History of Wayne, Pike, and Monroe counties, Pennsylvania, Part 29

Author: Mathews, Alfred, 1852-1904. 4n
Publication date: 1886
Publisher: Philadelphia : R.T. Peck & Co.
Number of Pages: 1438

USA > Pennsylvania > Monroe County > History of Wayne, Pike, and Monroe counties, Pennsylvania > Part 29
USA > Pennsylvania > Pike County > History of Wayne, Pike, and Monroe counties, Pennsylvania > Part 29
USA > Pennsylvania > Wayne County > History of Wayne, Pike, and Monroe counties, Pennsylvania > Part 29

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).

Following is a list of the persons holding the appointment of deputy attorney-general and the office of district attorney, with the time of com- mencing the performance of official duties :

Deputy Attorney-Generals.

Name. Duties Began.

Thomas B. Dick .December Term, 1798

John Ross.

September Term, 1800

Samucl Sitgreaves.

December Term, 1802

Hugh Ross

.May Term, 1803

John Ross.

December Term, 1805

Edward Mott.

.September Term, 1809

Amzi Fuller.

January Term, 1820

John D. Taylor. August Term, 1834

Ebenezer Kingsbury

.August Term, 1835

William H. Dimmick .... January Term, 1838 Charles K. Robinson ... September Term, 1840 Rufus M. Grenell .. September Term, 1845

Charles P. Waller .. September Term, 1848

District Attorneys.

Name. Duties Began.

Frederick M. Crane ... 1st Monday Dec., 1850

Resigned May 5, 1853

Jackson Woodward appointed May 5, 1853

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WAYNE, PIKE AND MONROE COUNTIES, PENNSYLVANIA.

Jackson Woodward, (elected) 1st Monday Dec., 1853

Henry Peet ....... 1st Monday December, 1856 Jackson Woodward .... 1st Monday Dec., 1859 H. B. Beardslee. .1st Monday Dec., 1862 Resigned Dec. 7, 1863

Jackson Woodward appointed Dec. 7, 1863 Wm. H. Dimmick (the younger,)

1st Monday Dec., 1864

Wm. H. Dimmick (re-elected),

1st Monday Dec., 1867 Resigned Sept. 16, 1869

H. B. Beardslee appointed, Sept. 16, 1869 Charles F. Eldred .... .. 1st Monday Dec. 1870 Resigned Dec., 9, 1871

Frank B. Brown. ..... appointed, Dec. 9, 1871 Frank B. Brown (elected),

1st Monday Dec., 1872

Peter P. Smith, 1st Monday January, 1876

Elwin C. Mumford 1st Monday Jan'y, 1879 Homer Greene .. .1st Monday Jan'y, 1882

F. M. Monaghan ..... 1st Monday Jan'y, 1885

BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCHES.

The subjects of the following biographical notices are divided into four classes, viz. :

I. Attorneys of the county who have become president judges of its courts.

II. Resident attorneys in permanent practice, including those who followed the profession during life or the period of active pro- fessional labor ; including, also, Judge Collins, who was reared in the county, and, though a non-resident, practiced in its courts for some thirty years.

III. Attorneys in temporary practice, inclu- ding those who, after entering on practice in the county, gave it up or removed.

IV. Law graduates, including those who prepared for the bar in the county, but, after admission, went elsewhere to commence practice.

In the biographical sketches, descriptions of personal or professional characteristics are con- fined to the president judges and resident attor- · neys who have been for more than ten years at the bar.

I. President Judges.

NATHANIEL BAILY ELDRED, the first pres- ident judge appointed from the bar of Wayne County, was bornat Dolsontown, Orange County, N. Y., January 12, 1795. His early education was such as the local schools afforded, supple- mented by a diligent reading of all books that

fell into his hands. While yet a boy he formed the purpose of becoming a lawyer, and about the year 1811 went to Milford, then the county- seat of Wayne, to begin the work of prepara- tion. He first entered the office of Dan Dim- mick, one of the leading lawyers of the county, and subsequently completed his studies under the direction of Edward Mott, deputy attorney-

general for the county. Before his course of legal study was finished the county was divided, and Milford became the county-seat of Pike. January 27, 1817, he was admitted to the bar of Wayne. He continued, however, to reside at Milford until after the death of Andrew M. Dorrance, the senior of the two lawyers then practicing at the county-seat of Wayne, in April, 1818. Thereupon he took up his resi- dence and commenced practice in Bethany, which remained his home for the greater part of the next half-century.

