HISTORY OF VERMONT Walter H. Crockett WALTER HILL CROCKETT 
Bom in Colchester, Vt., June 26, 1870. He was edu- 
cated in the public schools of Colchester and Milton 
and at Mount Hermon School, Mount Hermon, Mass. 
He was assistant night editor of the Burlington Free 
Press, 1895-1901; telegraph editor of the St. Albans 
Messenger, 1901-1909; managing editor of the Mont- 
pelier Journal, 1909-1912. Since 1913 he has been 
Director of the State Publicity Bureau, a department 
in the Secretary of State’s office, giving his entire time 
to the work until 1915, when he removed to Burlington 
to become editor of the University of Vermont publi- 
cations, giving part of his time to the State Publicity 
work. He is also a lecturer in journalism in the Uni- 
versity. Mr. Crockett has written numerous books and 
pamphlets for the State, historical articles for maga- 
zines and is author of “A History of Lake Champlain,” 
“Vermont, Its Resources and Opportunities,” “George 
Franklin Edmunds” and “Vermont, the Green Moun- 
tain State,” this volume being the fifth of the series. 
He was a member of the Lake Champlain Tercentenary 
Commission; Official Reporter of the House of Repre- 
sentatives, 1913 and 1915; Presidential Elector, 1912; 
Alderman of the City of Burlington since 1921. He has 
been secretary of the Vermont Society, Sons of the 
American Revolution, since 1903. In 1902 he married 
Kate M. Chamberlain of Swanton, Vt. Their children 
are Arthur C. (deceased), Eleanor A., Charles N. and 
Elizabeth. VERMONT 
The Green Mountain State 
BY 
Walter Hill Crockett 
AUTHOR OF 
Vermont—Its Resources and Opportunities 
History of Lake Champlain 
George Franklin Edmunds 
Volume Five 
The Century History Company, Inc. 
New York 
1923 Copyright 1923 
by The Century History Company 
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED 
Publication Office 
156 Fifth Avenue, New York 
U. S. A. CONTENTS 
THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR I>AGE* 
By Judge Frank L. Fish 1-473 
Introduction 1-5 
The State Courts 6-28 
The Federal Judges 29-46 
Judges, Supreme and Other State Courts 47-179 
Judges, Supreme Court 180-191 
Judges, Circuit Court 191-192 
The Bar by Counties 193-473 
RELIGIOUS DENOMINATIONS 474-517 
The Congregational Church, 
By Rev. C. H. Merrill, D. D 474-482 
The Episcopal Church, 
By Rev. George Y. Bliss, D. D., Bishop Coadjutor of Vermont.483-490 
The Catholic Church, 
By Rev. C. C. Delany, D. D 491-505 
The Baptist Church 506-508 
The Methodist Episcopal Church 509-511 
The Unitarian Church 512 
The Universalist Church, 
By Rev. George F. Fortier 513-515 
Other Denominations 516-517 
EDUCATION 518-537 
The University of Vermont 521-527 
Middlebury College, 
By Prof. Frank W. Cady 527-531 
Norwich University, 
By Prof. A. W. Peach 531-536 
St. Michael’s College and High School 536-537 
VERMONT AUTHORS 538-553 
Vermont Poets 545-549 
Vermont Novelists 550-553 
SOME VERMONT NEWSPAPERS AND EDITORS 554-565 
VERMONT ARTISTS 566-569 
VERMONT ARCHITECTS 570-571 
VERMONT SCULPTORS 572-573 
VERMONT LIBRARIES, 
By Rebecca W. Wright 574-576 
TRANSPORTATION 577-587 
VERMONT BANKS 588-589 
INSURANCE IN VERMONT 590-592 
VERMONT INDUSTRIES 593-597 
VERMONT AGRICULTURE 598-602 
HISTORY OF THE MEDICAL PROFESSION IN VERMONT 
By Dr. Charles S. Caverly and Revised by Dr. Henry C. Tinkham.603-638 
Diseases of Vermont 603-609 
Vermont Medical Societies 609-613 
Medical Education 613-622 
Public Health 622-630 
Hospitals 630-638 ILLUSTRATIONS 
Walter H. Crockett Frontispiece 
Judges Supreme Court Facing page 1 
Judges Superior Court, 1915 “ “ 6 
Edward J. Phelps “ “ 13 
John W. Rowell “ “ 22 
B. F. Fifield “ “ 31 
C. A. Prouty “ “ 40 
James M. Tyler “ “ 50 
Aldace F. Walker “ “ 59 
Hiland Hall “ “ 65 
Clark C. Fitts “ “ 72 
Alexander Dunnett “ “ 78 
John Young “ “ 85 
F. B. Jennings “ “ 91 
John W. Simpson “ “ 98 
W. B. C. Stickney “ “ 104 
John G. Sargent » “ “ 111 
Marvelle C. Webber “ “ 119 
B. B. Smalley “ “ 124 
J. K. Batchelder “ “ 132 
Richard A. Hoar “ “ 139 
Max L. Powell “ “ 145 
John W. Gordon “ “ 152 
John N. Harvey “ “ 158 
M. P. Maurice “ “ 165 
Frank E. Barber “ “ 171 
Collins M. Graves “ “ 178 
R. W. McCuen “ “ 184 
H. F. Wolcott “ “ 191 
C. C. Jamieson “ “ 197 
H. B. Thayer “ “ 204 
Parthenia Robinson “ “ 210 
Theodore N. Vail “ “ 217 
Eugene N. Foss “ “ 223 
George W. Brown “ “ 230 
George H. Bickford “ “ 236 
J. M. Boutwell “ “ 243 
H. J. M. Jones “ “ 249 
F. H. Babbitt “ “ 256 
N. G. Williams “ “ 262 
George O. Gridley “ “ 269 
Henry T. Cushman “ “ 275 
Frank H. Brooks “ “ 282 
F. G. Butterfield “ “ 288 
A. B. Chandler “ “ 295 
James A. Whitcomb “ “ 301 
James F. Dewey “ “ 308 
Harry E. Bradford “ “ 314 
F. D. Abernethy “ “ 321 
George L. Dunham “ “ 328 
George H. Morse “ “ 335 
W. A. Crombie “ “ 341 
E. W. Bailey “ “ 348 HISTORY OF VERMONT 
Sylvester Cushman Facing page 354 
W. R. Warner “ “ 361 
Hosea Faxon Ballou “ “ 367 
John M. Thomas “ “ 374 
Julia C. R. Dorr “ “ 380 
John G. Saxe “ “ 387 
Horace W. Bailey “ “ 393 
Larkin G. Mead “ “ 400 
W. Rutherford Mead “ “ 406 
C. P. Smith “ “ 413 
J. J. Flynn “ “ 419 
Allen Wardner “ “ 426 
H. C. Copeland “ “ 433 
A. G. Farr “ “ 439 
H. P. McClary “ “ 446 
F. S. Billings “ “ 452 
J. E. Weeks “ “ 459 
J. A. DeBoer “ “ 465 
Darwin P. Kingsley “ “ 472 
George O. Stratton “ “ 479 
Earle S. Kinsley “ “ 485 
J. Watson Webb “ “ 492 
W. W. Nichols “ “ 498 
E. S. Brigham “ “ 505 
H. M. Farnham “ “ 511 
H. A. Willard “ “ 518 
Franklin Orvis “ “ 526 
George Orvis “ “ 533 
Equinox Hotel “ “ 542 
A. B. Wilder “ “ 551 
Woodstock Inn “ “ 560 
Charles S. Caverly “ “ 566 
H. C. Tinkham “ “ 572 
Henry D. Holton “ “ 578 
J. H. Woodward “ “ 584 
Theodore Woodward “ “ 590 
Adrian T. Woodward “ “ 596 
Fred T. Kidder “ “ 602 
W. N. Bryant “ “ 608 
W. S. Webb “ “ 614 
C. B. Porter “ “ 620 
J. N. Jenne “ “ 626 
D. D. Grout “ “ 631 
S. E. Lawton “ “ 637 Judges, Supreme Court Chief Justice John H. Watson 
Justice George M. Powers Justice William H. laylor 
Justice Willard W. Miles Justice lighten P. Slack 
t THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
BY 
Frank L. Fish, Superior Judge DEDICATED TO THE 
SUPREME COURT OF VERMONT INTRODUCTION 
THE Vermont lawyer has been a potent factor in our history. It 
is true in the beginning that he did not share in the affairs of 
the State, but that was for the very pertinent reason that he was 
not here to take part. A few lawyers of the crown were here in the 
colonial days and soon after, but these men were not to be trusted 
by the fathers in the founding and building of a commonwealth. So 
it came to pass that the early officers of the State, including the 
Judges, belonged to other callings than the law. Nathaniel Chipman 
was the first Vermont lawyer to be called to the bench and he is 
fourteenth in the list of the Judges, beginning with the first court 
established in 1778 and counting forward. It was many years after- 
ward that the Supreme Court was made up wholly of members of 
the bar. Jonas Galusha was the last layman to be called to the bench. 
His employment was that of an inn-keeper and farmer. He was the 
twenty-eighth Judge to be elected and served from 1807 to 1809. As 
soon as the Vermont courts were organized young lawyers came to 
the State from Massachusetts and Connecticut and in a few years there 
was a bar from which men of talent and integrity could be selected 
for the high offices. These men soon found their way into public 
favor and were called to the discharge of public duty. Some were 
sent to the United States Senate, some to Congress; others became 
Governors and the courts were gradually changed in personnel from 
laymen to lawyers. In the final analysis it appears that the lawyer 
has had his full share of public honors. The history of the State 
from the beginning shows that of the twenty-eight Senators who have 
represented us at Washington twenty-three have been lawyers; of 
the fifty-seven Governors, thirty-one have been lawyers; and of the 
eighty-nine Congressmen, fifty-three have been lawyers. If a tabula- 
tion of the lesser offices were to be made, such as Secretary of State 
and Auditor of Accounts, it would be found also that these offices 
have been held by members of the bar during the greater part of our 
history. 
When I told Mr. Crockett in 1913 that I would write a history 
of the bench and bar of the State for his “Vermont—the Green Moun- 
tain State,” I had very little comprehension of the amount of labor 
that it would involve. I tried from all the New England States to 
obtain works of a corresponding nature, but did not get anything that 
seemed just suited to the work I had undertaken. In this situation I 
adopted the plan of giving an outline of the early and later State 
courts, biographical sketches of the Vermont Federal Judges, and the 
Judges of the Supreme and other State courts, and a brief historical 
review of the organization of each county and a sketch of such lawyers 
of the county as I deemed worthy of mention in a work of this 4 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
kind. The present members of the bar in brief outline are grouped 
with their county history. 
I have tried to preserve the big men of the bar in these sketches, 
but my selection may not accord with the judgment of others who are 
better qualified to speak or who have had better opportunities to know 
the men and their professional work. I may have overdrawn some 
of these men. Others I may have underestimated. It has not always 
been easy to get material and when at hand it has not always given 
the light needed for a discriminate judgment. If it shall be found 
that in most cases my judgment is in accord with those who are best 
qualified to know and speak of the men whom I have portrayed, I 
shall be content. 
All the present members of the bar are sketched briefly. A few 
are given special mention. This is a task that is not without embar- 
rassment. Some who are not drawn except in outline will think that 
they should have had full notice, and there will be those who will 
say that some who have been given full sketches should not have 
been so honored. Here again I have used my best judgment and I 
await the opinion of the bar as to whether I am out of harmony with 
the truth. 
Twice I have sketched the Judges from the organization of the 
State, once briefly by giving the general outline of the life of each, 
and once fully as appears herein. I was not satisfied with the first 
draft. I have drawn from all sources of information that were readily 
available and have endeavored to give a sympathetic sketch of each 
Judge. I am still living with the great and good men who have 
adorned the bench of our State for the past one hundred and forty 
years and more. Many of the Judges were among the greatest men 
in our history and many honored other offices than that of Judge. 
Some made the name of Vermont great in the national Capitol, others 
as Governors of the State; and these men assisted in establishing 
and building up our system of jurisprudence. I have sketched as 
fully as space would permit the deceased Judges and such others as 
have retired from the bench and are now living, but have drawn only 
in outline the present Justices of the Supreme Court and Superior 
Judges. There is enough that I would like to say in praise of all 
the Judges, but I stand too close to them to undertake the task. I do 
not need to add that it would be a delicate one, nor to sav that it would 
not be very useful. A life to be well presented should be viewed in 
retrospect. 
Speaking of the Courts as organizations, I can say, I think with 
the unanimous approval of the bar, that the Supreme Court is made 
up of able, conscientious and high-minded men who strive to admin- 
ister the law in justice, who can be trusted with the important interests 
that are committed to their hands, and relied on to deal fairly, wisely THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
5 
and justly with all questions that are submitted to them; and that 
Superior Judges are dispatching their work in the County Courts with 
minds single only to justice. 
A final word in acknowledgment of the help I have received from 
others: I have used without many changes the excellent article by 
Judge Wheeler on the Early Courts of Vermont, which was published 
in the proceedings of the Vermont Bar Association. He was a con- 
siderable historian and I like the way he states things and I depend 
on him for the truth. Then I have drawn heavily from Judge Taft’s 
articles in the Green Bag, and have obtained much useful data from 
“Men of Vermont” and “Deming’s Vermont Officers and Gazetter.” 
I wish to acknowledge, too, my indebtedness to my late lamented 
friend, Justice Haselton, for his help in going over my manuscript 
and advising me about the sketches, and to my good friend, Judge 
Waterman, for his advice, information and assistance, and to Hale 
K. Darling, for his valuable help in proof reading. 
When the work was undertaken it was understood that it would 
not include more than 60,000 words, but at a later time this space 
was enlarged, and it was found when my manuscript was submitted 
to Mr. Crockett that it contained more than 220,000 words. I cut 
this down to 70,000 words, which was the maximum amount of ma- 
terial that the publishers desired to use in the history. The Bar Asso- 
ciation then took up the matter and through a committee consisting of 
Mr. Sargent, Judge Dutton and Judge Healy arranged with the pub- 
lishers for the publication of my whole work by becoming responsible 
for the expense of all in excess of 70,000 words. 
The work has been a labor of love on my part. I have performed 
it without detracting from my judicial duties, I am sure, and I look 
upon it as a part of my public trust. I hope it may be received with 
favor by the profession and the public, and I trust that I may have 
been the means in it of preserving the names and records of many of 
the great men of the law who would not otherwise have been remem- 
bered, and that the example of their lives may be an incentive to 
others who are looking, or may look, to the noble profession of the 
law for the employment of high talents and the accomplishment of 
distinguished service. 
Dated at Vergennes, the 22nd day of February, 1922. 
Frank L. Fish. THE STATE COURTS 
THE British constitution provides that the King is the original 
proprietor of all the lands in his kingdom and that no man 
doth or can possess any part of them but such as have been 
mediately or immediately derived as a gift from him. 
As this principle extends to lands acquired by conquest, it applied 
to the territory which is now Vermont when it was a part of the 
British possessions. By virtue of this doctrine King Charles the 
Second, June 29, 1674, granted to his brother, the Duke of York, “All 
that part of the main land of New England, beginning at a certain 
place called and known by the name of St. Croix, next adjoining to 
New Scotland in America and from thence extending along the sea 
coast unto a certaine place called Petuaquine or Pemaquid and so 
up the river thereof to the furthest head of the same as it windeth 
northward and extending from the river of Kinebeque and so up- 
wards by the shortest course to the river Canada northwards. And 
all that Island or Islands commonly called by the severall name or 
names of Matowacks or Long Islands scituate and being towards the 
west of Cape Cod and the narrow Higansetts abutting upon the main 
land between the two rivers there called or known by the severall 
names of Connecticutt and Hudson’s River together also with the 
said river called Hudson’s River and all the lands from the west side 
of Connecticutt river to the east side of Delaware Bay. To bee 
holden of us our heirs and successors as of our Manor of East Green- 
wich in the county of Kent in free and common socage.” 
When the Duke of York ascended the throne as King James II 
in 1685, his private title became merged in the rights of the crown. 
In the commission from the King to Governor Benning Wentworth 
of New Hampshire, dated July 3, 1741, the southern boundary of 
New Hampshire was described as the north line of Massachusetts 
Bay, “extending westward till it meets with our other Governments.” 
The colonial government of New York claimed jurisdiction and title 
under the grant to the Duke of York, and that it included by the 
words “from the west side of Connecticut river,” the territory now 
Vermont. The Governor of New Hampshire claimed that the north 
line of Massachusetts did not meet “our other governments” till it 
reached its western extremity, and that his territory extended as far 
west as Massachusetts, and included the same territory that is now 
Vermont. The Governor of New Hampshire proceeded to grant the 
land by townships, commencing with Bennington in the southwest 
corner. Settlements were begun in the towns in that vicinity and he 
appointed Samuel Robinson of Bennington a Justice of the Peace of 
New Hampshire in that territory. These settlements attracted the 
attention of New York which protested against the grants. Both 
sides insisted upon having jurisdiction and an appeal was taken to Judges, Superior Court, 1915 THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
7 
the King in Council, who declared on the 20th day of July, 1764, 
“the western banks of the river Connecticut from where it enters 
the Province of Massachusetts Bay as far north as the 45th degree 
of north latitude to be the boundary line between the said two 
Provinces of New Hampshire and New York.” New Hampshire 
thereupon withdrew from any further exercise of jurisdiction, but 
claimed that its grants were good to pass the title to the land. New 
York claimed that the grants of New Hampshire were wholly void, 
and that the right to re-grant the land remained. This question was 
submitted to the King in Council and he forbade re-grants of the 
land, and directed that the inhabitants “be not molested on account 
of territorial differences or disputed jurisdiction for whatever Province 
the settlers may be found to belong to should make no difference in 
their property.” 
The few inhabitants were scattered along the Connecticut River, 
the Walloomsac and the Battenkill. The territory was within the 
county of Albany, the courts of which were at the city of Albany, 
whither all litigants had to go for legal redress. 
In the same year, 1764, Charles Phelps, a lawyer of learning and 
ability, came from Hadley, Mass., to Marlboro in this State and 
brought with him his law library. He had three sons, one of whom 
was a lawyer and remained at Hadley, and the others, Solomon and 
Timothy, came to Marlboro with him. Solomon was then twenty-one 
years of age and was educated in the law. In 1765 the inhabitants 
on the east side of the mountain petitioned the government of New 
York for a county, representing that it was now six months since 
they became inhabitants of the province and that they had “ever since 
been without law.” The petition was denied, but January 20, 1766, 
twenty-one Justices of the Peace, five of whom were of the quorum, 
were appointed and commissioned for his part of Albany county. 
These Justices met on February 27, at Rockingham, and appointed 
Constables for Westminster, Chester, Springfield, Windsor and New- 
bury. On March 31, 1766, Solomon Phelps was licensed by Henry 
Moore, Governor of New York, to practice as an attorney, as his 
commission ran: “in all His Majesties Courts of Record within the 
county of Cumberland.” This did not, however, entitle him to prac- 
tice in any court without admission for that purpose by the court. 
On July 3, the colonial legislature of New York passed an act to erect 
that part between Connecticut River and the Green Mountains into 
a county by the name of Cumberland, except that land held July 
20, 1764, by grant from New Hampshire was to remain in Albany 
county. This act was disapproved and declared void by the home 
government. On April 7, 1768, that territory was fully incorporated 
into a county by the name of Cumberland, with all the rights belong- 
ing to counties, with a shire at Chester, then called New Flamstead. 8 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
Each county was entitled to a Court of Common Pleas with jurisdic- 
tion of “all matters and things and causes tryable at the common law,” 
and a Court of General Sessions of the Peace holden by two or more 
Justices of the Peace, one of whom should be of the quorum, with 
jurisdiction of all offenses of which Justices of the Peace might law- 
fully inquire. Thomas Chandler of Chester, a large land owner, under 
grants from New York was largely interested and instrumental in 
procuring the establishment of the county and in the location of the 
shire at Chester. He was the most prominent man in the neighbor- 
hood, and had great influence with the New York authorities. He 
was a man of good ability and it was natural that he should be ap- 
pointed Chief Judge of the Court of Common Pleas. Joseph Lord 
of Putney, a man of great purity of character, and Samuel Wells of 
Brattleboro, an upright man, were appointed Judges. Thomas Chandler, 
Jr., a son of the Chief Judge, Samuel Stevens of Springfield, Nathan 
Stone of Windsor and William Willard of Newbury were appointed 
Assistant Judges. John Chandler, another son of the Chief Judge, 
was made Clerk of these courts. In that year another attorney came, 
John Grout, who first located at Windsor and later removed to 
Chester. A rude court house was erected there and sessions of the 
court held; but while some business was done, the proceedings were 
irregular, and no formal record of them was kept. Grout and Charles 
Phelps were the only attorneys practicing there, and the business was 
mostly instituted by Grout and conducted by him so far as one lawyer 
could do it. The law business was deemed to be unduly burdensome 
and oppressive to the people. At the June term, 1770, some of the 
inhabitants of Windsor appeared in court, declared that the court 
was ruled by Grout, and asked that he be forbidden to practice as an 
attorney, because, as they said, he was a bad man. The court an- 
swered that a contrary opinion was entertained of him but that if 
there was anything to be alleged against him it could be laid before 
the grand jury and the clerk would assist in drawing up a bill if found. 
The complaints were so turbulent that the court adjourned. Grout 
was taken by force and carried to Charlestown, N. H., and later to 
Windsor, where he was detained for several days, and an effort made 
to make him agree not to practice law any longer in the county. He 
escaped without making the promise and commenced a suit against 
his accusers for heavy damages, but did not prosecute it beyond the 
original process. It is apparent that he stood well with the court, 
for in a letter to Governor Tryon, dated January 29, 1772, Judge 
Lord wrote of him: “I have to crave your Excellency’s Patience 
& Leave to recommend to your Excellency’s Favour Mr. John Grout 
attorney at Law who hath suffered much by persons Enemical to 
this Government & to him on account of his firm attachment to it 
& Endeavors to maintain good Order & Justice therein. Truth itself SUPERIOR JUDGES OF VERMONT 
AD.1914 THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
9 
Obliges me to say that his Practice as an attorney in this County has 
always entitled him to the good opinion of the Court & the best Gentle- 
men in the County as I apprehend, altho. Riotous persons & parties 
Friends to New Hampshire & enemies to good order have given him 
much trouble which he has born with great magnimity and Strove 
in a Legal and Dispassionate way to overcome. Your Excellency being 
perfectly Humane will Delight in Protecting him.” 
By a New York ordinance, passed March 16, 1770, the territory 
north of Cumberland county was made a county by the name of 
Gloucester; Kingsland, now Washington in the county of Orange, 
was made the shire town, and provision was made for a Court of 
Common Pleas and General Sessions of the Peace. The first meeting 
of this court was held May 29, 1770, with John Taplin, Samuel Sleeper 
and Thornes Sumner as Judges appointed by the Government of 
New York, and James Pennock, Adner Fowler and John Peters as 
Justices of the Quorum, and John Taplin, Jr., as Sheriff. This court 
adjourned without transacting any business, to the last Tuesday of the 
following August, when it again met at Kingsland and appointed four 
Constables, then adjourned to the last Tuesday in November, when 
it again opened. The docket of eight cases was called; they were 
continued or dismissed; four surveyors of the county were appointed 
and a Constable for Thetford; and an adjournment was taken to 
the last Tuesday of the following January. The January session was 
attended by John Taplin, Judge, John Peters of the Quorum, and John 
Taplin, Jr., Sheriff. These officers of the court set out from More- 
town, February 25, 1771, and traveled until night. The snow was 
deep and there were no roads. They made the journey on snow shoes. 
On the following day they advanced further, but before they arrived 
at any human habitation, if indeed one could have been found, which 
is doubtful, they held a council and decided to open court in the 
woods without knowing whether they were in Kingsland or not. All 
cases on the docket were continued until the next term. Court then 
took an adjournment until the last Tuesday in May. The adjourned 
session was duly opened and after the disposition of one case was 
adjourned until the following August. The records of this court 
are in the County Clerk’s office at Chelsea and the reader must under- 
stand that Moretown is now Bradford and not the town which at 
present bears that name. 
In 1772 the shire of Gloucester county was changed to Newbury, 
and some business was transacted, but not in a very orderly manner. 
John Lawrence became clerk in 1774 in place of John Peters, and 
was commissioned an attorney at law January 20, 1775. In the letter 
of Judge Lord, quoted in part heretofore, he stated his age and in- 
firmities to Governor Tryon, which, he continued, disqualified him 
“for the full, free and perfect discharge of the offices of second judge 10 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
of the Inferior court of Common Pleas and Justices of the Peace 
which I have sustained in the county for several years last past, and 
having a desire to retire from public business and spend the remainder 
of my days in a calm retirement therefrom, and concern myself in 
nothing else but doing good to my numerous family and neighbors 
and praying for the KING, your Excellency, and all others, the King’s 
officers, and prepare for a glorious IMMORTALITY, therefore hum- 
bly entreat your Excellency to appoint some other person to said 
offices in my room and stead.” His entreaty was not granted but a 
fourth Judge was appointed and his commission was continued with 
the understanding that he should take “as little share of the burden 
of the office upon himself” as should be agreeable to him. The addi- 
tional Judge was Noah Sabin of Putney. 
In 1771, Crean Brush, a lawyer from New York City, came to 
Westminster. He came originally from Ireland to New York in 
1762, and soon obtained employment in the secretary’s office and 
became assistant to Secretary Goldsbrow Banyar. On January 27, 
1764, he was licensed by Lieut. Gov. Cadwallader Colden to practice 
as an attorney at law “in all his Majesty’s Courts of Record” within 
the province of New York. He affected great display in his dress, 
which was of a military character, made parade wherever he was, 
and his arrival at Westminster attracted much attention. He was a 
great favorite for a time, was feasted from house to house and main- 
tained great influence on account of his official connections and oppor- 
tunities. John Chandler was removed from the office of clerk of 
the county, and February 25, 1772, Brush was appointed in his place. 
Brush was a man of ability and from that time forward the records 
show regularity in the proceedings of the courts. The shire was 
changed from Chester to Westminster. His record commences with 
the last session at Chester, held June 2, 1772, and recites that court 
opened and adjourned to the Meeting House in the township of 
Westminster until the second Tuesday of June instant. At the ses- 
sion held at Chester there were present Thomas Chandler, Esquire, 
and Noah Sabin, Esquire, Judges, and William Willard and Benjamin 
Butterfield, Esquires, Assistant Judges. At the session held at West- 
minster, pursuant to the adjournment at Chester, there were present 
Thomas Chandler, Samuel Wells and Noah Sabin, Esquires, Judges, 
William Willard, Stephen Greenleaf and Benjamin Butterfield, Es- 
quires, Assistant Justices, and Bildad Andros, Israel Curtis, Jadack 
Wright, Samuel Nichols, William Williams, John Bridgman, David 
Toy, John Bolton, and John Winchester Dana, Esquires, Justices. 
His Majesty’s commissions appointing the Judges, Assistant 
Justices, and Justices of the Peace, and Clerk, were read and the 
Sheriff was called upon for returns, and he returned a panel of grand 
jurors which was called, sworn and charged. Licenses for retailing THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
11 
spirituous liquors and keeping tavern were granted from day to day. 
The court records at this term show that John Grout was ad- 
mitted to practice as an attorney of the court, “he having formerly 
taken the oath to well and truly demean himself in the practice of 
an attorney according to the best of his skill and understanding.” 
The grand jury found a true bill against John White for defacing 
a deed and were discharged. One cause was tried by jury, Grout 
representing the plaintiff and “Strong, by consent of the court,” the 
defendant. 
At this session of the court, upon motion of Crean Brush, it 
appearing that no entry had been made of any rules, orders or pro- 
ceedings in any action which had been commenced in that court, it 
was ordered that all actions which had been begun should be com- 
menced de novo, except in those cases where the defendants had 
entered a plea so as to bring the cause in issue, unless the parties 
should agree to release all errors in such actions and enter into an 
agreement signifying the same. 
Solomon Phelps who had practiced as an attorney of this court, 
although not admitted, was found to have been guilty of malpractice 
in very high degree by issuing two writs of capias ad satisfaciendum 
although no judgment could have been previously rendered. It was 
ordered by the court that he make a proper confession and that he 
should not be admitted to practice as an attorney of said court for 
the space of six months, and that he make a private confession to the 
late clerk of said court for his “ungenteel” treatment of him. 
There were forty-three cases at this term and Grout and Brush 
were the only attorneys appearing in any of them. 
At the September term of the same year, Samuel Knight, gentle- 
man, produced in court a license from Governor Tryon, bearing date 
June 23, 1772, empowering him to practice as an attorney at law in 
this court and was admitted. He was the same person who was long 
afterwards a Judge of the County Court for several years and a Judge 
of the Supreme Court from 1789 to 1793. Solomon Phelps on his 
petition was admitted on the same day. At said term there were 
forty-five causes. 
At the March term, 1773, Elijah Williams produced a license 
from Governor Tryon, bearing date February 3, 1773, as an attorney 
at law in this court, and took and subscribed the oath required of him, 
and likewise took an oath to well and truly demean himself in the 
practice of an attorney according to the best of his skill and under- 
standing. 
The sessions of the court were limited to four days and great 
economy of time was required. When a jury trial was commenced 
it had to be proceeded with until completed without any interruptions. 
Accordingly in Kingsley v. Bigelow, June term, 1773, in which there 12 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
were fourteen witnesses for the plaintiff and one for the defendant, 
after proceeding during the fore part of the day the record shows: 
“It appearing to the court that the trial of this cause would continue 
a considerable time on account of the number of witnesses attending: 
It was ordered by the court with the consent of the parties and their 
attorneys, that the jury be committed to the care of the Constable 
for an hour in order to receive necessary refreshment.” Whereupon 
the court adjourned for an hour. After which it again opened and 
the jury being returned to the bar, the court proceeded to the further 
trial of the cause. The jury returned a special verdict. Another 
cause was tried the same day after that was finished, and the jury 
was directed to sign and seal its verdict when it had agreed and to 
separate then and return the verdict in court in the morning. They 
agreed that night but did not write or sign the verdict and separated 
and wrote and signed the verdict in the morning and returned it into 
court. For this cause the court set it aside and ordered that the “cause 
be imparled until next term upon the issue already joined.” 
At this term rules of practice to the number of twenty-nine were 
adopted. The business of the court largely increased so that there 
were one hundred and eleven cases on the June calendar and one 
hundred and twenty-two on the September calendar. 
The people were largely dissatisfied with the proceedings of the 
court and its results. The Supreme Court of the Province of New 
York upheld the titles under the New York grants as against titles 
derived under the New Hampshire grants. The settlers had little 
money and were unable to meet judgments and their property, including 
lands, was often sold at low figures to speculators to satisfy them. 
At the September term, 1774, most of the petit jurors neglected to 
appear, and of the grand jurors only five attended court. The de- 
linquent grand jurors were fined forty shillings each and costs and 
the petit jurors twenty shillings each and costs. 
On September 15, 1774, “Simeon Olcott, gentleman, requested 
the result of the court’s consideration on his being admitted an attorney 
of the court agreeable to his license from the Lieut. Governor pre- 
sented to the court in the term of June last which being allowed” 
he was admitted. Olcott was from New Hampshire. 
At the December term, 1774, only about half of the grand jury 
appeared. Two indictments for riot and two for maintenance were 
presented. In the two last indictments the record is that the respondent 
“says he will not contend with our Sovereign Lord the King,” and 
the court “laid on him a fine of eight shillings.” 
Before the March term, 1775, the presiding Judge was called upon 
by some of the inhabitants of the county and requested that no court 
be held at that term. He answered that a criminal case required 
the meeting of the court. The day before the term the people gathered EDWARD J. PHELPS 
Son of Hon. Samuel S. Phelps, United States Sen- 
ator and Judge of the Vermont Supreme Court, was 
born in Middlebury, Vt., June 12, 1822. He entered 
Middlebury College at the age of fourteen and gradu- 
ated at the age of eighteen. He taught in Virginia, 
studied law at the Yale Law School and was admitted 
to the bar in 1843. In 1845 he removed to Burlington. 
In 1851 he was appointed Second Comptroller of the 
United States Treasury. Later in the same year he was 
elected State’s Attorney of Chittenden county. He 
was a member of the Vermont Constitutional Conven- 
tion of 1870. Mr. Phelps soon built up a reputation 
as one of the ablest lawyers of Vermont, and took a 
leading place in his profession in the United States. 
He was the first president of the Vermont Bar Asso- 
ciation and in 1881 was elected president of the Amer- 
ican Bar Association. One of the first appointments 
made by President Cleveland was that of Mr. Phelps 
as United States Minister to Great Britain, and in 
that capacity he was one of the most successful diplo- 
mats America has sent to the Court of St. James. 
President Cleveland intended to appoint Mr. Phelps 
Chief Justice of the United States Supreme Court, but 
owing to political complications did not carry out his 
original purpose. Mr. Phelps was a great orator and 
a man of charming, personality. He was professor of 
medical jurisprudence in the University of Vermont 
for several years and for many years he was Kent 
professor of law at Yale University. Tn 1893 he was 
senior counsel for the United States in the Behring 
Sea arbitration. Tn 1880 he was Democratic candidate 
for Governor of Vermont. He married Mary Haight, 
a woman of great tact and rare charm. A son and a 
daughter were born to them. Mr. Phelps died March 9, 
1900. Edward J. Phelps THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
13 
in the court house to request that other business be not done. Judge 
Chandler went into this meeting and was asked whether the Judges 
would consult with a committee as to the expediency of convening the 
court in the morning. He answered that the Judges could not enter 
into a discussion as to “whether his Majesty’s business should be done 
or not,” but gave his word that they could enjoy the house without 
molestation until morning, and that then the court would assemble 
and hear what those who were aggrieved might wish to offer. Before 
morning the Sheriff, William Patterson, with a posse armed with guns 
undertook to take possession of the house and in so doing William 
French was killed and Daniel Houghton mortally wounded. The 
latter lived but nine days. In the morning the court assembled and 
adjourned to three o’clock in the afternoon. The Judges made a 
statement of facts concerning “the very melancholy and unhappy 
affairs” and adjourned to the next term. The people assembled from 
all quarters and took the Judges and the Sheriff prisoners and sent 
some of them under guard to the Northampton jail. The court never 
assembled again. There is no further record but the books of court 
records remaining at Newfane show that they were reversed and 
the unused leaves used for the records of the County Courts when 
organized in Windham county in 1781. 
The resistance shown at Westminster does not appear to have 
arisen from dissatisfaction with the decisions of the court nor because 
of the dispute about the title to the lands. The records show but 
few actions of ejectment. It seems, rather, to have been a part of the 
general uprising of the country in opposition to royal rule. 
Thus ended the jurisdiction of New York in this territory and 
no courts were held here under any authority of law for nearly four 
years. Some persons, however, received commissions as Justices of 
the Peace from the authorities of New York within the territory and 
undertook to perform the duties of that office. This was deemed to 
be an offense by some of the inhabitants and the offending officers 
were tried for it by courts improvised for that purpose. According 
to the affidavit of one of the Justices a judgment seat was erected 
and a court organized in due form with Ethan Allen for the presiding 
judge. The case was decided on the merits and the respondent was 
adjudged guilty and sentenced, and the court attended to the execu- 
tion of the sentence in person. This person does not appear to have 
ever acted as Justice of the Peace thereafter. There were several 
such cases, all of them being first convictions. 
Soon after the overthrow of the rule of New York, committees 
of safety were organized in many of the towns and a Council of 
Safety was organized for the whole. The council exercised judicial 
powers almost wholly either by itself or by recommendation to com- 
mittees of the towns. It did not pass laws but made decisions in 14 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
regard to public matters and welfare and upon applications in par- 
ticular cases. It rendered judgments in regard to property, passed 
upon titles, and taxed costs; it also granted divorces and administra- 
tion of estates of deceased persons, and in some cases ordered the 
commitment of persons against whom judgments were rendered until 
sentence should be complied with. All this rested wholly in the con- 
sent of the people. There was no law for it but the law of necessity 
of acquiescence to some authority. 
The constitution which was provided by a convention of delegates 
assembled at Windsor, July 2, 1777, was slightly amended at an ad- 
journment of the same convention in December following. It was 
not submitted to the people. This provided for the election of a 
General Assembly on the first Tuesday of March, 1778, which was 
had in most of the towns. It also provided that courts of justice 
should be established in every county in the State. Although the 
constitution provided for a Supreme Court and Court of Common 
Pleas, no such courts were established for several years. At the June 
session of the Legislature in 1778, five Judges were appointed for 
special courts in the shires of Westminster, Newbury, Bennington 
and Rutland. These courts transacted some special business. That 
for the shire of Bennington tried and convicted David Redding, who 
was executed for treason. At the same session it was “Voted that 
Col. Peter Olcott, Bezaleel Woodward, Esq., Maj. Griswold, Patter- 
son Piermont, Esq., and Maj. Tyler be, and they are hereby appointed 
Judges of the Superior Court for the banishment of tories &c.” 
Whether this court was ever organized or what its jurisdiction was 
is not known. 
At the October session of the Legislature held at Windsor in the 
same year, it was “Resolved that there be a Superior Court appointed 
in this State consisting of five Judges.” Of this court Moses Robinson 
was appointed Chief Judge, John Shepardson second, John Fassett 
third, Thomas Chandler fourth and John Throop fifth Judge of said 
court. It was further resolved that the Superior Court sit four times 
in a year, viz.: At the meeting house in Bennington, in the shire of 
Bennington, on the second Thursday of December next; at the court 
house in Westminster, in the shire of Cumberland, the second Thurs- 
day of March next; at the house of Col. James Mead, in Rutland, 
in the shire of Rutland on a date not fixed in the resolution; and at 
Newbury, in the shire of Newbury, on the second Thursday of Sep- 
tember next. 
