USA > Pennsylvania > Washington County > The courts of justice, bench & bar of Washington County, Pennsylvania > Part 20
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256
COURTS OF JUSTICE, BENCH, AND BAR.
the plaintiff had won it. Thus was the issue formed that was to take a week or two in the trial, and here is the case as reported :
BROWN, EXECUTOR, V. BROWN.
BY LEX.
Old Brown died, as all men must, And was laid in his grave to be turned into dust; To sleep till the trumpet of judgment should sound, To raise him and the rest of the dead from the ground.
He was rich; owned a farm; had a good deal of stock In several banks; and at home under lock, In an old oaken chest, was a pretty big pile Of silver and gold, the fruit of his toil.
But he died, and his money was all left behind; Most likely because he had made up his mind That dollars and dimes are not the right kind Of a passport for old St. Peter to find.
There 's a trite old adage in use every day, Which runs that "where there's a will there's a way;" But the will makes the way for good or for ill, And there are various ways of making a will.
At common law, for many years The land in England all descended To the eldest son and heir in fee, Till by Henry VIII., Cap. 5, 'twas amended, And a man could select his own devisee.
Old Brown never could or would understand The primogenital right to land; He believed that the owner ought to dispose Of all his estate just as he chose; So he had given to Richard, the lamb of the flock, The farm and the money and most of the stock.
December 148 1901 Wie severally acknowledge ourselves to be bound, etc., in the own of etc . , Conditioned that we severally shall keep the Peace and be good , for one year and one day ; otherwise etc .
Samuel Amspoken, Che Aes. Ru. Knox Norwaco & black
Alex- Wilson, President Schaust Hourdoch
J. A. ICHimine
Henry Ganz M.S. Name,
Boys Cumming
ABDhughes
J. Carter tudcon ICClarke, Saken. Rw. Privin Oly M. Jumphatri
Rest meloy
Eco. O. forres.
D. M. Hamilton
alvanDonnan B.I.V. achecar Hled vankirke. Con C. Underwood James P. Eagleson Winfried MIvaine,
W.J. Parker CB. E. Milnacken James & Bor Blanchard. Hughes. to miller
I. M. Patterson I.M. Dickson. I.b. Towing AM Mc Burney
10.miller.fr. Ralph b. It Conwell Clarence Rehn.
James & Wiley Ein Richle
J. J. Jansson
BAR ASSOCIATION RECOGNIZANCE, 1901. [Etching by Bragdon, from original paper. ]
Jas Nease H. R. Myae. Lm Carrell Q.S. Chalfant J. Jeff. Duncan I. F. M .: Harland Grant EHess Mit.Brownle Albert J. Aprowls Suele r Dowell Andrew In. Linn
257
THE WASHINGTON BAR ASSOCIATION.
Richard's brother was stunned with surprise, When he heard of his father's peculiar devise; He declared it to be no better than theft, And the old man had died of his reason bereft; For he knew that plenty of men could be found Who would swear that his mind was wholly unsound; And besides, he could easily prove it was true That the influence brought to bear was undue; And he would spend all he had but what he would beat His sly brother Dick in such a wholesale cheat.
To a lawyer he went, who told him he might, For a moderate fee, have a beautiful fight; If it were as he said, he was certainly right, And would knock the executor's will out of sight. So an issue was formed, and the case was set down For trial, and was talked about all over town.
In an issue of fact, each party relies On what he affirms or what he denies; But in an issue of law, every one tries To pull the wool over the judge's two eyes.
In cases of contract or suits for a tort, Or anything else of the usual sort, Deny all that 's claimed, that's all you need do To get to the jury on the general issue.
But the rule won't apply at all to a will; The pleading to that requires more skill, And the law, always anxious to cure every ill That clients are heir to, compounds a new pill.
Some call it a lie; some style it a fiction; But either way, it's not worth contradiction. It is either or both, whichever you choose, And certainly a most ingenious ruse.
