USA > Vermont > Orange County > Gazetteer of Orange County, Vt., 1762-1888 > Part 18
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William Winthrop Blodgett was a Randolph man and entered the Univer- sity of Vermont as a freshman in 1842, graduating in 1846. He was ad- mitted to Orange county bar June 20, 1850.
Hiram A. Spear, of Randolph, was admitted to Orange county bar at the June term of the County Court, 1852 He removed to Meredith, N. H., and married there a daughter of Judge Kelley. Afterwards he went to Cali- fornia and died there March 4, 1858. He was a ready speaker and a man of considerable ability. He studied law with Hon. Jefferson P. Kidder.
Henry Partridge, who was in practice in West Randolph, and whose name appears on the Orange County Court docket for the June term, 1856, was born in Randolph, and was the son of Oramel Partridge, of that town. He was a brilliant young fellow, a fine speaker, and remarkably good looking. An old friend of his, who had been in the western army during the war of the
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Rebellion, says, that he don't think he ever saw General McPherson that he did not think of Partridge, and he used to see the General every day. While Partridge was at school at Randolph academy he was one of the edi- tors of a students' paper, called The Nonpareil, which had quite a successful career. Rev. Gustavus Maxim and Prof. W. H. Safford, of Chicago, who was then the wonderful boy mathematician, were associated with him, but he and his brother George were the head and front of the concern. They printed their paper on a wooden press which is thought to be still in existence in the attic of the house where they then lived.
Mr. Partridge studied law with Hon. William Nutting, and was admitted to the bar of Orange county about 1855. He soon after went to Minneapolis, where he was county clerk for a while, but fell into bad habits, and when the war broke out he entered the United States service. His history since then we cannot give.
Hon. John W. Rowell, fifth assistant judge of the Supreme Court, was born in Lebanon, N. H., June 9, 1835. The early education of Judge Rowell was in the common schools, like that of all boys in the Granite and Green Mountain states. He prepared to enter college a year in advance, and was intending to join the sophomore class at Dartmouth, but he changed his purpose and commenced the study of the law in the office of ex-Lieut .- Governor Kidder, then one of the most successful lawyers in Orange county. He also studied for a time in the office of Judge Weston, and attended a course of lectures in the law college established by Judge Hayden and other gentlemen, at Poland, Ohio. He was admitted to the bar of Orange county at the June term, 1858, and immediately formed a partnership with Hon. John B. Hutchinson, and commenced practice at West Randolph, where he had for a long time resided. Judge Hutchinson was disinclined to take a very active part in the trial of jury causes in the County Court, or to enter into the rough and tumble contests then so common before justices of the peace throughout the state, and this threw the burden of such labors upon his young partner. Judge Rowell not only performed the duties thus de- volving upon him, while so new in the profession, well and to the satisfaction of his clients and of his senior partner, but he rapidly grew in reputation as a lawyer and in knowledge and conscious strength in his profession. Naturally of a sharp and keen intellect, he soon became a formidable competitor, even when opposed to those of a much greater experience than he had enjoyed. He was a partner with Judge Hutchinson until 1866, except two years, during which the latter was acting as cashier of the Northfield bank, when the part- nership was dissolved on account of the continued ill health of the senior partner. In February, 1870, Judge Rowell removed to Chicago, feeling that if he was ever to go into a city he should do so in the prime of life, and formed a partnership with John Hutchinson, originally of Braintree, and formerly United States consul at Nice. But city ways and Chicago practice, or practices, were not congenial to the mental habits and strict training of
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Judge Rowell, and he soon felt that he was not at home. He returned to West Randolph in August, 1871, where he found a large business awaiting. him, and at the December term, 1871, he had sixty-eight. cases in County Court, which proved the wisdom of his decision in returning. He never saw a day after that, nor in fact after his admission to the bar, when he did not have a plenty of legal business to occupy his full time and attention. Judge Rowell represented the town of Randolph in the state legislature as a Repub- lican in 1861 and 1862, and was distinguished as being the youngest member but one in the House. "Youth was a fault to which every day brought amendment, and which did not incapacitate him from serving in both sessions upon the judiciary committee, of which Governor Smith was chairman." In September, 1862, and 1863, he was elected state's attorney of the county. He had been appointed to fill out the unexpired term of Gov. Farnham in 1862, who was absent in the army, and then was elected for the two years as above stated. After he was state's attorney there were scarcely any state cases of any importance tried in Orange county into which he was not called to assist the state's attorney, and he had his full share of all the important business in the court. He was at one time director of the Northfield bank, and later director and vice-president of Randolph National bank.
