Men of Vermont : an illustrated biographical history of Vermonters and sons of Vermont, Part 32

Author: Ullery, Jacob G., comp; Davenport, Charles H; Huse, Hiram Augustus, 1843-1902; Fuller, Levi Knight, 1841-1896
Publication date: 1894
Publisher: Brattleboro, Vt. : Transcript Pub. Co.
Number of Pages: 842

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OLCOTT, SIMEON .- At the October session, 1781, Bezaleel Woodward, represen- tative from Dresden, and a professor in Dartmouth College, was chosen a judge of the Superior Court. Prof. Woodward de- clined the office and Simeon Olcott of Charlestown (a New Hampshire town then in Union with Vermont and situate in the short-lived county above referred to) was elected in his place. Judge Olcott was the first lawyer to be elected to the bench by the Vermont Legislature, but he never held court, so that Nathaniel Chipman stands as the first Vermont lawyer elected judge who took judicial service upon himself. Mr. Roberts puts Olcott in the list of judges : while Judge Taft leaves him out because he didn't 'tend court. Whether it was a mere freak that kept Olcott away from sitting with Payne and Spooner when they were at Charlestown in December, or whether he had some constitutional scruple about main- taining that court of justice in Washington county, is not known. At any rate Olcott resigned Jan. 28, 1782, and Feb. 13, 1782, the Assembly elected Gen. Samuel Fletcher of Townsend, who declined, and, Feb. 16, John Throop, who had been judge till left off the October before, was elected, and served.

Simeon Olcott was born in Bolton, Conn., Oct. 1, 1735, graduated at Yale in 1761. studied law, moved to Charlestown, N. H., in 1764, was admitted as an attorney in Cumberland county, Sept. 15, 1774, and was

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In 17844 appointed chief justice of the court of common pleas in New Hampshire. In 1790 he was appointed a judge of the New Hampshire Superior Court of which he was made chief justice in 1795. On the resig- nation of Sammuel Livermore he was made a United States Senator from New Hampshire and served as such from Dec. 7, 1801, to March 3, 1805. He died in Charlestown, N. II., Feb. 22, 1815. He married, Octo- ber, 1783, Tryphena Terry and has descend- ants now living in Charlestown. He is said to have been the first lawyer to settle in Western New Hampshire.

FAY, JONAS .- Dr. Jonas Fay, of Ben- nington, was a judge of the Superior Court the last year of its existence and of the Supreme Court its first year. His two years of service were from 1781 to 1783. [See sketch in the " Fathers," ante page 50.]

OLCOTT, PETER .- Col. Peter Olcott of Norwich was the first person elected a judge of the Supreme Court who had not already served as a judge of the Superior Court. The Supreme Court was established the session of his election thereto, October, 1782. The Superior Court consisted of five judges during the four years it existed ; the Supreme Court had five to begin with, the number was decreased to three in 1787, in- creased to four in 1824, to five in 1828 and to six in 1846. In 1850 the number was decreased to three and so continued (during the existence of the Circuit Court of four judges) till 1857 when the number was restored to six at which it remained till in- creased to seven, its present number, in 1870.

Colonel Olcott served three years as a judge of the Supreme Court, his service ending in 1785. He is said to have been a graduate of Harvard College ; he married Sarah Mills and moved from Bolton, Conn., (where Judge Simeon Olcott was born) to Norwich about 1768. He was a member of the Windsor convention, June, 1777, and also of the convention of July and Decem- ber, 1777, which adopted the constitution. In 1777 he commanded a regiment in Glou- cester county and was summoned to march to Bennington too late to reach it before the battle, but was employed in other military service. He was elected to the council in 1779, and elected again in 1781 ; he served till 1790 as a councilor. He was Lieuten- ant-Governor four years -- 1 790 to 1794-and in the latter year declined to be longer a candidate for that office. His son Roswell graduated at Dartmouth in 1789 and his son Mills in 1790. Rufus Choate married Helen, a daughter of Mills Olcott. Judge

Olcott died at Hanover, where his son Mills resided, in September, 1808.