For the law abhors wagers, and pretends to despise Everything that 's immoral, profane, or unwise;
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COURTS OF JUSTICE, BENCH, AND BAR.
But in the case of a will it shuts one of its eyes, And winks with approval at outrageous lies.
Court met in session, and Brown against Brown Was still more the subject of talk over town. The plaintiff was ready, and all he'd to do Was to prove execution, and then he was through; But Brown, the defendant, was quite ill at ease, For he had to carry the load of his pleas.
One of defendant's attorneys arose, and proposed To read the complaint to which plaintiff deposed, -Generally called a declaration,
Sometimes narr., short for narration: " County of Blank, SS .; " and then there begins A lengthy account of the defendant's sins, In manner and form to wit: "R. Brown, By Brooks, his attorney, complains and says, That he heard the defendant plainly declare That a certain sealed writing, then and there, Which he, the plaintiff, proffered here, (Pro ut) was not his dear father's will; That he had bet the defendant a one-dollar bill That it was his genuine will and true, As he, the defendant, very well knew; That defendant had accepted the offered bet, And though often requested, never as yet Had paid him the bet, and still doth refuse The plaintiff to pay; whereupon he sues."
The defendant opened his eyes till they grew As big as saucers when the lawyer was through. " My God, men! does brother Dick swear That I made the bet declared on there ?"
The attorney replied, with a serious phiz, "Yes, sir, he does; and the worst of it is, We've admitted it all, supposing that Brooks Was as honest in practice as he is in his looks."
JUDGE'S CHAMBER, MCILVAINE, P. J. [Half-tone by the Chasmar-Winchell Press, New York.]
259
THE WASHINGTON BAR ASSOCIATION.
" You've ruined me, men," the defendant cried;
" If Richard says that he surely has lied. But there is only one man in our township would swear That I made the bet declared upon there; That's old Sol. Jenkins, the champion liar, Who would swear to whatever brother Dick might require. I could bring all the neighbors to court any day, And they would n't believe one word he would say."
But the lawyer replied: " It is too late to retract; We must manage your case with still more tact; To get over the bet we will prove as a fact, That when it was made your noggin was cracked."
But the Act for Defalking did not embrace That kind of a set-off; so they settled the case.
The picture to be presented of what followed, as the other addresses were delivered, must be of the impression- istic style; it must suggest rather than reveal. The two judges present were now mere lawyers, and had to take their chances with the rest of us. Some of the addresses were serious, thoughtful, and touching; others could be cor- rectly understood only by interpreting each sentence into a meaning exactly the opposite of what the words and man- ner expressed, and the greatest interest was manifested by all the listeners to know the exact details and circumstances of every incident referred to. One dignified and stately gentleman, giving his "Reminiscences of the Bar," stated that the very first case in which he was concerned after his admission to practice was a case- well, it was a mis- demeanor triable in the Quarter Sessions, very frequently appearing upon the calendars of the olden time, not alto- gether unknown to the criminal jurisprudence of the pres- ent day, and always decidedly interesting to the occupants of the front rows; and the moment the kind of case was men- tioned, the speaker was met with several inquiries, "Were you the defendant ?" " Who was your lawyer ?"
260
COURTS OF JUSTICE, BENCH, AND BAR.
And so it was for the entire evening. Moreover, we had our pianist, Mr. H. B. Hughes; our violinist, Mr. B. G. Hughes; and a vocal quartette, Messrs. J. P. Miller, John H. Murdoch, J. F. McFarland, and J. M. McBurney-all our own members. "Stars of the Summer Night," "My Country, 't is of Thee," "My Old Kentucky Home," " Old Black Joe," " Noah's Ark," and "Good Night" were sung and played; and let it be recorded that the Washington Bar Association has within its own limits music for the ear and soul, vocal and instrumental. Certain of the melodies were grateful to the spirit of one of our venerable judges, taking him back, he said, as would the perfume of an old-time flower, to the days when he played the role of minstrel by moonlight beneath the windows of a certain educational institution on East Maiden Street.
