USA > Vermont > Orleans County > Biography of the bar of Orleans county, Vermont > Part 16
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THOMAS ABBOTT.
T 'HOMAS ABBOTT, the son of Thomas K. and Abigail (Boyngton) Abbott, was born at Derby Line, Vt., and was educated in the common schools and Brownington Academy. He studied law with Jessie Cooper of Irasburgh, and was admitted to the Orleans county bar at its June term, A. D. 1848, and at once commenced the practice of law at Barton, where he remained two years. From there he went to Millsbury, Mass., where he practiced until 1855, when he removed to West Union, Iowa, and practiced law until 1859, when he removed to Independence, Iowa, where he still lives. Mr. Abbott enlisted and served in the Forty-seventh Iowa Infantry in the late war, where he contracted disease, so that at the close of the war he did not resume practice. Mr. Abbott married Ann M. Chadwick, and has two sons-Fred M. who is pas- tor of the Congregational church of Marseilles, Ill., and Edward B., a law student at home.
JOHN P. SARTLE.
T 'HE subject of this biography was born at Stowe, Vt., August 7, 1818, the son of Calvin and Eda (Herrick) Sartle. He attended the common schools and village academy, and for a while attended an academy at Hinsdale, Ill. He early learned the trade of a carpenter, and labored at his trade when not teaching until 1842, when he moved to Lowell, Orleans county, Vt., and built a saw-mill. Lowell was quite a new town, and one in which there was much litigation regarding lands, tax titles, adverse possession, and the like.
Mr. Sartle had a very good education and was quite apt and shrewd, and the result was he soon appeared as counselor in nearly all the justice trials of the town, and they were many, with excel- lent success. At one of these justice trials he encountered Nor-
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man Boardman, an attorney at South Troy, who had a large practice, and who was so favorably impressed with Sartle's ability and skill in handling causes, that he urged him to move to Troy and go into his office as a student, offering him a share of the busi- ness to enable him to support his family until he could be admitted to the bar and start for himself, assuring him that he would most certainly succeed in the profession of the law. Thereupon Mr. Sartle sold out his mill and other interests in Lowell and went to Troy, entering upon the study of the law with his new found friend. He was admitted to the bar of Orleans county at the December term, A. D. 1848, and soon thereafterward commenced the practice of his profession at Barton, where he remained in active practice until his death, which took place June 17, 1872. Mr. Sartle was state's attorney for the county of Orleans for the years 1855-56. When the United States Bankruptcy Act became a law he was appointed one of the four registers of the state, and held the office until his death. Mr. Sartle was a man of great force, energy and persistence. One who studied with him, now a prominent lawyer of the West, says of him: "In his profession I have seen harder students, greater plodders, but I do not remember ever to have met a lawyer with quicker and truer legal intuition. His ability in that respect always seemed to me to be something marvelous, and many times he could accomplish more in one day than most lawyers could in a week." Mr. Sartle was twice married. In 1842 to Miss Lucinda Perkins Williams, a lady highly and deserv- edly esteemed for her many virtues by all who knew her, who deceased, leaving two children-William J. Sartle, who was edu- cated at West Point, and at the time of his death, June 27, 1873, was regiment adjutant of the fifteenth regular infantry with Gen. Gordon Granger, and acting assistant adjutant-general for the dis- trict of New Mexico with headquarters at Santa Fe, and Mrs. Net- tie Sartle Clark of Peoria, Ill. Subsequently he married again, and by this marriage had one son, Harry Sartle.
WILLIAM HEATH.
W ILLIAM HEATH came to Derby from Stanstead, P. Q., about 1845, and pursued the study of the law with E. G. Johnson, Esq., and was admitted a member of the Orleans county bar at the June term, A. D. 1848, and soon left the state.
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BIOGRAPHY OF THE BAR
HENRY HEWITT FROST.
From funeral sermon delivered at Coventry, November 27, 1859, by Rev. Pliny H. White.
