Gazetteer of Washington County, Vt., 1783-1889, Part 7

Author: Child, Hamilton, 1836-, comp; Adams, William, fl. 1893, ed
Publication date: 1889
Publisher: Syracuse, N. Y., The Syracuse journal company, printers
Number of Pages: 898

USA > Vermont > Washington County > Gazetteer of Washington County, Vt., 1783-1889 > Part 7

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).

In February, 1812, there was a meeting, described in Thompson's History of Montpelier, of interest to lawyers. It was a mass meeting to consider the policy of the government then aiming at war. The Democrats first obtained control and chose Ezra Butler, the preacher and the judge, to preside ; the Federalists came in soon in strength and reorganized and put Charles Bulke -- ley, a lawyer, in the chair. The Democrats rallied and finally controlled the :

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meeting, their cause being championed by James Fisk, and the Federalist side by Nicholas Baylies, both afterwards judges of the Supreme Court. Jeduthun Loomis, another lawyer, was captain of the Montpelier Light In- fantry, and although a Federalist was earnest that the company should do good service when war was once declared. J. Y. Vail, another lawyer, was an earnest Democrat. Two students in his office appear on the muster roll of the company that went from the village at the time of the battle of Platts- burgh, Alanson Allen and Henry F. Janes. On the roll of the same com- pany is the name of George Rich, the first clerk of the court, and of Cyrus Ware, then a lawyer of mature years, and of Thomas Reed, Jr., who was then a boy who had not even begun the study of law. Joseph Howes, soon after a judge of the County Court, was second lieutenant; Rich was a sergeant ; Allen, the law student, was a corporal ; Janes, the other law stu- dent who was afterwards a member of Congress, was among the privates, as were Judge Ware and young Reed. Tho nas Brooks, grandfather of Gen . W. H. H. Brooks, of the war of the Rebellion, was also a private in this com- pany. The old muster roll throws an illuminating side-light on the men of that day, and it rather suits the mind's eye to see Judge Ware and young Reed plodding together toward the lake and the sound of battle. Another coming Montpelier lawyer was on the same journey in the Randolph com . pany-J. P. Miller, who also served in the Greek revolution.

Lest Mr. Camp's old diary of the cold June of 1816 should discourage im- migration, and cause a dearth of laborers in the granite harvest time, it is well tto note that he lived " clean up in the north part of the state, e'enamost to rthe Canada line." It was n't in this neighborhood at all-but even if it had been, what then ? " Why, there 't is !" as Charles Davis used to say to the Supreme Court. Every time and clime has its own worries and its compen- sations. If we haven't iron mines or marble we have granite quarries, and if, for one year, the " perfect day in June" was not found in its perfection in Vermont, it has since taken up its regular abode here and is only surpassed by one of our October days with its mountain forests dyed from the paint pot .of the Gods. Horace Greeley's " go west, young man " has been acted on- long before he said it, too-by many of our county people and in high degree by our lawyers. There they flourish and after a time return in glory, and the consolation of those that remain is that those who go are good fellows and · deserve their success, together with a sense of safety from cyclones and fire blizzards. The Vermonter disgusted with the West forty years ago may have been a Washington county emigrant.

" Great Western waste of bottom land ! Flat as a pancake, rich as grease, Where gnats are full as big 's your hand And 'skeeters ' are as big as geese ! I'd rather live on Camel's Hump And be a Yankee Doodle beggar,

Than never see a tree or stump

And shake to death with ' fever 'n' agur.'"

WASHINGTON COUNTY.

But pretty quick after those lugubrious lines appeared Matt Carpenter struck out from the very shadow of the Hump and got along rather well out West-though he had to get rid of some of the impediments of his name to make the race.

THE EARLY JUDGES.

None of the lawyers who occupied the bench will be described under this head, but only some laymen who from their good sense were chosen to ad- minister the law. The system appears to have worked well, and indeed being a county judge appears to have become quite a profession by itself. Now and then a lawyer was elected, but ordinarily in this county the lawyers kept within the bar.