The last address of the evening, on "How We may Make It a Success," was not less interesting than those which pre- ceded it. It had been observed that the door opening into the south committee-room had been closed all evening, and there was at least one present who did not know what was on the other side of it until Mr. Todd delivered his address, and as an object-lesson in his teaching of the rights and privileges of jolly good-fellowship, told of what was behind that door, and called upon Mr. J. M. Dickson, one of our number, to come forth as the chief butler pro tempore.
Mr. Dickson responded by causing the closed door to open, when a series of tables, loaded and well attended, brought about them as goodly an array of strong men, young and old, as any one might wish to see. One incident of this part of the evening's entertainment must be recorded. Many of the middle-aged as well as the younger lawyers lingered about those tables, while others withdrew to the association room, some to listen to the music, others to talk of other days; and to manifest the young blood that is yet in him, one of the two gentlemen admitted in 1851, fifty years ago, executed upon the brilliant Wilton carpet a physical demonstration of "Fisher's Hornpipe," which beat the band that furnished the music. Yet, that no one may imagine there were present at this meeting
261
THE ROLL OF ATTORNEYS.
any other kinds of stimulating spirits than those which nature furnishes along with good companionship, let all kindly search for a fact to be recorded in the last pages of this book.
Ye who come after us and are to be the men at the bar twenty-five, fifty, one hundred years hence, let not the growing commercial spirit of the age, or of the coming ages, so fill your brains with stocks and bonds and dollars and dimes that you shall have no inclination and no place in your lives for even a moderate allowance of good-fellowship and fun; for, as we left the third corridor at the end of that evening's enjoy- ment, and came down the marble stairways through a warm bath of color and light filling our " House Beautiful," out into the storm, we felt that the members of our bar of to-day were favored beyond the days of any of the long line of Washing- ton County lawyers who came and have gone before us.
ROLL OF ATTORNEYS, 1781-1901.
In 1840, as we have seen, there were eleven members of the bar then practicing at Washington, as shown by the paper of Mr. Henderson, deposited on the Fourth of July of that year in the corner-stone of the third court-house, ante, p. 72. Their names were, in the order of their admission: Thomas McGiffin (admitted in 1807) ; T. McK. T. McKennan (1814) ; John S. Brady (1817) ; William Waugh (1818); John L. Gow (1825); Isaac Leet (1826); James Watson (1831); A. W. Acheson (1832); William McKennan (1837); Daniel Leet (1839) ; and Joseph Henderson (1839). These were the only men-at-arms in the courts of the commonwealth in battle array at the midway point in the judicial life of the county. They were all at the bar when the court-house just removed from our sight was builded, but they had all gone from us before that court-house disappeared. Are they in the " cloud of wit- nesses " present but invisible when we are at work in the calling in which their manhood was engaged ?
Such are reflections which we of this generation of Wash-
262
COURTS OF JUSTICE, BENCH, AND BAR.
ington County lawyers may entertain when recalling these gen- tlemen of the olden time, for we are nearer to them and to their day. For the people generally who are yet to come, however, we would present the entire roll of attor- neys admitted to our bar from the organization of the county, copied, for the period ending in 1882, from Crumrine's His- tory, 250-255, with the biographical foot-notes corrected to date, and supplemented by the roll for 1883-1901, kindly com- piled for us by Mr. Blaine Aiken, admitted in 1901.
It will be noted that toward the end of the roll there is quite a large number of names in SMALL CAPS, which means that those bearing the names so printed are, at the date of this writing, resident and having offices within the county, and now in active and regular practice. These are eighty-two in num- ber, and the list may be compared with that made by Mr. Henderson in 1840, before referred to.
It will be remembered that the first term of the courts of Washington County was held on October 2, 1781; and about the first thing done at that term was to admit the three attorneys who start off the following roll:
1781.