We cannot do better than to quote the estimate of Judge Rowell in the " Biographical Enclyclopedia of Vermont," before referred to, which says :-
" The wide and varied experience necessarily involved in these successive changes of relation, residence and professional pursuit has been of no small service. It is an education in itself. Mr. Rowell was apt and quick to avail himself of every opportunity, and turn it to his own uses in legitimate and honorable manner. When he first began practice, the old trial-justice courts were at the zenith of popularity. His associate in business was not a trial lawyer, and the management of cases to be decided in those institutions naturally devolved upon him. In the forensic contests which followed he acquired knowledge, discipline and skill. These were of manifestly superior order, for he immediately assumed an active part in all the leading litigated cases of the county. His list of retainers included several notable criminal cases.
" The growing fame of Mr. Rowell as a learned and excellent legist afterward received large accessions from his labors as reporter of the Decisions of the Supreme Court, to which duty he was electively assigned by the legislature in the fall of 1872. In this capacity he labored with great acceptance, fidel- ity and success, until December, 1880, at which time he declined a further ap- pointment. Mr. Rowell reported the Supreme Court decisions for the years 1873 to 1880, inclusive. In 1874 he was elected state senator from Orange county [for the biennial term]. and served in the following legislative session as chairman of the committee on the asylum for the insane, and also acted in the committee on the judiciary.
" An admirable and successful practitioner, a learned jurist, and a wise and experienced legislator, his merits commended Mr. Rowell to the notice of Gov- ernor Farnham, by whom he was appointed on the 10th of January, 1882, to the office of associate justice of the Supreme Court. - The appointment was to a vacancy on the bench occasioned by the promotions consequent on the
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death of Chief Justice Pierpoint. In the fall of the same year the legislature concurred in the choice of the executive, and elected Judge Rowell to the further occupancy of his seat. Subsequent events have justified the sagacity of both branches of the state government. The high judicial office and the officer are thoroughly suited to each other ; nor is there any doubt that Judge Rowell will wear the judicial ermine with stainless honor to himself and with credit and advantage to the state."
Judge Rowell was married, on the Ist of August, 1858, to Mary L., daughter of Rev. Leonard Wheeler, of Randolph. They have no children. They con- tinue to reside at West Randolph in a convenient and elegant mansion erected by the Judge several years ago on a street just aside from the stir of the busy and growing village of West Randolph. In the same enclosure with the house is the law office of the Judge in a separate building. Here its owner spends most of his time, when not engaged in the active duties of his office, with an extensive and very carefully selected library at hand for refer- ence in preparing the opinions of the court that it falls to his lot to write out at length.
Judge Rowell has always had a remunerative practice, and, as might be ex- pected, he went on to the bench with such a share of this world's goods as to place him above any dependence upon his salary for his support.
Frederick Argyle Aiken was born in Shrewsbury, Mass., September 20, 1833. His parents were Solomon and Susan Rice Aiken. When ten years of age he moved with them to Hardwick, Vt. He was a student in Morrisville and St Johnsbury academies, and a graduate of Middlebury college. He early displayed a proclivity for journalism and, immediately after leaving college, became editor of the Burlington Sentinel. While editing that paper he married Miss Sarah O. Weston, eldest daughter of Judge Edmund Weston, of West Randolph, a brilliant scholar and accomplished woman. He after- wards studied liw with Judge Weston, and was admitted to the Orange county bar in 1859, and had an office for a time in Randolph. In 1860 Mr. Aiken went to Washington, D. C., and became the secretary of the National Democratic committee. During the early years of the war he was a volun- teer aide, with the rank of captain, on the staff of General Hancock, and participated gallantly in several engagements, in one of which he had two horses shot under him, and received injuries which no doubt hastened his death. In 1863 he was admitted to the Supreme Court of the United States, and practiced in that and the District of Columbia Courts until 1868, when he gave up law for his former much loved profession of journalism. He labored with marked success on several of the leading city papers, till the winter of 1877, when he started with the Washington Post as its city editor. This position he held until his death, which occurred December 24, 1878, after an illness of only two days. Gifted, brilliant and versatile, a gentleman by nature and a true friend, Mr. Aiken was held in high esteem by the jouanalists and literati of Washington, and they united after his decease in paying special tribute to his memory. Mrs. Aiken still resides in Washington.
