lord one thousand seven hundred and fifty-five, and in the twenty- ninth year of our reign.

Signed :

Robert T. Morris.

Other connmissions were issued before and after, one to John Armstrong on April 5, 1757, appointing him a justice of the Court of Common Pleas for the county of Cumber- land. The powers of these royal or provin- eial justiees were much more extensive then than those which belong to a justice now, and for some time the county of Cumber- land, over which their jurisdiction extended,

included nearly all of Pennsylvania west of the Susquehanna.

THE PROVINCIAL JUSTICES.

The justices who, with their associates, presided over our courts during the provin- eial period, that is, from the formation of the county to the beginning of the Revolu- tion, were as follows: Samuel Smith, from July, 1750, to October, 1757; Francis West, 1757-1759; John Armstrong, Francis West and IIermanus Alricks, January, 1760; John MeKnight, October, 1760; John Armstrong, April, 1761; James Galbreath, October, 1761; Thomas Wilson, 1763; John Byers, 1763; John Armstrong, from October, 1763, to April, 1776. The above embraces the names of all the justices who presided prior to the Revolution, with the exception possibly of a few who held but a single term of court. Of these we have already mentioned all we know of Samuel Smith.

Francis West was of English parentage, but was born in the north of Ireland about the year 1730; he emigrated to America and settled in Carlisle in or before 1753. He was commissioned one of the provincial justiees in July, 1757. He was an educated man and a loyalist. His sister (Ann) became the wife of his friend, co-justice Hermanus Alrieks, and his daughter of the same name married Col. George Gibson, the father of Hon. John Bannister Gibson, who was afterwards to become the greatest of the chief justices of Pennsylvania.

Hermanus Alricks was, as we have seen, the first elerk of the courts (from 1750 to 1770) and the first representative of Cum- berland county in the Provincial Assembly. HIe was also a young man, born in Philadel- phia about 1730. He settled in Carlisle about 1749-50. He was, as we have seen, a brother- in-law of Francis West, and was a man of mark and influence in the valley west of the Susquehanna. He died in Carlisle, December 14, 1772.

CUMBERLAND COUNTY

John McKnight was born about the year 1730, in the province of Ulster, Ireland. He came to Ameriea in early life, was eommis- sioned a loyal justiee in 1757, but became a eaptain in the sueeeeding year (1758) in Forbes' expedition against the Indians. He was a Presbyterian (elder in the Middle Spring Presbyterian ehureh) and a man of unblemished reputation. Ile died in April, 1768.

James Galbreath, another of these provin- eial Justiees, was an older man, born in the north of Ireland in 1703. He was a man of note on the frontier and the early provineial records of Pennsylvania contain frequent referenee to him .. He had been sheriff of Laneaster county in 1742, and for many years a justiee of that eounty. He first pre- sided over our eourts in October, 1761, after having served in the Indian wars of 1755-63, and at about which time (1761) he had re- moved to Cumberland county, where he died June 11, 1786.

Thomas Wilson lived near Carlisle. He was commissioned justiee Mareh 10, 1750. His son, James A. Wilson, became a promi- nent member of the early bar and a major in the Revolutionary war.

John Byers (who presided in Mareh, 1763) was a resident of Cumberland county. He came from Ireland and was commissioned a justiee in 1758. He was a member of the "committee of correspondenee" in 1775; a member of the supreme executive eouneil from 1781 to 1784. (See notiee of him in the Penn. Mag. of Hist. and Biog., Vol. II, pp. 230-1.)

John Armstrong was the last of these, and "the noblest Roman of them all." He first appears as a surveyor under the proprietary government, closely identified with the in- fant town of Carlisle and with the early his- tory of the province. In 1755 we find him commissioned as a justiee of the courts by George the Second, and from 1763 until his duties as a major-general in the Revolution

ealled him from the beneh, we find him, for a period of nearly thirteen years, presiding over our eourts. He was at this time already a eolonel and had distinguished himself in the Indian wars. In 1755 he destroyed the nest of savages at Kittanning, thus ending for a time the first Indian war in this seetion, for which he received a medal and a vote of thanks from the corporation of Philadel- phia. When, later, the Revolution broke out, we find him, in 1776, a brigadier gen- eral of the Continental army (commissioned Mareh 1, 1776), and in the sueeeeding year a major general in command of the Penn- sylvania troops. He was a warm personal friend of Washington, and was for years in personal correspondenee with him. He was a member of Congress in 1778-80, and again in 1787-88. Truly he was, in the language of another, "a man of intelligence and integ- rity, resolute and brave, who, though living absolutely ir the fear of God, feared not the face of man." He died Mareh 9, 1795, aged seventy-five years, and his ashes repose un- der a plain marble slab in the old graveyard of Carlisle.