Hugh M. Brackenridge,1 October. Samuel Irwin, October. David Sample, October.
1 This Hugh M. Brackenridge was the Hugh H. Bracken- ridge of a few years later. Just when or why his name was changed, as it undoubtedly was, is not known. He was born at Campbellton, Scotland, in 1748; came with his father to Pennsylvania at the age of five; graduated in Princeton Col- lege in 1771, and was master of an academy in Maryland when the Revolution broke out; removed to Philadelphia, studied divinity, and became a chaplain in the army; settled at Pitts- burg in 1781; in 1786 was sent to the legislature to have Alle- gheny County erected, which was accomplished in 1788; was made a judge in 1789; and from 1799 until his death at Car- lisle, June 25, 1816, he was a justice of the Supreme Court
JUDGE'S CHAMBER, TAYLOR, A. L. J. [ Half-tone by the Chasmar-Winchell Press, New York. |
263
THE ROLL OF ATTORNEYS.
1782.
Thomas Smith,1 January.
George Thompson, December.
David Espy, January.
Thomas Duncan, December.
David Bradford,2 April.
David Redick,3 December.
Robert Galbraith, April. Michael Huffnagle, December.
of the state. He took a prominent part in the Whiskey Insur- rection, and published "Incidents of the Whiskey Insurrection," "Brackenridge's Law Miscellanies," and "Modern Chivalry."
1 This Thomas Smith, the writer of an interesting letter re- porting the proceedings of Dr. John Connolly in the Boun- dary Controversy (see 4 Penn. Archives, 618), was the brother of Dr. William Smith, provost of the College of Philadelphia, now the University of Pennsylvania. They were natives of Scot- land. Thomas was early a settler at Bedford. In 1775 he was appointed colonel of militia, and the next year was a member of the convention at Philadelphia which formed our first con- stitution. From 1790 to 1794 he was president judge of the district comprising Mifflin, Huntingdon, Bedford, and Franklin counties, and was a justice of our Supreme Court from 1794 to 1809, when he died.
He practiced at the bar of Westmoreland at the time of his admission in our county. In the account of the burning of Han- nastown, near Greensburg, by the Indians, on July 13, 1782, published in the Greensburg Argus in 1836, and written by Judge Coulter, it is said: "Thomas Smith, Esq., afterwards one of the judges of the Supreme Court, brought quarterly from the East the most abstruse learning of the profession to puzzle the backwoods lawyers." Admitted to our bar at its second term, he was the attorney of General Washington in his eject- ment suit for his lands in Mt. Pleasant township. For more about him, see Crumrine's History, 173 et seq.
2 David Bradford was a native of Maryland, and had not been long in the county when admitted. In 1783 he was ap- pointed deputy attorney-general for the county, and held that office for a long time. He is chiefly noted for the prominent part he took in the Whiskey Insurrection, having been the head and front of that offending. The amnesty proclamation issued by the government included finally all the insurrection-
264
COURTS OF JUSTICE, BENCH, AND BAR.
1783. John Woods, December.
1784.
James Ross.1
ists save him; he then fled to Bayou Sara, in Louisiana Terri- tory, where he died. He built the limestone house now occupied by Mr. P. J. Finn, on the west side of Main Street, a few doors north of Maiden, said to have been the first stone house built in Washington. One of his descendants became the wife of Jeffer- son Davis, of the late Southern Confederacy.
3 David Redick was a native of Ireland. His wife was a daugh- ter of Jonathan Hoge, the brother of David Hoge, the proprie- tor of Washington. He was elected a member of the Supreme Executive Council in 1786, and was chosen vice-president thereof in 1788; represented Washington County in the Constitutional Convention of 1790, and in 1791 was appointed prothonotary of Washington County. In the Whiskey Insurrection he also took a prominent part, but on the side of law and order, being one of the commissioners, Mr. Findley the other, to wait upon President Washington when at Carlisle with the army, and to explain the condition of affairs in the western counties. He died at Washington, September 28, 1805. A daughter was the first wife of Dr. James Stevens, deceased.