In thus commencing life, Mr. Eldred was favored with no advantages except those be- stowed by nature. Those, however, were suffi- cient to win rapid advancement, especially in a community which recognized no conventional standards or artificial distinctions. His mental constitution was a rare combination of sturdy personal qualities, quick intelligence, keen powers of observation, generous impulses, rigid integrity and a ready adaptability to surround- ing conditions. He rapidly gained the apprecia- tion and confidence of the people of the county, both as a lawyer and a man; and in 1822, four years after he had come among them a stranger, he was elected to the Legislature. In the following year he was re-elected.

Under the system of rotation in the district that prevailed, the nominees were selected from Pike County for the next two years. When it again fell to Wayne to secure the candidate, Mr. Eldred was re-elected for two terms more. His fourth year's service completed, he declined a subsequent nomination. Later, when the system of public improvements constructed by the State was put in operation, he accepted the position of canal commissioner, but declined a second term. He was also a member of the board of commissioners appointed by the State -Hon. John Ross and Hon. David Scott being

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his associates-to treat with a like board ap- pointed by the State of New Jersey in relation to the navigation and control of the Delaware River, and aided materially in the adjustment of all questions connected with this subject. In 1844 he was chosen a Presidential elector, and cast his vote for James K. Polk. In the spring of 1853 he received from President Pierce the appointment of naval officer at the Philadelphia custom-house, a position which he held for four years.

Mckean, Warren and Jefferson were erected into the Eighteenth Judicial District, from and after September 1, 1835, and the Governor was re- quired to appoint a president judge for the dis- trict. When the time for making the appoint- ment arrived, Governor Wolf, who had often met Mr. Eldred at the bar, and recognized his fitness for the position, commissioncd him presi- dent judge of the new district. In 1839 the death of Judge Slupper made a vacancy on the bench of the Sixth District, composed of Erie,

But it was in the field of his profession, rather than in politics, that his chief distinction was won. During a practice of nearly twenty years, in competition with such men as Amzi and Thomas Fuller, George Wolf, Dan Dim- mick, Edward Mott, Garrick Mallery, Oristus Collins, John N. Conyngliam and other noted practitioners of that day, he rose to a high po- sition at the bar, and for nearly twenty years more he held a seat on the bench. By an act passed April 8, 1833, the counties of Potter,

Crawford and Venango Counties, and Gov- ernor Porter commissioned Judge Eldred as president judge of that district. In 1843, Judge Blythe, of the Twelfth District, composed of Dauphin, Lebanon and Schuylkill Counties, resigned to accept the office of collector of cus- toms of Philadelphia, and Governor Porter thereupon commissioned Judge Eldred as his successor.

In 1849 the counties of Wayne, Pike, Monroe and Carbon were erected into the Twenty-second

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District, and Judge Eldred desiring to return to his old home in Bethany, Governor Johnston commissioned lim president judge of the dis- trict. In 1851, the judiciary having been made elective by the Constitutional amendment adopted the preceding year, many of Judge Eldred's friends throughout the State proposed his nomination for judge of the Supreme Court. He declined, however, to become a candidate, preferring to remain on the bench where his home was situated ; and the desire to retain him was so general in thic district that he received the support of both parties, and was elected without opposition. In April, 1853, the posi- tion of naval officer at Philadelphia being tendered him by President Pierce, he decided to accept it, and resigned the judgeship. This closed his judicial labors, and, substantially, his professional career.

On quitting the position of naval officer Judge Eldred returned to his home in Bethany. The remainder of his life was passed in compara- tive retirement. The advancing years were be- ginning to make their approach felt; he had begun to suffer in health; and though frequently consulted in important cases, lie declined to re- sume active professional employment. The dec- ade following was spent mainly amid the tran- quil pursuits and interests of rural life, and he passed the limit of three-score and ten, loved and honored by all. He died January 27, 1867, just half a century from the day of his admis- sion to the Wayne County bar, at the place which had witnessed the beginning of his ca- reer, and had for more than a generation been his home.

Judge Eldred was twice married. His first wife was a daughter of Dan Dimmick, his earliest preceptor in the profession. She died in 1824. His second wife, who survived him, was a daughter of Dr. Samuel Dimmick, of Bloom- ingburgh, Sullivan County, N. Y. He left three daughters and a son. The latter, Charles F. Eldred, studied law and was admitted to the bar in 1861.