PORTER, THOMAS. - Thomas Porter was born in Farmington, Conn., in 1734, served in the British army at Lake George in 1755, held local offices in Farmington, married Abigail Howe, moved to Cornwall, C'onn., where he was prominent in town af- fairs and from that town he went into the Revolutionary army. He was many years a member of the Connecticut Legislature. In 1779 he moved to Tinmouth from which town he was elected as representative to the Assem- bly in 1780, 1781 and 1782, in each of which years he was elected speaker of the House. In 1782 he was also elected to the council and resigned as speaker to take the new po- sition. He served till 1795 as a councilor. Judge Porter was a farmer.

He was elected a judge of the Supreme Court in 1783 and served till 1786. Judge Porter died in Granville, N. Y., in 1833. His son, Ebenezer Porter ( Dartmouth, 1792), was a famous Doctor of Divinity and was presi- dent of Andover Theological Seminary.

NILES, NATHANIEL .- Nathaniel Niles, of Fairlee (that part which is now West Fairlee), teacher, student of law and medicine, preach- er, inventor and poet, was judge of the Su- preme Court from 1784 to 1788. [See sketch in "Representatives," ante page 127.]

CHIPMAN, NATHANIEL .- Nathaniel Chipman of Tinmouth, the first lawyer to serve as a Vermont judge, was elected an assistant judge of the Supreme Court in 1786, and served one year ; in 1789 he was elected chief judge, and served till he was appointed U. S. District Judge for Vermont in 1791. In 1796 he was again elected chief judge, and served one year, and in 1813 and 1814 was for the last times elected chief judge, serving two years in this, his third period of service as chief judge. Judge Chipman was the first to report decisions of the Supreme Court. Judge Samuel Prentiss said that the various traits of his mind and constitutional temperament, combined with his deep and extensive learning, entitled him to rank among the first judges of this or any other country. Judge Prentiss further said : "I witnessed, during the short period he was last on the bench, exhibitions of the great strength, vigor, comprehension, and clear- ness of his mind, of his profound and accur- ate knowledge of legal principles, and of his remarkably discriminating and well-balanced judgment." Judge Chipman was a student of the law, and eminently just-minded. He was a Federalist, and thought our system of electing judges a bad one-advocating an appointive system with long tenure. The

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proof of the pudding is in the eating, and if in any state as small as ours there can be found a court that has maintained a higher standing for a hundred years than that which we have had under our system then we had better give it up-and not till then. [See Mr. Davenport's sketch of Judge Chipman in the "Senators," ante page 108.]

KNOWLTON, LUKE .- Luke Knowlton of Newfane was elected a judge of the Su- preme Court in 1786 and served one year, being dropped with Nathaniel Chipman in 1787 when the court was reduced from five to three members. [See sketch in the "Fathers," ante page 59.]

BRADLEY, STEPHEN R .- Stephen Row Bradley of Westminster was elected a judge in 1788 and served one year. [See Mr. Dav- enport's sketch of him in the "Senators" and of his still more brilliant son, William C. Bradley in the "Representatives."] Judge Bradley was three times married, by the first and second of which marriages he had chil- dren. His first wife was Merab Atwater ; his second, Thankful Taylor ; and his third, Belinda Willard. Spooner's Vermont Jour- nal of Jan. 19, 1802, has the following notice :

"Died at Westminster, in this state, on Sunday the roth instant, of a lingering ill- ness, Mrs. Thankfull Bradley, consort of the Hon. Stephen R. Bradley, in the thirty-fourth year of her age. To those who have ex- perienced her tenderness and affection as a daughter, sister, wife and mother, her loss is irreparable. To the society which she adorned as a friend and neighbor, her virtues will long be remembered, and the loss regretted with tears.