H ENRY HEWITT FROST was the fifth child and second son of Loring and Abigal Boswell Frost, and was born in Coventry, August 24, 1825. When he was not quite three years old he was deprived of his mother by death, a loss which he could not then appreciate, but which in after life he fully appreciated and sincerely deplored, although he never lacked the fullest respect and the warmest affection for her who took the place of the mother that bore him. His childhood and youth were characterized by a defer- ence and obedience to parental authority, as admirable as it is rarc. In fact, his whole life was very marked in this respect, and so punc- tiliously did he perform his filial duties that on a review of his life, near its close, he could say with a clear conscience " I never diso- beyed my father." His early years were spent upon his father's farm, faithfully and industriously doing his allotted part of the hard work which must needs be done in a new country. But it soon became apparent that mental exertion rather than physical toil was to be his employment. The district school, poorly taught, and attend- ed for only brief periods and at long intervals, could not furnish food enough for his mind. Every hour of leisure from work was eagerly devoted to books. What he read he retained, and held at ready command. So mature was his judgment even in youth, that he would read no fiction, but selected solid, substantial literature- history, biography, essay, and the like. During his whole life he read but a single novel, and that out of regard to a friend who pre- sented it to him. On his dying bed he requested that this should be examined by a competent person, and committed to the flames if there should be found in it anything prejudicial to morality or offensive to good taste. His example in that regard is worthy of all imitation, in this day, when the world is so deluged with ficti- tious literature, which is
" Oft crammed full
Of poisonous error, blackening every page ; And oftener still of trifling second-hand Remarks, and old, diseased, putrid thought, And miserable incident."
After he arrived at the age of twenty-one he sought better edu- cational advantages than were to be had at Coventry. He attended
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for several months the academy at Brownington, then under the tuition of the Rev. A. L. Twilight, and spent a year and a half, in 1847-8, at Thetford Academy, under the tuition of the distinguished instructor, Hiram Orcutt. He secured the entire confidence of his teachers, and made good proficiency in his studies. While at Thetford he commenced the study of law with Abijah Howard, Esq., and upon his return to Coventry pursued the study with Charles Story, Esq., completed his studies with William M. Dick- erman, Esq., and was admitted to the bar of Orleans county court July 6, 1850. He immediately commenced practice in his native town, where he continued, with a constantly increasing business, till sickness withdrew him from his labors. At the June term of court, 1858, he had an unusual amount of business, and labored night and day without sparing himself, and by his over-exertions laid the foundations of a lingering consumption which terminated in his death, November 25, 1859.
Mr. Frost's distinguishing intellectual characteristic was sound common sense. No one faculty of his mind was so much devel- oped as to make the others seem dwarfish in comparison, but all were so evenly developed that his mind was well proportioned and balanced. His powers were also under good control, and he could bring them all to bear upon various and very different subjects. This gave him a versatility of talent which was of great service to his clients and to himself. In whatever he engaged he did it heart- ily, whether it were the study of professional books, the practice of law, the pursuit of his favorite science-geology, or any of the other things in which he, at different times, engaged. The result of all was that his townsmen had confidence in him as a man of business, and were giving him their confidence more and more. He was not without honor in his own county; in short, he was a "growing man," and bid fair to attain a good eminence as a lawyer and a citi- zen. Though he had little of that eloquence which makes the worse appear the better reason, he did not lack persuasiveness in argument, nor skill to put forward the strong points of his case. This he did with a candor and an evident confidence in the sound- ness of his positions, which secured attention and respect for the advocate, though it did not always gain his cause. His morality was of a high tone, and in one particular-honesty-it was of marked excellence. His profession exposed him to peculiar temp-
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tations in that respect, but he stood absolutely upright amidst them all. No man who knew him, ever so much as suspected the slight- est deviation from the exact right in all pecuniary affairs, or doubt- ed that whatever he ought to account for would be accounted for to the very last farthing.
He was hardly less energetic in paying to his clients the funds he had collected for them than in making the collection. A gentle- man residing in another county, who had formerly entrusted many demands to his care, said to me a few weeks since, "When Mr. Frost paid me the money that he had collected for me, I never looked the papers over; I felt sure it was all right." I mention this trait in Mr. Frost's character, not because he did any more than his duty or than any one else ought to do in similar circum- stances, but because it was of such rare excellence that it deserves to be held up to approbation and imitation. A reputation such as he had in that particular is more valuable to a professional man than talents or learning, and a more precious legacy than silver or gold to bequeath to one's children.
FERNANDO CARTER HARRINGTON.