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Hon. Nelson Luther Boyden, now of Randolph, was born in Barnard, Windsor county, Vt, July 19, 1836, and was the only child of Luther and Hannah (Goff) Boyden. His father died when he was but six years old, and, as he left no property, his son was deprived of many advantages that he other- wise might have enjoyed. What education he received was purchased at the price of hard work and the most rigid economy. He attended the com- mon schools and finally entered Royalton academy, where he improved its advantages thoroughly, and fitted for college, although unable to enter for want of means. While thus struggling to educate himself he taught twelve terms of district or common schools, which is of itself an education, and also taught several terms in the academy where he had been a student. In February, 1861, he removed to Randolph, taking up his residence in what, at one time, was the chief village of that flourishing town, sometimes called Randolph Hill, to distinguish it from the other villages, but which has now been largely outgrown by the enterprising village of West Randolph, situated upon and built up by the Central Vermont railroad. At his new residence Mr. Boy- den taught a part of the time for two years in the Orange County Grammar school, then a flourishing institution. He commenced the study of law with Hon. Philander Perrin, in the summer of 1861, and pursued his law studies for a while in connection with teaching, and was admitted to Orange county bar at the June term of the County Court, 1865. Mr. Boyden has always been interested in educational matters. He was superintendent of schools in Barnard and Randolph from 1858 to 1872, and is now one of the trustees of the State Normal school located at Randolph, and president of the board. He has been town clerk of Randolph continuously since 1868, and is at the present time. He has continued to reside and practice law at Ran- dolph ever since his admission to the bar. He was state's attorney for Orange county in 1871 and 1872, and again by another election in 1875 and 1876. He was state senator in 1882 and 1883. Mr. Boyden is a very use- ful citizen in the town of his adoption, has held various of its offices, and his services are indispensible in settling the business of the town just before and preparatory to the annual town meeting.
For many years he has lived upon a farm and has had the best herd of thoroughbred Jersey cattle in the state, which has taken the first premium more than once at the Vermont State Fair.
Mr. Boyden married Miss Eleanor Angene Carpenter, and by her has had five children, of whom three are deceased. Charles Irving, born in 1876, and Florence Louise, born in 1881, are the survivors.
E. J. McWain was born in the mountainous town of Ripton, Addison county, Vt., August 17, 1840. Subsequently he resided in several towns in the state with his parents, attending district school and performing such labor as country boys usually find to do. At the age of about eighteen he went to the Burr & Burton seminary at Manchester, Vt., where he graduated in the fall of 1861, intending to enter Middlebury college the next spring, but instead,
10*
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attended the spring term, 1862, of the Green Mountain Liberal Institute at South Woodstock, Vt., designing to enter college later ; but the excitement of the war was so intense that all thought of study was laid aside. Unable longer to resist the patriotic impulse he enlisted at Rochester, Vt., August 6, 1862, in Co. H, of the Eleventh Vermont Regiment. He was mustered into service September Ist, at Brattleboro, as first sergeant, and soon left for Washington. The regiment was stationed in the forts about Washington, on the Maryland side of the defense of the city. In the spring of 1863, it having been determined to transfer the regiment to a heavy artillery organiza- tion, and raise each company to a minimum of one hundred and fifty men, with two additional companies, Sergt. McWain, with several others, was detailed to return to Vermont to recruit men for that purpose, and remained in that service until the following fall, when he was summoned to Brattleboro to take charge of the recruits arriving in large numbers from all parts of the state, and for all of the Vermont organizations in the field. He served in that capacity until the following April, when he returned to his regiment. He was ·commissioned as second lieutenant of his company December, 28, 1863, and as first lieutenant December 2, 1864.
The Eleventh Regiment left the fortifications of Washington May 12, 1864, and on the 15th joined the Old Vermont Brigade in the field near Spottsyl- vania, and thereafter served in that organization as infantry until the close of the war. Lieut. McWain was slightly wounded in the right leg in front of Petersburg, June 23, 1864, near the Welden railroad, and on that day, with others of the Fourth and Eleventh Vermont Regiments, was captured, and was thereafter confined in Libby prison, and at Macon, Savannah, Charleston and Columbia, until March 1, 1865, when he was liberated on parole. He then re- turned north and never again served with his company. He contracted varicose veins in the field, and scurvey in prison, resulting subsequently in serious and well nigh fatal disabilities. He was discharged May 15, 1865, by order of the war department.