"Her funeral was attended by a very large and respectable assembly on the Wednesday following, when a very pathetic discourse was delivered by the Rev. Mr. Barber from the words of the Apostle : 'For we know, that if our earthly house of this tabernacle were dissolved, we have a building of God, an house not made with hands, eternal in the heavens.' "

This excellent step-mother is as worthy of remembrance as any just judge on the face of God's earth, for her love wrought a per- fect work and that is all justice can hope to do. Judge Wheeler in his paper on Will- iam C. Bradley, read before the Vermont Bar Association in 1883, said :

" At an early age he encountered what is perhaps the greatest earthly loss of a boy, the death of a worthy mother. Her place was not long after taken by a step-mother, who soon became his fast friend and whose kindness and care he dutifully and affection- ately repaid. Full of both physical and in-

tellectual life and vigor, he needed at times to break forth in somewhat wayward pranks. His father was stern and imperious with him. She with kindness and good judgment miti- gated the severity of the law. At one time when he was going from home alone under his father's displeasure, she followed him a little way and gave him a little case of needles and thread, called a housewife, which she had made for him, in the pocket of which was a guinea, and spoke some kind words of encouragement to him. His father soon relented and got him back. He re- membered the kindness and forgot the strictness. He always cherished this keep- sake and would never have the guinea taken out. In his last sickness he had it brought to him and held so he could see that the guinea was still there, and it was handed down under his will to a favorite grand- daughter." [See sketches, ante pages 104 and 136.]

SMITH, NOAH .- Noah Smith of Benning- ton was a judge of the Supreme Court from 1789 to 1791, and again from 1798 to 1801. He was born in Suffield, Conn., in 1755, graduated at Yale in 1778, and at once came to Bennington, where he that summer deliv- ered the address at the first anniversary of the battle of Bennington. He was admitted to the bar May 26, 1779, and went right to work as may be seen ante in sketch of John Shepardson. He was for some years state's attorney and county clerk of Bennington county, and was appointed U. S. Collector of Internal Revenue in 1791. In 1798 he was elected a councilor, but resigned to accept the judgeship. He moved from Ben- nington to Milton soon after 1800. He married Chloe Burrall ; she died in Burling- ton in ISI0, where he was then confined in jail for debt. In 181 1 the Legislature passed an act for his relief which freed him from jail. He died in Milton, Dec. 23, 1812.

His son Albert became a doctor of divin- ity, as did his son Henry, who married Abby, daughter of President Joshua Bates of Mid- dlebury College. Henry became president of Marietta College, Ohio, and died while a professor and the head of Lane Theological Seminary, Cincinnati. Prof. Henry Preserved Smith of that seminary and the present day, who is with Dr. Briggs in ecclesiastical con- troversy with certain strict constructionists in theology, by name and locality ought to be a grandson of the judge, but there is an- other family of Smiths and I do not know the professor's pedigree.

Judge Smith came near being elected sen- ator instead of Mr. Bradley in January, 1791, and resigned Jan. 24 of that year, perhaps with the intent to contest the senatorial election but he did not do it.

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KNIGHT, SAMUEL .- Samuel Knight of Brattleboro was elected a judge of the Supreme Court in 1789 and chief judge in 1791 and served until 17944, making five years service in all. He was born about 1730 and died at his home on his farm between Brattleboro and West Brattleboro in 1804. He was ad- mitted to the bar in 1772 and was on the York side in the Westminster trouble of March, 1775. He fled across the river and did not return to Brattleboro for a year. He finally made up his mind that the York cause was hopeless and overcame by his character the prejudice that existed against him be- cause of his early adherence to the authority of New York. He represented Brattleboro in 1781, 1783, 1784 and 1785, and was chief judge of Windham county court in 1786, 1794, 1795 and 1801.

PAINE, ELIJAH .- Elijah Paine of Will- iamstown was judge of the Supreme Court from Jan. 27, 1791, ( in place of Noah Smith, resigned), till he was elected United States Senator in 1794. [See sketch in the "Senators," ante page 107.]

TICHENOR, ISAAC .- Isaac 'Tichenor was judge from 1791 to 1794 and chief judge from 1794 to 1796. [See sketch in the " Governors," ante page 72.]