EZRA BUTLER, of Waterbury, was the first chief judge of the County Court- He was born in Lancaster, Mass., September 24, 1763. At six years of age his father moved to West Windsor, Vt., where Mrs. Butler, whose maiden name was McAllister, soon died. Ezra remained in West Windsor till he was- fourteen, most of the time living with an older brother, Joel. Then he went to Claremont, N. H., where he lived with Dr. Stearns for seven years and had the management of the Doctor's farm. He served six months in the army when he was seventeen. In 1784 he went to Weathersfield for a few months, and in the spring of 1785, with his next older brother, Asaph, came to Waterbury. They came as far as Judge Paine's in Williamstown with an ox- team, and the rest of the way (some over twenty miles) they traveled on snow-shoes drawing their effects on a hand sled. They went to the house of the only settler who had preceded them, James Marsh. No other settler came to that town for a year and a half after Butler's arrival. The Butlers " made their pitch," cleared a little land, planted some corn, and returned to Weathersfield, where, in June, Ezra married Tryphena Diggins. They soon went to Waterbury, where Ezra changed his pitch and built a log house on what has lately been known as the Reform School farm, just below the village, and into this residence the young couple moved in September, 1786. The pair " moved " from Weathersfield on horseback. Ezra was the first town clerk (1790) ; was town representative, 1794 to 1805 (except in 1798) ; was a member of the council from 1807 to 1825, inclusive, except when in Congress in 1813, 1814. He was elected to Congress in 1812 and served one term. He was a member of the Council of Censors in 1806, and of the Constitutional Convention of 1822. In 1826 and 1827 he was elected governor of the state, and in 1828 declined a reelection.

He was no novice at the judge business when this county was organized. He had been assistant judge of Chittenden County Court by three elections, in 1803, 1804, and 1805 ; and had been chief judge of that court from 1806 till his town was set off to the new county. He was chief judge of this county from its organization till the old system of county courts went out of existence in 1825, except from December 1, 1813, to December 1, 1815, the

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Federalists controlling the legislatures of 1813 and 1814, and Judge Butler be- ing also at that time a member of Congress.

He was, when he went to Waterbury, a vigorous and somewhat profane early settler ; in a few years he was converted and became a member of the Baptist church, and from about 1800 to within a few years of his death was. the pastor of that church in Waterbury. His early hardships gave him a somewhat stooping form, his complexion was dark and sallow, and his eyes black. His character and mind deserved the honors given him, and he gave good service in all the positions to which he was called.

A more extended sketch of Gov. Butler may be found in "Hemenway's Vermont Historical Gazetteer, vol. 4, p. 816. Poore's Congressional Direc- tory says he was " born in Conn.," (he was n't) ; "in 1762," (he was n't) ; " re- ceived a good English education," (he went to school only six months-self- educated in manhood he clearly was) ; "studied law, " (he did n't, except as he helped make it and administer it); " was admitted to the bar," (he never was); "and commenced practice in Waterbury, Vermont, in 1786," (he never commenced practice and there was but one other family in Waterbury in 1786) ; " he died July 19, 1838," (he did die, but before that day). This historical item from Poore strikes me as a mighty poor historical item. Gov. Butler died at Waterbury, July 12, 1838.

CLARK STEVENS, of Montpelier, who was the first assistant judge of this county ever elected, declined to serve, and indeed declined all other offices ex- cept that he was persuaded to be town clerk one year. He was born in Roch- ester, Mass., November 15, 1764, and after coming to Montpelier in 1790 married Huldah Foster, of Rochester, December 13, 1792, and brought her to his log house here. Soon after that he built a log meeting-house, and that was the first church edifice in the county. He was a Quaker and a minister of the gospel. He was full six feet tall, and of noble form and like character. Thompson says of him, " he was a prince in appearance, but a child in humil- ity." He died December 20, 1853.