In casting his lot among the people of Wayne County, Judge Eldred identified himself with them in purpose and action. He made their general interests his own, and strove by every

mcans in his power to promote them. In private and public life he was active in aiding the progress and development of the county, both as to material interests and educational ad- vancement. By nature, and by habit of thought and of life, he was essentially a man of the peo- ple, and no man in Wayne County ever had a stronger hold on the popular heart. The peo- ple of the county appreciated his services, and at all times gave him an unwavering support. During the first decade of his residence among them the only office in their gift which he would consent to accept was bestowed on him again and again. They viewed his elevation to the bench with a feeling akin to personal satis- faction and pride. When his life closed, most of the generation which had witnessed his suc- cess and his usefulness had preceded him to the grave; yet his fame, though it had become largely a tradition, was so enduring that his death was felt and mourned as a loss of no com- mon magnitude.

As an advocate Judge Eldred was clear in argument, earnest and persuasive, resting on the broad basis of equity, appealing largely to the natural perception of right, and arousing an aversion to every form of meanness, oppression and wrong. He was a jurist of more than ordinary rank. On the bench, however, he was little given to legal subtleties and refinements, or to the habit of measuring questions of right by narrow technical rules. He regarded the judicial function as designed for the practical administration of justice, and his decisions aimed at a fair and equitable adjustment of the difficul- ties between the parties. He was well read in his profession, and possessed a legal mind of a high order ; but a controlling sense of justice, that re- sponded instinctively to all questions respecting right as between man and man, predominated over the strictly professional view of a case, and his conclusions, even when not in strict conformity with technical rules and precedents, rested on a firm and obvious basis of equity. The essential justice of his purpose was so ap- parent as to command the respect of the bar, even when error was alleged in his rulings on questions of law. The people, without measur- ing his judicial action by professional tests,

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accepted its results as in the main just and equitable; they recognized his strong common sense and clear judgment, and had abiding faith in his judicial integrity. They gave him their confidence, because they knew him to be up- right, impartial and devoted to the adminis- tration of justice iu its broadest and noblest sense.

It will not be out of place to preserve anec- dotes illustrating some of Judge Eldred's characteristics. While he was on the Dauphin County bench a case of assault and battery was tried before him. The evidence showed that while the defendant and his wife were walking on the streets in Harrisburg, a rowdy used some grossly insulting language toward the wife, whereupon the husband knocked him down. Judge Eldred's charge to the jury was substan- tially in the following terms : " Gentlemen of the jury, the defendant is indicted for an assault and battery on the prosecutor. You have learned from the evidence the character of the offence. In law, any rude, angry or violent touching of the person of another is an assault and battery, and is not justified by any provoca- tion in words only. But if I was walking with my wife and a rowdy insulted her, I'd knock him down if I was big enough. Swear a con- stable." The verdict may be readily conjec- tured.

Another incident is related, showing his readiness and fertility in resources. On reach- ing the county-seat at which the first term of court was to be held, on his appointment to one of the western districts, his commission was not to be found, having been forgotten on leav- ing home, or lost on the way. It happened that the sheriff of the county had just been com- missioned, and was to begin his official duties at that term of court. Judge Eldred at once decided on a line of action. Sending for the new sheriff, he told him that the practice of reading commissions in court, on assuming office, was a relic of the ceremonial established under a monarchy, and unsuited to the simplic- ity of republican institutions, and that he should dispense with it in the courts of his dis- trict ; that the sheriff and himself having been duly sworn, nothing further was required of

them, and they should enter on their duties in a quiet, unostentatious manner. Accordingly, the new judge and sheriff went into court together the next morning, took their respective places, and proceeded to the discharge of their duties without further ceremony, no question being raised as to their authority in the premises.

CHARLES PHILLIPS WALLER was born at Wilkes Barre, Luzerne County, Pa., Angust 7, 1819. His youth was passed in his native town, and, after a preparatory course at the Wilkes-Barre Academy, he entered Williams College, Massachusetts. He completed the second year's study in 1838, but, in consequence of impaired eyesight, was obliged to abandon the course. Having recovered in some degree from this difficulty, he spent portions of the following three years in teaching at Blooms- burg, Columbia County, Pa. He finally de- cided to study law, and in the summer of 1841 entered the office of Judge Collins, in Wilkes- Barre. In 1843, at the August Term of the courts, having passed a rigorous examination with much credit, he was admitted to the Lu- zerne bar. In the following autumn he decided to commence practice in Honesdale, which had recently become the seat of justice of Wayne County.