HALL, LOT .- Lot Hall, of Westminster, was judge from 1794 to 1801. He was born on Cape Cod, and was in the early years of the Revolution a sailor. Engaged in a naval expedition to protect South Carolina, he was taken prisoner while acting as lieutenant in charge of a prize and carried to Glasgow, Scotland, where he was released. On his way home he was again captured, but Patrick Henry procured his release. His marriage to Mary Homer, of Boston, in 1786, was as romantic as his experiences in war ; she was but fifteen. Mary was not, however, the woman to whom the Chicago Tribune refers when it says that in Boston Sunday schools each class recites in concert, when asked what became of Lot's wife, "She was trans- muted into chloride of sodium."

He began the study of law at Barnstable in 1782, came that year to Bennington, and the next year settled in Westminster, which he represented in 1788, 1791, 1792 and 1808. He was a presidential elector in 1792, and a member of the Council of Cen- sors in 1799.

Judge Hall was taken sick while attending the Legislature in 1808, and died May 17, 1809.

WOODBRIDGE, ENOCH .- Enoch Woodbridge of Vergennes was a judge of the Supreme Court 1794 to 1798, and chief judge

1798 to 1801. He was born in Stockbridge, Mass., December, 1750, and graduated at Vale in 1774. In the Revolution he was in the Continental service as commissary of issues, and was at Hubbardton, Bennington, and Burgoyne's surrender. He studied law, and on first coming to Vermont began prac- tice in Manchester, from which place he went to Vergennes, of which city he was in 1794 elected the first mayor. He represented Ver- gennes from 1791 to his elevation to the bench, and again in 1802. In 1793 Mr. Woodbridge was a member of the Consti- tutional Convention. He died in May, 1805. Judge Woodbridge was descended from Gov. Thomas Dudley, and was a great-grandson of Rev. John Eliot, the apostle to the In- dians. He married, in 1774, Nancy Win- chell, and they had eight children ; one of whom, Enoch D., married Cora Strong, a daughter of Gen. Samuel Strong, and was the father of Frederick E. Woodbridge.

SMITH, ISRAEL .- Israel Smith of Rut- land was elected chief judge in 1897, and served one year. In 1801 he was again elected, but declined to serve. [See sketch in "Governors," ante page 73.]

ROBINSON, JONATHAN .- Jonathan Robinson of Bennington was chief judge from 1801 to 1807. [See sketch in the "Fathers," ante page 57, and also the follow- ing notes on Judge Tyler.]

TYLER, ROYALL .- Royall Tyler, was born in Boston, Mass., July 18, 1757. His father, Royall Tyler, was a man of distinction and died in 1771. B. H. Hall says that the son was named William Clark Tyler and that on the death of his father this was by legislative enactment changed to Royall. He gradua- ted at Harvard in 1776, went into the army and served on the staff of General Lincoln ; studied law with Francis Dana at Cambridge, was admitted to the bar in 1779, went to Falmouth (now Portland), Me., and practiced there two years, returned to Boston, and set- tled in Braintree, Mass., intending to make it his home. When Shay's Rebellion came he again served under General Lincoln, and was sent by Governor Bowdoin to negotiate with New York and Vermont concerning the sur- render of the rebels who had fled.

About this time he wrote the "Contrast," the first American play ever staged. This comedy was played at the old John Street Theatre in New York, April 16, 1786. Wig- nell, the actor for whom it was written, pub- lished it and Dr. Conland of Brattleboro can tell what year, for he has a copy. The state- ment here about the play differs from what is stated in Hemenway's Gazetteer, Vol. 5, from the pen of Thomas Pickman Tyler, son

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of Royall, who gives the place of production as the old Park Theatre and the spring of 1789 as the time. The editor of the Gazet- teer gave only extracts from T. P. Tyler's memoirs of Judge Tyler and they are just enough to make one hungry for the rest. Judge Tyler wrote many other plays and books.

ROYALL TYLER.