It was further resolved that the Superior Court should not sit 
longer at one sitting than a week. This court met and was organized 
pursuant to the acts of the Legislature on the 10th day of December, 
1778, at Bennington. Then and there commenced the operation of 
the organized jurisprudence of the State of Vermont. THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
15 
The Judges are sometimes referred to as Judges of the Supreme 
Court and sometimes as Judges of the Superior Court. At the first 
session of the court held at Bennington in the house of Stephen Fay, 
there were present Moses Robinson, Chief Judge, and John Fassett, 
Jr., and Thomas Chandler, Jr., Esquires. Having each of them taken 
the necessary oath of office they proceeded to the choice of a Clerk 
for said court and chose Joseph Fay. One cause was tried at that 
session, and one prisoner convicted of “enemical conduct against this 
and the United States and going over and joining the enemies thereof,” 
was sentenced to be transported within the enemies’ lines, and to 
proceed within the enemies’ lines without delay, nevermore to return 
within this or the United States of America on penalty of being 
“whipped on the naked back thirty and nine lashes, and the same 
number of lashes to be repeated once every week during his stay, 
paying cost.” 
The next session of court was held May 26, 1779, at Westmin- 
ster. The Judges took the same docket that was in use at Bennington, 
and the full court was in attendance. Stephen R. Bradley was ap- 
pointed Clerk and he and Noah Smith were admitted to practice as 
attorneys within the State, and their names head the list of attorneys 
in the State of Vermont. The jurisdiction of the Superior Court had 
been defined at the February session of the Legislature held in 1779. 
It was given jurisdiction of all criminal matters and all civil cases 
above twenty pounds, but it was expressly provided that it should 
have no power to try any action or title to land for the year ensuing. 
It was given power to approve of, nominate and appoint attorneys as 
there should be occasion, to plead at the bar, and an oath was pre- 
scribed for them, the same substantially as now, but careful provision 
was made “that in all cases whatsoever there shall be allowed but one 
attorney on a side to plead at the bar.” 
The rules governing civil actions were fixed at the same session, 
and provision was made for the attachment of property in cases where 
the plaintiff satisfied the authority issuing the writ that he was in 
danger of losing his just due unless one should be granted, and gave 
sufficient security for prosecution of his suit and to answer all damages. 
This was the origin of attachments on mesne process. The Superior 
Court was given the jurisdiction which the County Courts would have 
had by an act which recited that “no County Courts have been estab- 
lished in this State.” 
In October, 1779, the election of the Judges of the Superior Court 
was directed to be by the Governor, Council and House of Repre- 
sentatives by their joint ballot in October annually; and the Superior 
Court was constituted a court of equity in matters above twenty 
pounds and not exceeding four thousand pounds, and it was provided 
that cases above the last sum should be heard and determined by the 16 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
Governor, Council, and House of Representatives. The form of 
process was prescribed to be by petition setting forth at large the 
cause for relief. A right to review as in common law causes and an 
appeal to the Governor, Council and General Assembly was given 
in cases wherein the title to land was concerned. Provision was also 
made that all equity causes then pending before the General Assembly, 
wherein the demand did not exceed four thousand pounds, “shall be 
referred to the Superior Court in the same manner in which they 
now stand.” 
In October, 1780, the prohibition of trial of title to land was 
continued to June, 1781, and it was further extended from time to 
time to 1785. Thus it will be seen that the trial of land titles was 
carefully kept from the courts for several years. A special act was 
passed authorizing a suit to try the title to the Utley farm in Bromley, 
now Peru, between George Duncan and William Utley. 
At the February session of the Legislature held in 1781, provision 
was made for the election of Judges of County Courts to consist of five 
Judges each, as well as of Sheriffs and Justices of the Peace, by the 
freemen of their respective counties. Also an act was passed providing 
that the Governor, Council and House of Representatives should sit 
as a court to hear and determine all disputes between proprietors 
holding under different charters made out by one and the same au- 
thority by writ of right. At the April session of the Legislature held 
in 1781, the jurisdiction of County Courts was defined and extended 
to all crimes not capital, all civil actions where the matter in dispute 
exceeded six pounds, and to all appeals from Justices of the Peace. 
Pursuant to this act a County Court was organized within and for the 
county of Windham on Tuesday, June 26, 1781, at Westminster, at 
which court John Sessions was Chief Judge and Luke Knowlton, John 
Bridgman and Benjamin Burt were Side Judges. Stephen R. Bradley 
was sworn as State’s Attorney, and he and Samuel Knight, Ezra 
Stiles, Jr., and Micah Townshend were admitted to the bar. This 
was the commencement of County Courts in Windham county and 
probably in the State. 
At the June session of the Legislature held in 1782, a judiciary act 
regulating Justices of the Peace and County Courts was passed, and 
it was further enacted that there should be constituted a Supreme 
Court of judicature within and for this State to be held annually at 
the respective times and places mentioned in the act by one Chief 
Judge and four other Judges to be chosen by ballot by the Governor, 
Council and General Assembly annually at their October session, and 
commissioned for that purpose, any three of whom to be a quorum, 
who should have cognizance of all pleas of the State, criminal actions 
and causes and whatsoever relates to the conservation of the peace 
and punishment of offenders, whether brought to said court by appeal THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
17 
or original process according to law; and also of civil causes between 
party and party. 
In October, 1782, Moses Robinson, Paul Spooner, Jonas Fay, 
John Fassett and Peter Olcott were elected Judges of the Supreme 
Court and they properly head the list of such Judges for the State of 
Vermont. Causes in the Superior Court were left there and were 
completed by the Judges of the Supreme Court. The Supreme Court 
commenced its sessions at Marlboro, in the county of Windham, Feb- 
ruary 6, 1783, after it had disposed of the business of the Superior 
Court which was pending before it. From then till now there have 
been the Supreme Court, the County Courts and Justice Courts within 
the State. 
The first Council of Censors in its report of October 6, 1785, 
with reference to the jurisdiction in equity, recited that it was exceed- 
ingly inconvenient and against the interest of the community that so 
numerous a body as the Governor, Council and General Assembly 
should be employed in determining causes between party and party, 
whose attention would thereby be diverted from the more important 
duties of legislation, and recommended the repeal of so much of the 
act of 1779 as invested the Governor, Council and Assembly with 
equity powers as a court. This recommendation was heeded and 
the constitution in 1786, Sec. 5, was made to authorize the Legisla- 
ture to create a Court of Chancery “provided they do not constitute 
themselves the Judges of said court.” Sec. 6 provided that the legis- 
lative, executive and judicial departments should be separate and dis- 
tinct so that neither exercise the powers belonging to the other. 
At least one cause was brought before the old tribunal, sitting as 
a court of equity. The records of the Governor and Council for 
October 20, 1785, show that a verbal message was received from the 
General Assembly requesting His Excellency, the Governor and Coun- 
cil, to join the General Assembly in a grand Court of Chancery. The 
Governor and Council joined accordingly, the particular case to be 
heard being that between the proprietors of Wilmington and Draper. 
On October 21 the hearing was resumed between said proprietors. 
The defendant pleaded to the jurisdiction of the court and the Gov- 
ernor and Council adjudged the plea to be insufficient to bar the fur- 
ther trial of the cause. The records of the Assembly for that day 
show that this plea to the jurisdiction was in substance that the court 
was never established by the laws of the State and that if so attempted 
to be established it was unconstitutional, and that the case was proper 
to be heard and determined at law, and praying judgment whether 
said court would take any further cognizance of said bill. The ques- 
tion being put to the members of the Assembly, as one branch of the 
court, whether this court would take any further cognizance of the 
bill, the yeas and nays being required, they stood as follows: Yeas 18 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
•26; nays 32. So it was negatived by one branch of the court. In 
Council, October 26, it was resolved that unless the House should 
recede from this last determination, the Governor, Council and Assem- 
bly as a court could take no further cognizance of the cause. The 
House did not recede and the cause proceeded no further. 
By act of March 3, 1787, the Supreme and County Courts were 
each made to consist of one Chief and two Side Judges, and as to 
the Supreme Court, it was provided that if any one or more of the 
Judges should be disabled from attending by reason of sickness or 
otherwise, the presiding Judge should have the power to call to his 
assistance any counselor within the State. This provision was not 
long continued in force and is not known ever to have been acted upon. 
The Judges both of Supreme and County Courts were, by the 
Constitutions of 1786 and 1793, chosen by the House of Representa- 
tives in conjunction with the Council. There was no Court of Chan- 
cery nor any court authorized to exercise chancery powers except 
that the courts of law were authorized to mitigate penal obligations 
from 1787 to 1797. 
By an act passed March 3, 1797, a Court of Chancery was con- 
stituted, consisting of the Judges of the Supreme Court with all the 
powers incident to a Court of Chancery, the proceedings to be reg- 
ulated by the Judges in conformity to the English practice. 
In 1814 an act was passed, providing for law terms of the Supreme 
Court to be holden by all the Judges, any two of whom should con- 
stitute a quorum and for trial terms to be holden by one or more of 
the Judges, each once in each year in each county, and for adjourning 
actions from the trial to the law term on exceptions reduced to writing 
in a summary way, and allowed by the Judge or Judges during the 
term. The law term was to render such judgment or make such 
order or direction therein as to law and justice should appertain. This 
system continued until 1821, when this mode of review was taken 
away and all decisions were left to be made at the trial. In that year 
each of the Judges in the Supreme Court as chancellor was authorized 
to make interlocutory orders in chancery cases preparatory to final 
hearing in vacation. 
Until 1824 cases were taken from the County to the Supreme 
Court by appeal only, and from 1814 to 1821 the cases were tried 
there anew with a right to review in the Supreme Court on exceptions 
as stated. In that year all appeals were taken away except on ques- 
tions of law placed on the record and trials of questions of fact were 
remanded to the County Court. The County Courts were constituted 
of a Judge of the Supreme Court and two County Judges. 
The Supreme Court remained a Court of Chancery until 1839, 
and there were no appeals in chancery. After that time there was a 
Court of Chancery consisting of one Judge, as chancellor, sitting at THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
19 
the same time as the County Court in each county, with appeals from 
all decrees to the Supreme Court. From 1850 to 1857 the Supreme 
Court consisted of three Judges and the County Courts were com- 
posed of a Circuit Judge, who was chancellor, and two county Judges. 
When the Supreme Court was first organized in 1782 there were 
five Judges. In 1787 the number was reduced to three and so con- 
tinued until 1825 when another Judge was added. The court was 
increased in 1828 to five, to six in 1846, and to seven in 1870, and 
this number continued until 1906, when the court was divided and 
the present system established. At this time the Supreme Court was 
given four members and six Superior Judges were elected. In 1908 
the Supreme Court was enlarged to five members, which is the present 
number (1922), and the number of Superior Judges remained the 
same. There have been five complete changes in the personnel of 
the Supreme Court; first in 1789 when the Judges elected were for 
the first time lawyers; again in 1801 when the Republicans gained con- 
trol of the Legislature and elected a new set of Judges for the Supreme 
Court, although it is said that the change was not for political reasons. 
The next complete change took place in 1813, when the Federalists, 
having secured control of the State, elected three of their own party 
to the bench. This was a temporary change, however, for in 1815, 
the Republicans having won the election, they selected from their 
party three Judges. The only other complete change since that time 
was in 1817, but this was not due to politics, but came about through 
a combination of circumstances due to the elevation of one or more 
of the Judges to other positions of trust and the refusal of others 
to serve longer. In the five complete changes only one member was 
elected who had previously served as Judge. In all the other changes 
not one of the new Judges had ever acted as such before his election. 
In 1850 an act passed at the session of 1849 took effect, estab- 
lishing a Supreme Court consisting of one Chief Judge and two As- 
sistant Judges, with the provision that any two of the Judges should 
constitute a quorum. By the same act the State was divided into 
four judicial circuits, of which the counties of Bennington, Rutland 
and Addison comprised the first; Windham, Windsor and Orange, 
the second; Chittenden, Franklin, Lamoille and Grand Isle, the third; 
and Washington, Caledonia, Orleans and Essex, the fourth. Pro- 
vision was made for the election of a Judge for each circuit, who 
should also be a chancellor. It was further provided that in each 
circuit there should be held annually, in addition to the sessions then 
regularly held in each county, a term of the Supreme Court. By this 
act the Judges of the Supreme Court held eighteen sessions annually, 
fourteen in the counties and four in the circuits. The work of the 
trial courts was done by the Circuit Judges and the two courts were 
separate and distinct as now. 20 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
This plan continued until 1857, when the Legislature returned 
to the old law by which the Supreme Court Judges held both the 
County Courts and the Supreme Courts. The law passed at this time 
provided for a Supreme Court of six members, one Chief Judge and 
five Assistant Judges. It was made the duty of the Judges to desig- 
nate four of their number to hold sessions of the Supreme Court in 
the several counties, three of whom should concur in an opinion of 
the court. In addition to these sessions, two general terms of the 
same court were provided for, one to be held on the east side of the 
State for the eastern counties, and one on the west side for the western 
counties. It was the duty of all the Judges to attend these sessions, 
which were intended to take care of any business left over from the 
counties, and for the re-argument of any cases that the Judges might 
so order. A majority of the Judges had to concur in any decision of 
the court. Prior to 1850 a Judge who presided at County Court could 
sit in Supreme Court upon the hearing of any legal question reserved 
in County Court, except during the year following 1837, when an 
act was passed prohibiting this, but this act was repealed the following 
year. Since 1850 no Judge could sit in review upon any question 
that he had passed on in County Court, except that at one time there 
was an exception in case three of the Judges were disqualified. All 
the trial work in the counties was done by the six Judges of the Su- 
preme Court. 
In 1870 another Judge was added and provision made for a 
Supreme Court of four members. The court held this number until 
the present dual system was adopted in 1906. 
“An Act to Expedite Legal Proceedings” was passed in 1892. 
One of the leading features was a provision for three general terms 
of the Supreme Court for all the counties to be held at Montpelier, 
and such special terms as the Judges might appoint. Instead of writs 
being made returnable to a stated term of the County Court, they 
were made returnable within twenty-one days from the time of issuing 
the same, and the defendant was compelled to answer on or before 
the first Tuesday of the next month after the expiration of that time. 
Thus cases were brought to an issue earlier than under the old prac- 
tice. For twelve years this system of holding all the terms of the 
Supreme Court at Montpelier, the Judges having appointed no special 
sessions elsewhere, was maintained. This result was not achieved 
without effort, however, for many an attempt was made by the friends 
of the old system to put the Supreme Court “on wheels,” as it was 
said, and the forces back of the new law had to be rallied at Mont- 
pelier more than once to prevent its repeal. It was argued by the 
advocates of the new law that the State Library was of so much 
assistance in the preparation and argument of causes that no sittings 
of the court should be held except in the Supreme Court room in the THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
21 
State House. On the other hand, it was urged that the expense of 
going to Montpelier was too great for poor litigants and that they 
should be accommodated by a court nearer at home. 
When the present system of courts was established in 1906 the 
latter argument triumphed to the extent that terms of the Supreme 
Court were provided for once a year at St. Johnsbury, Rutland, and 
Brattleboro, in addition to the general terms at Montpelier. These 
sessions away from the capital have been regularly held since and 
have been found to be convenient for the attorneys and agreeable 
to the Judges. 
The act last referred to created a Supreme Court of one Chief 
Judge and three Associate Judges. It provided for three general terms 
of the court besides the special terms in the counties named. The 
same act made provision for the election of six Superior Judges, the 
one first elected to be the Chief Judge. It was made the duty of 
the Superior Judges to hold the County Courts and the law gave the 
Judges in either court power to sit in the other court should occasion 
require. The result has been that the Superior Judges have frequently 
been called to sit in the Supreme Court and in occasional instances 
the Justices of the Supreme Court have presided in the County Courts. 
At the session of 1908 another Judge was added to the Supreme 
Court, making five in all. This was done in response to an opinion 
that both the bench and bar entertained that the Supreme Court should 
consist of at least five Judges. Prior to the organization of the new 
courts in 1906 the Judges were badly overworked. Two of the Judges 
died as the result of their excessive labors and several other members 
had been ill from the same cause. Moreover the dockets of the courts 
could not be kept clear. The Judges had to leave the trial work 
unfinished in order to attend the terms of the Supreme Court and 
opinions had to be prepared while the Judges were engaged in the 
County Court. Litigation had increased in some of the counties and 
new duties had fallen to the Judges as the result of legislation and 
otherwise. In such a condition of affairs it is natural that there should 
have been a change in the judicial system. It was to be expected, too, 
that the change would result in the division of the court into trial 
Judges and Judges sitting in banc. Experience in other jurisdictions 
has shown this to be the usual and best method for the disposition of 
legal business. Under the present system it rarely occurs that work 
is delayed in either court on account of the inability of the Judges 
to attend to it. Two terms of County Court are held annually in 
each county, five regular terms of the Supreme Court are held at 
Montpelier, and three special terms at the places designated in the act 
of 1906. 
The Superior Judges hold the County Courts according to an 
assignment made by them, which is designed to equalize the work 22 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
as much as possible. They rotate by a fixed rule from county to 
county, the Judge holding a term in a county going to all the other 
counties before returning to the county where he first sat. This rule 
brings the visits of each Judge to a county in periods of from two 
and one-half to three and one-half years apart. The assignments are 
so made, too, that the Judge who holds the spring or summer term 
in a county, next presides at the fall or winter term. The 
difference in the periods between which a Judge holds court 
in a county, whether two years and a half or three years and 
a half, is made necessary in order that the schedule which was orig- 
inally made out by Justice Taylor, after much careful computation, 
may provide a rule that shall be permanent. Notwithstanding this 
rule the assignments of the Judges are made up every two years and 
when a new Judge is elected or appointed he takes the place in the 
assignment which the retiring Judge occupied. 
Until 1912 the Supreme Court consisted of a Chief Judge and 
Assistant Judges, but it was common to hear the term Chief Justice 
applied when the Chief Judge was referred to. This was particularly 
the case on the part of laymen and attorneys who came to Vermont 
from other States. The title of Chief Justice is so much more fitting 
that it is not unnatural that it should have been commonly used by 
those who were not familiar with our statutes. When the bar of 
Vermont erected the monument to Chief Judge Pierpoint at Ver- 
gennes, Mr. Phelps, who was his cousin, insisted that he should be 
described on the stone as Chief Justice for he said he was a “Chief 
Justice.” The stone was accordingly marked in this way although 
no such office was then recognized in Vermont. When the Constitu- 
tion was amended in 1912 provision was made that wherever the 
words “Judge” or “Judges” were used therein to designate a Judge 
or Judges of the Supreme Court, the words “Justice” or “Justices” 
should be substituted therefor as the case might require. By this 
change the Chief Judge of the Supreme Court became Chief Justice and 
his associates Associate Justices. 
When Vergennes was incorporated as a city in 1788, the Mayor 
was made Judge of the municipality. This is the first instance in 
the history of the State of the creation of anything like a Municipal 
Court. It is doubtful if any Mayor of the first city of Vermont ever 
sat as a Municipal Judge. The next Municipal Court was established 
in Burlington in 1865, the Judge being known as Recorder. Following 
this time, similar courts were established in Bennington, Rutland, 
Barre, Montpelier, St. Albans, Brattleboro, Winooski, Bellows Falls, 
Springfield and Brighton, and in the counties of Orleans, Caledonia 
and Addison. While these courts were at first intended to be local, 
their jurisdiction has been extended so as to embrace whole counties 
in many cases and under certain conditions. In this way the work JOHN W. ROWELL 
Born in Lebanon, N. H., June 9, 1835. He was edu- 
cated in the common schools and at West Randolph (Vt.) 
Academy. He began the study of law in Randolph in 
1856, and was admitted to the bar in 1858. He repre- 
sented Randolph in the Legislature in 1861 and 1862, 
was State’s Attorney of Orange county, 1862-63 
and State Senator in 1874. He was chosen Reporter 
of the Supreme Court decisions in 1872 and in 1882 was 
appointed a Judge of the Supreme Court. He con- 
tinued on the bench nearly thirty-two years, having 
been made Chief Judge in 1902. His judicial term was 
the longest in the history of the State. He is presi- 
dent of the Randolph National Bank. He has re- 
ceived the degree of LL. I), from the University of 
Vermont and Middlebury College. THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
23 
done heretofore by Justices of the Peace has been committed to more 
competent tribunals, and the County Courts have been relieved of 
much small civil business and a good deal of the criminal business. 
The Municipal Judges are lawyers who are appointed by the Gov- 
ernor for a term of two years. Exceptions on questions of law may 
be taken direct to the Supreme Court. Much business is done in these 
courts, especially in the larger places where many criminal prosecu- 
tions are brought. These courts cover so much of the State that they 
take the place of the Justice Courts very generally. They are avail- 
able daily for the transaction of business and in most cases the expense 
is less to suitors than in the County Courts. 
Courts for the settlement of estates of deceased persons and 
probate of wills were established during the second year of the State 
government. There are twenty probate districts. The eight 
northern counties comprise one district each, and the six southern 
counties are divided into two districts each. The Judges are elected 
by the freemen of the probate districts and they appoint their Regis- 
ters. This court has the sole, original jurisdiction of the probate of 
wills and trusts created thereby, and the settlement of estates, including 
estates of infants and all persons under guardianship. The County 
Court has appellate jurisdiction of all matters originally within the 
jurisdiction of the Probate Court, and questions of law arising in 
the trial of probate appeals in the County Court are reviewed in the 
Supreme Court the same as in other cases. 
Since the earliest times Justice Courts have been in existence and 
have had jurisdiction to try and determine civil and criminal cases of 
small magnitude. These courts have power also to bind over to County 
Court persons charged with crimes beyond the jurisdiction of the 
Justice to try and determine. Provision for a jury of six in Justice 
trials is made by law, but as a jury of twelve is guaranteed by the 
Constitution, it is the right of respondents to a trial by such a jury, 
and their cases are tried in the Municipal or County Courts when 
a jury trial is desired. Except in very small matters appeals are 
granted to the County Court or the Municipal Court if there is one 
in the county where the Justice trial is held. Formerly Justice trials 
were frequent and considerable consequence was attached to them, 
especially by young practitioners. It was very common, too, for older 
lawyers to participate, and the trials frequently extended far into the 
night, and were a matter of much interest in the locality where they 
were held. Many a young lawyer has established a reputation in these 
courts. They furnished an opportunity for a display of wit and 
learning on his part and added to his acquaintance and standing. All 
is now changed. Lawyers avoid these courts if possible, and trials 
in them are becoming more and more infrequent. The Municipal 
Courts have largely replaced them. 24 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
Reports 
There were no published reports of the decisions of the old Su- 
perior Court. The cases were largely criminal and many of the offences 
political. Prosecutions were in the name of the freemen. Many 
causes were for slanderous words, and in one case the words spoken 
were that the plaintiff “claimed protection of Burgoyne.” The point 
was raised, but these words were held to be actionable. In another case 
the proceedings were commenced in criminal form. Objection was 
made by counsel for the defendant that damages for private injury 
could not be recovered in that manner. This objection was at once 
overruled and plaintiff had a verdict and judgment for damages in a 
large amount. The library of Charles Phelps was confiscated and 
Abel Stockwell, Constable of Marlboro, went to take the books. Mr. 
Phelps and his son drove the officer off with pitchforks. The Con- 
stable of Brattleboro went soon after with assistants and took away 
the law books but left the theological books. Stockwell brought suit 
in Supreme Court against Mr. Phelps and his son for assault, claiming 
damages in the amount of three thousand pounds. The writ was in 
manuscript, folded in the usual form. The plea of Charles Phelps is 
written upon one of the folds. It recites that at the August term. 
1780, the defendant justifies the assault as being in defense of his 
property which was by force and arms attempted to be taken from 
him by the plaintiff, there being no redress provided for by law and 
he being a subject in and of the State of New York, where there was 
in fact a state of nature, and no redress of any grievance could be 
had by law for more than five years before said assault was made. 
Therefore, he claimed that by the law of nature and nations and by 
the law of the country there was no law by which he could avail him- 
self and this he prayed might be considered by the court. This plea 
was afterwards withdrawn, a default entered and damages assessed at 
seven hundred pounds. Damages were solvable in Continental money, 
which on that day was worth one dollar for one hundred dollars, so 
that the actual damages assessed were about thirty-four dollars. Among 
the books taken were some belonging to Solomon Phelps. He peti- 
tioned the Superior Court for their return. The last act of that court 
in that county was to grant the return to him of Salkeld’s Reports I 
Vol., Milton’s Paradise Lost, Telemachus 2 Vols., Lord Bacon’s Essays, 
and such other books as the said Solomon Phelps’ name was inserted 
in. The library of Charles Phelps was made use of by the revisers 
of the laws in 1782 and it may thus be said to have constituted 
the first appearance of a Vermont State Library. 
During the time when cases in the Supreme Court were either 
originally brought there or taken there by appeal and tried de novo 
and not heard upon exceptions as to matters of law, there were no THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
25 
official reporters of its decisions. This covers the period from 1783 
to 1814. Nathaniel Chipman, however, reported a few cases arising 
in 1789, 1790 and 1791. Tyler’s reports are of cases in 1800, 1801, 
1802 and 1803 and Brayton’s of cases from 1815 to 1820, inclusive. 
An act was passed in 1823 providing for the appointment of a 
Reporter and making it his duty to publish such of the former deci- 
sions of the Supreme Court as he should judge proper. The ap- 
pointment of first Reporter fell to Daniel Chipman. His first volume 
consists largely of the reports of cases during the time when the 
nisi prius system prevailed, from 1814 to 1821. He included, how- 
ever, a few of the cases reported by Nathaniel Chipman and cases 
arising after that system was abolished in the years 1822, 1823 and 
part of 1824. His second volume consists of cases in 1824. Aiken’s 
Reports cover cases in 1825, 1826 and 1827. The Judges reported 
the cases from 1826 to 1837 in the first nine volumes of Vermont 
Reports. Since then there has been a regular series of reports by an 
official Reporter. 
When Chief Justice John W. Rowell tendered his resignation to 
Governor Fletcher to take effect October 1, 1913, the usual advance- 
ment of the next older Justice in point of service to the place made 
vacant was not observed by the Governor. The appointment which 
would thus have fallen to Justice Loveland Munson was given to 
Justice George M. Powers, the youngest member of the court, who 
thereupon became Chief Justice. This appointment was accepted by 
Justice Powers with great reluctance and not until it was certain that 
the Governor would not appoint any of his associates to the place. 
The position was one that Justice Powers was well qualified by tem- 
perament and training to fill and his appointment was favorably re- 
ceived. At the same time there were many influential lawyers and 
citizens who regretted that the Governor had departed from the rule 
which had long been followed of advancing the Judges of the Supreme 
Court when a vacancy occurred on the bench. Justice Powers became 
Chief Justice October 1, 1913, and continued as such until February 
1, 1915, when, having resigned, Justice Munson was elected in his 
place. 
When the proposals of amendment to the State Constitution were 
passed at the session of 1912 no provision was made that the Justices 
of the Supreme Court and the Superior Judges should hold office 
after the term of their election, which was until December 1, 1914. 
The election of the above Judges had occurred on the third Thursday 
after the meeting of the Legislature in 1912, which was assembled 
on the first Wednesday of October in that year, according to the 
Changes Made in the Judges By Governor Fletcher 26 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
provisions of the old Constitution. They were elected for two years, 
their term of office to begin December 1, 1912. While the Legislature 
of that year made provision that the officers elected by the people 
in November, 1912, should hold over until the term of their successors 
elected in 1914 should begin, which by the provisions of the amended 
Constitution would be February 1, 1915, no provision was made as 
to the other State offices, which included the Judges. As the General 
Assembly did not meet according to the terms of the amended Con- 
stitution until the first Wednesday next after the first Monday oi 
January in 1915, the Governor was within his rights when he decided 
that he must fill vacancies in the Supreme Court and must appoint 
Superior Judges December 1, 1914. The Constitution provided that 
the Judges of the Supreme Court should be elected biennially and 
that their term of office should be for two years. Provision as to the 
election of the Superior Judges rested on the statute, lhe Governoi 
sought the advice of the Supreme Court, or at least some members 
of the court, and decided that it was his right and duty to appoint the 
justices of that court for a term of two years to begin on December 
1, 1914. It was his opinion, moreover, that inasmuch as there would 
be a vacancy at the end of the term to which he would appoint, 
it would be the duty of each successive Executive to fill the vacancy 
by appointment at the end of each term and that there could be no 
election of the Justices by the Legislature unless the Constitution was 
amended and this could'not be done for ten years. He accordingly 
made the appointments to the Supreme Court December 1, 1914. and 
issued commissions to the Justices for two years. He appointed and 
commissioned the Superior Judges at the same time and for the same 
term. It was understood that the incoming Legislature could interfere 
with these appointments, if it so decided, as the office of Superior 
judge was a creation of the statute and did not depend on any con- 
stitutional provisions. It was the expectation of both the Governor 
and his appointees that no changes would be made in either court as 
made up by him. It was the purpose of the Governor at the outset 
to make several changes in both courts and with this end in view he 
asked several lawyers to take places on the bench in one or the other 
of the two courts. For different reasons it was not easy to induce 
all the men of his choice to accept places under the circumstances. 
The tenure of the office was too uncertain and the emoluments not 
large enough to attract men in lucrative practice. The Governor 
finally made two changes in the Supreme Court and one in the Su- 
perior Judges. In place of Justice Munson, the senior member of 
the Supreme Court, he appointed Robert E. Healy, a young attorney 
of Bennington, and in place of Justice Haselton he appointed Judge 
Slack the sixth Superior Judge. James B. Donoway of Middlebury, 
the Municipal Judge for Addison county, was named as the fifth THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
27 
Superior Judge in place of Judge Fish and Walter A. Dutton of Hard- 
wick was given the place made vacant by the elevation of Judge Slack 
to the higher court. There was force, in a geographical sense, in the 
appointment of Judge Healy, for Bennington county was still repre- 
sented in the higher court; and Addison county lost nothing in this 
way, for both Judge Fish and Judge Donoway were residents of this 
County. In Chittenden county the situation was different. Caledonia 
county had received the judgeship that the large county of Chittenden 
had had since the election of Judge Taft in 1882 and Caledonia already 
had one Justice of the Supreme Court and now by the new appoint- 
ments had two members of that court and one of the Superior Judges. 
It was natural in a State where the tenure of the Judges had come to 
be regarded as one for life, although the elections occur once in two 
years, that the action of the Executive should have been questioned. 
There had been no demand, in so far as the public understood the case 
at least, for the removal of Justices Munson and Haselton and 
Judge Fish or for the appointment of the men who were made their 
successors. The situation was the subject of general discussion in 
the newspapers and among the people before the convening of the 
first Legislature to assemble under the amended Constitution in Janu- 
ary, 1915. This discussion happily did not involve the personnel of the 
new Judges, as it was generally recognized that they possessed the 
required ability to fill the places to which they had been appointed. 
It centered principally around the constitutional question as to the 
right of the Legislature to elect the Justices of the Supreme Court 
and bore more upon the importance of a permanent tenure of office 
of a Judge as a principle of government than upon the right of any 
particular men to hold places on the bench. Against the position 
that the new Constitution made an election of the Justices of the 
Supreme Court impossible, the advocates of the restoration of the old 
court urged that by providing that these offices should be elected once 
in two years by the Joint Assembly, the Constitution made that the duty 
of the incoming Legislature; and that when that had been discharged 
the vacancies which the Governor had sought to fill for a term of two 
years would no longer exist and the elected Judges would be the legal 
Judges for the term of their election. 
During the early days of the session bills were introduced pro- 
viding for the amendment of the law relating to the term of office 
of the Judges of both classes and making provision that the term of 
both should begin on the first day of February next after their elec- 
tion and continue for two years. The bill relating to the Superior 
Judges further provided that the term of the Judges then in office 
should end January 31, 1915. Both the proposed acts became laws on 
January 20, 1915, and took effect from their passage. No express 
provision relating to the end of the term of the Justices then in office 28 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
having been made in the new acts, the rights of an elected court under 
the circumstances depended upon the Constitution which declared that 
the court should be elected once in two years, and the amended law 
which changed the term so as to make it begin on February 1 and 
continue for two years. An honest difference of opinion existed as 
to what should be done under the circumstances. It was urged by 
some that to elect any but the Justices then in office would result in a 
duplication of courts and that this would involve litigants, as well 
as the courts, in uncertainty and trouble. In such a situation what 
court should decide the right of the matter—the old court or that 
created by the Legislature? The case seemed to require the Judges 
to determine by what right they held their own offices. This was not 
a pleasant situation. It was proposed that the Legislature, if it would 
act in the premises, should elect the present Justices and thus save all 
doubt. The solution of the question came in the resignation of all 
the Justices by the provisions of which their terms of office were to 
become vacant on the election of their successors. This act on their 
part led to the election of all the Judges by the Legislature. 
On the third Thursday after the assembling of the Legislature 
it met in joint assembly, according to the provisions of the statute 
then long in force, and proceeded to the election of the State officers, 
whose election by the Constitution and laws devolves upon the Legis- 
lature. The members of the old Supreme Court were all re-elected. 
Justice Munson was made Chief Justice, Justice Watson first Asso- 
ciate Justice, Justice Haselton second, Justice Powers third and Justice 
Taylor fourth. The old Superior Judges were likewise all re-elected. 
There was no contest in any instance. Thus was brought to a close 
one of the most exciting incidents in the history of the courts of 
Vermont. The result was due to the disposition of the people to follow 
long cherished traditions and customs. The election of the Judges had 
been a prerogative enjoyed by our legislators for more than a century. 
It was not easy to surrender such a privilege. Besides the people 
had come to regard a judgeship in the higher courts as a life office 
and did not look with favor upon a departure from this custom with- 
out a good and sufficient reason therefor. THE FEDERAL JUDGES 
SINCE the admission of the State into the Union in 1791 there have 
been but eight Judges of the Federal Court for the District of 
Vermont. The average tenure of these Judges has been a little 
more than sixteen years. Judge Paine served the longest term by 
rounding out a period of forty-two years, and Judge Chipman’s service 
was the shortest, he having resigned two years and a half after his 
appointment by President Washington. Judges Chipman, Paine, 
Prentiss and Wheeler were also Judges of the Vermont Supreme 
Court. Judge Chipman served in the State Court both before and 
after he resigned as a Federal Judge and Judges Paine, Prentiss and 
Wheeler before their appointment as Federal Judges. Judges Chip- 
man, Paine and Prentiss were also United States Senators. Judges 
Hitchcock, Smalley, Martin and Howe were selected from the ranks 
of the profession and had no judicial experience before their appoint- 
ment as District Judges. 
The statutes of the United States provide that Vermont shall 
constitute one judicial district to be known as the District of Vermont. 
Terms of the District Court shall be held at Burlington on the fourth 
Tuesday in February; at Windsor on the third Tuesday in May; at 
Rutland on the first Tuesday in October; and at Brattleboro on the 
third Tuesday in December. In each year one of the stated terms 
of the District Court may, when adjourned, be adjourned to meet at 
Montpelier, and one at Newport. A special term of any District Court 
may be held at the same place where any regular term is held, or 
at such other place in the district as the nature of the business may 
require, and at such time and upon such notice as may be ordered 
by the District Judge. Any business may be transacted at such special 
term which might be transacted at a regular term. 
The right of the District Judge to hold court outside of his dis- 
trict is also regulated by United States statute. This provides that 
when from the accumulation or urgency of business in any District 
Court, the public interests require the designation and appointment 
of a District Judge to sit outside of his district and the fact is made 
to appear to any of the Circuit Judges in which the district lies, or 
in the absence of all the Circuit Judges to the Circuit Justice of the 
circuit (who is one of the Justices of the United States Supreme 
Court) in which the district lies, such Circuit Judge or Justice may 
designate and appoint the Judge of any other district in the same 
circuit to have and exercise within the district first named the same 
powers that are vested in the Judge thereof. Each of the District 
Judges may, in case of such appointment, hold separately at the same 
time a District Court in such district, and discharge all the judicial 
duties of the District Judge therein. 30 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
NATHANIEL CHIPMAN 
1752-1843 
The first of the District Judges was Nathaniel Chipman of Tin- 
mouth, who served from March 4, 1791, to September 3, 1793. He 
was born at Salisbury, Conn., November 15, 1752, and died at Tin- 
mouth, February 15, 1843, at the age of ninety-one years. He was 
a graduate of Yale and a Lieutenant in the Revolutionary Army; he 
fought at Monmouth and endured the sufferings of Valley Forge. 
He studied law at Salisbury, Conn., and was admitted to the bar of 
that State in 1779. In April of that year he reached his father’s 
home in Tinmouth and began the practice of his profession. At the 
Superior Court held in Rutland in June, 1779, he was appointed as 
attorney at law and sworn and licensed to plead at the bar in the 
State court. He represented Tinmouth in the Legislature of 1784-85. 