SALVIN COLLINS, the first first assistant judge of the County Court, was born in Southboro, Mass., March 6, 1768, and about 1791 came to Berlin, where he lived till he removed to Montpelier in 1811. He was reelected assistant judge in 1812, and was judge of probate from 1815, five years. After that he was for many years a trial justice of the peace. His first wife (Rebecca) died in 1816, and March 6, 1817, he married Mrs. Lucy Clark. In Thomp- son's History of Montpelier (p. 225) is an appreciative sketch of Judge Col- lins. He died November 9, 1831.

BRADFORD KINNE, of Plainfield, was second assistant judge of the county for its first two years. He was born in Preston, Conn., about 1764, and moved to Plainfield from Royalton, Vt., in 1795. Judge Kinne went about at times. to preach-Judge Collins being the only judge of the first County Court who did n't have that habit upon him, and he was a zealous member of the Con- gregational church. Judge Kinne also practiced law, but not having been

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"admitted to the bar " he had to address the court and the jury from without the bar.

Goshen Gore by Plainfield in his day belonged to Caledonia county, and was separated from the rest of the county by ten miles of impassable forest, being a gore no constable had jurisdiction, and a sheriff, to get there, had to make a long detour. One Carnes, who lived in the Gore, was poor and fell into trouble, and a sheriff finally went to get him on some suit, whereupon Carnes knocked him about with an axe helve. Indeed Carnes confessed when sued for the assault that he " did hit the gentleman a wee bit of a tap on the sconce with the hoosel of his axe, but had no thought of hurting him at all at all." In fact Carnes's plea was about the same as some of the irrever- ent of our present bar allege a living lawyer to have made-that his client "struck the plaintiff in good faith." Judge Kinne defended Carnes, and in some way got the whole Carnes family over to Danville-the wife and six chil- dren like the husband clean and poor. Kinne stood without the bar and besought the jury to give a verdict for the defendant-"Now, gentlemen of the jury, every cent you take from the defendant will be a morsel out of the mouths of babes and sucklings "-and Kinne wept aloud-and Carnes wept aloud-and his wife wept alout-and the six " babes and sucklings " lifted up their voices and wept-and the jury was moved by the waters upon their faces, and Carnes and his family returned to the Gore unharmed-all having gone according to Kinne's programme ; pretty much as the justice of a later day, who "was a kind of a plaintiff's justice," once remarked to a famous lawyer with whom he rode to the place of trial over in Duxbury, " I suppose the cost should be figured as we talked coming over."

Judge Kinne was not prepossessing in appearance ; he had a long nose and a long chin, and, being withal somewhat toothless, the two made near acquaint- ance as he talked. In the days of his practice imprisonment for debt was the rule, and the "liberties of the yard " extended only a mile from jail. Judge Kinne defended in a suit brought for an escape, but all the other side was able to show towards the escape was that the prisoner lived in Plainfield, and that about daylight one morning he was discovered about one rod inside the jail limits running down Clay hill towards the jail as for dear life. It looked very much as the truth was that he had made a visit home and had not got back under cover of darkness. Judge Kinne, from without the bar, addressed the jury -- " Gentlemen of the jury, the plaintiff in this case has taken every method to prove my client within the limits of the jail-yard, and I shall take no manner of means to prove him out." And tradition is that the law was more severe than the administration of it, and that juries considered " all intendments in favor of liberty." At any rate that jury was all right. Judge Kinne died in Plainfield in 1828.

CHARLES BULKELEY, of Berlin, who was chief judge from December 1, 1813, to December 1, 1814, was a lawyer, and an account of him will be given among the sketches of the lawyers.

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DENISON SMITH, of Barre, was chief judge from December 1, 1814, to De- cember 1, 1815, and was a lawyer, and will be sketched among members of the bar.