Judge Tyler moved to Guilford, Vt., in January, 1791, and soon had a good law practice. He married Mary Palmer and they had eleven children. In 1801 he was elected a judge of the Supreme Court and in 1807 was promoted to chief judge. He left the bench in 1812 after eleven years continuous service. Tyler's reports are from his pen. From 1815 to 182 1 he was register of probate for Windham county and con- tinued the practice of law to about 1820. He was afflicted with cancer in his later years and died August 16, 1826.

In the memoirs above referred to are many letters to and from Judge Tyler that light up the past. Jonathan Robinson, long on the bench with him and then a Senator, writes to him from Washington, Feb. 4, 1810: "When we come to be judged for our judgments, my friend, the question will not be whether we pursued legal forms or technical niceties, but have you heard the cry of the poor and relieved them from their oppression. But I hope that the philan- thropy of Bro. Fay and yourself will prevent all unpleasant results because he does not carry the Hopkinsian doctrine to that lofty

pinnacle of revelation and philosophy to which you so ardently and rationally aspire. In one thing I fear, he will never be able to arrive to equal resignation, which you once expressed, even willingness to see Bro. Rob- inson damned. However, good men of all faiths will, I hope, be accepted if their hearts are but right." Senator Robinson's reference may be better understood if it be stated (Robinson being of the Calvinistic and Hopkinsian school) that he and Tyler had debated the alleged need, as evidence of regeneration, that one should be willing to be lost eternally if it were for the glory of God, and Tyler on being detained from court on one occasion wrote Judge Jacob and requested him to inform the chief judge (then Judge Robinson) "that he really be- gan to hope that he had made some little spiritual progress, for, although he could not honestly say that he was willing to be damned himself, even if it were needful for the glory of the Almighty, yet he believed that by great effort he had nearly or quite attained to a sincere willingness that in such an exi- gency Bro. Robinson should be damned."

Robinson writes Tyler from Washington, June 17, 1812 : "All is anxiety. It is four o'clock and the Senate has not yet taken the question [on a war measure]. I want a pipe, and I want my dinner, but I cannot start, tack or sheet, until I see, as Bro. Her- rington says, 'the last dog hung.' Recollect me to Mrs. Tyler, the boys and girls and to Miss Sophia. Keep this letter to yourself. I cannot continue while Gorman is murder- ing language in an endless speech, which sounds more discordant to my ears than the thundering cannon did thirty-seven years ago this day, when I heard more than two hundred of them in my cornfield in Benning- ton." The thundering cannon were those of Bunker Hill.

In another letter from Washington Robin- son expresses his impatience at delays in Congress, and on the outside of the letter describes his idea of the scene of its recep- tion by their Honors, the Judges of the Supreme Court of Vermont, in these words : " Bro. Tyler filled his pipe and said, 'Come, Brethren, let us see what Bro. Robinson has to say.' Reads. Bro. Fay spits and says, ' Bro. Robinson is as cross as the devil.' ' Well,' says Bro. Herrington, 'I feel easy about it, it is a pack for their backs, not mine.' Bro. Tyler smiled, and filled his second pipe."

Judge Tyler, was honored and loved by all. Judge Royall Tyler of Brattleboro, now in his eighty-second year, is his son. That fact, though neither the relationship nor the name is pat, somehow calls to mind this :

" Jerry !

I say, my boy, you'll go it yet You're like your uncle, very."

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JACOB, STEPHEN. - Stephen Jacob of Windsor was born in Sheffield, Mass., grad- uated at Yale in 1778, came to Bennington, Vt., that year, and read a poem at the first celebration of the Battle of Bennington, August 16, 1778; married Pamela Farrand in 1779, and came to Windsor in 1780. Hc had, before admission to the bar, studied law with Theodore Sedgwick of Massachu. setts. In 1781 he was a representative from Windsor, and again in 1788 and 1794, and was clerk of the House in 1788 and 1789. Ile was a member of the able council of censors of 1785, delegate in the constitu- tional convention of 1793, chief judge of Windsor county court 1797 to 1801, and a councillor from 1796 to 1802. Mr. Jacob was brave and energetic in quelling the Windsor county insurrection in 1786, and in 1789 was a commissioner in settling the controversy with New York.