He was elected Assistant Judge of the Superior Court in 1786 and 
was the first lawyer to be placed on the bench in Vermont. In 1791 
he was appointed, with Lewis R. Morris, commissioner to attend 
Congress and to negotiate for the admission of the State into the 
Union. Immediately afterwards President Washington appointed him 
as United States Judge for the District of Vermont, which position he 
resigned in 1793. In 1796 he was elected Chief Judge of the Supreme 
Court of Vermont and in 1797 United States Senator to succeed 
Isaac Tichenor, in which capacity he served for five years when he 
returned to Vermont, resumed practice and again represented Tin- 
mouth in the Legislature from 1806 to 1811. In 1813 he was elected 
one of the Council of Censors, a body chosen once in seven years to 
review the Constitution and recommend amendments. He was chosen 
Chief Judge again in 1813 and continued as such until 1815. In the 
latter year he was appointed professor of law of Middlebury Col- 
lege and held this place until his death. During this time he was 
president of the board of trustees of that institution. He outlived 
nearly one-half of his successors in the legal profession and spent 
the last ten years of his life in seclusion and study at his home in 
Tinmouth. His library was a wonder to the people of the neighbor- 
hood, and when it was produced for appraisal it measured exactly 
one cord. It was eight feet long, four feet wide and four feet high. 
Judge Chipman was one of the greatest of the early Vermonters. 
Four times he left the practice of the law to take a place on the bench. 
He rendered distinguished service as a legislator at Montpelier and 
Washington and was a writer of great force. Among his published 
works are his “Sketches of the Principles of Government” and a 
volume of “Reports and Dissertations.” The latter volume is made BENJAMIN F. FIFIELD 
Born in Orange, Yt., November 18, 1832. The fam- 
ily removed to Montpelier in a few years, where 
he prepared for college. He graduated from the Uni- 
versity of Vermont in 1855, studied law and was 
admitted to the bar in 1858. As a railroad and cor- 
poration lawyer he is said to have stood at the head 
of his profession in Vermont for many years. For 
thirty years he was counsel and confidential adviser 
of the Central Vermont Railroad and piloted that cor- 
poration through a long receivership and complicated 
litigation. It is said that during this period Mr. Fifield 
established the most important rules governing the 
practice in receivership cases which have been followed 
in this country since that time. He was appointed 
United States District Attorney in 1869 and held the 
office until 1880. He was elected a member of the 
Legislature in 1880 and was chairman of the House 
Judiciary Committee. A speech which he delivered in 
support of the Republican national ticket in 1880 was 
so effective that the National Committee circulated 
one million copies. He was a delegate to the Republi- 
can National Convention in 1884. In 1889 Governor 
Smith tendered him the appointment of United States 
Senator to succeed Justin S. Morrill, deceased, but he 
declined the honor. He served as a trustee of the Uni- 
versity of Vermont and from that institution he re- 
ceived the degree of LI.. D. He married Lucy Hub- 
bard of Montpelier, January 4, 1865. Three daughters 
were born to them. Mr. Fifield died July 23, 1918. THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
31 
up of cases decided by Judge Chipman and legal essays on the statute 
adopting the common law of England, the statute of offsets, on nego- 
tiable notes and the statute of conveyances. He was the author of 
the revision of the statutes published in 1797 and of a legal publica- 
tion entitled “Principles of Government, a Treatise of Free Institu- 
tions Including the Constitution of the United States.” As professor 
of law at Middlebury College he delivered a course of lectures which 
attracted favorable attention. During the nullification period he pub- 
lished a pamphlet against the Calhoun doctrine in which he exposed 
the fallacy of the great logician of the South. He was an early advo- 
cate of the Senate as a coordinate branch of the Legislature. He 
argued for the appointment of Judges during good behavior and pro- 
posed an amendment of the Constitution to this end in order to add 
to the independence of the judiciary. His reasons were set forth 
with his accustomed learning in a review of the constitutions and 
practice in all the States and a discussion of the history of the methods 
of other countries. His efforts for the creation of a Senate bore fruit, 
but we are still committed to the election of Judges at each session 
of the Legislature. His argument for life tenure was in accord with 
the best judgment of today and in harmony with the Federal law. 
that of several of the States and of Great Britain. In the days of 
Judge Chipman a judgeship was regarded as a political office and it was 
quite common for the party coming into power to change the bench 
so as to make it conform to the political faith of the dominant party. 
In later years a judgeship has come to be regarded as a life position 
and only once in the past fifty years has there been any variation 
from this rule when the Legislature has acted. The exception was 
in the case of Judge Barrett as will more fully appear in his sketch. 
It is true that the permanency of the judicial tenure was brought in 
question a few years ago when the Governor was called on to appoint 
the Judges and selected several new men in the places of those who 
were then serving, but the Legislature observed the time-honored 
rule by re-electing the old Judges. It can be said of the present sys- 
tem that it has usually worked well and there are not a few good men 
who deem it no misfortune that the question of the good conduct 
of our Judges is submitted at each session of the Legislature to the 
representatives of the people. 
Judge Chipman was eloquent as an advocate, and profound as 
a lawyer. As a Judge he was painstaking and thorough. He pre- 
sented a case fully to the jury, making a compact and lucid statement 
of the facts while giving his instructions on the law. He possessed 
a clear and discriminating mind. It was comprehensive and analytic. 
He was cautious in forming opinions, impartial in his judgments and 
positive and emphatic when he had arrived at a decision. 32 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
The last twenty-five years of his life were spent in practical 
retirement. He spent his time in rural pursuits, in books, in corre- 
spondence and in communion with congenial friends, and was regarded 
by his neighbors and professional brethren almost as a patriarch. 
SAMUEL HITCHCOCK 
1755-1813 
The second District Judge was Samuel Hitchcock of Burlington 
and Vergennes. He was born at Brimfield, Mass., March 23, 1755, 
and graduated at Harvard in 1777. He studied law at Brookfield, 
Mass., and was probably admitted to practice in Worcester. He was 
admitted to the bar in Bennington county in June, 1784, and was in 
practice in Manchester until about 1787, when he removed to Bur- 
lington where he practiced until his appointment as District Judge. 
He represented Burlington in the Legislature in 1789, 1790-91-92-93. 
He was a member of the Convention of Delegates of the People of 
the State of Vermont, held at Bennington in 1791, to ratify the Con- 
stitution of the United States, which had been submitted by an act 
of the Vermont Legislature, passed in October, 1790. He is credited 
with being the author of the charter of the University of Vermont. 
He was one of the first trustees of that institution and continued as 
a trustee the remainder of his life. He was appointed the first State’s 
Attorney of Chittenden county and served as such from 1787 to 1790. 
He was elected Attorney General of Vermont under the act of 1790. 
He was Presidential Elector in the second presidential election and 
voted for Washington and Adams. As one of the committee of 
revision of our statutes he assisted in the compilation of 1797. His 
appointment as District Judge came through President John Adams, 
September 3, 1793, and he continued to hold the office until the 
judiciary act was repealed in 1801. The first marriage recorded in 
Burlington is that of Judge Hitchcock to Lucy Caroline Allen, May 
26, 1789. She was the second daughter of Ethan Allen. For a half 
dozen years after his marriage he remained in Burlington, then moved 
to Vergennes, where he resided until 1806, when he returned to Bur- 
lington, where he died November 30, 1813. 
ELIJAH PAINE 
1757-1842 
The third of the Federal Judges was Elijah Paine of Williams- 
town, who was born at Brooklyn, N. Y., January 21, 1757; studied 
at Harvard for a few months, entered the Revolutionary Army and 
afterwards returned to college where he graduated in 1781. After THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
33 
studying law he came to Vermont and located at Windsor. Some 
time later he left the latter place, located in Williamstown and 
began the settlement in the midst of a wilderness. Here he estab- 
lished a mill for the manufacture of broadcloth which employed two 
hundred workmen. He erected the first saw and grist mill in the 
vicinity and built a turnpike from Brookfield to Montpelier at an 
expense of $10,000, which he presented to the State. At one time 
he was the owner of fifteen thousand Merino sheep, together with 
many high-grade horses, cattle and swine. In 1786 he was a member 
of the convention to revise the State Constitution. He represented 
Williamstown in the Legislature from 1787 to 1791 and was a Judge 
of the Superior Court after its organization until 1794, when he was 
elected United States Senator to succed Stephen R. Bradley. He 
declined a second election because of his appointment as District 
Judge, March 3, 1801. This was the last day of the administration 
of President John Adams and the appointment was one of a group 
which was called by the political opponents of the President, the 
‘‘Midnight Judges.” This was due to the fact that the appointments 
were made and confirmed a few hours before the expiration of the 
President’s term of office. This place he held for over forty years, 
and until a few weeks of his death, April 21, 1842. The University 
of Vermont and Harvard University each conferred on him the degree 
of Doctor of Laws. At the latter institution he delivered the first 
oration before the Phi Beta Kappa Society and was elected its pres- 
ident in 1789. He was a member of several learned societies for the 
advancement of the arts and sciences. He had four sons, Martin, 
an eminent physician; Elijah, a Judge of the Supreme Court of New 
York; George, a prominent lawyer; and Charles, who was Governor 
of Vermont 1841-43. 
Judge Paine was a remarkable man. It is not possible to learn 
much of him as a lawyer, although it is apparent that he had the 
requisite knowledge for the discharge of his judicial duties and that 
he applied his great business talent to the dispatch of the duties of 
his office. His appointment was said to have been a most admirable 
one. He gave strength and honor to his position and performed 
its duties with notable enlightenment. He was, with Tichenor, Brad- 
ley, Chipman and Ira Allen, one of the commissioners to settle and 
close the controversy between Vermont and New York. He was on 
terms of personal friendship with Washington and on the visit of 
Lafayette to Vermont was selected as the most fitting person to deliver 
the address of welcome. He was interested in many movements for 
the betterment of society and in close touch with the best minds of 
the day. He was one of the most versatile men of his time, an exem- 
plary Christian and a constant church attendant. He had no idle 
moments. In this lay his secret of success. Whenever there was an 34 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
intermission of labor he was at work with pencil and paper. His 
mind was so trained that he could deal thoroughly and systematically 
with one subject after another as they came before him, whether 
this subject was law, agriculture or mechanics. He was sure to come 
out superior to difficulty in every department of his labors. Punc- 
tuality was a religion with him. He routed out his hostler from his 
sleep and drove to a townsman’s house to pay a debt before mid- 
night because he had promised to pay that day. He rode forty miles 
and back, traveling all night, to make a loan, in order to fulfil an 
obligation on the next day. He is described as a “tall, well-propor- 
tioned gentleman, dressed in the style of George Washington, of a 
grave countenance and dignified bearing, scornful to none but affable 
to all, of commanding personal appearance, a well-proportioned frame 
of six feet in height, with a physiognomy of the Roman cast and a 
corresponding vigor of mind. Though sternly dignified he was as 
gentle as a woman and was loved and venerated by his children.” 
SAMUEL PRENTISS 
1782-1857 
Samuel Prentiss of Montpelier was the fourth District Judge. 
He served from April 8, 1842, to February 3, 1857. Judge Prentiss 
was born at Stonington, Conn., March 31, 1782, and died at Mont- 
pelier, January 15, 1857. His boyhood was passed at Northfield. 
Mass., where he acquired a common school education and afterwards 
studied law at that place and at Brattleboro in the office of John W. 
Blake, and was admitted to the bar in Windham county in 1802. A 
year afterwards he opened an office in Montpelier, which was his 
home during the rest of his life. In 1822 he was elected a Judge of 
the Supreme Court, but declined the position on account of the in- 
adequacy of the salary and the demands of his growing family. He 
represented Montpelier in the Legislature in 1824-25 and was the 
originator of the act in the latter year which made an important 
change in the courts. Until that time the three Judges of the County 
Court were not as a rule lawyers. This system was so changed that 
the Chief Judge of the County Court should be one of the Judges 
of the Supreme Court. When the act went into effect he was again 
elected Judge and this time accepted, holding until 1829, when he 
was made chief. This place he held for but one year, for in 1830 
he was elected United States Senator and re-elected in 1836, but 
resigned in 1842 upon being appointed District Judge, a position which 
he adorned until his decease. 
Judge Prentiss. was the greatest lawyer among the Vermont 
Federal Judges. He lacked, it is true, a college education and had no THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
35 
early training except such as he acquired in the common schools and 
under a private tutor, but he supplemented this slender foundation 
with extensive study and reading both in and out of the law and 
acquired an equipment such as few men have. He was by nature a 
student and he looked upon the law as a science, not as a genteel 
trade. Before coming to the bench of the State he had acquired a 
leadership at the bar and his services had been in demand in many 
of the counties of the State as an attorney. His experience as a 
Judge and as Chief Judge of the Supreme Court further equipped 
him for judicial service and to this was added such knowledge and 
discipline as came to him as United States Senator. He was born the 
same year as Daniel Webster and was elected to the Senate in 1830— 
the year that Webster made his immortal reply to Hayne. Webster, 
Clay, Calhoun and Benton were his associates in this body and he 
shared with the two former the Whig leadership in the Senate. Both 
these great men regarded Judge Prentiss as the best lawyer in the 
Senate. He made here a notable speech on the bankruptcy bill of 
1840, which Calhoun declared to be the clearest and most unanswerable 
argument on a debatable question which he had heard for years. He 
introduced the bill to suppress duelling in the District of Columbia, 
and offered the resolutions of the State Legislature for the abolition 
of slavery in the District of Columbia and against the annexation 
of Texas. Several of his speeches on different subjects went into the 
reading books as American classics and are fine examples of eloquence 
and logic. As a lawyer he was profoundly learned and this learning 
extended to the Roman law as well as the common law. Chancellor 
Kent said of him that he could not help regarding him as the best 
jurist in New England. This was a very high compliment, coming 
as it did from such a source and at a time when Justice Story was in 
the height of his judicial fame. His penetrating judgment, his power 
of analysis, his habit of sifting and of classification, together with 
his faculty of luminous statement and his resolute unrightness, com- 
bined to render him a model Judge. It is said that none of his deci- 
sions while on the Supreme Court bench have been overruled. There 
is reason for believing that Judge Prentiss could have had a seat on 
the Supreme Court of the United States, but preferred the Vermont 
judgeship because his duties were so near home. He used to sit 
with Justice Nelson of that court when the latter came to Vermont 
to hold Circuit Court, as was the custom of that day, Judge Nelson 
being assigned to this circuit. It is of great interest that Judge Nelson 
came to Vermont to procure his collegiate education. He graduated 
at Middlebury College in 1813. He was born at Hebron, N. Y., 
and was admitted to the bar of that State in 1817. He was early 
appointed to a judicial office and became Chief Justice of the Su- 
preme Court of New York. In 1845 he was appointed to the 36 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
Supreme Bench of the United States and held this place until his 
resignation in 1872, at the age of eighty, his judicial career hav- 
ing covered nearly half a century—a service without a parellel 
in the history of jurisprudence. Mr. Phelps, who was the greatest 
biographer of the bar we have ever had, says that for the daily admin- 
istration of human justice, year in and out, in great matters and small, 
if there ever was a better court he did not know where it sat than that 
presided over by these Judges. His vivid picture of the two men is 
most interesting. He says they were entirely unlike. Judge Nelson 
was not a great lawyer, but a good one. He had a large judicial 
experience, natural judicial qualities, great practical sagacity, a strong 
sense of justice, and the moral courage of a lion. He was a great 
presiding magistrate, one of the best that sat upon the bench in his 
day, not because he was a great lawyer, but because he was a great 
magistrate and had sway over the proceedings of the court for good; 
there was a moral power and dignity about it that was salutary not 
only on the business before the court, but upon the individuals who 
were in attendance. In this court Nelson carried the sword and 
Prentiss the scales, scales that hung upon a diamond pivot, fit to 
weigh the tenth part of a hair. When he held up the scales he not 
only weighed accurately, but everybody saw that he weighed accu- 
rately. But modesty, distrust of himself, fear lest he should go too 
far or fast retarded his judicial convictions. Nelson always took care 
to assure himself from Judge Prentiss that he was right, then the 
sword in his hand became “the sword of the Lord and of Gideon,” 
and when a decision was reached it was put in force without delay 
or debate or recall, and so it was that the court became like the 
shadow of a great rock in a weary land. It was a terror to the evil 
doer and a prompt protection to the just. It was difficult to bring 
Judge Prentiss to a decision without the assistance of Judge Nelson, 
and this element in his nature, his modesty, kept Judge Prentiss from 
going to New York to attend to the Federal matters there that have 
usually received the attention of the Vermont Federal Judges. In 
this he did himself injustice. He was often urged to go, but his 
extreme modesty kept him from so doing. He was a man of rare 
and fine powers, of complete attainments in jurisprudence, a student 
and thinker, conservative in all his opinions, conscientious to the last 
degree, thoughtful of others, a Christian gentleman in the largest 
sense, whose life was spent in the careful discharge of duty without 
thought of self. 
Judge Prentiss married in 1804 Lucretia Houghton of Northfield, 
a woman of unusual powers of mind and strength of character, who 
bore most of the family cares during the Judge’s busy life. She had 
twelve children, of whom ten were boys, and all who lived to reach 
manhood became lawyers. THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
37 
DAVID A. SMALLEY 
1809-1877 
David A. Smalley of Burlington, fifth United States District 
Judge for Vermont, was born at Middlebury, November 6, 1809. He 
died at Burlington, March 10, 1877. His father was Zara Smalley, 
who moved to St. Albans from Middlebury while the son was a child. 
At the former place Judge Smalley acquired his education in the 
common schools and at the academy. Choosing the law as a pro- 
fession he entered the office of Smalley and Adams at St. Albans 
as a student and was admitted to the bar in that county in April, 1831. 
Benjamin H. Smalley, the senior member of the firm, was his uncle. 
From 1832 to 1836 Judge Smalley practiced in Jericho and at the 
same time discharged the duties of Postmaster at that place. In the 
latter year he moved to Lowell, Mass., but remained but a few months 
when he returned to Burlington, which became his permanent home. 
He was successful in his practice and soon won a position of leader- 
ship at the bar. He likewise became greatly interested in politics and 
like Stephen A. Douglas was an ardent follower of General Jackson. 
In 1842 he was elected a Senator from Chittenden county; in 1844 
was admitted as a practitioner in the United States Supreme Court: 
in 1847 was made chairman of the State Democratic Committee, and 
attended the National Democratic Conventions of 1844, 1848, 1852 
and 1856. In the latter convention he was made a member of the 
national committee and by it was chosen as chairman. He was a 
friend of Stephen A. Douglas and of President Franklin Pierce. The 
latter tendered him the appointments of Minister to Spain, Russia 
and Austria, and the Solicitorship of the Treasury, successively, all 
of which were declined for the reason that he did not care to give 
up his large and lucrative law practice said to have been the largest 
in the State. He was one of the originators of the Rutland and Bur- 
lington Railroad Company, also a director and legal counsellor. From 
1856 to 1863 he owned all its stock and controlled the corporation. 
He was Collector of Customs from 1853 to 1857. In 1856 his re- 
markable powers of organization were employed in behalf of the 
election of James Buchanan to the presidency. The result was due 
in no small measure to Judge Smalley’s sagacity and zeal. In Jan- 
uary, 1857, he accepted the office of District Judge, which he held 
until 1877, when he was succeeded by Judge Hoyt H. Wheeler, he 
having tendered his resignation in February of that year to take effect 
from the appointment of his successor. A paralytic stroke impaired 
his physical powers in July, 1874. In consequence of this affliction 
Congress passed an act in February, 1875, authorizing him to retire 
from labor and continuing his salary. Partial restoration to health 38 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
induced him to decline the proffered privilege. Judge Smalley took 
strong ground in favor of the Constitution and against those who 
were illegally dealing in slaves and those who had levied war against 
the Government. The patriotic position which he took in both classes 
of cases in his charges to the grand juries in New York, coming as 
they did from a pronounced and eminent Democratic Judge, gave 
him great influence and the effect was immediate and decided. After 
Fort Sumter was fired on he had occasion to define to a grand jury 
in New York what constituted treason and he did it in such emphatic 
and positive terms that the effect was electric. It crystalized the 
chaotic sentiments of Unionists into definite and solid opinions and 
evidenced the fact that partisan distinctions were swept away in the 
presence of danger to the Union. Coming from a jurist of his po- 
litical antecedents it had the greater force. Lincoln warmly thanked 
him for his action and congratulated the country that in such a fearful 
crisis it was blessed with so fearless and independent a Judge, and 
the Northern press of both political parties generally commended the 
charge. 
HOYT H. WHEELER 
1833-1906 
The sixth appointee to the office of District Judge was Hoyt H. 
Wheeler of Jamaica and Brattleboro. He was born at Chesterfield, 
N. H., August 30, 1833, and died at Brattleboro, November 19, 1906. 
Judge Wheeler was one of the great Judges and he combined 
the learning of Prentiss with the practical wisdom of Paine. His 
education was obtained in the common schools of Chesterfield, at 
Chesterfield Academy and in select schools in Williamsville. Several 
of the earlier Judges from Windham county were college graduates, 
but beginning with Judge Wheeler none of the men of Windham 
county birth, or residence when called to the bench, were graduates 
of higher institutions of learning and but one of these attended col- 
lege at all. There are ten in the list, including Judge Wheeler. The 
others are Judge Tyler, Judge Waterman, Justice Watson, Judge But- 
ler, Judge Robb, Judge Orion M. Barber, Judge Martin, Judge Fish and 
Judge Chase. The most that can be said about this rather remarkable 
coincidence is that it happened so, and why it happened so is explain- 
able on the theory that these men came from the humble walks of 
life and were not very near any collegiate institution. It is no argu- 
ment against a college education. Indeed such of the Judges as had 
children were prompt to send them to college as soon as they were 
fitted to enter. Judge Wheeler had no children. When Judge Wheeler HOYT H. WHEELER 
Born in Chesterfield, N. H., August 30, 1833. He 
was educated in common and select schools and at 
Chesterfield Academy. At the age of sixteen he re- 
moved to Newfane, Vt., where he taught school and 
studied law. He was admitted to the bar in 1859 and 
formed a law partnership in the town of Jamaica. 
Here he built up a large practice. In 1867 he was 
elected to the Legislature to represent Jamaica and in 
1879 he was chosen State Senator. During that year 
he was elected to the Supreme Court bench, a position 
which he held until 1877, when President Hayes ap- 
pointed him Judge of the United States Court for the 
District of Vermont. In his later years he resided in 
Brattleboro. He received the honorary degree of 
LL. D. from the University of Vermont. He was in- 
terested in antiquarian and historical subjects. Judge 
Wheeler died November 19, 1906. THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
39 
was sixteen years of age his parents moved to Newfane and took up 
their residence on a farm which his father purchased on Newfane 
Hill. This was near where the old village was located which was the 
county seat from 1790 until 1825, with court house, jail and whipping 
post. The county buildings were removed to Fayetteville, now New- 
fane, in the valley below in the latter year. Judge Wheeler taught 
several terms of district schools in Vermont and in New Hampshire 
and was for a time preceptor of the Chesterfield Academy. In 1855 
he commenced the study of law in the office of Charles K. Field at 
Williamsville in the town of Newfane, and completed his studies with 
Bradley and Kellogg at Brattleboro. His tutors quickened in their 
student a love of the law and he developed rapidly under their in- 
struction and soon gave more than ordinary promise. His awakening 
was a surprise to himself no less than to his friends. He once told me 
that when he commenced to study law he did not expect to become 
anything more than a very ordinary lawyer. He was admitted to the 
bar at Newfane at the September term, 1859. He remained until 
December, 1859, with Bradley and Kellogg and then formed a part- 
nership with John E. Butler of Jamaica which lasted until the death 
of Mr. Butler in May, 1867. After the death of Mr. Butler, Judge 
Wheeler formed a partnership with Lavant M. Read, which lasted 
until the election of Judge Wheeler to the Supreme Court bench at 
the October session of the Legislature in 1869. Two years before 
he had been elected to the House as the Representative from Jamaica 
and was at the time of his election to the bench one of the Senators 
from Windham county. During his practice he had acquired a large 
clientage and on his retirement to take up the duties of a Judge he 
had twenty-five cases on the Supreme Court docket for trial at the 
February term, 1870. His appointment to the Federal bench was 
made on March 16, 1877, and he resigned as a Judge of the Supreme 
Court on March 31, 1877. Judge Wheeler could have had a place 
in the United States Circuit Court in 1891 if he had been willing to 
indicate that he would accept it if tendered to him, but this he de- 
clined to do and reserved the right to decide if the place was tendered 
to him. The situation from a political standpoint was such that this 
attitude was inconsistent with party purposes and the place was given 
to another. As a Judge of the Federal Court he attended to all the 
business of both the District and Circuit Courts in this district after 
the first two or three years. He was frequently called to New York 
and other places in the circuit under the provisions of the Federal 
statute for some months each year. He sat with the United States 
Court of Appeals, presided at jury trials, heard court and equity 
cases, including numerous patent cases, some of which attracted wide 
public attention. Some of the most eminent patent lawyers in the 
country were employed in these cases, but Judge Wheeler had a happy 40 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
faculty of simplifying such cases and of bringing the whole matter 
down to a practical basis for disposition. 
Judge Wheeler was an ideal Judge. When he came to the bench 
there was but one lawyer in Windham county who was considered 
his equal at the bar and that was Mr. Davenport. The latter ranked 
among the greatest of Vermont lawyers in his ability to present his 
case before the court or jury, but his viewpoint of the law and that 
of Judge Wheeler were quite different. It was said of Mr. Daven- 
port that he was not a great student of the law, but relied upon his 
powerful presentation of his case. It was not so with Judge Wheeler; 
the law to him was a science and its principles and precedents were 
a religion with him. This is not saying that he ever gave up any- 
thing that the skill of an artful pleader could defend. In this de- 
partment of the law—pleading—he was the acknowledged leader of the 
bar. His early lessons from Mr. Bradley, an accomplished pleader 
and a great lawyer, had been in this direction and he had learned 
even to “better his instruction.” So he was sure to put on paper his 
own claims of his clients’ rights in accurate and comprehensive terms 
well understood in the law and to answer the claims of the other side 
with equal skill and effect. If this called for the most technical of 
pleading, this he was equal to, and he could draw a plea in abate- 
ment that even Judge Barrett, the most subtle of the old Judges, 
could not “drive a chariot and four” through. He was not eloquent 
like Mr. Davenport, he lacked his majestic stride in the court room, 
his magnetic voice, and it should be said, his rather domineering 
manner, but in a quieter way he took care of his clients’ rights, argued 
his points forcefully and logically, with the light of many homely 
practical illustrations, kept always within the evidence and spoke 
convincingly to the point. The result was that he got his share of 
the verdicts and drew many clients about him. His temperament 
was always judicial and his elevation to the bench a natural result 
of events. He was equally at home whether presiding at nisi prius, 
sitting with the Supreme Court or writing opinions. He was happily 
unlike some of the other Judges of his day in his tempermental adapta- 
tion to the work. It was his to be calm, patient, thoughtful, kindly, 
attributes that not all Judges possess. 
It created a little surprise in political circles when President 
Hayes appointed Judge Wheeler to the Federal bench. The appoint- 
ment had not been sought and it was as much a surprise to the Judge 
as to the public. It was not unnatural that the choice should have 
fallen to him, for in learning, experience and temperament he an- 
swered every requirement. There was a further reason why, from 
a personal point of view, he should have been the appointee. Presi- 
dent Hayes had an uncle living at Newfane, Austin Birchard, whom 
he had visited at times and had thus come to know Windham county CHARLES A. PROUTY 
Born in Newport, Vt., October 9, 1853. 
He was educated in the public schools at St. 
Johnsbury Academy, and graduated from Dartmouth 
College at the head of the class of 1875. He excelled 
in mathematics and astronomy and after graduation 
secured a situation as assistant to Prof. S. P. Langley 
in the Alleghany Observatory. As the confinement of 
the work impaired his health, he returned to Newport, 
studied law and was admitted to the bar in 1877. He 
was State’s Attorney of Orleans county for two terms 
and in 1888 represented Newport in the Legislature. 
He was a delegate to the Republican National Con- 
vention of 1896. As attorney for the Central Vermont 
Railway and general counsel for the Rutland Railroad, 
he became thoroughly familiar with railroad manage- 
ment. In 1896 he was appointed to succeed Judge 
W. G. Veazey as a member of the Interstate Commerce 
Commission. In this capacity he served many years 
and won a national reputation. Later he was made 
director of the valuation of railways. He was twice a 
candidate for United States Senator. He was owner 
of the Newport Electric Light Company and president 
of the Orleans Trust Company and the Bradford Elec- 
tric Light Company. He married Abbie Davis of 
Lyndonville in 1877. Two sons, Ward and John A. 
Prouty, were born to them. Mr. Prouty died July 8, 
1921. THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
41 
and to have an interest in it and in New fane. This was the place 
to which Judge Wheeler had come when a boy, where he had gone 
to school, taught school, studied law, practiced before the County and 
Supreme Court, and presided as Judge. He had, moreover, a sister 
who lived here to whom he paid frequent visits, and he was almost 
regarded as a Newfane man. It was said, too, at the time that Senator 
Edmunds had a high opinion of Judge Wheeler and favored his ap- 
pointment. It would seem as though this must have been the case 
or he would not have been appointed. 
As District Judge he had a long and honorable career. He was 
esteemed in Vermont as few men have been, and he enjoyed the con- 
fidence and respect of the bar of New York. He was an admirable 
magistrate when presiding in jury trials. His charges were brief and 
to the point, plain and in harmony with the understanding of the 
jury, and without making it to appear to those who looked on, he 
was all the time directing the case with a strong, firm hand toward a 
right conclusion. His written opinions and decisions were concise, 
strong, profound. He used fewer words than most lawyers use 
because he was more fortunate than most men in the use of language. 
He thought, too, with more readiness than most others and acquired 
and retained knowledge with wonderful ease. He told me that he 
saw things in pictures. These were so photographed on his mind 
that their reproduction was simple. Sometimes when the jury wanted 
to know the evidence and no stenographer had been present to take 
down the testimony the Judge would recite it to the jury as it had 
been given by the witnesses, taking them up in their order and telling 
just what each one had said. For his own use he did not care to 
have the cases reported, and in jury trials did not rely much on a 
stenographer. Late in life I heard him testify in a land case. He 
was an admirable surveyor and had run around the piece of land in 
question and was called as a witness. He had no notes before him and 
referred to no data. He stated the variations in the magnetic needle 
from the time of a former survey and beginning at a given place he 
gave from memory all the distances and angles to the end of all the 
courses. He made it a business to keep up with such Federal opinions 
as bore upon his own work by careful examination of them when they 
came out, and relied upon his memory of them when he had occasion 
to refer to them in making rulings. He could cite the case, the volume 
in which it could be found and give from memory the principles in- 
volved. Although as a lawyer he was technical and close, claiming 
every advantage the law gave his client, yet when he became a Judge 
he cast aside all technicalities and ignored what he had considered 
permissible as impediments or obstacles in the progress of the law 
when in practice. 42 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
Judge Wheeler was an antiquarian of considerable note, and the 
acknowledged authority on local historical matters. He was the best 
posted of anyone in his part of the State about the men who had 
lived there in the olden time. He wrote not a few articles for the 
press, but usually modestly refrained from using his name in con- 
nection with his writings. Some of his work can be found, for- 
tunately, among the proceedings of the Bar Association. One of his 
articles is on the early courts of Vermont and another on William C. 
Bradley. 
The University of Vermont conferred on him the honorary degree 
of Doctor of Laws. He moved from Jamaica to Brattleboro soon 
after his appointment as District Judge and resided there the rest 
of his life. He took an active part in public affairs and contributed 
his share to public objects. He was a regular attendant upon church 
worship and stood for all that was good in his community. He was 
happily married to a lady of fine mind and many accomplishments 
who preceded him to the grave. The tribute which he caused to be 
carved upon enduring stone over her grave is characteristic. These 
simple words tell the story of her life: “Beautifully she lived.” 
Judge Wheeler was a large, finely-proportioned man, about six 
feet tall, square shouldered and erect, dignified and deliberate in every- 
thing he did. These attributes were present at all times whether he 
was on or off the bench. Nothing could change his demeanor in this 
regard. He was the picture of health, and perfect habits accompanied 
with a constitution such as was his, seemed to assure very long life. 
He had seen, as he told me, six generations of his own family by 
going back as he did to his great-grandmother, who remembered the 
events of the American Revolution, and whom the Judge as a child 
remembered, and coming down through his sister’s family to the third 
generation, and said he expected to see the seventh generation. The 
great ages to which most of his ancestors had lived justified such a 
conclusion, and no doubt after carefully considering all this data he 
confidently relied on a goodly number of years to be set apart for 
“reflection and repose” at the close of his judicial labors, such years 
as William C. Bradley had looked forward to and enjoyed as Judge 
Wheeler tells us in his sketch of the “Great Commoner.” But fol- 
lowing the death of his wife in 1904 symptoms of Bright’s disease 
developed, from which he died two years later. He had previously 
resigned his office. JAMES L. MARTIN 
Born in Landgrove, September 13, 1846. He studied 
in South Londonderry and Marlow (N. H.) Academies, 
taught school, studied law in the office of Hoyt H. 
Wheeler and in the Albany (N. Y.) Law School, gradu- 
ating from that institution in 1869. He practiced law 
in Londonderry until 1882, when he removed to Brat- 
tleboro. From 1874 to 1884 he represented London- 
derry in the Legislature and for six years he was 
Speaker of the House. In 1892 he represented Brat- 
tleboro in the General Assembly. In 1896 President 
McKinley appointed him United States’ Attorney for 
the District of Vermont, and he was reappointed in 
1902 and 1906. In the last-named year he was ap- 
pointed United States’ District Judge to succeed Hon. 
Hoyt H. Wheeler. He presided at New York in the 
sugar fraud and Danbury hatters’ cases. In 1869 he 
married Delia E. Howard, who died in 1881. In 1884 
he married Jessie L. Dewey of Montpelier, and three 
daughters were born to them: Margaret S., Helen R., 
and Katherine G. Martin. He was a director of the 
Vermont Mutual Fire Insurance Company and the 
National Life Insurance Company. He died January 
14, 191.5. THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
43 
JAMES L. MARTIN 
1846-1915 
James L. Martin of Brattleboro, from October 13, 1906 until his 
death, January 14, 1915, was the seventh Federal Judge. He was 
born at Landgrove in Bennington county, September 13, 1846, and 
was educated in the public schools and in the South Londonderry 
Academy and Marlow Academy (N. H.), where he afterwards taught. 
He also taught in the public schools of Londonderry and Winhall; 
he studied law in the office of Judge Hoyt H. Wheeler at Jamaica 
and graduated from the Albany Law School in 1869. He was ad- 
mitted to the Bennington county bar in June of that year and practiced 
in Londonderry from the time of his admission until 1882, when 
he moved to Brattleboro where he was at first a partner of Jonathan 
G. Eddy and afterwards of Judge Eleazer L. Waterman and for a 
time of Judge Waterman and George B. Hitt. He continued practice 
until he was appointed Judge to succeed Judge Wheeler. In 1874 
he was the representative of Londonderry in the Legislature and for 
ten years thereafter he continued to hold that office and during the 
last six years of the time was Speaker of the House. In 1892 he 
represented Brattleboro in the same body, declining to be a candidate 
for Speaker but serving as chairman of the Judiciary Committee. In 
1898 he was appointed by President McKinley United States District 
Attorney for Vermont and was re-appointed by President Roosevelt 
in 1902 and again in 1906; he was holding this position when he was 
appointed to the bench. Judge Martin presided at many important 
trials, among them being the sugar cases. The trial of these cases 
involved questions of fraud which were hotly contested and the trials 
were of long duration; they focused national attention upon Judge 
Martin; convictions were secured against all but one of the respond- 
ents, of whom there were many, and all the convictions were sustained 
on appeal because of the fairness and ability shown by Judge Martin 
in the trial of the causes. He presided at many other important trials 
in New York, where much of his work as Judge was performed; he 
also tried the celebrated Danbury Hatters case at Hartford (Conn.), 
where damages of two hundred and fifty thousand dollars were 
awarded by a jury under the anti-trust act of 1890 in a suit charging 
conspiracy in restraint of trade. This case was afterwards fully sus- 
tained by the United States Supreme Court. The work of Judge 
Martin in New York gave him a high standing as a trial Judge 
throughout the country. He died suddenly while on his way to take 
a train at Montpelier. 
If Judge Martin was not a great lawyer he was a good one and 
he lived a life of great usefulness both before and after he came 44 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
to the bench. He and Judge Wheeler were opposites in almost every 
way, but the elder man came to admire the younger one in the rela- 
tions which they bore to each other as Judge and United States Dis- 
trict Attorney and Judge Wheeler was glad to see Mr. Martin ap- 
pointed as his successor. It was felt at the time by those that did 
not know Mr. Martin intimately that the appointment was a mistake, 
as it was feared that he lacked the judicial temperament and the 
profound knowledge of the law that the place required. But his dis- 
charge of the duties of his office convinced everyone that these objec- 
tions were not well taken and the profession mourned the loss of a 
good Judge no less than a good citizen and friend when he was sud- 
denly taken from among them. 
Judge Martin did not have many early advantages. Had he 
enjoyed the culture and environment which are the part of the early 
experience of some men he might have had a very distinguished career. 
As it was he always acquitted himself well and he enjoyed a measure 
of success that falls to but few. He was not what would be called 
a studious lawyer; he lacked the disposition to search for the law 
for the law’s sake but rather looked for authorities and cases that 
bore on the case at hand. His intuitions were remarkable and his 
mental alertness very uncommon. He could see the point sooner 
than others and could state it in fewer words. He had great gifts 
as a public speaker and this talent brought him rapidly to the front 
as a young man. His arguments to the jury were persuasive and 
convincing and he was very sure to win his case if he was on the 
right side and very apt to do so if he was on the wrong side if he 
had an opponent who had bungled his case in putting it in or in 
arguing it. He knew human nature thoroughly and sympathetically 
and was certain to know the human side of every case and how 
it would appeal to the jury—a gift that the successful trial lawyer 
must have. He was a rare Speaker of the House. It was a 
fine tribute to him that he should have been called so many times to 
represent his town in that body and a great compliment that he should 
have been so many times its Speaker. Here his mental quickness and 
his knowledge of men made him an ideal presiding officer, and his 
dispatch of the business of the office saved the State many a dollar, 
for he had a way of moving the business along with fewer words 
and with more rapidity than anyone who has sat in the Speaker’s 
chair. 