His professional ability commanded speedy recognition. His genial temperament and marked elevation of character, combined with a deportment distinguished by courtesy, refine- ment and dignity, won troops of friends ; while his evident mastery of his profession, his un- tiring industry, his systematic business habits, his thorough preparation of causes and power as an advocate, with his faithful discharge of all professional duties, brought a large client- age. For about twelve years he continued in the active practice of his profession. At a bar which numbered among its leaders Earl Wheeler, William H. and Samuel E. Dimmick, Charles S. Minor and F. M. Crane, and with Oristus Collins, Henry M. Fuller, William Jes- sup, Franklin Lusk and other prominent attor- neys from adjoining counties, as frequent con- testants, he reached the front rank. While familiar with the various subjects of legal cuact- ment and decision, he made a special study of the

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WAYNE, PIKE AND MONROE COUNTIES, PENNSYLVANIA.

important questions arising from unsettled and conflicting land claims, the determination of which, for many years, formed a large propor- tion of the business of the courts. He made himself thoroughly familiar with the somewhat complicated system of land titles prevailing in the county, and took a leading part, as counsel, in the litigation connected with them. In deal- ing with these le met few equals and no supe- riors, and became recognized as one of the first authorities on the subject.

In 1848 he was appointed deputy attorney- general for the county by Governor Johnston, and entered upon his duties at September Term. He hield this position until December Term, 1850. By act of May 3, 1850, this office was made elective, under the title of district attor- ney. The county being largely Democratic, and Mr. Waller being a Whig, he declined to be- come a candidate for election.

The close attention given to professional duties at length undermined his health, and in 1855 he consulted various physicians, among whom was Dr. Willard Parker, of New York. Finding hini in a state of great exhaustion and with alarming symptons of consumption, Dr. Parker directed him to suspend practice and seek the benefit of an out-door life, at the same time giving him but little encouragement, and warning him that the chances were a hun- dred to one against his recovery. Acting on this advice, Mr. Waller purchased a farm a few miles from Honesdale, and passed the greater part of the time for several years in the open air. He resolved to overcome the threatening malady, and, maintaining the contest with re- markable tenacity and power of will, succeeded in repelling the dread enemy for more than a quarter of a century. He had, in 1850, formed a partnership with a younger brother, George G. Waller, who, after his enforced retirement, successfully conducted the large practice of the firm. The elder brother subsequently attended to the out-door business, doing but little office work, and seldom appearing in court except on the trial of some important land suit.

In 1862 the Republicans of the county nomi- nated him for the Legislature ; but party lines

were closely drawn, and the Democratic major- ity proved too large to be overcome.

In 1874, the counties of Wayne and Pike having been erected into the Twenty-second Judicial District, Mr. Waller yielded to the urgent solicitations of the Republicans of the district, and accepted the Republican nomina- tion for the office of president judge. The Democrats failed to unite, the Hon. F. M. Crane taking the field as an independent eandi- date, while the Hon. D. M. Van Auken re- ceived the regular party nomination. The re- sult was the election of Mr. Waller by a plural- ity of four hundred and five, in a district which, at the State election two years previ- ously, had given a Democratic majority of seventeen hundred and ninety-nine.

On the bench Judge Waller displayed the mental characteristics for which he had been eminent at the bar. He thoroughly understood every feature of every case tried before him. He possessed a matchless grasp of the facts, however numerous or complicated, with an un- erring perception of their true relation to the issue in the case, and a clear apprehension of the principles of law controlling their operation and effect. His mastery of a case and his re- tention of all its essential points were often ex- hibited in a marked degree. On one occasion, during the argument of an important case, in which the testimony was very voluminous, the counsel, in reading it, inadvertently made a mistake, which the judge at once corrected from memory. On every subject that ealled for judicial action he had clearly-defined views and positive convictions, and he always had the courage of his convictions. Decision and promptness were among his prominent quali- ties; he was a stranger to hesitation and timid- ity ; and he never wavered in the course to. which his convictions impelled him.

Judge Waller remained on the bench until removed by death, though during the last year of his life his failing health interfered largely with the regular performance of his official duties. Nevertheless, he bore up bravely under increasing weakness and was frequently found at his post when his physical condition would have justified him in quitting it. To a bron-

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chial affection of long standing, chronie gastritis was finally superadded. His stomach at length failed to perform its functions and his death re- sulted from inanition. He retained his facul- ties in his waking hours, and it was during sleep that lie ceased to breathe. His death took place August 18, 1882.