Both the above named gentlemen I take it were Federalists ; Bulkeley certainly was. But it is not certain how much politics had to do with the choice of county judges, for we find Stephen Pitkin elected in years when opposing parties had control of the legislature.

SETH PUTNAM, of Middlesex, succeeded Salvin Collins as assistant judge, and served from December 1, 1813, to December 1, 1814. Judge Putnam came with several brothers to Middlesex at a very early day, and was town clerk and a colonel ; he was an uncle of C. C. Putnam, of Putnam's Mills. There is what purports to be a sketch of the Judge in Hemenway's Gazetteer, but on examination it consists so far as facts are concerned in the statement that he had three sons, Holden, Roswell, and George. So it proves to be very much like the introduction that made Judge Alfred Conkling so indig- nant. After Roscoe had become popular, his father, the Judge, from whom the son honestly came by both his brains and haughty bearing, was invited to speak at some large meeting. When the time had come the usual com- mitteeman introduced to the audience " Judge Conkling, the father of Ros- coe Conkling "; whereupon the irate Judge bade the astounded committee- man "good evening, sir !" and left, saying he would be - if he would address a crowd to whose attention his only title was that he was the father of somebody.

STEPHEN PITKIN, of Marshfield, succeeded Judge Putnam and was assistant judge from December 1, 1814, to December 1, 1820. He represented his town thirteen years in the legislature. He moved into Marshfield March I, 1795, and died there May 22, 1834, aged sixty-two years. Judge Pitkin was a man of commanding presence and influence in his town. In the cold sea- son of 1816 and 1817, when almost no provision was raised, he was of great help to his neighbors in procuring food to tide over the evil days-fish it was that helped out the hungry people. Gen. P. Pitkin, of Montpelier, is a grandson of Judge Pitkin.

STEPHEN PIERCE, of Waitsfield, succeeded Judge Kinne, December 1, 1814, and served one year. I am unable to give account of him further than this, and that he was a justice of the peace in Waitsfield.

WARREN ELLIS, of Barre, became assistant judge December 1, 1815, and served the next three years, and again for awhile after the system was changed in 1825. He came to Barre from Claremont, N. H., about 1803 ; he was born in Claremont, May 24, 1777. Judge Ellis was a saddler by trade, and withal a good musician. He represented Barre seven years. His son Warren H. went to Waukegan, Ill., and a daughter married D. H. Sherman, and went West. Judge Ellis died in Barre, June 10, 1842.

JOSEPH HOWES, of Montpelier, was assistant judge from December 1, 1818, to December 1, 1825, and at times thereafter. He was born March 28,

WASHINGTON COUNTY.

1783, in Lebanon, Conn., and came to Montpelier in 1808. In the War of 1812 he served two years as adjutant. He was second lieutenant of the company that started for Plattsburgh. Judge Howes was prominent in all town affairs and a justly respected citizen. He died April 26, 1863.

JOSIAH B. STRONG, of Northfield, was assistant judge from December I, 1820, to December 1, 1825, but I have found no other account of him, except that he was sometime justice of the peace.

This closes the list of the judges of the old County Court. December 1, 1825, substantially the same system as now exists came into being.

THE EARLY BAR.

The Vermont Register for 1812 gives the names of eight "practicing attor- neys " in Jefferson county. To these should be added two names to com- plete the list of lawyers in the county at that date, James Fisk and Cyrus Ware. Mr. Fisk was in Congress and out of practice, and Mr. Ware was a. judge of Caledonia County Court when the new county was established, and he had at once cases on the docket, so his name should have appeared in the list.

In the space allowed and the time at command it is impossible to give in- dividual members of the bar such sketches as they deserve. And it will be found that many of the most prominent lawyers of the county have little space given them-in many cases for the reason that quite full accounts of them are elsewhere extant, and that it has been thought better to use these pages for material that is for the most part not already in print. Reference will be made to Hemenway's Gazetteer of Vermont as Hemenway, to Thomp- son's History of Montpelier as Thompson, to Mr. Baldwin's very praiseworthy History of the Orleans County Bar as Baldwin, and to Gov. Farnham's very useful work in Child's Gazetteer of Orange County.