When Judge Martin moved to Brattleboro he was not very well 
known among those who were in need of a lawyer there and did 
not acquire a large practice until after he had been there a few years. 
The firm of Waterman & Martin, and the firm of Waterman, Martin 
& Hitt became the leading one in Windham county and a very large 
business came to the office. In this Judge Martin did his share and THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
45 
was specially active in the work in County Court. His appointment 
as United States District Attorney came because President McKinley 
personally desired it, and he discharged its duties with fidelity and 
ability. As a Judge he took up the work of his new place on the 
human side and made his court a comfortable tribunal in which men 
could work and justice be administered; he presided naturally, fairly, 
ably. Counsel liked to try cases before him for they knew they would 
receive fair treatment. 
HARLAND B. HOWE 
1873- 
Harland Bradley Howe of Burlington, eighth Federal Judge, son of 
Worcester C. and Rosaline (Bradley) Howe, was born on a farm in St. 
Johnsbury, Vt., February 19, 1873. In 1886 his father, who was a har- 
ness maker by trade, moved from the farm to Lyndonville and opened a 
harness shop. Judge Howe attended the graded schools and learned 
the harness makers’ trade of his father, and later took a commercial 
course at Lyndon Institute. At his mother’s earnest solicitation he 
commenced reading law with George W. Cahoon of Lyndon. In 
October, 1891, he entered the law department of the University of 
Michigan and remained there one year, but, being out of funds, he 
could not return to the University the next year, and entered the office 
of Henry C. Ide of St. Johnsbury, as an assistant, where he earned 
money enough that year to return to the University in October, 1893, 
completing the course and graduating in 1894 with the degree of 
LL. B., having paid all of his expenses at the University from his 
own earnings as a harness maker, buying and selling eggs, and run- 
ning a collection agency. He was admitted to the Vermont bar in 
October, 1894, and commenced practice in St. Johnsbury on the first 
of November following. 
He is a Democrat, represented St. Johnsbury in the Legislature 
in 1908, and was the Democratic candidate for Governor in 1912 and 
again in 1914. On the 19th of February, 1915, he was appointed 
United States District Judge for Vermont. 
In 1900 he married Maybelle Jane Kelsey of St. Johnsbury, who 
died at St. Johnsbury. There are four daughters, Josephine, Barbara, 
Matilda and Harriet. 
When the conspiracy case of the United States of America vs. 
The Hamburg-American Line and others was ready for trial in the 
United States District Court for the Southern District of New York 
Judge Howe was called suddenly to preside. This was the case where 
the German steamship line and certain Germans were charged with 46 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
obtaining clearance papers by false manifests. These clearances were 
obtained for vessels chartered to carry coal and other articles to the 
German war vessels on the high seas. The question was one of fraud. 
The trial attracted international attention. Counsel on both sides 
had spent months in preparation and no less than two hundred and 
twenty-nine requests to charge were made in behalf of the respondents. 
Judge Howe tried the case with marked ability, and his conduct of 
the trial was the subject of much favorable comment by the city press. 
All the respondents were convicted. 
During the World War Judge Howe presided in several cases 
where ministers of the Gospel who were pacifists were respondents. 
Where convictions were obtained in these cases he imposed long 
sentences, but he was among the first when the war was over to ask 
for the pardon of the men. THE JUDGES OF THE SUPREME AND OTHER STATE 
COURTS 
MOSES ROBINSON 
1741-1813 
THE first of the Vermont Judges of the higher courts was Moses 
Robinson of Bennington. He was technically a Judge of the 
Superior Court as were also John Shepardson, John Fassett, 
Jr., Thomas Chandler, Jr., John Throop, Paul Spooner, Increase 
Moseley, Elisha Payne and Jonas Fay. But from 1778 to 1782 the 
Superior Court, so called by the Legislature, was in fact the Supreme 
Court of the State and the Judges named were Supreme Court Judges. 
This is at least regarded as the better classification, and it will be 
followed in this chapter. On the organization of the Superior Court 
in 1778 Moses Robinson was elected the Chief Judge. He was born 
at Hardwick, Mass., March 26, 1741, and died at Bennington, May 
26, 1813. He continued as Chief Judge of the Superior Court until 
1782, when the Supreme Court being established he was elected Chief 
Judge of that court. He was not elected in 1784, but was re-elected 
in 1785 and continued to hold the position of Chief Judge until 1789, 
when he was elected Governor. He was in the secret of the Haldi- 
mand negotiations and was the shrewd adviser of the fathers although 
he was a Judge. In 1782 he was sent to the Continental Congress as 
agent of Vermont, and he was one of the commissioners that adjusted 
the controversy with the State of New York. In 1791 he and Stephen 
R. Bradley were chosen the first United States Senators for Vermont 
and Judge Robinson served as Senator until 1796, when, being in a 
minority in respect to his political views, he resigned. In the Senate 
he opposed the Jay treaty and was instrumental in procuring its con- 
demnation by meetings held in Bennington town and county, called in 
connection with similar demonstrations in other parts of the country for 
the purpose of getting support for withholding the necessary appro- 
priations to carry the treaty into effect. After his retirement from 
the Senate, in 1802, he represented Bennington in the General As- 
sembly. This was the close of his public career. He was not a lawyer 
and his public career began with military service which was the com- 
mon experience of the leading men of his day. He commanded a 
regiment of militia and was with it at Mount Independence, opposite 
Ticonderoga, on the evacuation of the fort by General St. Clair. He 
was a man of culture, force and piety, and his sunset days were filled 
with hope and beauty. He induced Jefferson and Madison, who were 48 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
in Bennington on a Sunday during the year 1791, so goes the story, 
to attend church with him, and he tried to get from them an opinion 
as to the quality of the music they had heard as compared with the 
music they were accustomed to hear in the church services they at- 
tended when at home, but both declined to give an opinion for the 
reason that neither had attended church for several years. Judge 
Robinson married for his first wife a daughter of Stephen Fay and 
from this union were born six sons, several of whom became office 
holders and men of influence in the community. Dartmouth College 
conferred on him the honorary degree of Master of Arts. 
JOHN SHEPARDSON 
1729-1802 
John Shepardson was born in Attleboro, Mass., February 16, 
1729, and died at Guilford, January 3, 1802. He was one of the 
first men to come to Guilford after its early settlement and at the 
first recorded town meeting, held May 17, 1772, he was elected Clerk. 
When the new State was organized he was one of the leaders of the 
cause of Vermont against New York. He was elected in 1778 and 
again in 1779 second Judge of the Superior Court and attended the 
session of court held at Westminster in May, 1779. This was a stormy 
session where a conflict of authority between Vermont and New York 
having arisen over the drafting of men for the Vermont militia and 
the question having come to court on the arrest and trial of several 
respondents of the respective rights of the State and the prisoners, 
Ethan Allen appeared with a hundred men under order from Governor 
Chittenden to remain during the sitting of the court to see that the 
Vermont law was respected. Noah Smith had been appointed State’s 
Attorney and Stephen R. Bradley was acting as counsel for the re- 
spondents who were charged with offences growing out of violations 
of the act in question. Bradley had succeeded in getting some of the 
men released and the trial as to certain others was about to proceed 
when Allen entered the court room accoutred in his military dress, 
with a large cocked hat on his head profusely ornamented with gold 
lace, and a sword of fabulous dimensions dangling at his side. He 
addressed Chief Judge Robinson, his friend, and commenced a furious 
tirade against the State’s Attorney and the attorney for the respond- 
ents. He was promptly called to order and informed that the court 
would gladly listen to his remarks as a private citizen but not as a 
soldier. He thereupon threw his chapeau on the table, unbuckled 
his sword and laid it aside with a flourish and turning to the Judges 
exclaimed in a voice like a Stentor: THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
49 
“For forms of government let fools contest, 
Whate’er is best administered is best.” 
Then he proceeded: “Fifty miles I have come through the woods 
with my brave men, to support the civil with the military arm; to 
quell any disturbances should they arise, and to aid the Sheriff and 
the court in prosecuting these Yorkers—the enemies of our noble 
State. I see, however, that some of them, by the quirks of this artful 
lawyer, Bradley, are escaping from the punishment they so richly 
deserve, and I find also that this little Noah Smith is far from under- 
standing his business, since he at one moment moves for a prosecution 
and in the next wishes to withdraw it. Let me warn your honor to 
be on your guard, lest these delinquents should ,slip through your 
fingers, and thus escape the reward so justly their due.” When he 
had finished, with great dignity he replaced his hat, buckled on his 
sword and left the room. In this proceeding Judge Shepardson sat 
with Chief Judge Robinson. In December, 1783, the Yorkers at- 
tempted to capture Judge Shepardson but were unsuccessful. 
JOHN FASSETT, JR. 
1743-1803 
John Fassett, Jr., was the son of Captain Fassett, who came 
to Bennington in 1761, became an innholder and Captain of the first 
military company formed in town and was the town’s first Repre- 
sentative to the Vermont Legislature. Judge Fassett was born in 
Hardwick, Mass., June 3, 1743. He was a Lieutenant in Warner’s 
first • regiment in 1775 and Captain in Warner’s second regiment in 
1776. In 1777 he was one of the Commissioners of Sequestration, 
and with Governor Chittenden and Matthew Lyon was successful in 
subduing the Tories of Arlington. He moved to Arlington about 
this time and represented the town in the General Assembly in 1778 
and 1779 and Cambridge in 1787, 1788, 1790 and 1791. He was 
also elected Councilor in 1779, 1787, 1788, 1790 and 1791. He served 
in each office portions of the time. He was a member of the Council 
in 1779 and until 1795, with the exception of 1786, fifteen years. He 
was Judge of the Superior Court from 1778 to 1782 and of the Su- 
preme Court from 1782 until 1786 and Chief Judge of the Chittenden 
County Court from 1787 to 1794. In 1781 he was one of the com- 
mittee to issue bills of credit for the State of Vermont. In 1784 he 
removed to Cambridge where he was one of the proprietors of the 
town; he was a member of the Board of War and one of the com- 
mittee of the council “to make a draft of the political affairs of the 50 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
State.” He was the only Judge of the Superior Court elected in the 
first instance at each of the four elections and served during the 
existence of that court and in the Supreme Court until 1786. He had 
the singular distinction of holding the position of Councilor, member of 
the House and Judge of the highest court at the same time and for 
many years. On the military side of his life, as Captain in Colonel 
Warner’s Continental regiment, in the summer of 1776 he was stationed 
in command of a few men at a block fort in Jericho, on the Winooski 
River. Matthew Lyon was Lieutenant in the same company. The fort 
was abandoned on the approach of the British army from Canada. It 
was claimed by the officers that the men deserted, but charges were 
made that the desertion of the men was by collusion with the officers. 
Fassett and Lyon were arrested on their way south at New Haven, Vt., 
for desertion and taken to Ticonderoga, tried by a court martial and 
found guilty. They were punished by being deprived of their commis- 
sions and rendered ineligible for reappointment in the Continental serv- 
ice. This order was subsequently reversed by General St. Clair and 
Lyon rendered efficient service in the Continental army thereafter. Fas- 
sett did not again enter the military service. The official career of 
Judge Fassett in its usefulness and character and varied forms was not 
excelled by any of his compeers. The latter part of his life was spent 
quietly in Cambridge, where he died April 2, 1803. One of his sons 
was a lawyer by training, but entered the regular army, and another 
son was surgeon of the Vermont regiment that marched against the 
proclamation of Governor Chittenden to Plattsburgh in 1814 to meet 
the British invasion. 
THOMAS CHANDLER. JR. 
1740-1798 
Thomas Chandler, Jr., came to Chester with his father in 1763, 
the latter being one of the proprietors of that town under New Hamp- 
shire when the town was called New Flamstead. He procured for 
the town another charter from New York under the name of Chester 
after jurisdiction had been given that colony by the crown. Thomas 
Jr. was born at Woodstock, Conn., October 4, 1740. He was the 
first Secretary of State of Vermont and for nearly three years 
was the Speaker of the General Assembly. For nine years, 
from 1766 to 1775, he was an Assistant Judge of the Inferior 
Court of Common Pleas under appointment from New York, but 
he soon afterward became active among the Vermonters, was a dele- 
gate to the Westminster Conventions held in October, 1776, and Jan- 
uary, 1777, and was elected to the first General Assembly in 1778. 
Here he was make Clerk, but soon afterwards abandoned the place 
to become Secretary of State. He was re-elected in 1778 and in Born in Wilmington, Vt., April 27, 1835. He was 
educated in the common schools and Brattleboro Acad- 
emy and graduated from the Albany (N. Y.) Law 
School in 1860. For four years he practiced law in 
his native town, representing Wilmington in the Legis- 
lature in 1863 and 1864. In 1864 he removed to Brat- 
tleboro. In 1867 and 1868 he was State’s Attorney for 
Windham county. He was elected a member of Con- 
gress in 1878, serving two terms. In 1887 he was ap- 
pointed to fill a vacancy on the Supreme Court bench 
and held the position by successive elections until 1908. 
In 1911 he was chosen president of the Vermont Bar 
Association. He has received the degree of LL. D. 
from the University of Vermont. He is president of 
the Vermont National Bank of Brattleboro. In 1861 
he married Ellen P. Richardson of Brattleboro, who 
died in 1871. In 1875 he married Jane P. Miles of 
Brattleboro, who died in 1919. 
JAMES M. TYLER THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
51 
1781, was a member of the Council in 1779 and 1780. He was a Com- 
missioner of Sequestration on the estates of the Tories and was elected 
a Judge of the Superior Court in 1778. He resigned the speakership 
in the middle of the session of 1780 because of charges made against 
him by Captain Azariah Wright, a prominent citizen of Westminster. 
These charges were that he acted as an attorney for a negro while he 
was Speaker and that he invited the Westminster massacre by mis- 
leading the sons of liberty by writing them that his father was in 
their favor. Judge Chandler brought a libel suit against Captain 
Wright and recovered a small judgment, but the proceedings brought 
him into discredit politically and he sank in public favor from that 
time forward. He was, notwithstanding, elected a Judge of the Wind- 
sor County Court in 1786, and again represented Chester in the House 
in 1787, but the prejudice was so strong against him that he failed 
to make any further political advancement. Historians give him credit 
for having been an undoubted patriot during the Revolution and he 
exerted himself much for the patriotic cause in the town meetings in 
Chester. Like his father, he was a petitioner for an act of insolvency 
in his favor. The records of the Governor and council show this 
to have been in 1792 and the cause is assigned by reason of poverty 
from “a long series of sickness in his family.” He died at Chester 
in poverty about 1798. 
JOHN THROOP 
1733-1802 
John Throop of Pomfret was born in Lebanon, Conn., September 
11, 1733, and died at Pomfret, January 25, 1802. He was a Judge 
of the Superior Court from 1778 to 1781 and from February to Oc- 
tober in 1782. He had lived at Pomfret at least from the organiza- 
tion of the town in 1773. He was a delegate to the convention, June 
4, 1777, held at Windsor, and to the convention that met in July and 
December the same year and formed the Vermont Constitution. He 
was chosen the Representative from Pomfret in 1778 and was a 
member of the Council from 1779 to 1786. In 1787-88 he again 
represented Pomfret in the General Assembly and was Judge of 
Probate from 1783 to 1792. 
PAUL SPOONER 
1746-1789 
Dr. Paul Spooner of Hartland came to Vermont in 1768. He 
was a physician. He was born in Dartmouth, Mass., March 20, 1746, 
and was the youngest of ten children. His father, Daniel Spooner, 52 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
moved to Petersham when Paul was two years old and here he pre- 
pared for his profession. His father died at the great age of one 
hundred and three years. Judge Spooner appears in Vermont 
history as a delegate from Plartland to the convention at Westmin- 
ster, called in October, 1774, to condemn the obnoxious measures of 
Great Britain—the tea act, Boston port bill and like measures—and 
was one of the committee on resolutions in that convention. He 
was a delegate to and secretary of the Whig convention called 
at Westminster in 1775 and a delegate to the “Cumberland County 
Congress” which met the same year and in that year was chosen one 
of the delegates to represent Cumberland county in the New York 
Provincial Congress and was re-elected the following year. He was 
chosen Sheriff of Cumberland county by the New York government, 
but declined the office because he had the week before been chosen 
a member of the Council of Safety in Vermont, a place to which he 
was re-elected five times. In 1782 he was elected Lieutenant-Governor 
and held that position until 1787, and in 1780 and 1782 was appointed 
agent from Vermont to Congress. He was elected a Judge of the 
Superior Court in 1779. Judge Spooner served as a Superior Judge 
from 1779 until 1782, though in 1781 he was left off at the election. 
Chief Justice Robinson was displaced at this time by Elisha Payne 
as chief of the court and declined to serve as an assistant. In this 
situation Judge Spooner was elected in his place and in 1782 became 
a Judge of the Supreme Court and served as such until his death, 
which occurred at Hartland, September 5, 1789, in the forty-fourth 
year of his age. He was for one year Chief Judge. This was in 
1784. The following year Judge Robinson was elected Chief Judge 
and Judge Spooner resumed his place as first assistant. In 1781 and 
1782 Judge Spooner was a Judge of the Probate Court for the Dis- 
trict of Windsor. He was highly esteemed by his fellow citizens 
as appears from a notice in Spooner’s Vermont Journal, published 
shortly after his decease. In this article reference is made to the 
“sprightliness of his genius, his candid and generous temper, his dis- 
creet and diligent application to business.” It further refers to him 
as “a zealous promoter of learning, a great benefactor to the rising 
generation, and a Judge who ever aimed to administer judgment in 
uprightness.” 
INCREASE MOSELEY 
1712-1795 
Increase Moseley was also a physician. He was born at Norwich. 
Conn.. May 18, 1712, and died at Clarendon, Vt., May 2, 1795. He 
moved to Ancient Woodbury in his native State about 1740 and came 
to Clarendon about 1779. He was one of the leaders in Ancient Wood- THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
53 
bury and served as a Representative in the Connecticut Legislature 
from 1751 almost continuously until his removal to Vermont. He was 
Moderator of Woodbury’s meeting for the relief of Boston in 1774, and 
a member of her revolutionary committee. He was elected Judge of 
the Superior Court in 1780 but served only one year, going off the 
bench in the election of 1781, when the New Hampshire towns were 
given a representation in the court. He represented Clarendon in the 
Legislature in 1782 and was elected Speaker. He was Chief Judge of 
the Rutland County Court from 1781 until 1787 and was president 
of the first Council of Censors in 1785. 
ELISHA PAYNE 
1731-1807 
Elisha Payne was made Lieutenant-Governor in 1781 and at the 
same time was Chief Judge of the Superior Court. The next year he 
was one of the delegates to Congress. He appears only briefly in Ver- 
mont history and that during the continuance of the union of the 
Vermont towns with those of western New Hampshire. He was born 
at Canterbury, Conn., in February 1731, and was Colonel and Sur- 
veyor-General in colonial days in New Hampshire, and in the latter 
capacity was charged with the duty of preserving the pine trees reserved 
in all the grants of the crown for the Royal Navy. He did good 
service in the French War. In 1778 he appeared as a Representative 
of Cardigan, N. H. in the Vermont Legislature and was elected Council- 
or. This office he declined, for the reason that he thought he would 
be more useful in the House in resisting an effort which he knew would 
be made to dissolve the union between the New Hampshire towns and 
those of Vermont. He was a leader in the convention held at Charles- 
town, N. H. in 1781, which, with Ira Allen’s assistance, resolved to 
ask annexation to Vermont of all that part of New Hampshire west 
of a line seventy miles from the sea coast instead of attempting to form 
another new State of that part of New Hampshire and the eastern half 
of Vermont, as had been originally planned. Judge Payne urged this 
union energetically and eloquently before the Vermont Legislature at 
the time it was consummated. In 1781 he was elected Lieutenant-Gov- 
ernor by the Legislature of Vermont, there having been no choice by 
the people, and at the same time was made Chief Judge of the Superior 
Court, and he held both offices until he ceased to be a citizen of Ver- 
mont on the dissolution of the union with the New Hampshire towns in 
February, 1782. He presided at one session of the court held for 
the county of Washington, so-called, at Charlestown, N. H., in Decem- 
ber, 1781, which was made up of New Hampshire towns and dissolved 
when the union was dissolved. Judge Spooner sat with Judge Payne 54 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
at this session but no business was transacted. The winter following 
the election of Judge Payne to the two offices which he held in Ver- 
mont, New Hampshire started to regain by force the territory ceded to 
Vermont, whereupon Governor Chittenden gave orders to Judge 
Payne to call out the militia “to repel force by force,” but the Judge, 
whatever his commission or authority may have been in this regard, 
whether by virtue of being Lieutenant-Governor or otherwise, exercised 
his diplomacy by at once writing President Weare of New Hampshire, 
to whom he stated his instructions from Governor Chittenden, but in 
terms so conciliatory yet firm that bloodshed was averted and peace 
restored. When the union was dissolved Judge Payne adhered to 
New Hampshire, where he resided, though his hold on the affections of 
the people of Vermont was such that he could have commanded high 
honors from this State—honors that were made impossible from New 
Hampshire by reason of his relation to the union which had been dis- 
solved between the Vermont and New Hampshire towns. He died at 
Lebanon, July 20, 1807. 
SIMEON OLCOTT 
1735-1815 
At the October session of the Vermont Legislature in 1781, 
Simeon Olcott of Charlestown, New Hampshire, was elected a Judge of 
the Superior Court. Judge Olcott was the first lawyer to be elected 
to the bench in Vermont, but as he never held court, Nathaniel Chip- 
man stands as the first Vermont lawyer, elected a Judge who performed 
judicial service. Judge Olcott resigned January 28, 1782. On 
February 13, 1782 the Assembly elected General Samuel Fletcher of 
Townshend who declined and on February 16, John Throop, who 
had been Judge until the October previous was elected and accepted 
the place. Judge Olcott was born in Bolton, Conn., October 1, 1735, 
graduated at Yale in 1761, studied law, moved to Charlestown in 
1764, was admitted as an attorney in Cumberland county, September 
15, 1774, and in 1784, was 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. He was United States Senator from New Hampshire 
from December 7, 1801 to March 3, 1805. He died at Charlestown, 
February 22, 1815. He was the first lawyer to settle in western New 
Hampshire. THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
55 
JONAS FAY 
1737-1818 
Dr. Jonas Fay was the third physician to be called to serve as a 
Judge. He was the son of Stephen Fay who came from Hardwick, 
Mass., and kept the Catamount Tavern at Bennington. Doctor Fay oc- 
cupied a prominent position among the early settlers and his service 
covers a wider field than that of any of the other fathers of the 
State. He was born at Hardwick, Mass., January 28, 1737. At the 
age of nineteen he served in the French War at Fort Edward and Lake 
George as clerk of a company of Massachusetts troops. In 1772 he and 
his father were appointed agents to inform Governor Tryon of New 
York of the complaints of the settlers against the government of that 
province and was clerk of the convention of settlers in March 1774 
that resolved to defend by force Allen, Warner and others who were 
threatened with outlawry and death by the provincial assembly, and as 
clerk certified its proceedings for publication. He was surgeon in the 
expedition under Ethan Allen at the capture of Ticonderoga, and held 
a like position in Colonel Warner's regiment of that year. He was 
clerk of the Dorset convention in 1776 and a member of the conven- 
tion which declared Vermont independent. He was chairman of the 
committee to draw up the declaration and petition to Congress, of which 
he was author. He was a member of the Governor’s Council from its 
organization until 1785, judge of the Superior Court in 1781, and of 
the Supreme Court in 1782, and Judge of Probate for five years. 
He attended the Continental Congress at Philadelphia as the representa- 
tive from Vermont from 1777 until 1782. In company with Ethan 
Allen he published a pamphlet at Hartford, Conn., upon the New 
Hampshire and New York controversy in which the respective claims 
to the Vermont territory were set forth. He was devoted to the calls 
of public duty for a period of thirty-five years. Being a man of edu- 
cation he was made secretary of most of the meetings of the Committee 
of Safety and of other conventions until after the formation of the 
State government. He kept his records in account books or on slips 
of paper and some of these have been lost. He was a man of exten- 
sive information, bold and determined in his opinions, and in action. 
He was, moreover, a person of agreeable personality who was on 
intimate terms with all the leaders of his time, among whom there ap- 
pears no expression of jealousy toward him, or of feelings other 
than of confidence in his fidelity and capacity. He began his career 
as a physician and when he retired from his valuable public service he 
returned to the practice of his profession at Bennington, where he 
remained until 1800, when he removed to Charlotte. A few years 
later he located in Pawlet and from Pawlet returned to Bennington, 
where he died March 6, 1818. 56 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
PETER OLCOTT 
1733-1808 
Peter Olcott was born in Bolton, Conn., April 25, 1733, and died at 
Hanover, N. H., September 12, 1808. He was a member of the Ver- 
mont Court of Confiscation for eastern Vermont and of the court for 
the banishment of Tories. He was a delegate from Norwich in the 
convention of 1777, and a member of the convention of July and 
December of that year which adopted the Constitution. He command- 
ed a regiment of militia summoned to the relief of Bennington and 
was employed in other military services in that region; was a member 
of the Governor’s Council for several years, and Lieutenant-Governor 
from 1790 to 1794. In the latter year he declined to be a candidate 
longer for that office. He was elected Judge of the Supreme Court 
upon its organization and served until 1785. Judge Olcott is said to 
have been a graduate of Harvard College. Rufus Choate married 
Helen, a daughter of Mills Olcott, son of Judge Olcott. 
THOMAS PORTER 
1734-1833 
Thomas Porter of Tinmouth was elected a Judge of the Supreme 
Court in 1783 and served until 1786. He was born in Farmington, 
Conn., February 14, 1734, and held local offices in that town, after- 
wards moving to Cornwall, Conn., where he was prominent in town 
affairs. For a number of years he was a member of the Connecticut 
Legislature. In 1779 he moved to Tinmouth, where he was elected to 
the General Assembly in 1780, 1781, and 1782, in each of which years 
he was made Speaker of the House. In 1782 he was elected to the 
Council and resigned as Speaker to take the new position, in which 
he served until 1795. He served in the British army at Lake George 
in 1755, and later in the Revolutionary army in behalf of the colonies. 
His legislative career in Connecticut and Vermont covered a period 
of thirty-five years. He was a farmer, and lived to become nearly 
a centenarian. He died at Granville, N. Y., May 30, 1833. His son, 
Ebenezer Porter (Dartmouth 1792), was a famous Doctor of Divinity 
and was President of Andover Theological Seminary. 
NATHANIEL NILES 
1741-1828 
Nathaniel Niles of Fairlee was a clergyman and a man of varied 
attainments. He was born at South Kingston, R. I., April 3, 1741, 
and was a grandson of Samuel Niles, the famous author and minister of 
Braintree, Mass. He entered Harvard College where he suspended his THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
57 
studies on account of ill health, but later graduated at Princeton. He 
commenced the study of theology but early exhibited a tendency toward 
independent thought and inquiry along unusual lines. He was a 
student of law and medicine; taught school for a while in New York 
City; and preached for a time at Norwich and Torrington, Conn. He 
was also interested in mechanical experiments and the inventor of the 
process of making wire from bar iron by water power. He was an 
ardent patriot in the Revolution and the author of an ode entitled 
“The American Hero,” written just after the battle of Bunker Hill 
and set to music by Reverend Dr. Sylvanus Ripley, father of Gen. E. 
W. Ripley, which was almost universally sung in the churches of the 
Eastern States at that period and became the war song of the New 
England soldiers. He came to West Fairlee just after the Revolution 
and purchased a large tract of land. Here he preached every Sunday 
for twelve years in his own house. In 1784 he was elected to the Leg- 
islature and was immediately chosen speaker. He was an efficient pre- 
siding officer, being a master in parliamentary law, fair in his rulings, 
and expeditious in the dispatch of business. In 1784 he was elected with 
Moses Robinson and Ira Allen an agent to Congress to “transact and 
negotiate the business of this State with that body.” In the same year 
he was elected one of the Judges of the Supreme Court and held the 
position until 1788. In 1785 and 1787 he was also a member of the 
Council, served in the Constitutional Convention in 1791 and took the 
lead with Chipman in securing the ratification of the Federal Con- 
stitution. Upon the admission of Vermont to the union he was elected 
to Congress, serving two terms from 1791 till 1795. After his term 
of service in the Federal Congress he again represented Fairlee in the 
Legislature in 1800, 1801, 1802, and in 1812, 1813 and 1814. He was 
again a member of the Council of Censors in 1799 and was again re- 
turned to the Governor’s Council in 1803, where he served for five 
years until 1808, and he took a prominent part in the Constitutional 
Convention in 1814. With his work in the Legislature and the Con- 
stitutional Convention of 1814, Judge Niles at the age of nearly seventy- 
four retired from public life and passed the rest of his days until his 
death, October 31, 1828, at West Fairlee, being until the end among 
the most revered of the public men of his time. A massive granite 
monument, typical of his character, stands over his grave in the center 
of the town. Judge Niles was a voluminous writer and left a large 
number of sermons, addresses, essays and poems. 58 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
NATHANIEL CHIPMAN 
1752-1843 
We have now come to the fourteenth Judge of the higher courts 
and thus far have found but one man who was educated in the law, 
Simeon Olcott of New Hampshire, who was elected a Superior Judge 
in 1781 but never served. Nathaniel Chipman of Tinmouth was the 
first Judge to act who had a legal education. His first election was in 
1786, eight years after the organization of the court. During this 
time twelve men who were not trained in the law had held the courts 
and Judge Chipman’s first year of service was with four laymen 
Judges. In the situation in which the fathers found themselves they 
did the best they could in the selection of Judges. They wanted 
courts and to this end organized counties and these courts they wanted 
near at hand. They desired to see the law administered in fairness and 
justice by men who enjoyed their confidence and respect. There were 
no lawyers to fill the places on the bench when they were first created 
except lawyers of the crown, and had there been Vermont lawyers it is 
not certain that they would have been as acceptable to the fathers 
as the men who were chosen from the many other walks of life. The 
country was wild. We were at war with Great Britain and almost at 
war with New Hampshire on the one side and New York on the other. 
Several of the first Judges were military men. There was force in the 
selection of such men at a time when mobs gathered about the court 
houses and a man like Ethan Allen acted at one time as State’s 
Attorney and at another dressed in military uniform harrangued the 
court and abused the counsel while a company of a hundred men stood 
outside to do his bidding. It was strength, calmness, and courage 
that were needed at such a time and not a technical knowledge of the 
niceties of the law. It is beyond question that the early Judges, 
laymen though they were, were wise in the discharge of their duties, 
and gave the early State good courts. The offices which they held, the 
relations of confidence which they bore to the people, and the high 
standards which they maintained in their public trusts all confirm the 
opinion that they were not of the ordinary citizenship but were the 
first and foremost leaders of the time. 
Judge Chipman possessed the strong natural qualities of his 
laymen predecessors and immediate associates on the bench and 
had the advantage of being a trained lawyer besides. Then the tradi- 
tions of his life were in harmony with those of his associates. He had 
held a commission as a Lieutenant in the patriot army in the Revolution 
and was at the battle of Monmouth. He had sprung from the common 
people in Connecticut where so many of the early Vermonters had been 
born, but it had been his fortune to have prepared for college and to Born in West Rutland, Vt., May 11, 1842. He 
graduated from Middlebury College in 1862. He 
served in the Union army in the Civil War, reaching 
the rank of Lieutenant Colonel. At the close of the 
war he studied law and for several years practiced in 
New York City. In 1873, he returned to Rutland and 
huilt up an extensive practice. When the Interstate 
Commerce Commission was created, President Cleve- 
land appointed him one of its members. He resigned 
in 1889 to become chairman of the Interstate Com- 
merce Railway Association. He was also at the head 
of the Western Traffic Association and later one of the 
commissioners of the Joint Committee of the Central 
Traffic and Trunk Line Associations. In 1894 he was 
appointed one of the receivers of the Atchison Rail- 
road and upon its reorganization, he became chairman 
of the hoard of directors and of the executive com- 
mittee. He died April 12, 1901. 
ALDACE F. WALKER THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
59 
have received his degree from Yale in his fourth year there, although 
he entered the patriot ranks too soon to graduate. 
He had an ambition that he wanted to become a lawyer, so he 
resigned his commission in the army and in 1779 began the study of 
his profession in Salisbury, Conn., was admitted to the bar and 
came to Vermont. He intended to locate at Bennington but settled at 
Tinmouth. 
Before leaving Connecticut he writes his prospects to a friend: 
“I have been dubbed an attorney and propose in a few days to take 
up my abode in the State of Vermont.*** One thing, however, we must 
both forget our diffidence, it has no place at the Bar. Ha! ha! ha! I 
cannot but laugh to think what a flash we shall make when we come to 
be members of Congress; then again, I am vexed when I think how 
many steps there are which we must mount to that pinnacle of hap- 
piness. Let’s see, attorney, then a Selectman, a huffing Justice, a 
deputy, an assistant and member of Congress.*** I shall indeed be rara 
avis in terris for there is not an attorney in the State. Think, Fitch, 
what a figure I shall make, when I become the oracle of the law to the 
State of Vermont.” 
In May, 1779, Stephen Row Bradley and Noah Smith were ad- 
mitted to the Vermont bar at Westminster and in June of the same 
year Nathaniel Chipman was admitted at Rutland. The long and dis- 
tinguished career of Judge Chipman has been sketched with the other 
Federal Judges and it is not necessary to repeat the important facts in 
his eventful and useful life. He came to the bench when he was thirty- 
four years old and his life was one of the best gifts to the jurisprudence 
of early Vermont. He added the attainments of the scholar and knowl- 
edge of the law to a bench already endowed with practical wisdom and 
wide experience in the affairs of men. The character of his legal 
works and the many honors that were conferred on him by his 
fellow citizens are evidence that he was in the front rank of his pro- 
fession. 
Chief Judge Williams in volume 15 of the Vermont Supreme 
Court Reports at page 353 has left a record of the contribution of 
Judge Chipman to the jurisprudence of Vermont. He refers thus to 
him: “This distinguished and able judge, lawyer and statesman, who 
has done so much to give stability of form and substance to our laws 
and civil and political institutions, and who, in that way, gave a higher 
character to our State than any other man whatever, and who in con- 
nection with another eminent lawyer, reported the system of laws in 
1797 which was adopted and which is probably equal, if not superior, to 
any body of statute laws which has ever been passed in this country.” 60 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
LUKE KNOWLTON 
1738-1810 
Luke Knowlton of Newfane was elected Judge of the Supreme 
Court in 1786, and served one year, but was omitted in the list at the 
end of that time when the number of Judges was reduced from five to 
three. At the same time he was elected Chief Judge of the County 
Court and served until 1794. Judge Knowlton was born at Shrews- 
bury, Mass., November 4, 1738. He was a soldier in the French and 
Indian war and stationed at Crown Point. He came to Newfane in 
1773 and brought with him a title purchased from land jobbers in 
New York City to lands situated on Newfane Hill. As he had taken 
his title from New York proprietors it was natural that he should 
have taken sides with that State in the controversy with the Green 
Mountain boys. This position he continued to hold until 1780, when 
he and Ira Allen came to terms while they were at Philadelphia, as 
agents for the two sides of the controversy, between Vermont and 
New York before Congress. There have been two opinions regarding 
Judge Knowlton’s loyalty to Vermont. He was sent to Congress as an 
agent of the party that opposed the independence of this State, and was 
in close touch with Haldimand and acting apparently in unison with 
Samuel Wells, the pronounced loyalist, in reference to Vermont becom- 
ing a province of Great Britain. Some correspondence of Judge 
Knowlton in reference to the Haldimand affair was intercepted and 
by a direction of Congress in an order made November 27, 1782, his 
arrest was ordered, but on the advice of Ethan Allen, and other loyal 
Vermonters, he fled from the State and was gone for a year. On his 
return a situation developed which a little later presented a novel 
question for the court. On November 16, 1783, a party of Yorkers 
who were in sympathy with the American cause armed with “clubs, 
swords, pistols and bayonets” broke into his house at two o’clock in 
the morning, arrested and forcibly deported him to Massachusetts. 
A rescuing party was organized, but before it became necessary for it 
to act Judge Knowlton was released and returned to his home. The 
offense was brought to the attention of the officers of the law, and 
Francis Prouty, the leader of the abducting party, was indicted by the 
grand jury sitting at Westminster, for breaking and entering the 
Judge’s house and carrying him away. The respondent was tried by 
jury and the following curious though ingenious verdict was rendered: 
“The jury find in this case that the prisoner did break and enter the 
house of Luke Knowlton, Esq., in the night season, and did take and 
carry away the said Luke Knowlton, and if that breaking a house and 
taking and carrying away a person as aforesaid amounts to burglary, 
we say he is guilty; if not, we say he is not guilty.” The judgment of THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
61 
the court then made up of men who were not lawyers, was that the 
respondent was not guilty, a decision that lawyer-judges could not 
have bettered. It is now believed by historians that Judge Knowlton’s 
relations to the Haldimand negotiation were wholly due to a desire 
on his part to preserve the independence of Vermont and to protect 
its people from the ravages of war, and that he acted in concert with 
Allen, Chittenden, and other leaders and friends of the State, who 
knew his loyalty and trusted him. Newfane owed its consequence in 
great measure to the ambition and enterprise of Judge Knowlton. Pie 
is described as a man of keen perceptions and of intuitive knowledge 
of human nature, and he was revered by the people. He held many 
important positions of public trust. In 1774 he was chosen Clerk of 
Newfane and held that office for sixteen years. He represented the 
town in most of the conventions in Cumberland county and was a 
member of the county Committee of Safety from 1776 to 1777. In 
1788 he was appointed a Justice of the Peace by New York. He 
represented Newfane in the General Assembly in 1784, 1785, 1786, 
1788, 1789 and 1792, was a member of the Governor’s Council from 
1789 to 1800 inclusive, and a member of the Constitutional Conven- 
tion in 1793. “Saint Luke” was the appellation given him by his con- 
temporaries. This was due to his suave manners and marked humility. 