He returned to Rochester, Vt., and entered the law office of C. A. Webber, Esq., as a student, remaining about a year. He then entered the office of James J. Wilson, Esq., of Bethel, and was admitted to the Windsor county bar at the May term, 1867. The following winter he formed a partnership in the law business with George M. Fisk, Esq., at Northfield. In May, 1870, he opened an office at West Randolph and became a member of the Orange county bar the next June, and continued the practice of his profession in that county until the spring of 1886, except that for about five years from 1872, by reason of ill health, he had no office and did not attend court.
In the spring of 1886 he removed to Nebraska and is now (1887) practic- ing his profession in Falls City, in that state, the county seat of Richardson county.
Jason Henry Dudley, son of Jonathan and Minerva (Armstrong) Dudley, was born at Hanover, N. H., November 24, 1842, and was educated at the
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schools at Hanover, graduating at Dartmouth college in July, 1862. He went to Colebrook, N. H., in September, 1862, and had charge of Colebrook academy three years, during a part of which time he studied law with Hon. William S. Ladd, later judge of the Supreme Court of New Hampshire. From 1865 to 1866 he studied law with Hon. Bliss N. Davis, of Danville, Vt., having charge of Phillips academy, of Danville, during that time. In September, 1866, he went to West Randolph and took charge of the academy there, and studied law with Hon. Edmund Weston. December 3, 1867, at Chelsea, he was admitted to the Vermont bar, Judge Peck presiding.
He commenced the practice of law at Colebrook, N. H., December 15, 1867, in company with James I. Parsons, as Dudley & Parsons. After two years the partnership was dissolved, and Dudley practiced alone till 1878, when he took Daniel C. Remich as partner, under the firm name of Dudley & Remich. After four years this partnership was dissolved, and Dudley has since been alone. He was elected solicitor of Coos county, November, 1878, and also in the years 1880, '82, '84 and '86. He has held various town offices, and is a member of the Odd Fellows, Excelsior Lodge, No. 73. Septem- ber 22, 1869, he married Lucy A. Bradford, daughter of Dr. Austin Bradford, of Vergennes, Vt., and later he married the step-daughter of Hon. Edmund Weston, of Randolph, Vt. He has had two children, Allen Bradford Dudley, born June 18, 1871, and William Henry Dudley, born April 13, 1873, who died July 2, 1876.
Joseph Dudley Denison, Esq., was born at Royalton, Vt., November 1, 1847, and fitted for college at the Royalton academy. He spent two years at the Nor- wich university, the military academy founded by Capt. Alden Partridge, and graduated at the University of Vermont at Burlington in 1868. He studied law with his father, the Hon. Dudley C. Denison, of Royalton, and was ad- mitted to the bar in Windsor county at the May term of that court in 1869. He practiced law in company with his father until March, 1885, when he re- moved to West Randolph, where he is now in the successful practice of his profession. He was secretary of civil and military affairs from 1872 to 1874, under Governor Julius Converse. During the partnership with his father the latter was member of Congress from the Second Congressional district of Vermont for two termis, from 1875 to 1879.
Mr. J. D. Denison married Miss Elizabeth A. Rix, then of Royalton, for- merly of Mobile, Ala., in 1874, and they have two children. He is a man of strict integrity, and is the soul of honor, and has the respect and esteem of all who know him.
Charles P. Tarbell is the son of Daniel Tarbell, and was born at South Royalton, Vt., February 22, 1850. When he was about six years old his parents moved to the village of East Granville, Vt., on the Central Vermont railroad, popularly known as "Sandusky." The winter he was ten years old he drove a two-horse team drawing cord wood, and that was his regular work for six successive winters. His father knowing that Charles wished to go to
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school, on the first of October following his fifteenth birthday, gave him his time. That fall he took a small wood job, in the winter worked by the month, and in the spring was able to attend the academy at West Randolph. From that time he went to school at Randolph all the time, except when obliged to. stay out to earn the wherewith to pay his expenses, until August, 1869. During this time Hon. Philander Perrin loaned him a copy of Blackstone, which he read carefully. In the month last named he went to the Albany, N. Y., Law school and graduated the spring following, borrowing money of his brother to meet the enhanced expenses. He was admitted to the Supreme Court in New York by virtue of an act of the legislature providing for the admission of the graduates of that school. At the December term, 1870, he was admitted to the bar in Orange county on motion, Judge Peck remarking. in reply to a suggestion of Judge Perrin that the candidate had not reached his majority, that he probably would not practice much before that time.