T HE subject of this sketch was born at St. Johnsbury, East Village, June 3, A. D. 1830. His father, Jubal Harrington, was a merchant at that place, and a son of Leonard Harrington, the founder of the place, owning a grist, oil, and saw-mill, and a large farm. Jubal was afterwards a wholesale dealer in the city of New York. His mother's name was Arabella M. Hill, only daugh- ter of John Hill of the neighboring town of Waterford, one of the settlers of that town as early as 1804. Fernando commenced his school life at the district school of his native village, but at the age of eight years, his father having moved to New York, he was placed at school first at Ridgesfield, and afterward at New Canaan, Conn. Subsequently he commenced the study of the law in the office of Stoughton & Harrington, prominent attorneys of New York, Mr. Harrington being his father's brother. Life here not being in any way to his liking, he returned to Vermont, and continued his law studies with A. J. Willard at Lyndon Center, and afterwards with John L. Edwards at Derby Center, and was admitted to the bar
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from his office at the June term, A. D. 1851, and at once com- menced the practice of his profession at West Charleston. There not being a large amount of law business to attend to, in June, 1854, in connection with E. E. G. Wheeler, he commenced the pub- lication of a newspaper at West Charleston, called the North Union. They subsequently sold out to a stock company. After this Mr. Harrington was engaged for some time as agent for the Grand Trunk Railway of Canada, in which business he was when the late war broke out. He enlisted in the third regiment, Ver- mont volunteers, and was mustered into service as captain of Co. D. He served with honor and credit. He had command of the party who made the charge across the creek at Lee's Mills, April 16, 1862. In September, 1863, he resigned, and on his return to Vermont was at once appointed by the governor state drill master, and assisted in fitting out later regiments. Soon after this he retired to the old homestead in St. Johnsbury, where he now resides, dividing his time between farmer, lawyer and publisher, as Mr. Harrington has given much time in the later years of his life to writing for the papers and magazines, and has also written and published several volumes of books. He was married September 6, 1852, to Harriet A. Frost, daughter of Sumner Frost of Derby, by whom he had one son, now a merchant in Chicago.
ALBERT M. HOLBROOK.
T HE subject of this sketch was born at Winchester, N. H., in 1821, the eldest son of Marcus and Abbie (Wild) Holbrook.
His mother was the daughter of Dr. Wild, the editor of Wild's almanac, and a notable man. Albert attended the common schools, and was sent to the Chesterfield Academy, where he obtained a very good academical education.
He pursued the study of the law with Gove & Atherton of Nashua, and was admitted to the Hillsborough county bar in 1842, and commenced the practice of his profession at Lowell, Mass. After one year, ambitious to make more rapid progress, he went West, but soon returned to New Hampshire and located at Salem, where he practiced law some six or seven years, when he removed to Gloyer, Vt., about 1851. Mr. Holbrook was a man of excellent
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literary taste, and a forcible and interesting speaker. He is remem- bered by those who were students in the Orleans Liberal Institute in the fall of 1852, as delivering a lecture that fall upon education, which was full of good things well said. He was a very bright man and a good lawyer. He succeeded in obtaining quite a busi- ness, but his health soon failed, and he died October 22, 1853, aged thirty-one years.
NATHANIEL TRACY SHEAFE. By WILLIAM W. GROUT.
N ATHANIEL TRACY SHEAFE was born at Portsmouth, N. H., about 1817. His ancestors on both sides may be traced to the early Puritan stock of New England. His father's name was Jacob Sheafe. His mother's name was Mary Haven, the daughter of Jacob. Haven, a clergyman of Portsmouth.
In his early education he had the advantage of the excellent com- mon schools of that day, of Portsmouth, and of the Portsmouth Academy, where he fitted for college. He must have made good use of these opportunities for he was entered at Dartmouth in 1831, and graduated in 1835.
In the fall of 1835 he took charge of the high school at Bellows Falls, Vt., and continued the principal for two years ; but his taste was for the law, and in 1837 he commenced the study of it in the office of Hon. William C. Bradley of Westminster, Vt., then one of the best lawyers in the state, and was admitted to the Windham county bar in 1839. Immediately upon admission he opened an office in Bellows Falls, where he did a profitable and growing busi- ness till 1843, when he formed a copartnership with his old precep- tor, William C. Bradley and removed to Westminster. He con- tinued the partner of Mr. Bradley till 1851, when he removed to Derby Line, where he has since resided. He was for a time cashier of the bank at Derby Line, but soon resumed the practice of his profession.