Pie was generous to the poor and filled with public spirit. He gave 
the county of Windham the land for a common on Newfane Hill where 
the court house and jail were built, when the shire was removed from 
Westminster in 1790, and contributed substantially toward the erection 
of the first court house and jail. He left numerous children and 
grandchildren, one of the latter being Frederick Holbrook of Brattle- 
boro, a Civil War Governor of Vermont. The cemetery located easter- 
ly of the summit of Newfane Hill and toward the present village of 
Newfane is the only reminder, save a few ancient cellar holes and 
walls, of the once prosperous village where the County Courts wrere 
held from 1790 until 1825, and here among the tombstones of the early 
inhabitants is one of Judge Knowlton which records the death of “Luke 
Knowlton, a Judge of the Supreme Court on the twelfth day of 
December, 1810.” 
STEPHEN ROW BRADLEY 
1754-1830 
Stephen Row Bradley, the first of the distinguished Windham 
county family of that name, came to Westminster from Connecticut 
in 1779. He was born at Cheshire, Conn., February 20, 1754, graduated 
at Yale in 1775 and commanded the Cheshire volunteers in the 62 
FIISTORY OF VERMONT 
Continental service in 1776. He was adjutant, and later aide to Gen- 
eral Wooster, and was with him when he was slain in 1777 at Danbury. 
He held a Major’s commission in 1778, and served as commissary. 
He studied law under Judge Reeve at Litchfield, Conn., and was ad- 
mitted to the Vermont bar, at Westminster, May 26, 1779. He was 
made Clerk of the court at about this time and the next year was 
appointed State’s Attorney of Cumberland county. On December 10, 
1779, he prepared at the request of the Governor and Council a state- 
ment of Vermont’s case against the claims of New York, New Hamp- 
shire and Massachusetts. This was a pamphlet of remarkable power, 
which reviewed the claims of each State, laid bare the weak points 
in the argument for the other States, and closed with an eloquent 
appeal for the independence of Vermont as a natural right. With 
Jonas Fay and Moses Robinson, he represented the State before Con- 
gress to urge the recognition of its independence. While the mission 
failed, it is said that an examination of the papers of Mr. Bradley at 
this time show conclusively that he was in many respects the ablest man 
in Vermont. At a later time the same year he went again to Congress, 
this time to defeat the claims of Luke Knowlton, the representative 
of the Cumberland County Yorkers, and of Peter Olcott, who was 
there to advocate the formation of a new State from towns on both 
the Vermont and New Hampshire sides of the Connecticut. In this 
mission he was successful. He represented Westminster in the Gen- 
eral Assembly in 1780, 1781, 1784, 1785, 1788 and 1790. He was 
Speaker in 1785. In 1783 he was Judge of the County Court, and 
Judge of the Supreme Court from 1788 to 1789. He was at first 
Lieutenant, then Major and finally Brigadier-General in the Vermont 
militia. The latter military honor came in 1791. He was on the staff 
of General Ethan Allen. He was frequently called on to restore order 
in the southern part of the State, and his efforts were usually attended 
with success. He was a member of the commission that settled the 
controversy with New York and the one that fixed the boundary be- 
tween that State and Vermont. He was, next to Chipman, the most 
powerful man in the Convention of 1791, called to ratify the Federal 
Constitution and to take action on the admission of Vermont to the 
Union. In 1791 he became a United States Senator of the first class, 
with a term of four years. He was defeated in 1794 for re-election, 
but in 1800, after serving a term in the Council and one in the Gen- 
eral Assembly, he was again elected and re-elected in 1806, serving 
with great distinction. Jeremiah Mason, who was a student in his 
office, and who was a United States Senator from New Hampshire at a 
later period, said of Judge Bradley that Senator Giles told him that 
Bradley had the greatest ability in defeating any measure that he 
opposed in a legislative body of any one he had ever known. Judge 
Bradley was the author of the constitutional amendment of 1803 that THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
63 
requires the Vice-President, like the President, to be elected by a 
majority of the electoral vote. Judge Bradley opposed the war with 
Great Britain in 1812; he counselled Madison against it, and at the 
close of his term in 1813 he became dissatisfied with his party’s policy, 
and finally retired from public life. He removed from Westminster 
across the Connecticut, into Walpole, N. H., in 1818, where “after a 
happy and contented evening of life he went to rest, December 7, 1830.” 
Again referring to Mr. Mason, it will be of interest to the readers 
of this sketch to know the estimate that he placed upon Judge Bradley 
as a lawyer. In his autobiography Mr. Mason says that Judge 
Bradley was not a student, and that his efforts in books were desultory. 
He gives him on the other hand credit for having great natural talent. 
He says further of him that there was much drollery in his nature and 
that he made use of this to a considerable extent in his daily life. His 
office was so arranged as to open into the parlor of his home, and this 
in turn onto his piazza. When these spaces were connected, room was 
afforded for a considerable audience which he would gather from time 
to time to hear speakers or preachers whom he would invite to address 
them. Here he had erected a pulpit from which the speakers addressed 
their audiences. A minister of independent thought was an- 
nounced to speak from Judge Bradley’s pulpit on a certain occasion 
and the local pastor of sound and conventional doctrines in the church 
challenged the stranger to a joint debate. Judge Bradley presided with 
profound apparent dignity, and ruled as a Judge would rule upon all 
questions of propriety or admissibility as they came up in the debate; 
but within he was enjoying the efforts of the disputants, and looking 
upon the whole proceeding as a huge practical joke. He abounded in 
political sagacity, was a great wit, a wonderful story teller, wise in 
knowledge of mankind, a great historian, attractive in conversation, and 
intensely interesting in his portraitures of the men whom he had 
met and known and on whom he looked back as a philosopher. Judge 
Bradley was the father of William C. Bradley, of Westminster, who 
was elected to Congress in 1812, the year before Judge Bradley retired 
from the Senate, and the grandfather of J. Dorr Bradley of Brattle- 
boro. Both these men were brilliant lawyers, and their sketches ap- 
pear among the leaders of the Windham county bar. The family has 
been a notable one and some of its representatives are still at the bar. 
NOAH SMITH 
1756-1812 
Noah Smith, who was admitted to the bar at the same time as 
Judge Bradley, was born in Suffield, Conn., January 27, 1756, and 
graduated from Yale in 1778. He came to Vermont and delivered 
an address at the first celebration of the battle of Bennington. He 64 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
later came and was admitted to the bar in May, 1779. At the same 
term he was appointed State’s Attorney pro tem for Cumberland county, 
and in June, 1779, was appointed to the same office in Bennington 
county, holding the office for several years. From 1781 to 1784 he 
was County Clerk of Bennington county. In 1788 he was elected to 
the General Assembly from the town of Johnson while he was a 
resident of Bennington. His right to a seat was opposed in the 
House and he was denied admission. In the following year he was 
again elected from Johnson and this time his right was not questioned. 
This is said to have been the only instance, with possibly one exception, 
where a non-resident was chosen to represent a town in the General 
Assembly. He was elected a Judge of the Supreme Court in 1791. 
This office he resigned a little later, and was appointed Excise Com- 
missioner, an office which he held for several years. In 1798 his 
brother, Israel, who had been Chief Judge for one year, failed of re- 
election in the Legislature, which has become famous as the “Vergennes 
Slaughter-House” and Judge Noah Smith was elected in his place. 
He continued in office until 1801 when he was succeeded by Stephen 
Jacob. Soon after his retirement from the bench he removed to 
Milton where he built a Congregational church and presented it to the 
society of that denomination, of which his wife and children were 
members. His business was unsuccessful, his lands in Milton passed 
from him, and he was imprisoned for debt in the jail at Burlington. 
In 1811 while he was still in confinement, the Legislature passed an 
act for his release. This act recited that “for some time he had been 
in a state of mental derangement, almost wholly lost his reason, and 
it is thought that change of air and the use of medical springs are the 
most probable means of restoring his reason.” The act released and 
discharged him from confinement, and freed him from arrest for 
five years. He died December 23, 1812, at Milton. Judge Smith is 
reputed to have practiced his profession with reputation and success, 
and in every walk of life is said to have been a gentleman, scholar and 
friend. Judge Smith was the first Grand Master of the Masonic order 
in Vermont, and a very old but well preserved oil painting of him hangs 
in the Masonic Temple at Burlington. It was presented to the Grand 
Lodge by Miss Ann Eliza Huntington, of Vergennes, who was his 
granddaughter. His grandson, Rev. Dr. Henry Smith, a cousin of 
Miss Huntington, became a doctor of divinity. He married a daughter 
of Joshua Bates, President of Middlebury College. He was president 
of Marietta College, in Ohio, and at the time of his death professor 
in Lane Theological Seminary in Cincinnati. Doctor Smith moved 
to Vergennes late in life and purchased the residence now owned by 
Judge Fish. Here he resided at the time of his decease. He was a 
powerful and eloquent preacher, and performed the duties of a pastor 
during the time he was a teacher. He was also the author of several 
books. HILAND HALL 
Born in Bennington, Vt., July 30, 179.5. He at- 
tended the public schools, studied law and was ad- 
mitted to the bar. He represented Bennington in tlie 
Legislature of 1837 and was State's Attorney from 
1838 to 1831. He was elected to Congress in 1831 to 
fill the unexpired term of Jonathan Hunt and served 
until 1843, when he was appointed State Bank Com- 
missioner, a position which he held until 1846. He 
was a Judge of the Vermont Supreme Court from 1846 
to 18.50, Second Comptroller of the United States 
Treasury from 1850 to 1851 and United States Land 
Commissioner for California from 1851 to 1854. He 
was a delegate to the first Republican National Con- 
vention in 18.56, Governor of Vermont from 1858 to 
1860, and was chairman of the Vermont delegation 
to the Peace Conference of 1861. While Governor Hall 
was one of Vermont’s most active public men, and 
served his State with distinction in executive, legisla- 
tive and judicial positions, he will be remembered 
longest as a writer of history. In 1868 his “Early His- 
tory of Vermont” was published. This is a thorough 
and comprehensive work. For six years he was presi- 
dent of the Vermont Historical Society. He was act- 
ively engaged in the promotion and erection of the 
Bennington Battle Monument. His long and useful 
life ended December 18, 1885. THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
65 
SAMUEL KNIGHT 
1730-1804 
Samuel Knight, of Brattleboro, was born at Woburn, Mass., 
February 10, 1730. He came to Brattleboro as early as 1762 and re- 
sided here until his death, July 23, 1804. He was commissioned as 
an attorney in His Majesty’s courts of record in Cumberland county, 
June 23, 1772. His commission was signed by Governor Tryon and 
noted in the Inferior Court of Common Pleas for the same county, 
September 8, 1772. He was the first and only one of the lawyers 
commissioned by the courts of the crown to become a Judge of the 
Vermont courts. What his early education was or where he was 
schooled is not known. He was a man of learning but not a college 
graduate. It is supposed that he studied law with Charles Phelps and 
his son Solomon, at Marlboro. In 1774 he was appointed a commis- 
sioner by New York to administer oaths, but this was the only office 
he ever held under that State. He was regarded as an unpopular New 
Yorker and was in professional attendance at the court house in 
Westminster in March, 1775, when William French was killed, al- 
though he does not appear to have been personally engaged in the 
assault on the Whigs, but a coroner’s jury nevertheless found an indict- 
ment against him for the murder of French and he escaped into New 
Hampshire and Massachusetts, and did not return to Brattleboro for a 
year. He took an active part in the Revolution, and favored New 
York until 1778, when he became convinced she could not maintain 
her claim to Vermont, and submitted to the authority of Vermont and 
took a commission as Justice of the Peace from the State in 1781. 
Remonstrance was made against his holding this office, and his con- 
duct was reviewed by the Legislature with the result that a regularly 
executed commission was issued to him. He must have come into good 
favor at about this time, for in 1793 he was prominently mentioned as 
a candidate for United States District Judge to succeed Judge Chip- 
man, who had resigned. He was apparently worthy of such an honor, 
and qualified to fill the place, for Matthew Lyon wrote of him: “How- 
ever he got his education, he has it in such a degree, both universally 
and professionally, as would do honor to a gentleman in the most 
enlightened country,” and Judge Wheeler, than whom we have had no 
more dependable historian, says of him: “His reputation as it has 
come down by tradition is that of a man of learning, accomplishments, 
and, professionally, of strict integrity.” Dr. Graham adds his tribute, 
too, by saying of him that, “he was bred to the law” and was a 
“gentleman of great abilities.” Judge Knight represented Brattleboro 
in the General Assembly in 1781, 1783, 1784 and 1785. He was Chief 
Judge of the Windham County Court as early as 1786. He was elected 66 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
Second Assistant Judge of the Supreme Court in 1789 and Chief 
Judge in 1791, serving until 1794. After this term of service in the 
Supreme Court he was again Chief Judge of the County Court in 
1794, 1795 and 1801. 
ELIJAH PAINE 
1757-1842 
Elijah Paine of Williamstown was elected a Judge of the Supreme 
Court in January, 1791, and served until the fall of 1794. He later be- 
came United States Senator, and after service for a full term and part 
of another resigned to become United States Judge for the district of 
Vermont. In this position he had the longest judicial service in the 
history of our State. He occupied the office for more than forty 
years, beginning in 1801 and ending in 1842, when he resigned. His 
full sketch will be found among the Federal Judges. His letter, ad- 
dressed to the General Assembly on his first election to the Supreme 
Court, is indicative of his good business sense as well as his idea of 
public service. In this letter he writes: “You will, however, give me 
leave to discern that the pay of your Judges bears but a small propro- 
tion to the pay received by the Judges of any of the other States, when 
the ability of the State is compared, and were the State still in debt 
for the expenses of the late war, I would with pleasure live on my 
own property and serve my country without reward, but the State is 
now in great measure free from debt. Although I know the Legis- 
lature will not waste the property of the citizens, . I am confident they 
would wish to make their servants a reasonable compensation; if, upon 
deliberation on the subject, they shall think proper to make any addition 
to the pay of the court, it will be gratefully received; if on the other 
hand, they should think the present pay adequate to the service, I shall 
with pleasure acquiesce and serve the State to the best of my abilities.” 
ISAAC TICHENOR 
1754-1838 
Isaac Tichenor was born in Newark, N. J., February 8, 
1754. He graduated at Princeton College and studied law in Schenec- 
tady, N. Y. He became an assistant to Commissary General Cuyler 
in buying supplies for the Northern Army and it was the accumulation 
which resulted from his efforts that tempted the British to make the at- 
tack at Bennington. August 16, 1777. He reached the field at dusk on THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
67 
the day of the battle but did not participate in it. He located in Ben- 
nington and about the close of the war began the practice of law there. 
He represented Bennington in the General Assembly in 1781, 1782, 
1783 and 1784, and in 1783 was Speaker. He was sent as an agent to 
Congress in 1782 and the same year was commissioned by the Legis- 
lature to quell the disturbances in Windham county, an enterprise in 
which he was only partially successful. He was a commissioner in 
1789 to determine the terms of settlement with New York. He was 
Judge of the Supreme Court from 1791 to 1796 and Chief Judge in 
1795 and 1796. On the resignation of Moses Robinson as United 
States Senator he was chosen to fill out the unexpired term, and at the 
close of the term was elected for a full term. He resigned the 
Senatorship at this time because of his election as Governor, an office 
which he filled eleven years in all, beginning in 1797 and ending in 
1809. In 1807 he was defeated for the office by the Democrats (Re- 
publicans) under the leadership of Israel Smith. He was again elected 
to the Senate in 1814 and after serving out his term retired to private 
life. He died at Bennington, December 11, 1838. Judge Tichenor is 
described by a faithful historian as a man of “good private character, 
of highly respectable talents and acquirements, of remarkably fine per- 
sonal appearance, of accomplished manners and insinuating address.” 
His perfect manners and dress gained for him the sobriquet of 
“Jersey Slick,” a name which he carried through life. But this was not 
given in derision, for he was held in high regard as a man of good 
talent, unusual diplomacy and real art as a politician. He was one of 
the first to urge the need of a State Prison as a “humane and benevo- 
lent” institution and his wise disposition of an unfortunate difference 
with Canada over the supposed murder of John Griggs brought from 
our Legislature the most generous praise from friends and foes alike. 
He was a Federalist in politics and his popularity was such that he 
was continued in office several terms after his party had gone out of 
power. 
LOT HALL 
1757-1809 
Lot Hall came to Bennington in 1782 and the year following lo- 
cated in Westminster where he practiced law extensively with a good 
reputation as a lawyer until his election to the bench. He was born at 
Yarmouth, Mass., April 2, 1757, and died at Westminster, May 17, 
1809. He enlisted in the cause of the colonies against the mother 
country as a sailor. While engaged in a naval expedition to protect 
South Carolina and acting as a Lieutenant in charge of a prize the 68 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
crew of his prize vessel mutinied and he was carried to Glasgow, 
Scotland. Here he was released but having no way of returning home 
went to Ireland, where he “found the people very kind and civil as well 
as warmly attached to the American cause.” Here he was treated 
in “a genteel manner” until he had an opportunity to take ship to 
America. When his vessel was within Cape Charles and Cape Henry 
it was captured by a British man-of-war lying in Hampton Roads, 
the St. Albans, and he was held captive for ten days where he suffered 
“everything that British insolence and cruelty could inflict, short of 
actual violence.” Through the efforts of Patrick Henry, the Governor 
of Virginia, his exchange was procured and he was provided with a 
horse and money for his return home, which he reached February 22, 
1778. After his death Congress awarded his descendants remunera- 
tion for his services. He began to study law at Barnstable, Mass., and 
came to Bennington the same year. He represented Westminster in 
the General Assembly in 1788, 1791, 1792 and 1808. He was a 
Presidential Elector in 1792, voting for Washington and Adams. He 
was a member of the corporation of Middlebury College from its in- 
corporation until his death, and a member of the third Council of 
Censors. He was elected a Judge of the Supreme Court in 1794 and 
served until 1801. In 1786 he married Mary Homer of Boston, an 
orphan fifteen years of age. His marriage was as romantic as his 
experience in the war. A newspaper account of the courtship and 
marriage appearing in 1789 and re-published occasionally by the press 
until as late as 1845, served to keep the interesting story before the 
public. He was seized with a violent catarrhal trouble while attending 
the Assembly in 1808, from which he died the next year. Judge 
Stephen R. Bradley, who was in practice at Westminster at the same 
time as Judge Hall, did not regard the latter as a great lawyer. He 
encouraged his student, Jeremiah Mason to try a justice case against 
him and was greatly elated, because, to use his own words, he had 
“beat Hall” in the case. But we must remember that the Bradleys 
were supermen, and Mason was a giant mentally as well as physically. 
It is said in praise of Judge Hall that he discharged his duties as 
Judge “with great fidelity and credit” and his instructions to grand 
juries attracted so much favorable attention that they were often pub- 
lished and commended by the press. An early writer, Doctor Graham, 
says of him that he held the office of Judge in such a manner as to 
reflect honor even on so important an office. He further says of his 
memory that it was so tenacious as to make him master of every sub- 
ject he read or heard and able to recapitulate the facts without the 
slightest hesitation or previous study. Such a man must have been 
a good lawyer and a wise Judge. THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
69 
ENOCH WOODBRIDGE 
1750-1805 
Enoch Woodbridge was the first Judge to be chosen from Addison 
county and one of three to be elected from Vergennes. He was born 
at Stockbridge, Mass., December 25, 1750, and graduated at Yale in 
1774. He was in the commissary department in the Revolution and 
was at the battles of Hubbardton and Bennington and at Burgoyne’s 
surrender. He studied law and first came to Manchester in this State 
but soon removed to Vergennes, where he was elected the first Mayor 
of the city in 1794. It was believed that Vergennes was destined to 
become a very important place and Ethan Allen and other prominent 
men of his time were instrumental in procuring the charter for the 
first city in Vermont. There were but two cities in New England, 
Hartford and New Haven, when Vergennes was incorporated in 1788, 
and these places are but a few years older. It was natural that the 
fathers should have believed that Vergennes would become a real city. 
It is beautifully located in the center of a rich farming section, is at the 
head waters of navigation on Otter Creek—an important commercial 
consideration at that time—and has abundant water power. Its citi- 
zenship of the best New England stock was made up of strong men who 
had come from Massachusetts or Connecticut to found a common- 
wealth. Among these men Judge Woodbridge was a leader. He 
came of good ancestry, for he was descended from Governor Thomas 
Dudley of Massachusetts, and was the great grandson of Rev. John 
Eliot, the apostle to the Indians. He was a Judge of the Supreme 
Court from 1794 to 1798, and Chief Judge from 1798 to 1801. He 
represented Vergennes in the General Assembly from 1791 until his 
elevation to the bench and again in 1802. In 1793 he was a member 
of the Constitutional Convention. He died at Vergennes, April 25, 
1805. Judge Woodbridge was an able man and was not unlike his 
successor from the same city, Chief Justice Pierpoint, in poise and 
judgment. His son, Enoch D. Woodbridge, was also a lawyer and 
resided at Vergennes. Enoch D. Woodbridge married a daughter 
of Gen. Samuel Strong, who commanded the Vermont militia at the 
battle of Plattsburg and was also a resident of Vergennes. From 
this union was born Frederick E. Woodbridge, member of Congress 
from Vermont and prominent lawyer. Enoch D. Woodbridge built 
across the city park from the Stevens House the brick building, now 
the chapel of the Episcopal Church, and formerly for three-quarters 
of a century a law office. It remains unchanged on the outside and 
the interior is not greatly altered. It is a fine type of the country law 
office of a few generations ago and it has been the scene of many 
legal battles between men who knew how to give and take hard blows 70 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
in the days when “Woodbridge and Grandey” were the particular 
stars in the legal firmament in the north end of Addison county. I 
spent many happy days in practice in this office from 1890 to 1900. 
Aside from the County Court House at Middlebury it was the most 
noted meeting place for the men of the bar in the earlier days and 
with the old jail at Vergennes it is one of the most interesting land- 
marks. The latter antedates the county jail by many years and it 
has traditions that are more interesting than any that attach to the 
county stronghold for bad men. It is built of stone; its walls are 
thick and well cemented together; it has one large room and a cell. 
Here it was that Matthew Lyon, Congressman from Vermont and later 
from Kentucky, was confined under the alien and sedition laws, and 
from this jail he was released in the winter of 1799 after a thousand 
or more friends had paid one dollar each to make good his fine and 
costs, while a procession of admiring sympathizers that reached from 
Vergennes to Middlebury, a distance of thirteen miles, accompanied 
him on his journey southward. 
ISRAEL SMITH 
1759-1810 
Israel Smith, younger brother of Judge Noah Smith, was born 
at Sheffield, Conn., April 4, 1759, and graduated at Yale in 1781. He 
came to Rupert two years later, where he was admitted to the bar. He 
represented that town in the General Assembly in 1785, 1788, 1789 and 
1790. He was one of the commission, and the youngest member, 
in 1789, to close the controversy with New York and a member of 
the convention in 1791 that ratified the Federal Constitution prepara- 
tory to the admission of Vermont into the Union. He moved to 
Rutland the latter year and was elected the Representative of the 
southwestern district in Vermont to Congress and was re-elected in 
1793 and 1795, but was defeated by Matthew Lyon in 1797. He rep- 
resented Rutland that fall in the General Assembly and was made 
Chief Judge of the Supreme Court. He held the office but one year, 
for the next session was controlled by the Federalists and the “Ver- 
gennes slaughter house” saw every position in the State within reach 
made party spoils. He were elected Chief Judge again in 1801 but 
declined. He was this year a candidate for Governor against Gov- 
ernor Tichenor, but was defeated. He was, however, elected to Con- 
gress and at the end of his term elected Senator over Nathaniel Chip- 
man. In 1807 he was elected Governor and resigned his seat in the 
Senate to accept the office. He died at Rutland, December 2, 1810. 
His son, William Doneglas Smith, a graduate of Middlebury College THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
71 
and a lawyer, was Clerk of the House of Representatives from 1809 
to 1822. Judge Smith was a man of high ideals and fine talents. He 
early took rank as one of the distinguished lawyers of his day and 
so prominent was he in national circles and so favorably regarded that 
it was confidently expected that he would have the place of Attorney- 
General in the cabinet of President Jefferson, but for some reason 
this did not come to him. It would have been a distinct honor to him 
and to Vermont had he received the appointment. No resident Ver- 
monter has been Attorney-General of the United States. Alphonso 
Taft, father of President Taft, was Attorney-General, but it was 
while he was a resident of Ohio. He left Vermont in 1840. 
JONATHAN ROBINSON 
1756-1819 
Jonathan Robinson was a younger brother of Moses, who became 
the first Chief Judge of Vermont. Jonathan was a lawyer. He was 
born at Hardwick, Mass., August 11, 1756, came to Bennington 
with his father in 1761 and was admitted to the bar in 1796. He 
was Town Clerk of Bennington six years, beginning in 1795, Town 
Representative thirteen times before 1802, and Chief Judge of the 
Supreme Court from 1801 to 1807. He was then elected United 
States Senator in place of Israel Smith, resigned, and in 1809 was 
re-elected for a full term and served until 1815. On his retirement 
from the Senate he was elected Judge of Probate for four years, and 
in 1818 represented Bennington again in the General Assembly. He 
died at Bennington, November 3, 1819. He was an astute and far- 
seeing leader, was faithful to duty and had strength and solidity 
rather than brilliancy as a basis of success. He possessed a pleasing 
personality and had great talent. 
ROYALL TYLER 
1757-1826 
Royall Tyler was the first man of literary accomplishments to 
be called to the bench of Vermont. He was born in Boston, July 18, 
1757, the son of Royall Tyler, a man of marked ability, a graduate 
of Harvard and a member of the King’s Council. Judge Tyler also 
graduated at Harvard and in a class which included among others 
Christopher Gore, Governor of Massachusetts and United States Sena- 
tor, and Chief Justices Sewell and Thatcher. On the graduation of 
Judge Tyler in 1776 at Harvard, Yale paid him the unusual compliment 72 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
of bestowing on him the degree of A. B. He studied law in the office 
of Francis Dana, of Cambridge, and afterwards in that of Benjamin 
Hichburne, of Boston. During the three years following the beginning 
of his studies, which commenced the year of his graduation, he pur- 
sued his professional preparation together with other congenial literary 
pursuits and enjoyed the friendship of such men as Christopher Gore, 
Rufus King, William Eustis, Aaron Dexter and Thomas Dawes. In 
1778, while he was still studying law, he enlisted in the patriotic army 
as an aide to General Sullivan and was with him in the unsuccessful 
attempt to drive the British from Newport. He was admitted to the 
bar in 1779 and located in Portland, Me. Business at Boston had been 
nearly ruined by the British occupation and Portland had been burned 
but was being rapidly rebuilt. An amusing incident occurred here 
which grew out of an action brought by Judge Tyler against an officer 
of a privateer then lying in the harbor. To make sure the process 
was well served, Judge Tyler accompanied the Sheriff onto the vessel, 
but the privateer’s man not liking these proceedings weighed anchor 
and sailed away to Booth’s Bay, where he landed the Sheriff and the 
attorney and then kept on his cruise. In a short time Judge Tyler 
returned to the vicinity of Boston and for two years resided near 
Quincy. In 1784 he opened an office in Boston, but was not permitted 
to practice undisturbed because of Shays’ Rebellion, which broke out 
in 1786, in which he took an active part. During the summer and fall 
of that year the courts in most of the counties in Massachusetts could 
not be held. Whenever a session of court was due to sit several hun- 
dred armed men would assemble, take possession of the court house, 
compel an adjournment sine die and disperse. These men became 
more bold as time went on and acts of violence became more numerous 
until “the defenders of the people,” as they called themselves, became 
more feared than favored. The leaders were arrested and held for 
treason and an army of forty-four hundred men was enlisted, before 
whom the rebels broke and ran. In this army Judge Tyler was aide- 
de-camp to General Lincoln, who commanded the State troops and 
had the rank of Major. This was in 1787. The fugitives fled into 
Vermont and New York. Into our own State Major Tyler was sent 
by General Lincoln on the delicate mission to ask our aid in arresting 
the rebels. He came to Bennington while the Legislature was in session 
and there met Ethan Allen, Isaac Tichenor and Jonas Galusha. Here 
he was courteously received and wras invited to address the Legis- 
lature. The mission was not very successful for the reason that 
the Vermonters were as much in favor of the insurgents as the gov- 
ernment of Massachusetts. We were not at this time a State in the 
Union and both New York and New Hampshire claimed the territory 
which is now Vermont. He was entirely successful, however, in 
a similar mission to New York. He returned to Boston after his CLARKE C. FITTS 
Born in West Wardsboro, Vt., October 17, 1870. He 
studied in the public schools, Leland and Gray Sem- 
inary and the Brattleboro High School. After teaching 
in Stratton, he began the study of law in the office of 
Waterman, Martin and Hitt at Brattleboro, and was 
admitted to the bar in 1891. He was almost immedi- 
ately successful in the practice of law. From 1894 to 
1896 he was State’s Attorney of Windham county. In 
1904 he was elected a member of the Legislature and 
was chairman of the Judiciary Committee. The Gen- 
eral Assembly created the office of Attorney General 
and elected Mr. Fitts to fill the position, which he held 
for four years. When he retired he entered upon a 
large and lucrative practice. He was particularly in- 
terested in water power development and was attorney 
for the corporation that built the Vernon and other 
dams. He was one of Vermont’s greatest lawyers. He 
was a director of the National Life Insurance Company, 
the Connecticut River Rower Company, the People’s 
National Bank, and a trustee of the Brattleboro Sav- 
ings Bank. He had been president of the Vermont Bar 
Association and a vice-president of the American Bar 
Association. He married Miss Harriet H. Lyon of 
South Londonderry in 1893. She died in 1897, leaving 
two sons, Robert L. and Stanley C. In 1903, Mr. Fitts 
married Miss Maud L. Emerson of Brattleboro. Two 
children were born of this union, Osmer C. and a 
daughter, Miriam. Mr. Fitts died December 20, 1916. THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
73 
services in suppressing the rebellion and began his first important 
literary effort. It was at a time when the stage was well supported in 
the larger cities and Garrick and Siddons were in their prime on 
the stage and Goldsmith and other writers of comedy had revived 
the taste for the drama. No American had at this time written a 
play of prominent merit for the regular stage and Judge Tyler was 
urged by his friends to make an effort in the new field. Accordingly 
he wrote a play entitled “The Contrast.” In this he contrasted the 
homely plainness of our national character with the polished hypocrisy 
and villainy of foreign fashionable life. This play, written in the 
winter of 1788-89, was staged at the Park Street Theater in New 
York while Congress was in session in that city. It met with marked 
success, as did also the farce entitled “May Day in Town,” written 
at about the same time and played as an afterpiece. Judge Tyler was 
in New York and saw his play produced and was flattered by the 
attentions which he received as an author. When he returned to 
Massachusetts he did not go to Boston, but to his mother’s home at 
Jamaica Plain. A love affair with the daughter of John Adams, who 
had promised to marry him but later dismissed him, induced him to 
leave Boston with his increasing practice and to seek a home in the 
new State he had visited in the service of Massachusetts during Shays’ 
Rebellion. In the summer of 1790 he ascended the Connecticut as 
far as Windsor, where the Supreme Court was then in session. Here 
he met some of the men with whom he had previously become ac- 
quainted and a new circle of bright and congenial companions, and 
in January, 1791, he moved to Guilford, then the most populous 
town in the State, where he established himself in his profession. 
Here he practiced for ten years and at the same time found further 
opportunity for literary work. He wrote during these years “The 
Duelist,” a farce in three acts; the “Georgia Spec, or Land in the 
Moon,” in ridicule of the speculative mania of the times; “The Doctor 
in Spite of Himself,” an imitation of Moliere’s comedy; and “Bari- 
taria” or the “Government of a Day,” founded on the adventures of 
Sancho Panza. At the same time he was a member of a brilliant 
coterie of literary men who held meetings at Greenfield, Brattleboro 
and Walpole. At Walpole was a periodical called The Farmers’ 
Weekly Museum or the New Hampshire and Vermont Journal, to 
which Judge Tyler contributed. The periodical had a large circula- 
tion and to it Judge Tyler gave the exuberance of his genius. In 
1797 he had published at Walpole the most important of his literary 
works, “The Algerine Captive.” This describes the piratical practices 
of the day of Algiers and displays on one side the early manners of 
New England folk, and on the other those of the ferocious race then 
so dreaded by the commercial powers. This work carried the fame 
of its author across the water and had the distinction of being the 74 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
first production of American fiction to be published in London. 
In 1798, Judge Tyler was chosen by the Legislature State’s Attor- 
ney of Windham county, an office which he filled until his elevation 
to the bench in 1801. In the latter year he changed his residence from 
Guilford to Brattleboro and located on a farm two miles from the 
village. He was a Federalist in politics and at first sat with Judges 
Jonathan Robinson and Stephen Jacob. Robinson was a Repub- 
lican and Jacob also a Federalist. Judge Robinson had been ac- 
customed to look upon Judge Tyler as a writer of light poetry and 
fiction and as the author of satirical poems, pointed epigrams, and 
political squibs against the Republicans rather than as a lawyer. He 
did indulge in all these things and was a poet as well as a writer of 
fiction. 
From this time forward Judge Tyler was engrossed mainly in 
his judicial labors. He rode up and down the State to attend the 
courts which became popular while he was on the bench both with 
the bar and the people. In 1807 he became Chief Judge with Judge 
Harrington and Judge Galusha as Assistant Judges. He continued on 
the bench as Chief Judge until 1813, when the Federalists gained 
control of the Legislature and changed all the Judges of the Supreme 
Court. This was the party to which Judge Tyler nominally belonged, 
but it was known at the time that in sentiment he was a Republican. 
Before this time he had rendered valuable services to the profession 
by collecting and arranging reports of the decisions of the Supreme 
Court which were published in two volumes known as “Tyler’s Re- 
ports” in 1809 and 1810. About the same time he published “The 
Yankee in London,” a series of letters by an American youth during 
nine months’ residence in London, a work that was received with 
favor in this country and in England. In 1811 he accepted the pro- 
fessorship of jurisprudence in the University of Vermont and was 
an active member of the corporation for ten years. 
After his retirement from the bench Judge Tyler resumed prac- 
tice at Brattleboro. After 1820 he was obliged to relinquish his prac- 
tice on account of the progress of a cancer on the face which caused 
his death. He died at Brattleboro, August 16, 1826. 
In 1794, Judge Tyler married the daughter of Gen. Joseph 
Puree Palmer, of Framingham, Mass., and from this union there were 
born nine sons and two daughters. One of the former was named for 
his father. He resided all his life at Brattleboro and was for fifty 
years the Judge of Probate for the district of Marlboro and for 
forty-five years the County Clerk of Windham county. He was a 
man of the old school and his interesting personality and genial tem- 
perament are still pleasantly remembered by many who knew him in 
life and recall how he held his court and discharged his duties as 
Clerk. He was the best friend of every member of the bar and his THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
75 
room at the Newfane Inn was the meeting place of his good com- 
panions in the days before the automobile took the court folks away 
from the town at the close of each day’s business. The open fire- 
place, the bright lights, the cards and card-table, and it ought to be 
said to complete the picture, the cupboard in the wall, were familiar 
objects and all intended to intensify the interest in the man to whom 
the room belonged while County Court was in session. In court he 
was a model of dignity. He thought it was his business to be in 
constant attendance when court was in session, and I do not recall 
a time when he was absent while the court was sitting and he was 
the Clerk. It was amusing to hear him administer the oath to the 
witnesses. He used to sit leaning back in his chair against the bench, 
and when the time came for him to administer the oath he would 
bring his chair onto all fours and arise and stand erect while he swore 
the witnesses. This he did deliberately, impressively and in a falsetto 
voice and with a rising inflection. He was obliged to use this voice 
for he had no other, his voice never having changed from boyhood. 
He was a remarkable penman as a young man, but in old age his 
hand was coarse and not well systematized, but he was a good Clerk— 
Judge Ross used to say the best in the State—and he understood 
thoroughly all the duties of his office and kept all the files and records 
in an orderly manner. He died at Brattleboro in 1896. 
STEPHEN JACOB 
1755-1817 
Stephen Jacob came to Vermont on the occasion of the first anni- 
versary of the battle of Bennington, and read a poem or a political 
essay. This was on August 17, 1778,* the occasion also which first 
brought to Vermont Noah Smith, a classmate of Jacob, who delivered 
the oration at the celebration. How much these engagements were 
responsible for the location of these gifted men in Vermont, history 
does not disclose. Stephen Jacob graduated at Yale in 1778 and he 
pursued his legal studies in the office of Theodore Sedgwick, who was 
distinguished both as a jurist and patriot in Massachusetts. He was 
admitted to the bar, in 1780 came to Windsor and soon occupied 
an eminent position in his profession. It is said of him that no one 
who ever came to Vermont rose more rapidly as a lawyer. He was 
engaged in all litigation in or near Windsor county, and at the end of 
* August 16 fell on Sunday that year. 76 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
the second year of his practice had a very large docket. He was 
counsel in the second and third cases reported in the second volume 
of reports issued in this country and edited by Nathaniel Chipman. 