After Mr. Tarbell's return front Albany he went into the practice of law in the office of Judge Perrin, at West Randolph, and remained there until the spring of 1872, except that he frequently went to " Sandusky " nights to look after some farming and lumbering business, which he had engaged in, some- what to the detriment of his law business. When he was with Judge Perrin, both before and after his return from Albany, the Judge's house was his home and he was treated like a son, for which kindness of the generous hearted old lawyer and his wife their young friend will never cease to be grateful.
In the spring of 1872 he removed to South Royalton, Vt., and some months after opened an office there, but he did not continue alone long, for on the first day of February, 1873, he entered into co-partnership in the law business. with Charles M. Lamb, Esq., a veteran in the profession, and this relation still continues.
Hiram Blaisdell was born in Albany, Orleans county, Vt., June 30, 1847. He was educated in the common schools and at the academies of Newbury, Glover and Barre, Vt., where he nearly fitted for college. He studied law with Hon. Timothy P. Redfield, of Montpelier, and Charles H. Heath, Esq., of Plainfield, Vt., and was admitted to the bar at Montpelier at the March term of the Washington County Court, 1870. He practiced in Orange county about two and a half years, living at West Randolph, and was admitted to the Supreme Court at the March term, 1873. He was the candidate for state's attorney on the Democratic or Greeley ticket in the fall of 1872, and was defeated by Orin Gambell, the Republican candidate. In May, 1873, he re- moved to Bay City, Mich., where he practiced his profession about six years. In 1874 he was elected circuit court commissioner of Bay county, Mich., and. held the office two years. In the spring of 1879 he removed to the Yellow- stone Valley, Montana territory, and tried the first case that was ever tried in the Yellowstone Valley. Late in the fall of 1880 he removed to Denver, Col. In the summer of 1881 he came to Boston in the interest of some .:
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mining companies, and has remained there ever since, making his family residence in Newton Center, Mass.
Jonathan Kendrick Kinney was born in Royalton, Vt., October 26, 1843, and is the son of Luther Skinner Kinney, who was the son of Jonathan Kinney, who was the son of Rev. Jonathan Kinney who came to Plain- field, Vt., at an early day. The subject of this sketch was educated in the common schools and the old academy of his native town. When about ready for college he enlisted as a private, at the age of eighteen, and served in the 16th Vermont Regiment, being present at the battle of Gettysburg, and en- gaged in some subsequent skirmishes. After his discharge he went west and engaged in business, but in 1872 he came east to study law with Hon. John W. Rowell, at Randolph. In 1875 he was graduated from Harvard Law school, and June 29, of the same year, he was admitted to the Orange county bar. He practiced for a short time in West Randolph and later in Cincin- nati, Ohio. He gradually drifted into the writing and editing of law books, and is there still. He is the author of " Kinney's Digest," a complete digest of the decisions of the Supreme Court of the United States. He is also editor of the last (and since the author's death the only) edition of " Redfield's Railways " He terms himself "a man whose life has been turned all awry by the war," and there are many such among those who survive.
Alexander Dunnett is of Scotch descent. His father, Andrew Dunnett, was born in Wick, Scotland, in 1816, and emigrated to Barnet, Vt., in 1841. Here he married Christianna Galbraith, whose father and mother came to this country from Scotland about 1800. Immediately after his marriage he moved to Peacham, Vt., where the subject of this sketch was born, Novem- ber 29, 1852. He was the third of a family of six children. He was edu- cated in the public schools and Randolph Normal school, from which insti- tution he graduated in 1875, and immediately commenced the study of his profession with Hon. Nelson L. Boyden, at Randolph, and prosecuted his studies there and in the Law school of Boston university until he was ad- mitted to the bar in Orange county at the June term, 1877. He was ad- mitted to the bar of the Supreme Court in Caledonia county in May, 1880.
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