In 1863 and 1864 he was state's attorney for Orleans county. He was also auditor of the court expenses of the county for many years and until the law was changed and the state auditor took the immediate charge of court expenditures.
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Upon the passage of the present highway law Col. Sheafe (this title of colonel was derived by service upon the staff of some gov- ernor of Vermont prior to 1860), was made chairman of the board of road commissioners, for which position he is well fitted, not only by a large experience as special commissioner in road cases, but by the liberal and progressive spirit evinced by him in all public mat- ters. His strong love of justice was an additional qualification for this position and always made him available in the judgment of the court for auditor in book account cases and referee in important matters sent out under rule of court, to which service he was fre- quently called. It also equally well fitted him for commissioner of the United States Circuit Court, which position he has long held. He was also for several years prior to 1876 postmaster at Derby Line. The duties of all these several positions were discharged by him with fidelity and ability.
Col. Sheafe's love for a fine horse and good cow was always grat- ified by the possession of excellent specimens of each. His taste was for the Morgan horse (now unfortunately nearly extinct), and the Jersey cow. He was, in fact the pioneer Jersey man in North- eastern Vermont.
As a lawyer Mr. Sheafe's field of activity lies more in the prep- aration than in the trial of causes in court, his retiring and unde- monstrative nature finding but little satisfaction in the sharp encounters of the court-room. The careful preparation of cases for trial, however, is his especial pride, and so efficient is he esteemed in that department that in most of the important crimi- nal trials in the county he is called to assist in the preparation.
But so pacific and conciliatory is he in his methods that in his own cases he almost invariably so manages that the parties them- selves come to a settlement of their differences, thereby saving the expense and irritation of a trial. By this course he has undoubt- edly been much more useful to his clients and neighbors than if he had sought the solution of all questions by the court. In early life Col. Sheafe was married to Miss Margaret Hyde of Bellows Falls. Of him it may be truthfully said that he is a kind husband, an indulgent father and a most estimable friend.
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BIOGRAPHY OF THE BAR
JERRY E. DICKERMAN. By HON. GEORGE N. DALE.
J ERRY E. DICKERMAN, Senior, married Mariah F. Fletcher,
and went to St. Johnsbury to reside about 1822, where the gen- tleman of whom I am writing was born January 15, 1830, and who is the fourth of five children born to said Jerry E. and Mariah. The senior was a practicing physician at Burke and St. Johnsbury. The junior having been born in a clean New England village and reared in the midst of respectable and desirable surroundings, became deeply imbued with the habits, characteristics, and sentiments peculiar to a New Englander.
His common school and academical education acquired at New- bury, St. Johnsbury and Derby, gave him a various experience and observation in different schools, while his broad common sense adapted what he learned to practical use.
In his make-up there is more of the utile than of the poetical or fanciful, so that when he came out from the schools he was as well accoutered for the struggles of life as the most exacting could demand.
In 1851 he commenced the study of law with his brother, William M. Dickerman, at Coventry. This was fortunate for the student. It associated him with an interested and intimate friend so unlike himself, and whose stirring enthusiasm had a favorable influence on his more matter of fact brother.
From that place he entered the office of Henry F. Prentiss at Derby Line, where enjoying the instruction and companionship of that bright man, he applied himself to the books with that tenacity of purpose which he has ever since exhibited in his work.
He was admitted to the bar of Orleans county court June 25, 1852, and practiced law at South Troy in 1854-5. From there he removed to West Charleston. He was then twenty-two years of age, not above the medium in stature, lithe, trim and neat in appearance, an accomplished penman, thoroughly systematic, and possessing every practical element of education and none of the belle lettre type to interrupt the efficiency of his outfit. .
He had a lively appreciation of the brightness of life. He was quite sensitive to the influence of his surroundings. The nature and importance of everything around him seemed to be impressed
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upon his mind. Unlike many who seem to regard nothing in life as very important, this character is incapable of indifference. He is either pleased or disgusted with whatever he comes in contact. Here at West Charleston his character was formed, and this is a fit place for the camera, but the artist is wanting, and we must get along as best we may.