In 1781 he was the Representative from Windsor in the General 
Assembly and again in 1788 and 1794, and was Clerk of the House 
in 1788 and 1789. He was a member of the Council of Censors in 
1785 and State’s Attorney of Windsor county for a long time. He 
was one of the commissioners to treat with New York; was appointed 
first United States District Attorney for Vermont in 1791; was a 
member of the Governor’s Council for several years, and of the 
Constitutional Convention of 1793, and was Chief Judge of the Wind- 
sor County Court. While he was holding the office of State’s Attorney 
in 1786 he assisted the militia called out to quell the mob that 
attempted to interrupt the sessions of the court and was slightly 
wounded. In 1801 he was elected a Judge of the Supreme 
Court, but was obliged to retire at the end of two years on ac- 
count of his strong adherence to the doctrines of Federalism. He 
did not again enter public life, although he was at the time but forty- 
seven years of age. He was a man of aristocratic bearing and per- 
haps out of harmony with the plain men of his time. He entertained 
lavishly and while he had a large practice he was comparatively poor 
at the time of his decease. He died at Windsor, January 27, 1817. 
Judge Jacob was a slave holder, having purchased several slaves 
who came into Vermont. This does not mean that slavery as such 
ever existed in this State. It could not exist here, for by the pro- 
visions of our first constitution it was forbidden, and the legal effect 
of this provision of the Constitution was immediately to set free any 
persons in bondage when they reached Vermont soil. Any service 
that these servants may have rendered in Vermont was a voluntary 
service and not slavery. The relation became one of master and 
servant and not one of master and slave. The recent address of 
Chief Justice Watson delivered before the Vermont Bar Association 
in January last (1921) has forever set at rest any question as to the 
adoption of our first Constitution and as to the possibility of slavery 
existing in Vermont thereafter. His conclusions that the instrument 
was legally adopted and that by its own force slavery was afterwards 
made impossible in Vermont are unanswerable. One of the servants 
of Judge Jacob who had been in bondage before coming to Vermont 
was Dinah, a negro woman whom he purchased in 1783. He was 
afterwards sued by the town of Windsor for her support and the 
case was defended by Charles Marsh, the leader of the Vermont bar. 
and is reported in second Tyler at page 192. THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
77 
THEOPHILUS HARRINGTON 
1762-1813 
It is a curious circumstance that the next man to be elected to 
the bench should have been Theophilus Harrington, who made him- 
self the best known and longest remembered of any of the older 
Judges, because he required a bill of sale from God Almighty before 
he would recognize the title of a slave holder to his slave in Vermont. 
He was in strange contrast in every way to Judge Jacob, in birth, 
education, tastes and environment, and yet these two men were called 
to serve in the same court at a distance from each other in point of 
time of only two years. One was a scholar, an accomplished lawyer, 
an aristocrat and a slave owner; the other was a farmer, probably 
poorly educated, a common man who appeared in court barefooted, 
and an enemy of slavery. These men must have represented the ex- 
treme views of their constituents, and it was to be expected that the 
man of the people would have a longer service than the lawyer and 
scholar. Such was the case, for Judge Harrington served for ten 
years and Judge Jacob only two years. But Judge Harrington 
came of distinguished ancestry, among whom were Theophilus 
Whaley, who was one of the Judges who beheaded Charles I, Thomas 
Harris, one of the Pilgrims of 1620, Dr. John Clarke, Governor of 
Rhode Island, and Dr. Michael Dwindle, who fled from Paris upon 
the revocation of the Edict of Nantes and settled in Massachusetts. 
Judge Harrington’s mother was a great granddaughter of Doctor 
Dwindle. Judge Harrington was born in Coventry, R. I., March 27, 
1762, came to Vermont in 1785, and located as a farmer in Clarendon. 
He represented the town in the Legislature in 1795, and from 1797 
to 1803, inclusive. He was elected Speaker the latter year. He was 
Chief Judge of the Rutland County Court from 1800 to 1803, and 
Judge of the Supreme Court from 1803 to 1813, the longest term 
held by any one man before the change in the judicial system in 1825. 
He was admitted to the bar after his first election to the Supreme 
Court. He was by nature a Judge and not by education. He was 
rough and unpolished in his manners and had no acquaintance with 
the technicalities of the law, but his mind was vigorous, and his dis- 
crimination acute, and his search for the justice in a case so pains- 
taking that he seldom went wrong in arriving at a decision. This was 
very sure to be in the direction of substantial justice, although it must 
be admitted that he sometimes overlooked the rules of law in arriving 
at results. An occasion of this kind arose in a case where two leaders 
of the bar, Nathaniel Chipman and Israel Smith, were in discussion 
over a demurrer to a declaration. The Judge had listened for a long 
time with patient attention to the two disputants, and taking the docu- 78 
HISTORY OF VERMONT * 
ment in his hand he asked each of the men what he called the paper. 
“It is a demurrer, Your Honor,” was the answer. Whereupon Judge 
Harrington said: “I do not know what a demurrer is, but I know 
what justice is, and this plaintiff is entitled to a judgment.” This 
decision may have been on the side of justice, and very likely it was, 
but not as much can be said of another incident which arose in the 
course of his judicial career. In a land case which the Judge was 
trying counsel on one side objected to a deed because it was not sealed. 
The Judge asked if that was the only objection and on being advised 
that it was, he called the Clerk and said to him: “Clerk, hand me a 
wafer.” He then attached a piece of paper to the deed with the wafer 
and said: “That objection is removed; now proceed, Mr. Attorney.” 
In a case where a horse had been stolen in Canada, taken through 
Vermont and sold in Massachusetts, it was claimed on the part of 
the defence that the thief could not be prosecuted in Vermont. The 
case was before the Supreme Court and the other Judges doubted 
about the right of the officers to prosecute in Vermont. Judge Har- 
rington said that in his opinion the respondent stole the horse when 
he took it and stole it every step of the way he took with it until he 
sold it and, therefore, he was stealing it all the way through Vermont. 
The other Judges concurred, the respondent was convicted and a prin- 
ciple of law was established for all time in Vermont. 
The most interesting event in the judicial career of Judge Har- 
rington occurred when a slave was brought before him under an act 
of Congress authorizing the owners of slaves that had escaped into 
other States to seize them and take them before a magistrate to show 
cause by evidence that the person seized “Doth under the laws of the 
State or Territory from which he or she fled owe service or labor 
to the person claiming him or her.” It was made the magistrate’s 
duty Jo give a certificate thereof to the claimant which should be a 
sufficient warrant for moving the slave. Under this law a master 
undertook to make out a case before Judge Harrington to recover 
a slave who had escaped into Vermont. His proof consisted in part 
at least of affidavits, one of which contained a bill of sale of the 
slave in question. This was offered in evidence, but the Judge made 
no order in the case. Then the attorney offered an affidavit showing 
the bill of sale to the man who sold the mother of the slave. “Is 
this all?” inquired the Judge. The claimant said he had gone back 
to the ownership of the mother, but the Judge was thinking of familiar 
terms in land cases which he was accustomed to try and "said: “You 
do not go back to the original proprietor.” The claimant’s attorney 
then asked what would answer beyond the bills of sale, and received 
from Judge Harrington the historic reply: “A bill of sale from God 
Almighty.” The slave was not held. Judge Harrington died at Clar- 
endon, November 17, 1813. ALEXANDER DUNNETT 
Born in Peacham, Vt., November 9, 1852, of Scotch 
parentage. He was educated in Newbury and Mclndoe 
Academies and Randolph Normal School. He studied 
law and was admitted to the bar in 1877. He prac- 
ticed law at South Ryegate until 1883, when he re- 
moved to St. Johnsbury. He was State’s Attorney of 
Caledonia county from 1886 to 1890 and United States’ 
Attorney for the District of Vermont from 1906 to 
1915. He was a member of the State Senate in 1890. 
He was a delegate to the Republican National Con- 
vention in 1920 and chairman of the Vermont delega- 
tion. He had been president of the Vermont Bar As- 
sociation, a trustee of Norwich University and had re- 
ceived from that institution the honorary degree of 
Master of Science. He died September 14, 1920. THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
79 
JONAS GALUSHA 
1753-1834 
Jonas Galusha, the last layman to be chosen to the bench of the 
Supreme Court, was born at Norwich, Conn., February 11, 1753, and 
came to Shaftsbury in 1775. He commanded two companies of 
Shaftsbury troops in the battle of Bennington and saw much active 
service from 1777 until 1780. His occupation was that of a farmer 
and innkeeper and his first office that of Sheriff of Bennington County, 
which he held from 1780 to 1787. He was State Councilor from 
1793 to 1798, and from 1801 to 1805. In politics he was a Democrat 
(Republican) and soon came into leadership in the party. He was 
elected Governor in 1809, 1810, 1811, 1812, and again in 1815, 1816, 
1817, 1818 and 1819, in all a service of nine years. He was elected 
a Judge of the Supreme Court in 1807 and 1808; was Presidential 
Elector in 1808, 1820 and 1824; one of the Council of Censors in 
1792, and member and president of the Constitutional Conventions in 
1814 and 1822. Judge Galusha married a daughter of Thomas Chit- 
tenden, and his brother-in-law, Martin Chittenden, was his most active 
political opponent. In 1813 he was defeated by Martin Chittenden 
for the governorship, but prevailed over him in 1815, and continued 
as Governor for five years thereafter. Judge Galusha will be best 
remembered as Governor. Not much can be learned about him as a 
Judge. In the former office he displayed great personal friendship 
toward his political opponents and employed no harsh epithets against 
them in his political relations with them. He urged the repeal of 
the law which allowed the imprisonment of debtors. Flis messages 
breathe a religious spirit and he refers in one of these to the “wide 
and recent spiritual harvest” in the State, referring to a religious 
revival at the time. Such a man should have been, and probably was, 
a good Judge. His last days were spent in contentment and honor in 
the rural quiet of his Shaftsbury home where he died October 8, 1834. 
DAVID FAY 
1761-1827 
David Fay was the youngest brother of Judge Jonas Fay and 
the son of Stephen Fay. He was born at Hardwick, Mass., Decem- 
ber 13, 1761. He was in Capt. Samuel Robinson’s company at the 
battle of Bennington and served as a fifer. At the age of thirty-five 
he was admitted to the bar and was State’s Attorney of Bennington 
county for several years prior to 1801. He was appointed by Presi- 80 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
dent Jefferson United States District Attorney for Vermont and in 
1809 was chosen Judge of the Supreme Court on the occasion of the 
election of Judge Jonathan Robinson as United States Senator. He 
served until 1813, when the court was thrown out by the Federalists. 
He was afterwards Judge of Probate and from 1817 to 1821 was 
a member of the Governor’s Council. He died at Bennington, June 
5, 1827. 
DANIEL FARRAND 
1760-1825 
Daniel Farrand was one of the most accomplished of the early 
Judges. He came from Canaan, Conn., where he was born September 
9, 1760. He graduated at Yale and settled at Windsor in this State 
in 1780. It is thought that he studied law with his brother-in-law, 
Stephen Jacob of Windsor, but of this there is no record, nor is there 
one of his admission to the bar. He began practice while a resident 
of Windsor and was Register of the Probate Court from 1783 to 
1786. He was in practice in 1784 and 1785, but soon afterwards re- 
moved to Newbury, where he remained until 1800, when he took up 
his residence in Bellows Falls. He took a leading part in the political 
affairs of Orange county while a resident there and represented 
Newbury in the convention of 1791, which adopted the Constitution 
of the United States. He was Register of the Probate Court and 
State’s Attorney for several years, and for one year Judge of Probate. 
He represented Newbury in the General Assembly in 1792, 1793, 1796 
and 1798, and the last year was Speaker. He had a large practice in 
Orange county and represented the State in the first case to be re- 
ported by the Supreme Court. It is the case of State against Annice 
and may be found in the reports of N. Chipman at page 9. During 
his four years at Bellows Falls he represented the town in the General 
Assembly in 1802, and in 1801, 1802 and 1803 was State’s Attorney of 
Windham county. The latter year he was defeated for Congress by 
James Elliott, of Brattleboro. In 1804, Judge Farrand removed to Bur- 
lington, where he remained until his death, which occurred there Octo- 
ber 13, 1825. He was elected a member of the Council of Censors in 
1813, and when the sweeping change was made in the court that year he 
was elected a Judge with Jonathan Hubbard of Windsor and Nathaniel 
Chipman. The latter was Chief Judge. Two years later the Federalist 
party was removed from power, and with it the Judges of the Supreme 
Court. From the standpoint of today the party changes that took 
place in our highest court at this time were anything but creditable. 
The present idea about the court is one of permanency and not of THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
81 
party affiliation. It should be kept in mind, however, that the differ- 
ences between the two parties at this time growing out of the second 
war with Great Britain were very marked, and that the men of the 
period took the most extreme views and carried the results of their 
political activities to great lengths, so much so that the members of 
the court were affected. 
On the occasion of the visit of President Monroe to Burlington 
in 1817, Judge Farrand was selected to make the address of welcome 
in behalf of the citizens of the place, and no doubt the brilliance of 
his wit and humor pleased the Chief Executive of the nation, but it 
is reasonably certain that he did not outdo Robert Edmund, of Ver- 
gennes, who performed a similar service in that city in such a manner 
as to call forth from the President the question, “Why is not that man 
in Congress?” 
Judge Farrand was celebrated in his profession as a lawyer, and 
outside of it as a man of extensive learning. If it is true that he had 
“a stubborn and vigorous intellect” as is recorded of him, then he had 
some of the attributes of a good Judge, and it would seem at this day 
as though his compeers would have done well to have retained him 
longer on the bench. He was, however, in his later years troubled 
with failing eyesight and compelled to retire from active business, 
although he did not become totally blind. When he died his profes- 
sional brethren bestowed on his memory the highest compliment, de- 
claring that “his legal attainments were of the first order,” and that 
they were “bound to acknowledge him as one of the ornaments of 
the profession.” The resolutions also make reference to his research 
in literature and science, and praise his life as it was exemplified as 
a neighbor, statesman and Judge. 
JONATHAN HATCH HUBBARD 
1768-1849 
Jonathan Hatch Hubbard was born at Tolland, Conn., May 7, 
1768. He received a liberal education, studied law and was admitted 
to the bar in 1770. He moved to Windsor, Vt., where he practiced 
his profession with success until 1808, when he was elected to Con- 
gress, where he served for one term. At the time of the overthrow 
of the Republicans in 1813 he was elected a Judge of the Supreme 
Court and served for two years. Dartmouth College conferred on 
him an honorary degree. He died at Windsor, September 20, 1849. 82 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
ASA ALDIS 
1770-1847 
Asa Aldis was the son of a Loyalist, who was a Massachusetts 
merchant of considerable wealth before the Revolution. Both his 
father and mother died while he was quite young, and he was brought 
up in the family of an aunt. After the war closed he recovered some 
of the property his father had possessed, including a farm which 
he retained until his death. Judge Aldis was born April 14, 1770, 
at Franklin, Mass. He entered Brown University and graduated 
at twenty-six. He studied law in the office of Judge Howell in 
Providence, was admitted to the bar and opened an office for 
practice in Chepachet. Not being satisfied with his location he went 
in search of a better place through Pennsylvania and Ohio, and 
returned through St. Albans, which he found so ideal that he lo- 
cated there in 1802. He was associated for a short time with 
Bates Turner in practice. He was not a natural politician, 
but was ardently in favor of the Republican policies of the time, 
especially the embargo and non-intercourse acts, and was foremost 
in the support of the war measures of the Republicans, had great 
influence in the party, and was looked up to for advice by party 
leaders. When the Republicans came into power in 1815 they looked 
for popular as well as able men to fill the places on the bench, then 
occupied by Federalist Judges, and Aldis was made Chief Judge. He 
did not seek the place nor want it. This election was the result of 
a political move and it met with much opposition. The duties and 
cares of the office did not appeal to his tastes and at the end of the 
year he declined re-election. Official life was so objectionable to him 
that not even the entreaties of the leaders of the opposing party 
could induce him to remain on the bench. Among these was Charles 
Marsh of Woodstock, a Federalist, who stood at the head of the 
Vermont bar. Judge Aldis returned to the practice, but ill health 
forbade a very active participation in it. In legal matters he was 
regarded with the greatest respect. He was not a student of the 
law, but rather employed his powerful intellect in trying to reason out 
what the law ought to be, and in the trial of cases how the evidence 
would strike the jury under the charge of the court. Both his son, 
Asa Owen, and his son-in-law, Daniel Kellogg, were Judges of the 
Supreme Court. He died at St. Albans, October 16, 1847. THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
83 
RICHARD SKINNER 
1778-1833 
Richard Skinner was born in Litchfield, Conn., May 30, 1778, 
and was educated in the law school at that place. This school was the 
nursery of lawyers about the beginning of the last century, many of 
whom came to Vermont and left their lasting impress on the govern- 
ment and jurisprudence of our State. Judge Skinner was one of the 
first of the Judges who received training under the old masters of the 
common law (Judges Reeve and Gould), but many other men were des- 
tined to follow him in the school who were to make Vermont their 
home, and not a few of these early law school students took a course at 
Yale before studying law. It would be interesting to follow the gradu- 
ates of this old-time institution into Vermont, and to trace their success- 
ful careers through the many offices which they occupied during the first 
half of the last century, but this is not the place to do this. Judge Skin- 
ner was admitted to the bar in Connecticut and came at once to Man- 
chester and began practice. This was in September, 1779. Offices came 
to him in rapid succession. The following year he was appointed State’s 
Attorney for Bennington county, and held that office until 1812. 
For the last six years of this time he was also Judge of Probate. The 
next year he was elected to Congress, where he served a term, then 
returned to Manchester and represented the town for two years in 
the Legislature, the last year, 1818, being Speaker. He was elected 
Assistant Judge of the Supreme Court in 1815 and 1816, and in 1817 
was elected Chief Judge, but declined to serve. He was again State’s 
Attorney in 1819. He was elected Governor in 1820, 1821 and 1822 
and declined a further election. In 1825, on the reorganization of the 
court, he was elected Chief Judge, and remained in office until 1829, 
when he refused to become a candidate for re-election. His death 
resulted from injuries which he received when thrown from a car- 
riage while crossing the Green Mountains. He died at Manchester, 
May 23, 1833. 
History says of him that “intellectually his qualities were of that 
kind which gained the respect and confidence of mankind rather than 
immediate admiration, and as a lawyer he was noted for the clearness 
and force with which he presented his cases.” He and his descend- 
ants have contributed generously to the school, library and cemetery 
in Manchester. HISTORY- OF VERMONT 
84 
JAMES FISK 
1763-1844 
James Fisk was born at Greenwich, Mass., October 4, 1763. His 
father died when he was two years old, and left no means. Ap- 
parently he was self-educated. When he was sixteen years of age he 
enlisted in the American army and served three years. At the age 
of twenty-two he was elected to the General Assembly of Massa- 
chusetts and at about the same time began to preach as a Universalist 
minister. He came to Barre, Vt., in 1798, continued to preach occa- 
sionally, cleared a farm, studied law in his spare moments, opened 
practice and rapidly rose to eminence and influence. His alert mind, 
ready wit and power of argument, his poise of character and justice 
and kindliness of views, combined with his genial manner qualified 
him for leadership. Walton says of him that “in his form, the vigor 
of his intellect and the brilliancy of his mind, he much resembled 
Aaron Burr.” He was small of stature, with keen eyes, was a brilliant 
conversationalist and, says Thompson, “really talented.” He rep- 
resented Barre in the Legislature from 1800 to 1805, in 1809, 1810 
and 1815. He was Judge of the Orange County Court in 1802 and 
1809, and in 1816 was elected one of the Judges of the Supreme Court. 
The next year he was re-elected, and he was on his way to become 
Chief Judge when he resigned to accept an election to the United 
States Senate as the successor of Dudley Chase. He had already 
represented his district in the lower house at Washington for four 
terms, serving from 1805 to 1809, and from 1811 to 1815. After 
remaining in the Senate for one year he resigned to accept the appoint- 
ment of Collector of Customs in the Vermont district, and in 1819 
removed from Barre to Swanton, where he resided for the most part 
during the rest of his life. In 1812 he was offered the position of 
Postmaster General by President Madison, but declined; and he sub- 
sequently refused a judgeship in the United States Court in the Ter- 
ritory of Indiana. He was a man of a good mind and sound judgment, 
and was an excellent reasoner; and his integrity was such that positions 
of trust came to him without his seeking. He died at Swanton, De- 
cember 1, 1844. 
WILLIAM A. PALMER 
1781-1860 
William A. Palmer was born at Hebron, Conn., September 12, 
1781. He had only a common school education, but a fall on the ice 
with an axe caused the loss of a part of one hand and rendered him JOHN YOUNG 
Born in Stanstead, Que., March 81, 1839. He gradu- 
ated from Wesleyan University in 1860 with high hon- 
ors. He was principal of Derby (Vt.) Academy, 
studied law and was admitted to the bar in 1862. He 
practiced at Derby Line until 1881, when he removed 
to Newport. He had a large practice, representing im- 
portant corporations, and was recognized as one of the 
ablest lawyers in the State. He was elected to the 
House of Representatives in 1864 and to the Senate in 
1898. He was elected president of the Vermont Bar 
Association in 1901. He married Augusta A. Young 
in 1866 and one son, George B. Young, was born to 
them. THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
85 
unfit for physical labor. This induced him to take up the study of 
the law, which he pursued in the office of Judge Peters, in Hebron, 
and in the office of Daniel Buck, in Chelsea, in this State. He had 
come to Chelsea in 1800, and after being admitted to the bar there 
spent a short time in the office of William Baxter of Brownington, 
then moved on to Derby, and afterwards settled in St. Johnsbury about 
1805. He was soon after appointed Judge of Probate for the Cale- 
donia district and also County Clerk. He held the office of Judge 
seven years, and that of Clerk eight years. He moved to Danville, 
where he remained the rest of his life, dying there December 3, 1860. 
He was six times elected Representative of Danville to the General 
Assembly, was a delegate to three Constitutional Conventions, and 
in 1836 was one of the first Senators chosen. After he had completed 
his term as State Senator he was appointed Judge of the County 
Court, and served as such for two years. He was elected a Judge 
of the Supreme Court in 1816, and re-elected in 1817, but declined 
to serve further. In 1818 he was elected United States Senator to fill 
out the unexpired term of James Fisk and the full succeeding term. 
His service was during the time the Missouri Compromise was before 
Congress, and he voted at certain stages for the measure. He was 
the only Senator from the State who ever cast a vote in favor of 
the slave interests, but he insisted to his dying day that he was right, 
not because he approved of slavery, but because he stood at that early 
day on what afterwards became the Douglas idea of squatter 
sovereignty as the only doctrine consistent with compromise and 
the Constitution. His stand for the compromise made him unpopular 
at the time, but on his return home after his services in the Senate he 
was sent to the House in 1827. He was elected Governor in 1831 
and re-elected until 1835. In 1831 and 1832 he was elected in the 
Legislature by one majority. His office of Governor terminated his 
public career except as a delegate to Constitutional Conventions. He 
was a Jefferson Republican and adhered to the Democratic side from 
Jefferson to Buchannan, save during the Anti-Masonic excitement. It 
is recorded of him that he “was honest and just in his business trans- 
actions and estimable in all relations of life, and was a man of strong, 
natural abilities, possessing a decided and penetrating mind.” It was 
further said of him that he was “too benevolent, loving his neighbor 
better than himself. He had high social qualities, with great sim- 
plicity of manners.” HISTORY OF VERMONT 
86 
DUDLEY CHASE 
1771-1846 
One of the interesting and brainy Judges of his time was Dudley 
Chase. He was an uncle of Salmon P. Chase, Lincoln’s Secretary of 
the Treasury, and later Chief Justice of the United States Supreme 
Court. Dudley Chase was born at Cornish, N. H., December 30, 
1771. Though poor, he managed to procure a college education and 
graduated with honor at Dartmouth in 1791. He studied law with 
Lot Hall at Westminster and located in Randolph, where he remained 
all his life and died February 23, 1846. He was State’s Attorney of 
Orange county from 1803 to 1811; member of the Constitutional Con- 
ventions of 1814 and 1822; member of the General Assembly from 
1805 to 1812, and the last five years Speaker. He closed his service 
in the House with such popularity that he was elected to succeed 
Stephen R. Bradley as United States Senator, but resigned his seat 
in 1817 to accept an election as Chief Judge of the Supreme Court. 
He was re-elected to this position until 1821, when he retired to prac- 
tice law. Again representing Randolph in the House in 1823-24 he 
won such popularity that he was elected to the Senate a second time. 
He retired from public life at the end of his term in 1831, and devoted 
the last of his years to farming and gardening, in which he found 
great delight. On the occasion of his last election as Senator his 
competitor was Samuel Prentiss, of Montpelier. Both were members 
of the General Assembly and occupied the same seat while the election 
was in progress. In 1830, Judge Prentiss succeeded Judge Chase as 
Senator. 
Judge Chase did not observe the usual conventions in respect to 
relinquishing his law practice when he became a Judge, but deemed 
it his right and duty to finish the work that his clients had committed 
to his care rather than turn it over to other members of the bar. One 
of his cases was on the docket of the Washington County Court, where 
he was called to preside soon after his election to the bench. He 
first sat in the cases in which he was not interested, and when these 
were tried he called one of the other Judges to preside, and doffing 
the judicial ermine and putting on the robes of the advocate, entered 
the bar and tried his case. He was making his argument to the jury 
when an habitual frequenter to the court dropped in, who had seen 
the Judge presiding during the term and supposed he was still acting 
as such, although he was speaking from a different place in the court 
room. As he passed out he met a crony who inquired if the case 
was finished and was informed that it was nearly so, “For,” said the 
spectator, “the Judge is charging and he is going it like h—1 for the 
defendant.” THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
87 
Judge Chase was portly and commanding in appearance, like the 
great Secretary, of winning address, and well-balanced mind. He was 
admirably fitted for judicial office. 
JOEL DOOLITTLE 
1773-1841 
Joel Doolittle came to Middlebury in 1800 as the first tutor in 
Middlebury College. He was born in Russell, Mass., in 1773, and 
graduated at Yale in 1799. He was admitted to the bar in 1801 and 
obtained an extensive law practice in Middlebury. In 1817 he was 
elected a Judge of the Supreme Court. He was re-elected for the 
five following years and again in 1824. In the latter year he repre- 
sented Middlebury in the Legislature. He was a member of the 
Governor’s Council for three years before becoming Judge, and in 
1834 was a member and president of the Council of Censors. For 
a score of years he was a member of the corporation of Middlebury 
College, and was active in its behalf and interested in education. He 
applied the studious habits which he had acquired in his college work 
to his labors as a lawyer and Judge, and performed his duties, both to 
his clients and the public with fidelity. After his retirement from the 
bench in 1825 he resumed practice at Middlebury and continued therein 
until 1841. He died at Middlebury, March 9 of that year. 
WILLIAM BRAYTON 
1787-1828 
William Brayton was born at Lansingburgh, N. Y., August 22, 
1787, and when he was thirteen years of age was a student at Williams 
College, but did not graduate. He came to Franklin county, studied 
law, was admitted to the bar in 1807, and located in Swanton. 
He married Hortentia Penniman, daughter of Jabez and Frances 
Penniman. The latter was the widow of Ethan Allen. He was made 
Chief Judge of the Franklin County Court in 1815; represented Swan- 
ton in the General Assembly in 1817, was chosen Judge of the 
Supreme Court at that session and served in all by continuous elec- 
tions five years. After he became Judge he removed to St. Albans 
and after leaving the bench to Burlington, where he practiced until 
his death, which occurred at the latter place, August 5, 1828. He 
was the author of the early reports of the decisions of the Supreme 
Court known as Brayton’s Reports. 88 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
CORNELIUS P. VAN NESS 
1782-1852 
Cornelius P. Van Ness came of a prominent and wealthy Dutch 
family and was born at Kinderhook, N. Y., January 26, 1782. He 
prepared for college but did not enter. He entered the law office of 
his brother, William P. Van Ness, in New York, where he studied 
law in company with Martin Van Buren, was admitted to the bar 
in New York in 1804 and began practice in Kinderhook, where he 
remained for two years, when he removed to St. Albans, Vt. He 
practiced at St. Albans from 1806 to 1809, when he took up his resi- 
dence in Burlington. He soon began a career as an office holder, 
and during his eventful life held many positions of trust in the State 
and Federal governments. He was appointed without solicitation 
United States District Attorney for Vermont. This office was one 
of great importance at the time due to the attempted smuggling 
of merchandise by way of Lake Champlain from Canada. The 
office was so faithfully administered that it led to the appointment 
to the more important trust of Collector of the port of Burlington, 
to which he was transferred in 1813, and which he held until the 
termination of the war with Great Britain. During his administration 
of this office Burlington was the most important revenue port in the 
country for the reason that the sea ports were closed on account of 
the war. When the war came to an end he was appointed one of the 
Commissioners to settle the national boundary under the treaty of 
Ghent, and displayed rare fitness and ability in the discharge of his 
duties. 
When the duties of this task were over he continued to practice 
law in Burlington “for the love of it,” as it was said; but he was soon 
called upon to take up public duties again, this time as a member of 
the General Assembly, where he served from 1818 to 1820. In 1821 
and 1822 he was elected Chief Judge of the Supreme Court, and in 
1823 Governor, to which office he was twice re-elected without opposi- 
tion. He was then forty-four years of age and stood in the front 
rank of his profession, where he had practiced for almost twenty 
years; he had wielded the Federal patronage of the State for a decade 
as well as that of the State during his term as Governor; he had 
attended to bestowing the honors of the State upon General Lafayette 
in 1825, in a manner that was worthy of the distinguished visitor; 
he had entertained with a generous hospitality and distributed his 
favors with shrewdness that was mixed with kindness and good fellow- 
ship. He aspired to the Senatorship, which he felt sure he could 
obtain, and his mortification came when the honor he coveted was 
taken from him by Senator Seymour. The fight was a long and THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
89 
bitter one and he was defeated by six votes which he charged to the 
administration of John Quincy Adams and persons in New York City 
who were hostile to him. It was the most exciting political fight ever 
held in the State, and when it was over Judge Van Ness issued a 
manifesto in which he directly charged the Adams administration with 
his defeat, and at the same time abandoned it. Before the election oi 
1828 his old power had been pretty generally broken in the State 
which was carried for Adams by a strong majority. But the country 
went for Jackson, who appointed Judge Van Ness Minister to Spain, 
where he remained for ten years and discharged his duties with ability 
and success. He returned to Vermont in 1840 and made a determined 
effort to carry the State for his fellow law student, Van Buren, for 
President, but his influence was gone and he was unsuccessful. He 
then left Vermont for New York, where he was appointed by Presi- 
dent Tyler Collector of the port of New York, a position which he 
held for a short time in 1844 and 1845. He continued to reside in 
New York thereafter, and on the death of his brother, Gen. John P. 
Van Ness, in Washington in 1846, he became administrator of his 
estate and spent much of his time in Washington until his death, 
which occurred at Philadelphia, December 15, 1852. 
The citizens of Burlington retained a fondness for Judge Van 
Ness after his defeat in the senatorship contest, for they turned out 
en masse to receive him when he returned from his mission to Spain. 
An amusing incident occurred at this time. A stranger stopping at 
one of the Burlington hotels inquired of the landlord who the man 
was that the whole populace turned out to greet, and received the 
answer that “years ago he practiced law here, but he has been gone 
several years and I believe he has been a minister in a penitentiary 
out in Spain.” 
In an obituary sketch published in the New York Evening Post 
just after his decease the character of Judge Van Ness is thus summed 
up: “Governor Van Ness neither felt nor affected love for literature; 
troubled himself little with theoretical speculations or with abstract 
principles, except as connected with the kindred sciences of law and 
politics, which few men more thoroughly studied and understood; 
this concentration of mind and effort was the secret of his success. 
Without imagination, using language plain but expressing always the 
precise idea he wished to convey, disregarding decoration, his rea- 
soning, compacted link within link, glowed with the fire of earnestness 
and conviction, or rather his speech was a torrent of impassioned 
argument as clear as it was rapid, capable of sweeping away juries 
and assemblies, and of moving from their moorings the anchored 
caution and gravity of the Bench.” 90 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
CHARLES K. WILLIAMS 
1782-1853 
The father of Charles K. Williams was a philosopher and his- 
torian. He came to Vermont from Cambridge, Mass., where he was 
an instructor in Harvard College. His two-volume history of Vermont 
is one of the best contributions to our early literature. Charles K. 
Williams was born at Cambridge, January 24, 1782, and came to 
Vermont with his father in 1790. He graduated at Williams College 
in 1800. He studied law in the office of Chauncey Langdon of Castle- 
ton, whose daughter he subsequently married, and with Cephas Smith, 
of Rutland, who was Clerk of the United States courts for the dis- 
trict of Vermont. He was admitted to the bar in 1803 and located 
at Rutland, where he resided thereafter and died March 9, 1853. He 
served in the campaign on the northern frontier in the War of 1812 
and acquired the militia title of General. He practiced his profession 
in Rutland until 1822, and during this time was a member of the 
General Assembly in 1809, 1811, 1814, 1815, 1820 and 1821. In 1822 
he was elected Judge of the Supreme Court and served two terms. 
He declined re-election, was appointed Collector of Customs and 
served through the administration of President Adams. In 1829 he 
was again elected Judge and in 1833 was made Chief Judge and 
served until 1846, the longest term as Chief Judge in the history of 
Vermont, with the exception of Chief Judge Pierpoint. From 1850 
to 1852, Judge Williams was Governor. 
He was a member of the corporation of Middlebury College from 
1827 to 1843, from which he received the degree of Master of Arts. 
He had a similar degree from Williams College and the degree of 
Doctor of Laws. 
Judge Williams stands high in the jurisprudence of Vermont. 
As a lawyer he was a leader. His manner was courteous and affable. 
He was quick and impulsive, and possessed a fine sense of honor. 
He had large general knowledge, and was a good conversationalist. 
As a Judge he possessed great readiness of apprehension, quickness 
of decision and a keen sense of justice. He was sympathetic and 
impulsive, and could not conceal from the bar and jury what he con- 
sidered the right or the wrong of a case. As a trial Judge he directed 
the trial himself, and did not wait for counsel to make objections 
when witnesses were asked improper questions, but came to their res- 
cue when they were being unfairly treated. He held night sessions 
of the court. In charging the jury he stood, and required the jury to 
stand. He read largely from his minutes of the evidence and mar- 
shalled and applied the testimony as it bore on the different points 
in the case. In this way the jury came to see his point of view in FREDERICK B. JENNINGS 
Born in Bennington Center, Vt., in 1853. He 
graduated from Williams College in 1872 and 
later from the Harvard and New York Uni- 
versity .Law Schools. He was admitted to the 
bar in 1875. In 1874 he entered the office of Evarts, 
Southmayd and Choate in New York. In 1880 he 
formed the firm of Jennings and Russell, which in 
1894 became Stetson, Jennings and Russell. He was 
general counsel for and director of the Associated 
Press, counsel for and director of the International 
Paper Company, director of the New York Trust Com- 
pany, and many other corporations, president of the 
First National Bank of North Bennington and a trustee 
of Williams and Barnard Colleges. He married Lila 
Park Hall of North Bennington, July 27, 1880, and 
four children were born to them, one daughter and 
three sons. Mr. Jennings died at his home in New 
York City, May 26, 1920. THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
91 
the case, and to understand what his opinion was as to its merits. 
It was said of him that no Judge in Vermont was ever more justly or 
highly esteemed, and that his opinions received merited commenda- 
tion from great law writers and Judges, and that our reports bear more 
distinctly the impress of his work than any other. He must have 
been dignity personified, for it is said that in all his nineteen years on 
the bench he never smiled but twice. One of these occasions was 
when the irrepressible Jacob Maeck was making an argument before 
the Supreme Court. Judge Williams told him he need not discuss 
the point because it had been decided. “It has?” said Mr. Maeck. 
“Yes,” said Judge Williams, “in the 10th Vermont.” “Where?” said 
Mr. Maeck, putting his hand to his ear. “In the 10th Vermont,” 
repeated the Judge. Mr. Maeck gravely bowing replied: “I will 
buy the book, Your Honor.” Another occasion was when Joshua 
Sawyer of Hyde Park offered a deed from a black woman “to show 
color of title” to a piece of land where her cabin had remained for 
a long time, and she had exercised the right of squatter sovereignty 
thereon. 
ASA AIKENS 
1788-1863 
We have now sketched forty of the early Judges of Vermont, 
who held office over a period of fifty-five years, and have come to the 
first native-born Vermonter who sat in the Supreme Court. Asa 
Aikens was born in Barnard, Windsor county, January 13, 1778. He 
entered Middlebury College in 1804, but was transferred to the Mili- 
tary Academy at West Point as a cadet, and passed the last year of 
his college course in that institution. At the end of his course he 
returned to Middlebury and studied law in the office of Joel Doolittle. 