" No minute is found of the admission of Hon. James Ross to our courts; but the records of Fayette County show that he was admitted in the courts of that county in December, 1784, which is satisfactory evidence that he was admitted here about that year.
Mr. Ross was born July 12, 1762, the son of Hon. George Ross, of York County. Following Dr. McMillan from the place of the latter's nativity, he taught in McMillan's school for the ministry in the Log Cabin for a while, then upon the recommen- dation of H. H. Brackenridge he began the study of law. In 1790 he was in the Constitutional Convention of that year, and was United States senator in 1794-1803. On August 8, 1794, with Jasper Yeates and William Bradford, he was appointed on the commission to "confer with such bodies of individuals
265
THE ROLL OF ATTORNEYS.
1786. James Carson, June.
1787. Alexander Addison,1 March.
1788. George Vallandigham, April.
1789.
John Young, June. Daniel St. Clair, September.
1790. Henry Purviance,2 March. John Ralph, March.
1791.
Thomas Scott,3 September. Steel Sample, September.
as you may approve concerning the commotions " then existing during the Whiskey Insurrection. He died at Allegheny City, Pennsylvania, November 27, 1847, leaving children of deceased daughters, and one son, James Ross, Jr., who was admitted to the bar of Allegheny County, but never practiced. He has died also, and unmarried. During the Whiskey Insurrection Hon. James Ross lived in Washington. See Brackenridge's Hist. Whisk. Ins., 70, 174. See portrait.
1 Our first president judge under the constitution of 1790. See silhouette and sketch, ante, p. 39.
2 Deputy attorney-general, 1795-96.
3 This Thomas Scott had much to do with making the history of western Pennsylvania, perhaps more than any of our pioneers. He was born in Chester County, but lived in Lancaster County until 1770, when he removed with his family and settled on Dunlap's Creek, in what was then Bedford, now Fayette County. In 1773, when Westmoreland County was created, he was made a justice of the peace, and was an influential Pennsylvanian in the boundary controversy with Virginia. See Crumrine's History, 163-224. He was a member of the state convention which formed
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COURTS OF JUSTICE, BENCH, AND BAR.
1792.
Hugh Ross, September. Joseph Pentecost,1 September. David McKeehan, December.
the first Pennsylvania constitution of 1776, and the next year he became a member of the Supreme Executive Council. Upon the organization of Washington County in 1781, he was appointed the prothonotary and clerk of that county, and he then removed to Washington. In 1787 he was a member of the state convention ratifying the first Constitution of the United States, and in 1788 he was a member of the first Congress under that Constitution. In 1792, the next year after his admission to the bar, he was elected a member of the Third Congress of the United States. He died on March 2, 1796, in the fifty-eighth year of his age, leaving a widow (maiden name unknown), three sons, and eight daughters. One son, Alexander, succeeded him in Congress. One daughter, Agnes, married Samuel McKinley, and became the grand- mother of Alex. McKinley, the father of F. B. Mckinley, the jeweler, of Washington; another, Elizabeth, married Alex. Cun- ningham, and became the mother of Samuel Cunningham, the cashier of the old Franklin Bank, afterwards the First National Bank of Washington; Jean, another, married David Hoge, a son of David Hoge, the proprietor of Washington; and Mary, another, married Joseph Pentecost, admitted to the Washington bar in 1792. The will of Thomas Scott, in his own handwriting, is filed in our register's office, and is recorded in Will Book 1, page 283. A volume could be made of the recorded incidents of the life of Thomas Scott.
1 Mr. Pentecost was the eldest son of Colonel Dorsey Pentecost, our second president judge under the constitution of 1776; ante, p. 36. His wife was Harriett Stewart, daughter of Galbraith Stewart, Esq., the grandfather of Mrs. Jannie (Stewart) Acheson, the wife of Hon. E. F. Acheson, of Washington.