CHARLES BULKELEY, of Montpelier and Berlin, was the first lawyer to settle in Washington county. He lived in Montpelier at least as early as April 8, 1797, as he is described in a deed of that date as of Montpelier ; and he had not moved into Berlin as late as December 10, 1798, but probably did so soon after, and he there remained till his death, April 25, 1836, at the age of seventy-two. He was a native of Colchester, Conn.

He was state's attorney (Berlin then being in Orange county) in 1800, 1801, and 1802 ; and was chief judge of Jefferson county from December I, 1813, to December 1, 1814, as heretofore stated. He was one of the trus- tees of the Montpelier Academy when it was incorporated, November 7, 1800, and I take it that Sally Bulkeley, who attended that school when J. Y. Vail taught it in the winter of 1807-08, was his daughter, and from the place her name occurs in the list that she was then quite a girl. Judge Bulkeley ceased the practice of the law the last ten years of his life. When living in Montpelier he occupied the Frye house, the third built in town, on the west side of Main

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street, near the arch bridge, and his house in Berlin was about a dozen rods above that bridge. He was a respected citizen, and at his death gave liber- ally of his considerable property for public purposes. Very likely Sally was dead before that time. Mr. and Mrs. Bulkeley left an unfortunate son named Frank, who was a well-known character for years in all this region. Frank was harmless and used to go upon the run-his main pursuit being pushing over decayed "stubs " in the woods. He sometimes varied the exercises, though, and was once discovered setting adrift a Bible on a board in the Winooski. Inquired of as to what he was doing, he explained : "'Spect, s'pose, pretty likely, sendin' the word o' God, t' the heathen down to Burling- ton, on a shingle."

JAMES FISK, of Barre, came into that town about 1796, according to some accounts, but probably not till 1798. He was not then a lawyer, and Cyrus Ware and Samuel Prentiss were in Montpelier before Fisk was admitted to the bar. Mr. Fisk was born in Greenwich, Mass., October 4, 1763. He served in the Revolution three years, married Priscilla West, who died August 19, 1840, served a term in the Massachusetts legislature, and soon began to preach as a Universalist minister. He moved to Barre, probably in 1798, and began clearing a farm, preaching occasionally. He was, in 1802, elected assistant judge of Orange County Court, and admitted to the bar of that county June 21, 1803. He represented Barre several years, be- ginning in 1800, and was a member of Congress from March 4, 1805, to March 4, 1809, and again from March 4, 181I, to March 4, 1815. He was chief judge of Orange County Court in 1809, and again represented that town in 1809, 1810, and 1815. He was nominated by President Madison in 1812 as judge of Indiana Territory, and was confirmed, but declined to serve. In 1.815 and 1816 he was a judge of the Supreme Court, and in 1817 and 1818 was United States Senator, but resigned to accept the collectorship of Vermont, which he held from 1818 to 1826. He was a personal friend of President Monroe, and delivered an address of welcome to him at Montpe- lier, July 24, 1817. In January, 1819, he moved from Barre to Swanton, where he lived till his death, November 17, 1844.

He is said to have been kind and genial, and not to have sought the posi- tions of trust which he held. Thompson describes him as " small sized, keen- eyed, ready-witted, and really talented," when he saw him at the Montpe- lier meeting of February, 1812, to attend which Mr. Fisk had come from Washington "to act as the champion speaker of the Democrats."