In 1812 he served as Captain in the Thirty-first Regiment of the 
United States Infantry. He located at Windsor in 1812, and repre- 
sented the town for two years in the General Assembly, and was for 
two years State’s Attorney. He was elected Judge of the Supreme 
Court in 1823, and served until the change in the judicial system in 
1825. Upon the reorganization of the court he was appointed editor 
of the decisions, and issued two volumes which bear the title of 
“Aikens’ Reports.” He also published “Aikens’ Forms,” which were 
extensively used by the profession until recently. 
Judge Aikens moved to Westport, N. Y., in 1843, which was 
afterwards his home. He was formally admitted to the bar in New 
York, but did not practice to any considerable extent. He devoted 
much time to the compilation of a work called “Aikens’ Tables.” HISTORY OF VERMONT 
92 
These were tables of interest, discount, annuity values, rents, etc., 
with an almanac of the last half of the nineteenth century and the 
Northampton Life Tables. This was a valuable work and has been 
of much service to the courts and banks. He was a careful, pains- 
taking man, accurate in his work and faithful to the duties imposed 
on him. Two-thirds of the opinions reported in the second volume 
of D. Chipman’s Reports were written by him. Judge Redfield refers 
to Judge Aikens as “an excellent lawyer.” He died suddenly at Hack- 
ensack, N. J., July 12, 1863, and was buried in Trinity Cemetery in 
New York City. 
SAMUEL PRENTISS 
1782-1857 
The full sketch of Samuel Prentiss appears among the outlines 
of the Federal Judges. Judge Prentiss was the author of the act 
which made an important change in the courts in 1825. Until that 
year the three Judges of the County Court were usually laymen. 
Occasionally a lawyer appeared among these Judges, but these in- 
stances were rare. These courts endeavored to do justice, but a careful 
adherence to the principles of the law was not to be expected from men 
who were not trained in it. The system was so changed that the 
Chief Judge of the County Court should be one of the Judges of the 
Supreme Court. The system worked admirably. The courts have 
been conducted with more dignity, the rights of litigants have been 
better protected, and the confidence of the public in the courts has been 
strengthened. Ever since the passage of the act in question the pre- 
siding Judge in County Court has been a lawyer, and while the two 
assistants have not been members of the profession as a rule, it has 
sometimes happened that they, too, have belonged to the bar. Under the 
present system one of the Superior Judges presides in the Countv 
Courts, but the justices of the Supreme Court have the same powers 
should it become necessary for them to sit in County Court. The old 
courts, made up as they were of laymen, are so firmly entrenched by the 
Constitution and laws and in affections of the people, that it has not 
been possible to depart from the custom of having their local repre- 
sentatives sit in the County Courts. Every effort to alter the Con- 
stitution so as to eliminate the Assistant Judges has proven futile. 
It is said that Vermont is the only State that has courts made up 
in this manner, and there are many who would like to see the Assistant 
Judges abolished and the court conducted by the presiding Judge alone. 
On the other hand, it is argued that the Assistant Judges are useful in 
the trial of questions of fact in cases where jury is not called, and THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
93 
that with the one lawyer and the two laymen as good results can be 
obtained as with a jury and at less expense. The Assistant Judges 
have charge of the county property and hold inquests. They are not 
very useful in jury trials, but their helpfulness on questions of fact 
cannot be denied, and on the whole, after an experience of over thirty 
years in practice and on the bench, I am inclined to think that they 
are a benefit rather than a hindrance in the administration of justice. 
I should not dare to ask one of them what he thinks of a question 
of law, and particularly a question of evidence, for fear that having 
gone for advice I should feel that I must follow it if given, and it 
would be more apt to be wrong than my own judgment, but I know 
that I feel surer of the facts if my associates and I agree about them. 
As I make this record I am reminded of some rare cases where the 
Supreme Court has said that the Assistant Judges were right when 
overruling the Presiding Judge. But there are other cases where it 
has been said they were wrong in so doing. 
TITUS HUTCHINSON 
1771-1857 
Titus Hutchinson was born at Grafton, Mass., April 29, 1771, 
and came with his father from Hebron, Conn., to Pomfret, Vt., 
on the birthday of the nation, July 4, 1776. His early opportunities 
for an education were limited. He worked on the farm until his 
nineteenth birthday, when he began his preparations for college, 
and two years later was prepared to enter Dartmouth two years 
in advance, but the college rules there required the payment of 
tuition for the full course, which the parents thought unjust, so 
he entered Princeton instead, where he graduated with honor after 
two years, delivering the English salutatory oration, the second 
honor in the class. He studied law in the office of his brother, 
Aaron, at Lebanon, N. H., and was admitted to the bar at Chelsea 
in 1798. He settled at Woodstock where there was already one 
lawyer, Charles Marsh. In 1813, Judge Hutchinson was appointed 
United States Attorney for the district of Vermont, and held that 
office for ten years. Upon the re-organization of the Supreme 
Court in 1825 he was elected second Assistant Judge, and in 1830 
was elected Chief, and served until 1833, when he was defeated 
by Judge Williams. The opposition which developed against Judge 
Hutchinson in 1833 was due in considerable measure to his con- 
duct in the case of State v. Cleveland, heard at Irasburg in April, 
1830. The case was for murder, and as the statute then provided 
another Judge of the Supreme Court sat with him in this case, 94 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
Judge Paddock. Cleveland was convicted and sentenced to be 
executed on the last Friday of the next October. He had taken many 
exceptions during the trial and these had been allowed and would 
have been heard in the regular order of events at the Supreme 
Court, which would meet in April, 1831, five months after the 
execution was to take place by the terms of the sentence. The 
blunder was corrected by the Legislature which met early in 
October and commuted Cleveland’s sentence to one of imprison- 
ment in the State Prison. But the error was urged strongly 
against the Chief when he presented himself for re-election, and 
the fact that Judge Williams had served on the bench before Judge 
Hutchinson was elected was another argument advanced why the 
former Judge should be elected in his place. The election was 
close and was carried by a majority of three in a total of two 
hundred and thirty-three votes. 
Judge Hutchinson retired at the close of his judicial duties 
from active participation in matters of his profession, although 
he occasionally engaged therein. In his latter years he labored 
upon his farm. He was a popular man and could have secured 
any preferment within the gift of the people. His friends often 
urged him to become a candidate for Congress, but he steadily 
refused. He was an early abolitionist and the candidate of his 
party for Governor at a time when its members were very few. 
He died at Woodstock, August 24, 1857. 
STEPHEN ROYCE 
1787-1868 
Stephen Royce, of Franklin county, was for twenty-five years 
a member of the Supreme Court and for six years its Chief Judge. 
The Royce family has produced some of the brainiest men who have 
found their way to the bar and the bench of Vermont. Judge Stephen 
Royce was the grandson of Maj. Stephen Royce, a Revolutionary 
soldier and a member of the Dorset convention that declared Ver- 
mont’s independence, and the son of Stephen Royce, also a Revolu- 
tionary soldier, who was Berkshire’s first Representative in the Ver- 
mont Legislature. On his mother’s side he was the grandson of Dr. 
Ebenezer Marvin, likewise a Revolutionary officer, who was with 
Allen at the capture of Ticonderoga, a surgeon in the Continental 
army, a Judge in the County Courts in Rutland, Chittenden and 
Franklin counties, and a member of the Governor’s Council. There 
have been several members of the family who have distinguished 
themselves in the law, but the best known and most conspicuous was THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
95 
his nephew, Homer E. Royce, who was a member of Congress and 
Chief Judge of the Supreme Court. It is easy to trace the Royce 
family for six generations through Judge Homer E. Royce. His son, 
the late H. Charles Royce, was the most learned lawyer at the Franklin 
county bar at the time of his death in 1912. He married Christie, 
a daughter of Bishop Burgess, and their son, Alexander, a very bril- 
liant young man, graduated at Yale, was a Major in the World War, 
and afterwards completed his course at the Harvard Law School, and 
entered the law office of Elihu Root, the leader of the American bar, 
in New York City. 
Judge Stephen Royce was born at Tinmouth, August 22, 1787, 
but removed with his parents in 1791 to Franklin, and two years later 
to Berkshire. His opportunities for schooling were meagre, but his 
mother, Minerva Marvin Royce, taught him and developed his char- 
acter until at the age of thirteen he was sent to Tinmouth to attend 
the common school, a year later began an academical course under 
the instruction of Charles Wright, of Middlebury, and in 1803 entered 
Middlebury College, where he graduated at the end of a four years’ 
course which had been twice interrupted because he was called home 
to help his father on the farm. He made journeys back and forth 
on foot and brought back with him packages of furs which he had 
secured in the wilderness, which he sold, and with the money obtained 
purchased his necessary school books. At the age of twenty-one he 
began the study of the law in the office of his uncle, Ebenezer Marvin, 
Jr., at Sheldon, with whom he was afterwards in partnership. He 
where he remained for six years and represented the town in the 
Legislature in 1815 and 1816. The next year he located in St. Albans, 
where he lived for the remainder of his active life, and practiced 
until his elevation to the bench. He represented St. Albans in the 
General Assembly in 1822, 1823 and 1824, and as a delegate to the 
State Constitutional Convention in 1823. He was State’s Attorney 
of Franklin county from 1816 to 1818 and Judge of the Supreme 
Court in 1825 and 1826, when he declined a re-election and resumed 
practice until 1829, when he was again elected to the bench and served 
continuously until 1852, becoming Chief Judge in 1847 and refusing 
to continue in office after 1852. In 1854 and 1855 he was elected 
Governor, and at the end of his second term retired to private life, 
of which there were twelve years in store for him. He spent these 
years attended by nephews and nieces, for he was never married, and 
died at Berkshire, November 11, 1868, where he had made his home 
after his retirement from the bench. Here in the evening of his days 
he made a beautiful picture surrounded by the hospitality of friends 
and blessed with the amenities of social intercourse, the companionship 
of books and the care of loving kindred. 96 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
As I am writing this sketch I am seated beneath his portrait, 
an oil painting which hangs in the Judges’ room in the court house 
at St. Albans, and am thinking of Smalley’s description of the man as 
being “tall, erect, with a vigorous and well-proportioned frame, of 
a commanding presence and a serene majesty of manner. His face 
was mobile, expressive and strongly marked. The gleam of his mild 
gray eye illuminated his countenance and revealed every emotion, 
whether grave or gay, that was passing within, moving the looker-on 
by a sort of magnetic influence to sympathize with him.” I wonder 
what he would say to me if his lips could move again in life and he 
could draw the outline of his own career as a lawyer and a Judge. 
One thing is made plain by others who have sketched him, and that 
is that professionally he had a high sense of honor. Like Lincoln, 
he could not argue the wrong side of a case and he did not intend 
to take a fee in a case where the justice was on the other side, and if 
he made this discovery after his employment he would induce his 
client to settle or abandon the case. As a jury advocate he held a prom- 
inent place at the bar. His mind was discriminating and his statement 
clear and convincing. He carefully examined his witnesses and was 
skilful in discovering any falsehoods that came into the case against his 
side. And in argument he sought to instruct the jury by a well-consid- 
ered and careful statement of the case on the evidence rather than a dis- 
play of wit or sarcasm. He was not one who went to the court with 
many citations of authorities, but relied on general principles and 
arguments drawn therefrom. 
As a Judge he was best known. It was not easy for him to decide 
his cases and he was even called the “doubter,” after Lord Eldon. 
He was an excellent presiding officer, and as a County Court Judge 
one of the best. Instead of following the method of Judge Williams, 
and making his personal opinion in the case directly felt, he left the 
questions to the jury to decide, but took all pains possible that the 
evidence should go in uninterrupted and in an orderly manner, so 
that the jury could understand it. Sometimes he would call on a 
witness to repeat some part of his testimony so as to make sure it 
was understood. 
He was kind to the younger members of the bar, and would look 
over their papers and correct their errors. Such a man would nat- 
urally be a good equity lawyer and a great equity Judge ; and he was 
profoundly learned in the principles of equity. 
His opinions while sitting as a Judge of the Supreme Court are 
models of clearness in judicial statement. He never wrote a legal 
essay when trying to dispose of a case, but stated the case in hand 
and the legal principles governing it and the decision that resulted from 
their application. He refused to report cases when no new legal prin- 
ciple was involved, and it is said that he also refused to report some THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
97 
when he was satisfied on a review of the case that his decision had 
been wrong, holding that it was bad enough to have done an injustice 
without sending it out as a precedent for future wrongs. These omis- 
sions to report involved him in trouble at one time; the Legislature 
withheld his salary on this account, but he was not moved. A friend 
writes of him as he appeared after his retirement from public life, 
but still full of intellectual and physical life, “The treasures of infor- 
mation, the fund of anecdotes and personal adventure, especially the 
amusing and comical scenes in and about courts, in which his experi- 
ence had been so wide and varied, which were garnered in his re- 
tentive memory, were here unlocked and produced for the entertain- 
ment of his guests, arrayed in his own inimitable garb of quiet humor.” 
BATES TURNER 
1760-1847 
Bates Turner was born in Canaan, Conn., in 1760, and entered 
the Revolutionary army at sixteen years of age. After the war he 
studied law at the Litchfield Law School and was admitted to the 
bar in Connecticut. He soon afterward came to Vermont and settled 
in Fairfield in 1796, supposing that place would be made the shire of 
Franklin county. He removed to St. Albans in 1804 and formed a 
partnership with Asa Aldis, but they did not continue long together, 
and on the dissolution of the firm Turner returned to Fairfield and 
established a law school, the only one in the history of the State, 
except that kept by Judge William C. Wilson. During his profes- 
sional life he instructed nearly one hundred and seventy-five law 
students. With a design of establishing a more permanent school he 
moved to Middlebury in 1812, but not receiving adequate encourage- 
ment returned to Fairfield. The three-story building where he in- 
tended to hold his law school in Middlebury still stands on Seminary 
Street in that village. Soon after his return to Fairfield he again 
removed to St. Albans, and in 1827 was elected one of the Judges of 
the Supreme Court, serving for two years, when he returned to his 
profession. 
At the time of his election to the bench he was the oldest lawyer 
to have been called to that station. He was sixty-seven years of age. 
In 1906, when the courts were divided, Judge Waterman was elected 
a Superior Judge and was then of the same age as Judge Turner at 
the time of his first election to the Supreme Court. There have been 
no other instances where men of this age have been advanced to the 
bench, but most of the Judges have served beyond this age who were 
called to the bench earlier. 98 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
Judge Turner was a sound lawyer, a fair-minded and skilful 
practitioner, and an amiable and courteous gentleman. He prepared 
more men for admission to the bar than any lawyer who ever lived 
in the State, and I think it is said that at one time he had more law 
students than any law school in the country. He died at St. Albans, 
April 30, 1847. 
EPHRAIM PADDOCK 
1768-1859 
Ephraim Paddock, of St. Johnsbury, was born at Tolland, Conn., 
May 7, 1768, and came as a young man from Massachusetts to Ver- 
mont. He had few advantages in an educational way as a young 
man, but made such good use of these that on coming to Caledonia 
county he was employed for two or three years as an instructor in 
Peacham Academy. He began the study of law in St. Johnsbury. 
and by diligence became a careful and discriminating lawyer. He 
was a man of excellent character and studious habits. He repre- 
sented St. Johnsbury in the General Assembly from 1821 to 1826. 
inclusive; was a member of the Constitutional Convention in 1828, 
and of the Council of Censors in 1841. He was elected a Judge of 
the Supreme Court in 1828 and served until 1831, when he retired, 
preferring private practice to life on the bench. He remained at work 
in his profession until 1848, when he gave up its duties for quiet and 
peace. Eleven years were allotted him for the pursuit of these, and 
he died at St. Johnsbury, July 27, 1859. 
JOHN C. THOMPSON 
1790-1831 
John C. Thompson was born at Westerly, R. I., in 1790. He 
studied law in Hartford, Conn., and was there admitted to the bar 
about 1813. He came at once to Windsor and remained until 1818, 
when he removed to Hartland. In 1822 he removed to Burlington, 
which was his residence until his death. He rose rapidly in his pro- 
fession and in public favor. In 1827 he was elected a Councillor, and 
held that office until elected a Judge of the Supreme Court in 1830. 
Before his first year of service was ended he was taken sick while 
on his way from Burlington to Montpelier in a stage coach and died 
a few days later. Before his elevation to the bench he had obtained 
an extensive practice in Chittenden and adjoining counties, and took JOHN W. SIMPSON 
Born October 13, 1850, in East Craftsbury, Vt., of 
Scotch ancestry. His father, James W. Simpson, was 
prominent in State affairs. The lad was educated in 
the public schools of Morrisville and Stowe and at 
Johnson Normal School. He entered Amherst College, 
where his record was a brilliant one. He won several 
prizes and was distinguished for oratorical ability. He 
graduated in 1871 and studied in Columbia Law School, 
graduating in 1873. The same year he became associ- 
ated with Alexander and Green, then one of the best- 
known corporation law firms, and he specialized in real 
estate and corporation law. In 1884 the firm of Simp- 
son, Thacher and Barnum was founded, which later 
became Simpson, Thacher and Bartlett. Mr. Simpson 
was active in railroad organization and industrial cor- 
poration work. He held many important directorships. 
Amherst gave him the degree of LL. D. and he was a 
life member of its board of trustees and chairman of 
its finance committee. He was a lover of beautiful 
pictures, fine porcelains and rare books. He was ac- 
customed to spend his summers at his boyhood home 
in Craftsbury, Yt. In 1889 he married Miss Kate 
Seney of Brooklyn. One daughter was born to them, 
Jean W. Simpson. Mr. Simpson died May 16, 1920. THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
99 
high rank, especially with the Supreme Court. But one opinion of 
his is reported, that of Crofoot v. Moore, 4 Vt., 204. The other cases 
assigned to him were reported by Hutchinson, C. J., after his death. 
He succeeded Judge Prentiss and was followed by Judge Phelps, two 
of the ablest of the Vermont Judges. He died at Burlington, June 
27, 1831. 
NICHOLAS BAYLIES 
1768-1847 
Nicholas Bay lies, of Montpelier, was born at Uxbridge, Mass., 
April 9, 1768. He remained at home on the farm until he was nine- 
teen years of age, when he fitted for Dartmouth College, where he 
graduated in 1794. He studied law with Charles Marsh at Wood- 
stock, with whom he formed a law partnership which continued for 
a number of years. He removed to Montpelier in 1810 and remained 
there until 1836, when he located in Lyndon, where he resided at 
the time of his death, August 17, 1847. He was a scholarly man and 
was the author of a three-volume “Digested Index to the Modern 
Reports,” published at Montpelier in 1814, and commended at the 
time by James Kent and Judge Parker, a work which is now prac- 
tically useless. He also published a theological work on free agency. 
He was State’s Attorney in 1813, 1814 and in 1825, and Judge of 
the Supreme Court in 1831, 1832 and 1833. After removing to Lyn- 
don he practiced in company with his son-in-law, George C. Cahoon. 
He argued a case in Montpelier before the Supreme Court a few 
days before his death. He was buried in Montpelier. 
Judge Baylies was active and instrumental in establishing the 
Vermont State Library as well as the reports of the Supreme Court. 
He was a man of great industry and labor, and learned in the reports. 
SAMUEL S. PHELPS 
1793-1855 
The most powerful and gifted man who has sat in the Supreme 
Court of Vermont was Samuel S. Phelps, of Middlebury. He was 
born in Litchfield, Conn., the birthplace of many of the great men 
who came to Vermont early in the last century, May 31, 1793. He 
came from a family that for generations had been intelligent, well- 
to-do farmers. He entered Yale at the age of fourteen and graduated 
in 1811. He began his legal studies in the celebrated law school at 100 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
Litchfield, where he remained for a few months and, in 1812, removed 
to Middlebury, entering the law office of Horatio Seymour, who 
had himself come from Litchfield. He served in the War of 1812, 
first in the ranks and then as paymaster. He was admitted to the 
Addison county bar in 1815, and made rapid progress toward profes- 
sional eminence in a field where Horatio Seymour, Daniel Chipman, 
Robert E. Bates and Robert Edmond were competitors. He was a 
member of the Council of Censors in 1827, and wrote the address 
of that body to the people of the State in which he argued for the 
abolition of the Governor’s Council and the establishment of a Senate 
as the other branch of the Legislature, an argument that failed at 
the time but won in 1836. In 1831 he was elected a member of the 
Governor’s Council and the same year chosen a Judge of the Supreme 
Court. To the latter place he was re-elected at each session of the 
Legislature until 1838, when he was chosen United States Senator 
to succeed Benjamin Swift. He was re-elected to the Senate in 1844, 
though he had one of the most disagreeable fights that the State has 
ever witnessed. In January, 1853, on the death of Senator Upham. 
of Montpelier, he was appointed to the vacancy in the Senate on the 
recommendation of the Vermont delegation in Congress, although he 
lived on the west side of the State. This appointment was made for 
the reason that he was in Washington at the time, and the Whigs 
needed his vote in the Senate before anyone could reach the capital 
from Vermont. Judge Phelps remained in Washington through the 
session and returned the next winter to claim his seat, but as the 
Legislature had met and failed to make any election the Senate re- 
fused to admit him on the ground that an executive appointment did 
not continue after a session of the Legislature had intervened at which 
an election could have been had. 
Judge Phelps retired at this time from public life, though he 
still continued to practice in important cases. He had much the same 
experience as Webster in the Senate on the subject of slavery, for 
while he made a speech of remarkable eloquence and power in answer 
to Calhoun and Berrien on the bill for the exclusion of slavery from 
Oregon, and had been fully committed to the Wilmot Proviso, yet he 
was a member of the committee of thirteen that reported favorably 
on the Clay compromise measures of 1850. In this way he lost much 
of his influence both at Washington and at home. He was regarded, 
however, as one of the very best lawyers in the Senate, and as “a 
man of rare ability and equalled by few as a forensic debater.” When 
it is considered that the Senate at this time was made up of men like 
Webster, Clay, Calhoun, Cass, Benton, Marcy, Wright and Douglas, 
this is a very high compliment. Webster himself pronounced him 
one of the ablest lawyers in that body, and Chief Justice Chase, who THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
101 
was with him in the Senate, said that in power of clear, convincing 
statement he had no peer in that body. 
Before Judge Phelps reached the bench he was regarded as the 
foremost advocate in southwestern Vermont, and a master of legal 
principles. More than thirty years ago I remember hearing an old 
man in Windham county describe an occasion when Judge Phelps 
was associated in a case with Oscar L. Shafter of Wilmington, the 
leader of the Windham county bar and afterwards Judge of the 
Supreme Court of California, who told me that Judge Phelps’ client 
said that “he subsoiled Shafter at every point.” 
There were several elements of power that accounted for Judge 
Phelps’ leadership at the bar. In the first place, he had the advantage 
of a fine figure and commanding presence. He was tall, erect, finely 
moulded and well proportioned, with an easy, graceful and dignified 
carriage. His physical appearance was such that he would command 
attention and admiration anywhere. He had a fine style of expres- 
sion, an attribute that distinguished his son, Edward J. Phelps, above 
any man that Vermont ever produced. He had besides great power 
of analysis and generalization. No question seemed new to him. 
His application of the principles of law was quick and conclusive. 
No Judge ever sat in a Vermont court who could dispatch business 
so rapidly. In one term in Rutland county, not exceeding four weeks 
in length, forty-three verdicts were rendered in his court. It is not 
said of him that he was often reversed by the Supreme Court, and 
we must assume that these cases were correctly tried. His remarkable 
capacity in this regard was due to his clear and quick legal percep- 
tions, which saw the vital point in the case and directed the evidence 
to it, to his thorough acquaintance with the rules of evidence, and to 
the precision of his charges to the jury. He was enabled to dispose 
of many cases without trial upon the statements of counsel. When 
he had heard these he would announce that the action could not be 
maintained or that the claimed defence was no defence and would 
direct a verdict accordingly. This and like modes of speedy trials 
did not always please the bar, who characterized this process as a 
decapitation of the case rather than a trial. 
He argued several cases before the United States Supreme Court 
with great ability, among them the West River bridge case, where he 
prevailed against Mr. Webster on a question of constitutional law. 
In the Woodworth Planing Machine patent case, which Judge Phelps 
argued before the same court, Justice McLean pronounced his argu- 
ment as the ablest address to the court that had been delivered at 
that term, though many distinguished counsel were present in that 
case alone. 
Judge Phelps was a delightful man in social life. He was a 
capital story-teller, had a fine sense of humor, loved to converse, 102 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
was free in the expression of his opinions, and full of anecdotes. 
His charm can readily be imagined by any one who ever knew and 
conversed with Edward J. Phelps. The latter was in Washington 
with his father, as a young man, during part of the time that Judge 
Phelps was Senator. Judge Phelps died at Middlebury, March 25, 
1855. 
JACOB COLLAMER 
1791-1865 
Jacob Collamer, by some critics regarded as “the ablest man 
who has adorned the annals of Vermont,” was born at Troy, N. Y., 
January 8, 1791. His father was a soldier in the Revolution and be- 
longed to a family that for generations was prominent in Massa- 
chusetts. His father came to Burlington, probably in 1795, and lived 
for a time near the corner of Church and King Streets, and later on 
the west side of the “Court House Green.” He was a carpenter. 
Early in youth Jacob Collamer had a thirst for knowledge and by 
his own efforts procured the means to equip himself for college and 
the study of the law. He entered the University of Vermont at the 
age of fifteen and graduated in 1810. He studied law with Mr. Lang- 
worthy, later with Benjamin Swift, at St. Albans, and was ad- 
mitted to the bar in 1813. His course as a law student was inter- 
rupted in 1812 when he was drafted into the detailed militia service 
and served in the frontier campaign as Lieutenant of artillery. In 
1816 he removed to Royalton, where he practiced his profession with 
increasing popularity until 1836, when he removed to Woodstock, 
where he resided for the remainder of his life. He was for several 
years Register of Probate in the Royalton district and he represented 
the town in the General Assembly in 1821, 1822, 1827 and 1828. He 
was State’s Attorney of Windsor county in 1822, 1823 and 1824. He 
was a member of the Constitutional Convention of 1836 that abolished 
the Governor’s Council and established the State Senate. 
In 1833 he was elected a Judge of the Supreme Court, and con- 
tinued in that office by repeated elections until 1842, when he declined 
further service. One year later he was elected to Congress, an office 
which he held until 1848, when he declined a re-election. A legislative 
caucus in the fall of 1848 recommended him for a Cabinet position 
and President Taylor made him Postmaster General. On the death 
of the President in July, 1850, Judge Collamer resigned his place 
in the Cabinet and returned to his law practice in Vermont. The 
following fall he was again called to the bench, this time as one of 
the Circuit Judges. He was given his choice between the trial bench THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
103 
and the Supreme Court, and chose the former. He continued to 
preside in the County Courts until he was called to the United States 
Senate in 1854 by election by the young Republican party and he rep- 
resented the State in the Senate from that time until his death at 
Woodstock, November 9, 1865. He was for some time professor of 
medical jurisprudence in the Vermont Medical College at Woodstock. 
The University of Vermont conferred on him the degree of LL. D. 
in 1849 and Dartmouth the same degree in 1860. 
Judge Collamer was called to serve in more positions of trust 
than fall to the lot of many, and he discharged his duties with a fidelity 
and ability that give him front rank among the public men of Vermont. 
He was the only man to be selected from Vermont as a Cabinet officer 
before Redfield Proctor was appointed Secretary of War, and his 
statue, with that of Ethan Allen, was given a place in Statuary Hall 
at Washington as a representative Vermonter. 
Judge Collamer excelled on the bench as a nisi prius Judge, but 
as good a critic as Judge Poland says of him that his published opinions 
are models of judicial composition that are unexcelled for accuracy 
of learning, terseness of statement and clearness and comprehensive- 
ness of style, and he gives the opinion that had he remained on the 
bench until the end of his life he would have ranked with Chief Justice 
Shaw of Massachusetts. 
On his work as a trial Judge the highest praise is bestowed. 
One who was well qualified to speak from acquaintance and experi- 
ence gives the following judgment on this branch of his judicial labors: 
“The professional and public judgment of the State concurs in assign- 
ing to Judge Collamer an excellency of merit as a nisi prius Judge 
not exceeded, and rarely, if at all, attained by any other. With the 
disposition to accord full justice to all of the many Judges whom I 
have known within and without the state of Vermont, I frankly 
say that I never saw any other who, in so many respects, came up 
to my idea of a perfect nisi prius Judge as did Judge Collamer.” 
On the occasion of his death his fellow Senators bestowed the 
highest praise on his life and labors at Washington. One of these 
wrote: “Judge Collamer was the nestor of the Senate. We think 
that if his colleagues had been called to designate the wisest of the 
body, the general suffrage would have fallen on him. On every occa- 
sion his opinion had great weight whether in the open Senate or in 
the informal deliberations which often preceded the settlement of 
important measures.” Senator Reverdy Johnson, of Baltimore, the 
leader of the American bar, said: “The universal sentiment seemed 
to be that under the guidance of such wisdom as his all would be well.” 
The most striking portrait that is preserved of Judge Collamer 
was drawn by Congressman Woodbridge of Vergennes in presenting 
resolutions on his death. He said: “You all recollect the sweetness 104 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
of his face. He seemed, as Sidney Smith said of Horner, to have 
the Ten Commandments written there.” He was a man who was 
loved by children, by neighbors and by all who knew him. He was 
a church member and occasionally preached a sermon from the pulpit, 
and he once delivered a course of learned and reverent lectures on 
“The Authenticity of the Scriptures.” 
JOHN MATTOCKS 
1777-1847 
John Mattocks was the son of Samuel Mattocks, who came to 
Tinmouth about 1778. John Mattocks was born at Hartford, Conn., 
March 4, 1777, and came with his father to Tinmouth when he was one 
year old. He enjoyed a good academic education before going to live, 
at the age of fifteen, with his sister, Rebecca Miller, the wife of 
Samuel Miller, the first lawyer who located in Middlebury. Here he 
began to study law with his brother-in-law, and after remaining for 
two or three years in Middlebury completed his course with Bates 
Turner at Fairfield, and was admitted to the bar in Franklin county 
in 1797. His was the first admission in that county. 
He went to Danville and commenced practice, but soon removed 
to Peacham, where he remained the rest of his life and died August 
14, 1847. He represented Peacham in the General Assembly in 1807, 
1815, 1816, 1823 and 1824, was a delegate to the Constitutional Con- 
vention in 1836, and was elected to Congress in 1820, 1824 and 1840. 
He was chosen Judge of the Supreme Court in 1832, but declined 
a re-election the next year. He was elected Governor by the Whigs 
in 1843. 
Judge Mattocks possessed an acute and logical mind and sound 
judgment, a tenacious memory, a remarkable power of analysis and 
a capacity for forcible statement, argument and illustration. In his 
addresses to the jury he indulged in a style that was plain and simple, 
and he won ready assent to his arguments by his infinite wit and 
humor. 
As a trial Judge he was kind and courteous to the bar, possessed 
great facility in dispatching business, and administered justice in his 
court. It is said in criticism of him that his charges to the jury be- 
trayed his sympathies in the cases which he tried, but he had a warm 
and impressive nature and his conduct was due to his solicitude that 
the jury should decide correctly. 
He did not often speak when in Congress. His most notable 
effort here was in 1841, when he presented the petition of his con- 
stituents for the abolition of slavery in the District of Columbia. His WILLIAM B. C, STICKNEY 
Born in Marblehead, Mass., January 16, 1845. He 
studied in the public schools of Cambridge and Boston 
and won the Franklin medal. He completed his educa- 
tion at Harvard College, being a member of the class of 
1865. He was employed in the government depart- 
ments at Washington and later was secretary to Sen- 
ator William F. Fessenden of Maine and to Gen. Ben- 
jamin F. Butler. He studied law, was admitted to 
the bar and came to Vermont, forming a law partner- 
ship at Bethel. Here he established a large law prac- 
tice, making a specialty of corporation law. He has 
held the office of president of the Vermont Bar Asso- 
ciation. In recent years he has been considered the 
leader of the Vermont bar. In 1884 he represented 
Bethel in the General Assembly and from 1888 to 1890 
was State’s Attorney of Windsor county. He is presi- 
dent of the National White River Bank. In 1877 he 
married Mary Hunton, daughter of A. P. Hunton, his 
law partner. Two children were born to them, Wil- 
liam and Marv. In recent years he has resided in Rut- 
land. THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
105 
words seemed bold at that early day when he declared: “I present 
this petition because I believe in my soul it ought to be granted, to 
free this land of liberty from the national and damning sin of slavery, 
in this our bailiwick, the District of Columbia.” 
He was an intense Federalist. At the time he was Governor, 
former Vice-President Richard M. Johnson visited the State and was 
received by the Governor and General Assembly. Governor Mattocks 
welcomed his former acquaintance, making one of his always apt 
speeches of welcome, and concluding with the words of salutation: 
“How are you, Dick Johnson? I am glad to welcome you to this 
State and to this chamber.” The Vice-President closed his reply by 
saying: “How are you Jack Mattocks? God bless you.” 
It is a misfortune that a man of such talent should have been 
unwilling to remain longer on the bench. But this gave him a longer 
period at the bar, where he had faculties that were exceptional, and 
where he ranked first among the great men of his time in northeastern 
Vermont. His relations to Bell, Cushman and Fletcher, the other 
leaders of the bar in his section of Vermont, are discussed in the 
chapter on Caledonia county. He has been called Vermont’s greatest 
advocate. 
ISAAC F. REDFIELD 
1804-1876 
Isaac F. Redfield served longer on the bench than any Judge in 
the history of the State except Judge Rowell, and his name stands 
among the foremost of our jurists. If his life had been confined to 
his labors at the bar and on the bench, perhaps as much could not be 
said, but his efforts as an author and in the discharge of a difficult 
mission abroad give him preeminence. He was born at Weathers- 
field, April 10, 1804, the son of Dr. Peleg Redfield. He went with 
his father to Coventry, in this State, in 1805, where the latter became 
a prominent physician and respected citizen, and died in 1848. Isaac 
F. Redfield graduated with high honors at Dartmouth in 1825 and 
two years later was admitted to the bar of Orleans county. He began 
practice at Derby, and from 1832 to 1835 was State’s Attorney of 
Orleans county. In 1835 he was elected a Judge of the Supreme 
Court. He was then thirty-one years of age and was the youngest 
man who ever attained that honor, except Judge Steele, who was elected 
at twenty-eight. For twenty-four successive years he was unani- 
mously re-elected by the Legislature, though a large majority of that 
body were opposed to him politically. He was a Democrat. When 
Stephen Royce retired from the office of Chief Judge in 1852, Judge 106 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
Redfield was elected as his successor and served continuously until 
his retirement from the bench in 1860. 
The judicial opinions of Judge Redfield are included in the re- 
ports from Volume 8 to Volume 33. They exhibit the judicial cast 
of his mind, the vigor of his reasoning powers, the accuracy and ex- 
tent of his learning, his unwearied industry, the breadth of his views, 
his high sense of justice, and the elevation of his sentiments. Judge 
Redfield came to the bench with something more than a desire to 
follow the traditions of the law as it had been administered thereto- 
fore, although it was never said of him that he disregarded precedents. 
But the law was somewhat in a state of transition, at least on the equity 
side, and the subject of railways and their government was just be- 
ginning to engage the attention of the law student no less than that 
of the capitalist. Looking as he did upon the law as a broad and 
noble science for the wise government of men, and not a collection 
of arbitrary rules, he questioned those decisions that were not the 
result of the application of sound principles and that led to judgments 
that were unjust. And he thus found means of tempering the rules 
of the common law and infusing into them principles of equity. He 
took a broader view of his case than a smaller man and a close lawyer 
would have done, made himself familiar with the reasons, the history 
and the morality of the case, and rendered judgment accordingly, 
regarding precedents not as the law, but rather as evidence of what 
the law ought to be. 
It fell to him to write many opinions on the subject of railroad 
law, and he had as much to do in shaping the law of this subject as 
any Judge in the country. It was a subject in which he had a great 
interest, and amid the cares and labors of his judgeship he found 
time to write a work on the “Law of Railways,” which he published 
in 1857. It was in immediate demand and attained a wide circulation, 
and became the acknowledged and standard text-book on the subject. 
It gave its author not only a national reputation, but introduced him 
to the bench and bar of England. Five editions of this work were 
published during his lifetime. This work and his opinions had the 
effect of elevating the court in which he sat to a position of great 
importance and respect in other tribunals. But this credit was not 
due to him alone, when it is considered that such men as Charles K. 
Williams, Stephen Royce, Samuel S. Phelps and Jacob Collamer were 
on the bench with him. 
Judge Redfield retired from the bench in 1860 and took up his 
residence in Boston. After his election as Judge he removed to 
Montpelier, where he remained until about 1846, when he removed 
to Randolph Center and occupied the house formerly owned by Judge 
Chase. He resided here for three or four years, when he removed 
to Windsor, where he lived until he went to Boston. He was then THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
107 
fifty-six years of age, but his writings had already given him a reputa- 
tion upon which he could expect to stand while he was acquiring a 
practice in the larger field into which he had entered. He had several 
reasons for leaving the bench, one that he felt that his opinions on 
constitutional questions that he supposed would come up at the time 
of the Civil War, that was then at hand, would be out of harmony 
with the people of Vermont; another of more weight, that he might 
improve his condition financially; and a third, that he might extend 
his legal writings into other fields than those he had already explored. 
He bade adieu to his associates on the bench and to the members of 
the bar at the general term of the Supreme Court, held at Montpelier 
in November, 1860, where a series of resolutions were passed in his 
honor which were presented in behalf of the bar by Lucius B. Peck, 
its leader at the time, and appropriately responded to by Judge Red- 
field. These will be found in Volume 36 at page 762 of the Vermont 
Reports. 