After the death of his father, Mr. Pentecost built the brick house on the farm now occupied by McClelland Brothers, part of the old Dorsey Pentecost estate in North Strabane township. As a lawyer in Washington, it is said he occupied and perhaps owned the large two-story brick dwelling on the north side of East Beau Street, a short distance from Main, now one of the properties of
267
THE ROLL OF ATTORNEYS.
1793. George Armstrong, June.
1794.
Arthur St. Clair, September. Henry Woods, September. Parker Campbell,1 December.
Mr. W. W. Smith. He died on March 29, 1823, leaving a son, George Pentecost, who died at West Middletown, in Washington County, on April 19, 1885; two other sons, Dorsey B. and James Ross Pentecost, admitted to the bar in 1823, both now deceased, without known descendants; and at least four danghters: Sarah Ann and Elizabeth, who were married, and Mary and Catharine, who died unmarried.
George Pentecost had three children ; one died in infancy; Joseph H. died on March 26, 1865, of wounds received March 25th, in an assault upon Fort Steadman, near Petersburg, Virginia, being then Lieutenant-Colonel commanding the One Hundredth Pennsylvania Volunteers, known as the " Roundheads"; Clarissa, wife of Rev. W. S. Eagleson, Columbus, Ohio; and Thomas McCall Pentecost, residing at West Middletown, the only repre- sentative of old Colonel Dorsey Pentecost living in Washington County.
1 Parker Campbell is said to have been the most distinguished lawyer of his day, the old records of this and adjoining counties showing that he was extensively engaged in the trial of most of the important canses instituted. He was born in Carlisle in 1768, and married Elizabeth Calhoun, of Chambersburg. Their chil- dren were: Nancy, who married Samuel Lyon; Elizabeth, who married first William Chambers, then the late Mr. John S. Brady, whose portrait is given in this volume; Ellen, who married John Ritchie ; and three sons, Francis C., John, and Parker, born in 1815, and lately died at Richmond, Virginia. Mr. Campbell died in Washington, Pennsylvania, on July 26, 1824. In the resolu- tions of the bar meeting, held immediately after his death, he is described as the "lamented advocate, the chief leader for many years of this bar." See portrait. The peculiar original of the photograph from which our half-tone was made bears a striking resemblance to other portraits said to have been made by a Mrs. Best, at the beginning of the last century.
268
COURTS OF JUSTICE, BENCH, AND BAR.
1795.
Thomas Collins, March. George Henry Keppele, September. James Morrison, September.
1796.
James Allison, January. Joseph Shannon, July.
John Simonson,' January. James Montgomery, October.
Thomas Creigh, July. Thomas Hadden, October. Samuel Sidney Mahon, October.
1797.
Thomas Nesbit, July. John Lyon, October.
Thomas Bailey, July. Robert Whitehill, October.
1798.
John Cloyd, August. Thomas Johnston, November.
Thomas Mason, August. Cunningham Semple, November.
Jas. Ashbrook,2 November. William Ayers, November.
1799.
George Heyl, May. Robert Callender, August. John Kennedy, August.
1800. Isaac Kerr, August.
1801.
Robert Moore, August. Obadiah Jennings,4 November.
John Gilmore,3 August. James Mountain,5 November.
1 Died at Steubenville, Ohio, December 2, 1809, aged 36 years.
2 See portrait. Mr. Ashbrook's wife was Lucy, daughter of Colonel Dorsey Pentecost and sister of Mr. Joseph Pentecost, supra.
3 The father of Hon. Samuel A. Gilmore, president judge, ante, p. 55.
4 Obadiah Jennings was born near Baskenridge, New Jersey, December 13, 1778. Educated at the Canonsburg Academy, he
269
THE ROLL OF ATTORNEYS.
1802.
Alexander William Foster, February.
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