It is fortunate for the character of any man if it may best be sketched by relating what he has done or is doing. Such I deem this character to be.
When he fairly settled down to his life work and began to assume and develop distinct characteristics, his methodical and thorough style soon began to win the confidence of those around him, and more than that he began to mould business men into his ways, so that few lawyers have left more lasting or beneficial impressions on a clientage than he did there. The country was comparatively new, but much of the business of this immediate vicinity had grown old. The town had continued quiet but prosperous for many years, but about the time Dickerman went there it began to feel the influences of railroad enterprises. Equidistant from two of them, it began to stir itself to new enterprises, and the effects of lax and careless business habits began to vex this people, and much of the young lawyer's time was occupied in arranging and closing out old differ- ences and complications, and regulating the confused affairs of his clients, invoking the aid of the courts when necessary. In doing this he won the unlimited confidence of his patrons. This work naturally placed him in many positions of responsibility, but when these trusts were tested first impressions in respect to them became permanent. He was too frugal to allow necessity to push him to extravagant demands for his services, but they were regarded by him of too much consequence to be treated as worthless.
His own financial matters managed accurate and just have made him fairly successful in respect to them.
As an expert accountant he could state and unravel the most intricate and irregular matters with much skill so as to reach defi- nite and satisfactory mathematical conclusions. In this work he grew in the esteem of those around him, and soon came to be regarded with a familiar and pleasant respect and confidence. There chanced to be halting there in that day a class of men much older in years than the subject of this sketch, but who are nearly
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all gone now. They regarded him with a sort of paternal affection.
His blunt, frank speech, and spontaneity of feeling and expres- sion soon secured the good will of those somewhat old-fashioned but strong-minded and just men.
His laughter and fun-loving modes were familiar in social hours, and enlivened the whole community, but never disturbed his settled convictions or his discipline in respect to integrity and seriousness in the realities of professional life. There never was a time in his most impatient modes when a bon mot would not be responded to by him with the merry laugh of a boy, and yet his jealousy of the honor and dignity of the profession is unbounded If I should attempt to state the most distinguishing or most marked features of his character I would use three words, viz: Honesty, indepen- dence and fidelity-to clients, friends, and in all his relations. He is hasty of speech, but his real friendships are not easily disturbed by differences nor moderated by time or absence.
Whenever his words seem quick or intolerant or uncharitable, the inducement is a peculiar temperament which, like his wit, flashes almost before thought, but it is as "harmless as the idle winds," because there is no shade of malice in it. As I see him, though he is often impatiently indignant at things he deems wrong, there is not a particle of revenge or enmity in his being.
It is true that he is independent to a degree almost bordering on stubbornness, but this results from his deep and settled convictions of right and wrong. As an advocate he is direct, logical and prac- tical-never diffusive or ornamental. He goes directly to his work with nothing in words or acts suggestive of personal considerations. He is too blunt and frank for art, and too independent for flattery.
As state's attorney for Orleans county in 1858 and 1859, he per- formed the duties of that office with the same skill and care which he exercised in his private business, and which gave universal sat- isfaction.
As a legislator in 1859 and 1860, his opinions were clear and pos- itive. His speeches were short and comprehensive, with no attempt at brilliancy. Sometimes his irrepressible humor would manifest itself as if involuntary and coming unbidden.
In 1860 he and the able and eloquent Allen of Rutland, were very intimate friends. They ate at the same table, and were in hearty accord in respect to all things personal. An act appropri-
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ating money to pay the Montpelier subscribers to a fund raised to rebuild the state house at that place was under discussion, and was bitterly opposed on the ground inter alia that the money was paid by the people of Montpelier for a consideration-a benefit which they had and were receiving ; like hotel-keepers who had paid lib- erally, and were receiving such returns in the patronage of mem- bers and others. To this argument Dickerman made a neat little speech in reply, and when he came to this argument of Allen, he said in substance : " I was not aware, Mr. Speaker, that the putt- ing up at a hotel differed from any other business transaction in which the obligations and benefits are mutual ; and certainly so far as the gentleman from Rutland is concerned, if you sat at the table where I do, you would agree with me that he gets a quid pro quo for every cent he pays his landlord."
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