PROSECUTORS FOR THE CROWN.

In this provineial period, these were our judges: George Ross (afterwards a signer of the Declaration of Independence) was the first publie prosecutor for the Crown from 1751 to 1764. Robert Magaw follows in 1765- 66, and Jasper Yeates in 1770. Chief Justice Benjamin Chew, who was a member of the provineial eouneil, was at this time (1759- 68) attorney general, and prosecuted many of the eriminal eases from 1759 to 1769 in our courts.

THE FIRST RECORDED ADMISSION.

The first recorded admission which we have been able to diseover was that of Wil- liam McClay, who is admitted on the appli- eation of Mr. John Mather on "taking the oath preseribed." This was in October term,

TIIE BENCH AND BAR OF PENNSYLVANIA

1760. William MeClay was from near Ship- pensburg. He was then twenty-three years of age, and afterwards beeame member of the Assembly, 1781, of the supreme executive council, and in 1788 was elected to the first United States Senate under the administra- tion of Washington. He married a daughter of the elder John Harris, the founder of Harrisburg. He was personally intimate with Washington, as his published diary shows, but does not always seem to liave been in aeeord with the administration.

MEMBERS OF THE BAR BEFORE THE REVOLUTION.

The principal members of the bar who practiecd from the time of its formation until the breaking out of the Revolution, with the dates of their first appearance or admission, were George Ross, 1750; James Smith, 1750; Samuel Johnston, 1763; Robert Magaw, 1765; Robert Galbreath, 1765; Jas- per Yeates, 1765; James Wilson, about 1768; David Sample, 1766; George Stevenson, 1770; Thomas Hartley, of York, 1771; David Grier, 1771; John Steel, 1773; James Arm- strong Wilson, 1774, and George Ross, Jr. It is a noteworthy fact that no less than three of these men who practiced at our provincial bar were afterwards signers of the Declaration of Independence.

Hon. George Ross, who, at the age of twen- ty-one, was the first publie prosecutor for the Crown in the courts of Cumberland eoun- ty, was a son of George Ross, an Episcopal elergyman. He was born in Newcastle, Del., in 1730, read law in Lancaster, and imme- diately upon his admission to the bar began to act as prosecuting attorney for the Crown in our eounty from 1750 to 1764, and praetieed in our courts until cleeted to Con- gress in 1774. He was a member of the Colonial Assembly of Pennsylvania (from 1768 to 1776) and when this body eeased or was continued in the Legislature, he was a member of that body also. In 1774 he was

one of the committee of seven who repre- sented Pennsylvania in the Continental Con- gress, and remained a member until January, 1777. He was a signer of the Deelaration of Independenee. He died at Laneaster in July, 1779. In appearance, George Ross was a handsome man, with high forehead, regu- lar features, oval faee and long hair worn in the fashion of the day.

Samuel Johnston, admitted in or prior to 1765, was a strong lawyer of York, and David Sample, who appears as a practitioner at about the same time, of Laneaster. David Grier, who became a lieutenant general in the Revolution, was admitted in 1777. He was of York and read law with James Smith.

Col. Robert Magaw was another promi- nent practitioner at this early period. His name appears upon the record as early as 1762. He was an Irishman by birth and re- sided in Cumberland county prior to the Revolution, in which he served as colonel of the Fifth Pennsylvania Battalion. At the opening of the Revolution he had a very large practice, and had already attained distinetion as a lawyer in Carlisle. In 1774 he was one of the delegates from this county to a convention at Philadelphia for the pur- pose of eoneerting measures to eall a general congress of delegates from all the eolonies. During the Revolution he served as eolonel of the Fifth Pennsylvania Battalion. He was in command of Fort Washington (Man- hattan island) and when threatened by Gen- eral Howe with extremities if the fort should have to be carried by assault, replied that such threats were unworthy of a British offieer, and that he (Magaw) would defend it to the last extremity. After the gallant defense which drew forth the admiration of General Washington, who witnessed it from the opposite side of the Hudson, he was compelled to surrender to superior forces (November 16, 1776), was taken prisoner and held for four years. He was released in October, 1780, when, with two others, he

CUMBERLAND COUNTY

was exchanged for Major-General De Reide- sel. He was a member of the Assembly in 1781-82. He died in Carlisle, January 7, 1790, and was buried with military honors at the Meeting House Springs, although no stone 'or monument remains to mark the now forgotten spot.

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The twentieth century bench and bar of Pennsylvania, volume I, Part 1

Author: Publication date: 1903 Publisher: Chicago, H. C. Cooper, jr., bro. & co. Number of Pages: 1102

Author:
Publication date: 1903
Publisher: Chicago, H. C. Cooper, jr., bro. & co.
Number of Pages: 1102