CYRUS WARE, of Montpelier, was the second lawyer to settle in the county, for though Mr. Fisk had moved in a year or more before him it was as a farmer and preacher that he came. Mr. Ware was born in Wrentham, Mass., May 8, 1769. His father died when Cyrus was three years old, and when he was fourteen he came to Hartford, Vt., and learned blacksmithing. After he was twenty-one he studied law with Charles Marsh, of Woodstock, and Jacob

WASHINGTON COUNTY.

Smith, of Royalton, was admitted in 1799 to the Windsor County bar, and ·came at once to Montpelier. He represented the town from 1805 to 1809, and it was through his influence and that of David Wing, Jr., then secretary of state, that the act of 1805, making Montpelier the state capital, was passed. He was chief judge of Caledonia county from December 1, 1808, to Decem- ber 1, 1811. He was a man of good ability, and might have risen to higher places had it not been for his social disposition and the customs of the time. He was in his later life the trial justice of the town, and it was he who held Morricey, in 1836, for trial for the murder of Corrigan. Thompson says he was a philosopher and the most perfectly original character of Montpelier in thought, words, and ways, and that his shrewd observations, and quaint and witty sayings, were more quoted than those of any other man in this sec- tion. He denied that he was poor, for he put a round valuation on his chil- dren and thanked Heaven he had them on hand. He died February 17, 1849. He married Patty Wheeler, of Barre, May 26, 1803, and of their six ·children Mary, the youngest, is now living in Montpelier, the wife of Joel Foster.

SAMUEL PRENTISS, of Montpelier, when he came to Montpelier, and for many years after, was Samuel Prentiss, Jr., his father, Dr. Samuel Prentiss, being in the practice of medicine in Northfield, Mass. Young Samuel was born in Stonington, Conn., March 31, 1782 ; the next year his father went to Worcester, Mass., and about 1786 to Northfield, Mass., where Samuel went to school, and where he studied the classics with Rev. Samuel C. Allen. At nineteen he entered the law office of Samuel Vose, and soon left there and went into the office of John W. Blake, of Brattleboro, and was, in December, 1802, admitted to Windham County bar.

He came to Montpelier and opened an office in May, 1803. He married Lucretia Houghton, daughter of Edward Houghton, of Northfield, Mass., October 3, 1804. She was born March 6, 1786, and died June 15, 1855, nineteen months before her husband, who died January 15, 1857.

They had twelve children, of whom two died in infancy (Augustus, their tenth child, born February 16, 1822, and died May 19, 1822 ; and Lucretia, their eleventh child, born June 13, 1823, and died July 23, 1823). Of the ten sons who 'reached manhood, nine were lawyers. The remaining son (their third child, Edward Houghton, born December 28, 1808) was a drug- gist, but May 21, 1842, was appointed clerk of the District Court for Ver- mont, and held the position till September 20, 1859. Edward H. married Laura H. Doane, April 10, 1831. He moved to Brooklyn, N. Y., in 1866. ·Of the seven children of Edward H., two, Charles C. and Samuel F. (who will be remembered by the members of the 2d Vermont Brigade as an aide on the staffs of Gens. Stoughton and Stannard), are now law partners in New York city.

As several of the nine sons of Judge Prentiss, who became lawyers, were inot admitted in Washington county, I have thought best to give notices of

61.

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this " Montpelier nine " here, and not in the order of their admission. More full accounts of them will be found in Binney's Genealogy of the Prentiss Family, and of Charles W., John H., and Henry F. in Baldwin's Orleans County Bar. The children of Judge Samuel Prentiss and Lucretia Hough- ton Prentiss were :-

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Gazetteer of Washington County, Vt., 1783-1889, Part 7

Author: Child, Hamilton, 1836-, comp; Adams, William, fl. 1893, ed Publication date: 1889 Publisher: Syracuse, N. Y., The Syracuse journal company, printers Number of Pages: 898

Author: Child, Hamilton, 1836-, comp; Adams, William, fl. 1893, ed
Publication date: 1889
Publisher: Syracuse, N. Y., The Syracuse journal company, printers
Number of Pages: 898