He was elected a judge of the Supreme Court in 1801 and served two years. Judge Jacob was a high-strung Federalist, aristo- cratic in bearing and mode of life and bought several slaves and brought them into Vermont, where, of course, they could serve him or not as they chose. He bought one Dinah, a negro woman of thirty, July 26, 1783, for forty pounds, but Dinah emanci- pated herself, fell into want, and the select- men of Windsor sued Judge Jacob for her support. His views on the slavery question were very different from those of his suc- cessor next noticed herein. Judge Jacob died Jan. 27, 1817.

HERRINTON, THEOPHILUS. - Theo- philus Herrinton of Clarendon, called by others in his own day Harrington, Herring- ton, or Herrinton, but who himself wrote his name as here given, was born in Rhode Island, married Betsey Buck, came to Ver- mont in 1785 and became a farmer in Clar- endon. Betsey and he were not out, and in 1797 there were living eleven of their twelve children. In their school district that year were eight families to whom had been born 113 children, 99 of whom were then living, and none of the husbands in these families had a second wife.

Judge Harrington, to use the name by which he is known in history, represented Clarendon in 1795, and from 1798 to 1803 inclusive, being speaker the last-named year. He was chief judge of Rutland county court, 1800 to 1803, and in 1803 was elected a judge of the Supreme Court, where he served ten years.

He was no observer of conventionalities, if he knew them, and it has been said that he sometimes went into court barefooted. His business was that of a farmer, and he was not admitted to the bar till after his election as a Supreme Court judge. Many

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stories are told of him-how that he said he didn't know as the court knows what a demurrer is, but it knows what justice is, and the plaintiff shall have judgment ; how, while the other judges doubted whether the horse thief who stole in Canada and was guilty of asportation in this state, could be here convicted, Harrington insisted that he not only stole it in Canada, but every step of the way he took with it, and so stole it all the way through Vermont ; and how he cut the knot about the seal by his " hand me a wafer."

His strong good sense and just mind gave him the respect of the people and of his as- sociates on the bench, and one of his judg- ments ( remember he succeeded Judge Jacob, who bought slaves) deservedly made him famous. It was upon application for a war- rant to be given the claimant, which would give him power to remove his escaped slave. The claimant's lawyer had a bill of sale of the slave and back of that a bill of sale of the slave's mother. " Is that all ? " said the judge. The claimant's lawyer thought going back to the two bills of sale was enough, but Har- rington said, " you do not go back to the orig- inal proprietor." The attorney wanted to know what would be sufficient and was in- formed that nothing in that court would give title to a human being but "a bill of sale from Almighty God."

Judge Harrington died Nov. 27, 1813.

GALUSHA, JONAS .- Jonas Galusha of Shaftsbury was a judge of the Supreme Court two years, 1807 to 1809. [See sketch in "Governors," ante page 74.]

FAY, DAVID .- David Fay of Benning- ton, youngest son of Stephen and brother of Judge Jonas Fay, was born in Hardwick, Mass., Dec. 13, 1761. When sixteen he was a fifer in Capt. Samuel Robinson's com- pany at the Battle of Bennington. He was admitted to the bar in 1794, member of the council of censors in 1799, state's attorney of Bennington county, 1797 to 1801, and United States attorney throughout Jeffer- son's administration.

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Men of Vermont : an illustrated biographical history of Vermonters and sons of Vermont, Part 32

Author: Ullery, Jacob G., comp; Davenport, Charles H; Huse, Hiram Augustus, 1843-1902; Fuller, Levi Knight, 1841-1896 Publication date: 1894 Publisher: Brattleboro, Vt. : Transcript Pub. Co. Number of Pages: 842

Author: Ullery, Jacob G., comp; Davenport, Charles H; Huse, Hiram Augustus, 1843-1902; Fuller, Levi Knight, 1841-1896
Publication date: 1894
Publisher: Brattleboro, Vt. : Transcript Pub. Co.
Number of Pages: 842