About a year and a half after taking up his residence at Honesdale (April 3, 1845) Mr. Waller was married to Miss Harriet Ward Stone, daughter of the late Henry Ward Stone. Mrs. Waller died May 24, 1884. Their chil- dren-Lizzie (wife of William H. Stanton) and Miss Mary S. Waller,-survive them and reside in Honesdale.

The personal characteristics of Judge Waller are thus outlined by a life-long and intimate friend :

"The old log academy at Wilkes-Barre served to plant the seeds of culture in the mind of Judge Waller, and induce an aspiration after something beyond the rudiments of knowledge. He early appeared rapid in his acquisition, re- markably retentive in his powers of mind, keen in his perceptions, and sternly logical in his methods of deduction. He had a temperament that gave him an impassioned address, an im- agination enlivening his expression even in early youth, and combined therewith a judg- ment the deliberate and careful movements of which would have indicated his fitness to draw the lines, at some future day, between the conflict- ing claims of men. He knew but little of idleness or waste of life ; and in the application of excel- lent native endowments he was constantly in the pursuit of knowledge ; ever grew in the breadth of his views of life. There scems to have been but little of the boy in him. Manli- ness of character seemed stamped upon every period of his early life, and personal dignity of bearing all remember as having marked his re- lations to men. Yet, with singular harmony, he possessed those qualities of a generous and noble nature, that prompt sympathy with the condition and experience of all others, whichi relieved the dignity of all hanteur and austerity, crowning his manliness with the more influen- tial traits of fellowship in the ever-changing condition of those around him. He possessed

a depth of character and a breadth of view, a courtliness of true nobility, an elevation above suspecting the motives of others, that enabled him to adapt himself with equal grace and power of influence to any and every class in society. He was a friend to every man and every man seemed his friend. Perfectly at home in the society of children, above moodi- ness amid the invasion of unyielding disease, possessing a temperament the vivacity of which rendered the suspicion of his actual age abso- lutely beyond a possibility, he would have been considered, while upon the bench, one of our younger men, wearing the ermine with singular grace, an expounder of the law hardly suggest- ing by his youthful appearance the names of those whose judicial career has been associated with advancing years and hoary hairs, as upon the English bench ; but the community in which he administered, and whose interests he was called on to protect, can best testify to his integrity, his wisdom and his watchful care."

HENRY M. SEELY is the second son of Col- onel Richard L. aud Maria Seely, and was born in Seelyville-abont a mile from Honesdale- September 18, 1835. After the usnal prepara- tory course he entered Yale College, and was graduated from that institution in May, 1857. He soon afterward commenecd a course of legal study in Honesdale, under the direction of F. M. Crane, and in the following year attended the Albany Law School for one term. He com- pleted his course as a student in the city of New York, and was there admitted to the bar in May, 1859. In September following, while on a visit to Honesdale, he was admitted to the bar of Wayne County. He had, however, com- menced practice in New York, and remained there until the breaking out of the Rebellion, in 1861. He then decided to make Honesdale his home, and removing to that place opened an office. In due time his abilities commanded recognition, and his professional acquirements, the fruit of close study, diligent research and deep thought, with his vigorous and well-disci- plined mental powers, gave him a high rank in the profession.

In the summer of 1882 the death of Hon. Charles P. Waller, president judge of the judi-

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cial district, made a vacancy on the bench. There was no division of opinion as to the choice of a successor. The bar of the district looked to Mr. Seely as the man by whom it should be filled, and those who were confessedly entitled to high consideration, had they become his competitors, were foremost in asking for his appointment. August 28th, ten days after the death of Judge Waller, he was commissioned as president judge of the district, and the va- caney having occurred within three months of the general election in 1882, lis commission ex- tended until the first Monday of January, 1884.

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History of Wayne, Pike, and Monroe counties, Pennsylvania, Part 29

Author: Mathews, Alfred, 1852-1904. 4n Publication date: 1886 Publisher: Philadelphia : R.T. Peck & Co. Number of Pages: 1438

Author: Mathews, Alfred, 1852-1904. 4n
Publication date: 1886
Publisher: Philadelphia : R.T. Peck & Co.
Number of Pages: 1438