He removed to Boston in 1861 and there resided until his death, 
which occurred at Charlestown, Mass., March 23, 1876. During his 
residence in Boston his industry was unremitting. Besides successive 
editions of his work on railway law, which finally extended into two 
volumes, he published a treatise on the “Law of Wills,” in three 
volumes, and another on “Carriers and Bailments,” in one volume, 
which became standard books. He also published a collection of 
“American Railway Cases” in two volumes, and one of “Leading 
American Cases on Wills,” in one volume. He edited an edition of 
Judge Story’s work on “Equity Jurisprudence, Equity Pleading, and 
on the Conflict of Laws,” and of Professor Greenleaf’s work on the 
“Law of Evidence.” He wrote many of the articles for a new edition 
of Bouvier’s “Law Dictionary,” was one of the editors of the Ameri- 
can Law Register, and wrote one article of considerable length for 
the London Law Review, which was later published in this country. 
During the same time he was employed in private practice and en- 
gaged in giving opinions in cases submitted to him, some of which 
were published. He also wrote other articles on topics apart from 
the law, and particularly in relation to the Episcopal Church, in which 
he was deeply interested. 
At the close of the Civil War he was appointed in conjunction 
with Caleb Cushing as special counsel for the United States in respect 
to the suits and claims in the English equity courts relative to Con- 
federate property remaining in England, and remained abroad on 
this mission for two years. He was also counsel for the Government 
in claims against Great Britain for the losses sustained by reason of 
the privateers that were fitted out in that country. These were deli- 
cate trusts, but he discharged them in a manner that brought him 
respect and admiration on the part of all who came in contact with 108 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
him. His residence in England was a delightful one, and his unfailing 
courtesy and tact coupled with his unusual ability rendered his services 
in a high degree praiseworthy and creditable to the Government. 
The opinions of Judge Redfield differ materially from those of 
any other Judge who ever sat in the Supreme Court. He had a better 
fund of knowledge of the law from which to draw than most others, 
and his memory of the cases was so remarkable and accurate that 
he could apply the principles laid down with great facility. He was 
a natural essayist and philosopher, and his discussions and illustrations 
in his opinions took him farther afield from the precise point at issue 
than others were accustomed to go, but while he wrote himself out 
in a wonderfully human way, he did not stray from the point in the 
case, nor did he fail to be interesting. In one case this language found 
its way into an opinion from his pen: “After reading and re-reading 
until I have become heartily tired of it, I have not been able to feel 
very confident upon this point”; and in another he writes that Thomas 
More, when Lord High Chancellor, “swore an oath in the horrid 
language of the times, by the beard of the Almighty, that just as long 
as courts of law continued, he would enjoin them.” 
The pictures of Judge Redfield gave him a patriarchal appearance, 
with his full beard and benign countenance, and there must have been 
“something of the august and venerable about him,” attributes that 
Rufus Choate so highly admired in Chief Justice Shaw, of Massa- 
chusetts. It would be interesting to know whether on his mission 
to London he conformed to all the conventions of dress and appearance 
that the standards of that city required. It is almost safe to say that 
he did not much disguise the personality that had been known to his 
friends so long and affectionately, and that he held to his accustomed 
traditions in this regard. He was too big to be moved in such matters 
by petty considerations, as his relative, the mother of Senator Redfield 
Proctor, found on an occasion when he visited her home at Cavendish 
while on his way from Vermont to Boston. She observed that he 
was wearing a very ancient tile and said to him as he was leaving: 
“Isaac you ought to have a new silk hat,” to which he replied: “No. 
anybody who sees this one will know that the wearer of it has been 
a gentleman for a good while.” 
The printed page is the monument to his industry and ability. 
A word should be added in the way of description of the man. The 
best record that has been left comes from the pen of Mr. Phelps, who 
writes: “His unfailing courtesy and kindness, his amiable temper, 
his unquestioned and unquestionable purity of character, his patience 
in bearing, the unassuming dignity and quiet decorum with which he 
invested the proceedings of his court, the practical sense and sagacity 
with which he encountered questions of fact, these are qualities which 
will be always remembered by those who appeared before him, but THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
109 
of which the memory must die when the witnesses are gone. He 
presided at nisi prius with great tact and acceptance. Under his guid- 
ance juries seldom went astray. And the most disappointed suitor 
carried away a kindly respect for the Judge. No man was ever more 
capable of appreciating and profiting by good argument or was more 
candidly open to its influence.” Mr. Phelps’ appreciative sketch is 
published in 49 Vt. Reports, pp. 5-19, et seq. 
MILO L. BENNETT 
1789-1868 
Milo L. Bennett was born at Sharon, Conn., May 28, 1789, and 
was educated at Williams College and at Yale. He graduated at the 
latter institution in 1811, studied law at the Litchfield Law School 
and came to Bennington but soon removed to Manchester. Here 
he was State’s Attorney and Judge of Probate. About 1836 he went 
to Maine and engaged in the lumber business and in land speculations 
and lost his property. He was accustomed to refer facetiously to this 
unhappy experience whenever he gave his age by saying that he was 
so many years old, but if the time he lost in Maine was counted he 
would be two years older. 
In the spring of 1838 he located with his family in Burlington, 
and in the fall of that year Judge Phelps, his classmate at Yale, was 
instrumental in procuring his election to the Supreme Court over 
Charles Linsley, of Middlebury, who was defeated by a small ma- 
jority. 
Judge Bennett was a man of plain and simple manners, a great 
master of the common law and the principles of equity, a better Judge 
in the Supreme Court than at nisi prius, and more noted in the trial 
of criminal than in civil cases. When he was told that there was 
criticism because he ruled the criminal cases against respondents, he 
said: “I try criminals as I do other cases; I don’t intend that many 
of these rascals shall slip through my fingers.” Judge Bennett was 
right in his dissenting opinion in State v. Croteau, 23 Vermont Re- 
ports, page 14, where he argues that the jury are not judges of the 
law as well as the facts in criminal cases. The majority opinion is 
given by Judge Hiland Hall, and it can be readily imagined that the 
question aroused the greatest interest on the bench and at the bar. 
Judge Smalley argued the case in behalf of the respondent. The case 
covers sixty-seven pages of the report and all the learning on both sides 
of the question is assembled and discussed. The dissenting opinion 
is over thirty pages in length. This case was overruled in the case 
of State v. Burpee, 65 Vermont Reports, page 1, in an exhaustive 110 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
opinion by Judge Thompson, and the law that Judge Bennett so 
strenuously defended was established as the law of this State. 
Judge Bennett was never reconciled to the decision in State v. 
Croteau and long afterwards characterized the doctrine of that case 
very properly as “a most nonsensical and absurd theory.” In the 
latter case counsel, in discussing the charge of the court, said: “This 
part of the charge bristles all over with italics, like daggers, and drips 
blood at every sentence.” (State v. McDowell, 32 Vt., p. 528.) It 
is said of Judge Bennett that in spite of his attitude in some cases that 
seemed very hostile to respondents he was capable of coming to their 
support when he regarded them as not guilty, and that it could not 
be claimed that any innocent man was ever punished in his court, 
although few guilty ones escaped. 
Judge Bennett served until the change in the judiciary system 
in 1850. He was a Circuit Judge for one year, was in practice for the 
next, then was elected to the Supreme Court, where he remained until 
1859, when he was appointed Commissioner to revise the statutes, and 
his judicial service came to an end. This revision is known as the 
General Statutes, and was published in 1863. Judge Bennett also 
published “Bennett’s Justice,” a book of legal forms and instructions 
as to the general principles of law and their application to practice, 
which came into general use in law offices and with Justices of the 
Peace and town officers, and was of great service. This book con- 
tinued in general use until replaced by the recent works of the late 
Henry A. Harman. The worthy descendants of Judge Bennett at 
the Boston Law School, his son and grandson, are still of precious 
memory. Judge Bennett died at Taunton, Mass., July 7, 1868. 
WILLIAM HEBARD 
1800-1875 
William Hebard was a self-made man, who read law in the office 
of William Nutting, of Randolph. He was born in Windham, Conn., 
November 29, 1800. He was admitted to the bar in Orange county 
in 1827, and commenced practice at East Randolph, but in 1845 re- 
moved to Chelsea, where he remained until his death, October 22, 
1875. He was one of the ablest and most popular men of his time. 
He represented Randolph four years and Chelsea five years in the 
General Assembly; was State Senator in 1836 and 1838; State’s Attor- 
ney in 1832, 1834 and 1836; Judge of Probate in 1838, 1840 and 1841, 
and Judge of the Supreme Court from 1842 to 1845, inclusive. In 
1848 and again in 1850 he was elected to Congress and was a delegate 
to the National Republican Convention that nominated Abraham Born in Ludlow, Yt., October 13, 1860. He studied 
in Vermont Liberal Institute at Plymouth, Vt., taught 
school, graduated from Black River Academy in 1883 
and from Tufts College in 1887. After graduating 
from college he studied law in the office of Gov. W. W. 
Stickney at Ludlow, was admitted to the bar in 1890 
and formed the partnership of Stickney and Sargent, 
in recent years known as Stickney, Sargent and 
Skeels. Mr. Sargent was State’s Attorney for Windsor 
county from 1898 to 1900, Secretary of Civil and Mili- 
tary Affairs under Governor Stickney from 1900 to 
1902, and Attorney General of Vermont from 1908 to 
1912. He was elected president of the Vermont Bar 
Association in 1919. Mr. Sargent is one of the foremost 
lawyers of Vermont and his firm has a large corpora- 
tion practice. 
JOHN G. SARGENT THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
111 
Lincoln to the presidency. He was a good advocate, an excellent 
lawyer and a faithful official. He had a long service at the bar, which 
was more agreeable to him than the bench; but his opinions are well 
written and will bear comparison with those of his associates. His 
prominent characteristics were candor, considerateness, integrity and 
faithfulness. He was plain and practical and well endowed with com- 
mon sense. His wife was a niece and an adopted daughter of Dudley 
Chase. ' 
DANIEL KELLOGG 
1791-1875 
Daniel Kellogg, an accomplished lawyer and learned Judge from 
Windham county, was born at Amherst, Mass., February 10, 1791. 
He graduated at Williams College in 1810, studied law with Gen. 
Martin Field on Newfane Hill, and was there admitted to the bar 
and commenced practice in Rockingham in 1814. In 1819 and 1820 
he was Judge of Probate of the district of Westminster; Secretary of 
the Governor and Council from 1823 to 1828; State’s Attorney in 
1827 and member of the Council of Censors in the same year; United 
State’s Attorney for the district of Vermont from 1829 to 1841 ; 
member and president of the Constitutional Convention in 1843; 
Presidential Elector in 1864; and Senator from Windham county dur- 
ing the 60’s. 
He was elected a Judge of the Supreme Court in 1843, but did 
not accept the office. He was again elected in 1845 and served six 
years. His term of service included the time when some of the Judges 
served only in the Supreme Court, and others only in the County 
Courts, and he occupied both places, and rendered equally good service 
on either bench. He was a scholarly, orderly man of excellent legal 
learning, took great pains in writing his opinions and read them 
annually until his death. He had the confidence of the bar and the 
people, and his professional, social, political and business life were 
characterized by the most perfect integrity. Judge Kellogg was three 
times married; his second wife was the daughter of William C. Brad- 
ley, and his third the daughter of Judge Asa Aldis. He moved to 
Brattleboro in 1854 and died May 10, 1875. The oil painting of Judge 
Kellogg which hangs over the bench in the court house at Newfane 
is silent evidence of the estimable qualities which the Judge possessed. 
It is a face of refinement, intelligence, candor and strength. 112 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
HILAND HALL 
1795-1885 
Judge Hiland Hall was descended from good New England stock 
on both sides of his father’s family. His ancestors were the first 
settlers in Middletown, Conn., going there from Boston in 1650. He 
will be best and longest remembered as an historian. In this depart- 
ment he rendered a great service to Vermont. He held many offices 
and discharged their duties creditably, and his service as a Judge of 
the Supreme Court was worthy of his high talents as a lawyer and his 
fidelity to public duty as an official. He was born in Bennington, July 
20, 1795, was brought up on a farm, and educated in the common 
schools and at Granville Academy, N. Y., where he spent one term. 
He taught a few terms of district school and early in life displayed 
a decided taste for historical matters, being an omnivorous reader of 
history and biography, and like Lincoln reading by the light of the 
open fire. He was a born patriot, and at the age of eighteen organized 
the “Sons of Liberty,” a society which took a decided stand against 
Great Britain in the War of 1812. 
He was admitted to the bar at Bennington in 1819, and there 
remained in practice during his active life. He represented the town 
in the Legislature in 1827 and was Clerk of the County and Supreme 
Courts for Bennington county in 1828, a position which his son and 
grandson afterward held for many years. He was State’s Attorney 
of Bennington county from 1828 to 1831. In 1833 he was elected 
to Congress, where he served for ten years, when he declined a re- 
nomination and tried to return to private life. He was president of 
the large Whig Convention held in Burlington in 1840, and introduced 
Daniel Webster at the famous Stratton Whig Convention held on 
the top of the Green Mountains, August 16 of the same year. He 
was Bank Commissioner of Vermont for four years, from 1843, and 
Judge of the Supreme Court for a like period, ending in 1850, when 
he was appointed the Second Comptroller of the United States Treas- 
ury. In 1851 he was appointed by President Fillmore with Gen. 
James Wilson of New Hampshire and Judge H. I. Thornton of Ala- 
bama a Land Commissioner for California, when he resigned his com- 
mission in the Treasury Department and was succeeded by Edward 
J. Phelps, whom he recommended as his successor. In 1854 he re- 
turned to Bennington and resumed the practice of his profession. 
In 1856 he was a delegate to the Republican National Convention 
held in Philadelphia, and in 1858 was elected Governor. He was a 
member of the fruitless Peace Congress held in February, 1861. He 
delivered the first address before the Vermont Historical Society, 
for six years from 1859 was its president, and was afterward active THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
113 
in the preparation of the materials for a number of volumes of its 
collections and otherwise promoted its success. He read several 
papers before the society, one in 1869 in vindication of Ethan Allen 
as the hero of Ticonderoga. He contributed papers to the New York 
Historical Magazine, the Vermont Historical Gazetteer, the Phila- 
delphia Historical Record, and the New England Historic Genealogical 
Register. In 1860 he read before the New York Historical Society 
a paper showing why the early inhabitants of Vermont disclaimed 
the jurisdiction of New York and set up a separate government. In 
1868 he published his “Early History of Vermont.” This is a work 
of over five hundred pages, in which it is shown that the separation 
of our inhabitants from the government of New York was necessary; 
that they were justified in their struggle for independence; and that 
the important acts of the Vermont leaders were performed in loyalty 
to the State. He took a leading part in the rearing of the Bennington 
battle monument, an enterprise which did not reach fruition until after 
his decease. He received the honorary degree of LL. D. from the 
University of Vermont in 1859. He was a life member and vice- 
president for Vermont of the New England Historic Genealogical 
Society, a member of the Long Island Historical Society, an honorary 
member of the Buffalo and corresponding member of the New York 
Historical Societies. He married Dolly Tuttle Davis, of Rockingham, 
who was the daughter of Henry Davis, who was with Colonel Stark 
at the battle of Bunker Hill. Henry Davis also served at West Point 
at the time of Arnold’s treason. On his ninetieth birthday a party 
was given Judge Hall at the residence of his granddaughter, in Ben- 
nington, at which were present fifty-one of his descendants, and 
there were five others who were detained from attending. Judge 
Hall died at Springfield, Mass., at the home of his son, with whom 
he was spending the winter, December 18, 1885. 
Judge Hall was essentially a historian. He had great taste for 
historical research, a strong mind and a retentive memory. His flow 
of language as an extemporaneous speaker was deficient, but at the 
desk he excelled. Here his formulated thoughts and moulded ideas 
flowed as freely as could be readily written, and his fund of informa- 
tion extended to all branches of national, constitutional or international 
research. His judicial labors covered but four years, but he was one 
of our ablest jurists, and his published opinions are clear and strong 
presentations of the law. 114 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
CHARLES DAVIS 
1789-1863 
Charles Davis, of Danville, was born in Mansfield, Conn., Jan- 
uary 1, 1789. His father, also a native of Mansfield, removed with 
his family to Rockingham in January, 1792, where he resided until 
1806, when he removed to Middlebury in order that he might with 
more facility give his son a college education. Charles Davis made 
preparation to enter college by attending the district schools and a 
neighboring academy, and in 1808 was admitted a member of the 
sophomore class of Middlebury College, where he graduated in 1811. 
Following his graduation he entered the office of Daniel Chipman at 
Middlebury as a law student and was admitted to the bar in June, 1814. 
In June, 1816, he removed to Barton, when Orleans county was com- 
paratively new, where he resided until March, 1818, when he removed 
to Waterford, in Caledonia county, where he remained until 1828. 
when he took up his residence at Danville, the county seat, where he 
made his home as long as he remained in Vermont. 
In 1828 he was elected State’s Attorney of Caledonia county, 
and was re-elected for seven successive years. He was again elected 
in 1838 and held the office for one year. In 1831 he was elected Clerk 
of the House. In 1841 he was appointed District Attorney of the 
United States for Vermont and held the office until 1845. In 1845 
and 1846 he was elected Judge of Probate for the district of Caledonia 
by the Legislature, but at the latter session a bill was passed for the 
addition of another Judge to the Supreme Court, and the choice fell 
to Judge Davis, who served for two years. After his retirement from 
the bench he represented Danville in the Legislature in 1851. Judge 
Davis kept up an interest in general literature during his life as a 
lawyer. He was acquainted with the ancient classics, the best English 
authors, as well as some of the modern languages. His last few years 
were spent with his son at Rockford. 111., where he died, November 
21, 1863. 
He is credited with having been an excellent lawyer, thoroughly 
educated in the common law, and an able and honest Judge. His 
opinions are noticeable for sound reasoning and careful research. 
He did not enjoy the work of a trial Judge, and this and the condition 
of his health induced him to retire from the bench. 
LUKE P. POLAND 
1815-1887 
If Henry Clay deserved to be called the mill boy of the slashes 
because he carried his mother’s grain to the mill of Mrs. Darricott 
on the Pamunkey River in Virginia, Luke P. Poland can well be THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
115 
called the mill boy of Lamoille county for having tended his father’s 
upright saw mill in Waterville. It is a title that he would have en- 
joyed, for he used to say of himself that he “was brought up and 
educated in a saw mill.” His father was the first Representative to 
the General Assembly from Waterville after it was organized as a 
town. Luke P. Poland was born at Westford, November 1, 1815, 
attended the district schools until he was twelve years old, and was 
at the academy at Jericho for about five months when he was seven- 
teen. The balance of his youth was passed as a clerk in a country 
store at Waterville and in work upon the paternal farm and in his 
father’s saw mill. When he went out from his home to attend the 
academy at Jericho he exchanged boards from the saw mill for neces- 
sary clothing to wear while he was away at school. He was bashful 
and retiring, but characterized by good sense and industry. Hopes 
had been awakened that he might do better than pursue the calling of 
his father, and he persuaded the latter to give him his time during 
the remainder of his minority. Carrying a single change of clothing, all 
his earthly belongings, he walked to Morrisville, where he taught the 
winter term of school so successfully that he was engaged to teach 
it the following winter. At the close of the first school year he com- 
menced the study of law in the office of Judge Samuel A. Willard 
at Morrisville, and acquitted himself so well that before his admission 
he was sent by his instructor to Greensboro to open an office there 
and attend to urgent legal business. He was admitted to the bar at 
the December term of the Lamoille County Court, 1836, the first term 
after the organization of the county, and shortly after he had attained 
his majority. He was for three years a partner of Judge Willard 
and for nine years in practice alone. His residence and office during 
this time were at Morrisville, and his practice, which was a large one, 
was mostly in Lamoille, Orange and Orleans counties. In 1848, twelve 
years after his admission, at the age of thirty-three, he was elected 
one of the Judges of the Supreme Court over a Whig competitor, by 
a Whig Legislature, though he had himself always been a Democrat 
until that year, when he was a candidate for Lieutenant-Governor 
on the Free Soil ticket. He had before that time been Register of 
Probate for Lamoille county in 1839 and 1840; member of the State 
Constitutional Convention in 1843 and State’s Attorney for Lamoille 
county in 1844 and 1845. He served two years until the change in 
the judicial system, when he became Circuit Judge and continued as 
such until 1857, when he was elected first Assistant Judge of the 
Supreme Court. In 1860 he was elected Chief and remained as such 
until 1865, when upon the death of Senator Collamer he was ap- 
pointed by Gov. Paul Dillingham to succeed him in the United States 
Senate. He remained as Senator until March, 1867, when he entered 
the lower House in Congress and remained until 1874. He afterwards 116 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
served one term in 1882-84 in Congress and represented St. Johnsbury 
in the General Assembly in 1878, and Waterville in the same body in 
1886. He had moved to St. Johnsbury in 1850, was influential 
in procuring the removal of the county buildings to that place from 
Danville, and chairman of the committee for their erection. The 
University of Vermont conferred on him the honorary degree of 
Master of Arts in 1858, and of Doctor of Laws in 1861. He became 
one of its trustees in 1878, founded in it in honor of his native town 
the Westford scholarship in 1882, and was active and helpful in its 
management as long as he lived. In 1885 he purchased the old home- 
stead at Waterville, fitted it up comfortably, and took up his residence 
there. After fifty years of service at the bar and on the bench he 
attended the April term of court in 1887 in Lamoille county in the 
court house where he was admitted, and on account of the situation 
of one of his cases a recess was taken until July 5 following. June 
30 he returned from St. Johnsbury feeling unusually well, but on 
July 2 he overworked in the forenoon, ate a hearty dinner and while 
mowing away a load of hay in his barn in the afternoon died suddenly. 
Judge Poland was beyond doubt one of the best Judges Vermont 
ever had. He was one of the brainiest men who ever sat on the bench, 
and his natural talents were such that in spite of the lack of early 
training, now deemed so necessary for one who is to enter one of the 
professions or to seek a public career, he held his own against the best 
of men at home and at Washington, and was recognized as a leader 
everywhere. As a Judge he was dignified and courtly, saw at once 
the question at issue, had a clear perception of the testimony as it 
was given, and the jury readily understood his instructions. In the 
trial of cases he enforced great order without waste of time, and 
rapidly dispatched business without seeming to hurry. In the trial 
of questions of fact, as auditor, referee, master, Judge or chancellor, 
it is doubtful if the State ever had his equal, certainly not his superior. 
He at once saw the real issue and he cut out what was irrelevant and 
superfluous, and directed the trial to the things that were material. 
In this way he heard cases more rapidly than others and with more 
ease and better results. 
In the Supreme Court his opinions were usually written during 
the sessions of the court, and for this reason they did not show the 
finish that some of the other Judges who were less gifted gave their 
opinions. He explained his habit in this regard by saying that his 
education had been defective, and while in some cases it might be 
desirable to make fuller examination of questions and refer to authori- 
ties not at hand at the time, yet on the whole he could write a matter 
at first fully as well as he could if he attempted to revise it. His 
opinions are clear, concise and easily understood, and they show the 
power of a strong mind and the clear thinking of a sound lawyer. THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
117 
Some of them, struck off as they were after a day in court, are land- 
marks in our jurisprudence. 
As a legislator he was without a superior. His ready grasp of 
affairs and unusual capacity to put matters in definite shape made 
him a natural leader. His judicial qualities, too, were of great service 
and these he displayed throughout his political career. When it became 
his duty to present the tribute to his predecessor in office, Jacob 
Collamer, instead of lauding him to the skies, as some men would 
have done under similar circumstances, his speech was discriminating, 
temperate and judicial in its tone, and it placed the great Senator 
among other mortals with whom he labored and among whom he was 
loved and honored. He was chairman of the committee to investigate 
the Ku Klux outrages, also chairman of the Credit Mobilier investi- 
gating committee, making the report in that case. He took an im- 
portant part in the discussion of the Geneva Award and was chairman 
of the committee to investigate troubles in Arkansas. But his great 
work was in the compilation of the United States Statutes. It was 
thought that this task was too great to be undertaken by Congress, 
but in Judge Poland was found a man who was capable of undertaking 
it, with the aid of others, and its successful accomplishment was due 
in great measure to his tireless labors and efficient leadership. In 
the closing days of Congress he succeeded in getting the Statutes 
printed, as they had to be submitted in full to the Senate before they 
would become law, and going to that body they were passed on the 
strength of the work that had been done in the House, without inquiry 
into their correctness, after having been read by title only. 
It would seem as though such a career had been as successful 
as could be hoped for in the usual course of events in life, but it is 
said that the break in the political life of Judge Poland would not 
have happened had he had more thoughtful qualities and fewer ob- 
jectionable ones, and among the latter is mentioned his attitude toward 
money matters. He became a wealthy man and a very close one, and 
when he was in such favor politically that there were suggestions 
of him for a Presidential nomination the “salary grab” bill came along 
and dashed his hopes to the ground. He voted against the bill for 
the just increase to $7,500, but would not yield to the storm of popular 
fury to turn back the extra pay to the treasury or give it to the State 
or to charity, and he felt contempt for the terror of his associates 
in the House who hastened to part with what they had received in some 
one of the ways above mentioned. But he said, on the contrary, “Here 
it is,” slapping his trousers’ pocket, “and here it is going to stay.” 
He did after this, however, become chairman of the Vermont delega- 
tion in 1876, and his name was suggested as a candidate for Vice- 
President, but he presented William A. Wheeler’s name to the con- 
vention and was instrumental in securing his nomination. He 118 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
was a leader in the sessions of 1878 and 1886 of the Vermont Legis- 
lature, and at the latter session introduced and procured the passage 
of the Poland pauper law. This was his last public trust. He re- 
mained in full apparent vigor until the last, and was to have made 
an address at Bakersfield, July 4, 1887, on the occasion of the celebra- 
tion of the national holiday. 
PIERPOINT ISHAM 
1802-1872 
Pierpoint Isham was the son of Dr. Ezra Isham, of Manchester, 
and his mother was a cousin of Judges Phelps and Pierpoint. He was 
born at Manchester, August 5, 1802. He studied law in the office of 
Judge Skinner, was admitted to the bar, and at first located in Pownal. 
but soon removed to Bennington, where he remained in practice urltil 
his election to the bench in 1851. He was short in stature, of a rotund 
figure, quick and energetic in movements, excitable in temperament, 
impulsive and ardent, and of too impatient a spirit to endure grace- 
fully the labors of a trial Judge. His duties when first chosen were 
in the Supreme Court. When the dual system that was inaugurated 
in 1850 went out in 1857 and the old system was restored by which 
the Supreme Court Judges had to sit in both the Supreme and County 
Courts, he declined a re-election, feeling that he was not fitted by 
temperament to endure the vexations that attend the work of a trial 
Judge. The pursuit of politics was not to his taste, and he was not 
the recipient of any other public honor except that of Bank Commis- 
sioner, which came to him from the Legislature. 
His son, Edward S. Isham, was a member of the law firm of 
Isham, Lincoln and Beale in Chicago. In this firm Robert T. Lincoln, 
son of President Lincoln, was a member. Judge Isham died at Pier- 
mont, N. H., May 8, 1872. 
The opinions of Judge Isham exhibit good legal scholarship and 
a comprehensive knowledge of the case in hand and the legal prin- 
ciples governing it. 
ASA O. ALDIS 
1811-1891 
Asa O. Aldis was born at St. Albans, September 2, 1811, and 
died at Washington, D. C., June 24, 1891. He graduated at the Uni- 
versity of Vermont in 1829, studied law with his father, Judge Asa 
Aldis, at St. Albans, and became his partner. He was an able lawyer. MARVELLE C. WEBBER 
Born in Rochester, Vt., January 14, 1868. He 
studied at Montpelier Seminary, Williams College and 
Boston University, graduating from the last-named in- 
stitution in 1889, and from its law school in 1891. He 
served as a clerk in the office of Evarts, Choate and 
Beaman in New York and was admitted to the bar in 
1892. He continued in the office of this famous law 
firm until 1898, when he returned to Vermont. He 
located in Rutland in 1901. In 1909 he was appointed 
member of a commission to compile and issue a digest 
of the decisions of the Supreme Court. He has been 
a member of the Board of Education since 1915. He 
was elected president of the Vermont Bar Association 
in 1920. In 1902 he married Mary Rex of Philadelphia. 
Three children have been born to them, Payson R., 
Christopher A., and Marvelle C. Webber, Jr. THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
119 
a distinguished advocate and had an extensive practice when he was 
elected to the bench in 1857. He remained on the bench until 1865, 
when the loss of several children and the delicate health of others 
of his family induced him to resign, when he was appointed United 
States Consul at Nice, where he remained until 1870. The following 
year he was appointed president of the Southern Claims Commission, 
and remained in this employment until its duties were brought to a 
close in 1880. Immediately following this service he was appointed 
Commissioner on the French and Alabama claims, and served as such 
until 1884. During the discharge of the duties of these offices it was 
necessary for him to be in Washington, and he made that city his 
home during the last twenty years of his life. He suffered from an 
attack of the grip in 1890, from the effects of which he never re- 
covered. His son, Owen Aldis, was also a lawyer and a member of 
the Chicago bar. 
Judge Aldis was an accomplished gentleman, a man of high ability, 
a cultured scholar, a polished speaker, with independent ideas and 
patriotic sentiments. 
JOHN PIERPOINT 
1806-1882 
John Pierpoint was for fifty-five years at the bar, for twenty-five 
years a Judge of the Supreme Court, and for over sixteen years Chief 
Judge of that court. The latter is a longer term than the same office 
has been held by any other Judge. Judge Pierpoint was born at Litch- 
field, September 10, 1806. He could trace his ancestry in an un- 
broken line from Robert Pierpoint, who was a supporter of William 
the Conquerer, and was with him at the battle of Hastings. On his 
mother’s side he came from strong New England stock. His mother 
was a sister of John Phelps, who was the father of Judge Phelps 
and the grandfather of Edward J. Phelps. Thus Judge Phelps and 
Judge Pierpoint were cousins and Judge Pierpoint and Edward J. 
Phelps cousins, one degree removed. 
Judge Pierpoint came to Rutland when he was ten years old, and 
became a member of the family of his brother, Robert, who had 
preceded him there and was established in his profession. Here he 
attended the public schools, his only education, took care of the cows, 
brought in the wood, and did the chores for his brother’s family. At 
the age of eighteen he commenced the study of law, probably in the 
office of Calvin Sheldon at Manchester. He left the law office to 
become a student in the famous law school at Litchfield, and here he 
boarded in his father’s family, and walked to the school daily, a dis- HISTORY OF VERMONT 
120 
tance of two miles. On leaving the law school he returned to Rut- 
land, where he was admitted to the bar in 1827 and soon located at 
Pittsford, where he remained for about five years, when desiring a 
larger and more lucrative field for practice he moved to Vergennes 
and established himself in practice there. This was in May, 1832. 
Here his life was equally divided between his practice as an attorney 
and his work as a Judge, each covering the space of twenty-five years. 
At this time his health broke down, but after spending the winter 
of 1835-36 in Fayette, Miss., he was so much improved that he was 
able to resume practice, and although not robust in health he was 
usually able to do a considerable amount of work. 
Until 1848 he was a Democrat, as were Judges Aldis, Peck and 
Poland. Then he and they joined the Free Soil party and after that 
the Republican party. He represented Vergennes as a Democrat in 
the General Assembly in 1841, and from 1836 to 1857 was Register 
of Probate for the district of New Haven. He represented Addison 
county in the Senate as a Republican in 1855, 1856 and 1857, was 
on the Judiciary Committee at each session, and its chairman the last 
two sessions. In 1857 he was elected fourth Associate Judge of the 
Supreme Court, and continued in office on the bench from that time 
until his death, which occurred at Vergennes, January 7, 1882. He 
had been Chief Judge since November, 1865. 
Judge Pierpoint was one of the most beloved of the Judges and 
one of the best. He was well grounded in the principles of the law 
as a result of his early training at the law school of Judges Reeve 
and Gould, to and from which his daily walks were employed in re- 
viewing their instruction. His habit of “thinking on his feet” became 
so firmly established during this period of his life that he wore through 
the boards in the floor of his Pittsford office from constant walking 
back and forth while trying to solve the legal problems that came to 
him in the early days of his practice. This practice he kept up while 
he was holding court. He would leave the bench and walk forth 
and back in the court room while he was trying to bring his mind to 
a decision of some new question; and the older inhabitants of Ver- 
gennes describe him as walking all day on his veranda on the occasion 
when John P. Phair, whom the Supreme Court had sentenced to be 
hanged, was to be executed. 
The health of Judge Pierpoint was not equal to the exactions of 
a large and active practice, nor had he the initiative and personality 
to obtain one. The field was limited, too, and occupied by men who 
came more often into the public eye—Philip C. Tucker, Frederick 
E. Woodbridge and Gen. George W. Grandey. But none of these men 
equalled Judge Pierpoint in soundness of learning or correctness of 
judgment. His efforts were not so much employed in the forensic 
field as those of his competitors, all of whom were rather remarkable THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
121 
orators, but his old trial justice, who used to look proudly at his 
portrait that hung in the Woodbridge office in my early days as a 
practitioner at Vergennes, and declare that the Judge was “almost 
always right” in the thousand and more cases he had heard for him 
as a Justice of the Peace, said that Judge Pierpoint was capable of 
making an argument of great power and clearness. But he settled 
more cases than he tried, and his real place in the legal field was 
found when he was engaged as a referee, commissioner, auditor or 
master. In this kind of legal work his good business sense, knowledge 
of the principles of the law and capacity for dealing with the real 
issues of the case, made him a favorite among the lawyers who had 
cases for trial before such a tribunal. This introduced him to the 
larger field in which he so distinguished himself during the last twenty- 
five years of his life. 
He presided with dignity and fairness, and with gentleness toward 
those interests that required it, especially the young attorneys who 
were timid in the ways of the courts. To such he was most con- 
siderate. He was a master of every thing that bore on the court 
rules, the making up and disposing of the dockets, and his word was 
so much held in reverence in this regard that it was fallowed long 
after he was gone. I used to hear Rufus Wainwright, the ideal 
clerk of Addison County Court when I came to the bar, and the 
father of the present incumbent of the same name, say, referring 
to a disposition to be made of a certain case on the docket, that it 
should be made in a certain manner, for “that is the way Judge Pier- 
point directed it to be done and I haven’t heard any other rule about 
it since.” 
In the Supreme Court Judge Pierpoint sat with the legal giants 
of his day, Judges Bennett, Poland, Redfield, Aldis and Barrett. These 
men were all quite different from Judge Pierpoint. Some of them 
had a much better general education, and others were better trained, 
more profoundly learned and more experienced in the law. But in 
the happy combination of the qualities that make up the good Judge, 
he was the peer of any of them, and his influence over the opinions of 
the court during his long service on the bench was far reaching and 
highly useful. As the presiding officer of the Supreme Court he was 
regarded as a model in fairness, dignity and dispatch of work, and 
as the last Judge to be called on for his opinion in conference over 
cases that had been and were under discussion in chambers the clear- 
ness and saneness of his views were of great assistance in balancing 
the conflicting judgments of the other Judges. 
Judge Pierpoint was a great lover of the out-of-doors, a famous 
hunter and a dead shot. He took up his residence in Vergennes in a 
house which stood on the slope where the Bixby Memorial Free 
Library now stands, which looks down on the bay where so many 122 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
encounters took place between the forces of the Green Mountain 
Boys and of the Tories over the possession of the falls, then known 
as the “Lower Falls in New Haven,” in the days before the American 
Revolution, and on the bay where Macdonough built his fleet in 1814 
that destroyed the British flotilla at the Battle of Plattsburg; and 
he enjoyed from this vantage point the grand panorama of river, forest, 
field and mountain that stretches to the westward. 
In the fall of the year he was accustomed to spend many happy 
days hunting ducks on Dead Creek, Little Otter, Lewis Creek and 
Lake Champlain, where he was rowed in his long boat which was 
propelled by sweeps in the hands of his trusted guide. He was the 
first wing shot in his vicinity, and his unerring aim was sure to result 
in a full bag of birds, whether he went in pursuit of ducks on the 
waters, or woodcock and partridges on the land. 
Edward J. Phelps was sometimes his companion on these trips, 
and usually his friend, John E. Roberts, of Vergennes, his former 
trial justice, was with him. On one occasion Judge Peck was with 
him and saw him bring down a partridge “two or three minutes 
after it had disappeared beyond the cedars.” He was accustomed to 
pitch his tent and remain all night and enjoy the morning shooting. 
One of his favorite camping places was “Pierpoint’s Kitchen,” as it 
was called, near an overhanging rock at the mouth of the Little Otter. 
This spot is on the same side of the bay, and not more than a hun- 
dred rods from Sam Lovel’s Camp, made famous in the works of 
Rowland E. Robinson, himself a sportsman and a lover of nature. 
It was the custom in the earlier days for the trial Judge to “bust the 
docket” on calling it at the opening of the term, which meant that 
the cases not then ready for trial would be continued until the next 
term, and once at the opening of Chittenden County Court, in Sep- 
tember, where Judge Pierpoint presided as in Addison county, 
the Judge arranged with his party to be at “Pierpoint’s Kitchen” on 
the afternoon of the first day of the term, giving them the word before 
leaving home that he would be back on the afternoon train. Matters 
were so well ordered at Burlington that this plan was carried out, no 
doubt to the joy of the bar which has more than once since then failed 
to have business for the court on the opening day of the term, and the 
Judge was at his favorite hunting ground before nightfall. 
In his poem, “To My Cousin Jack,” Mr. Phelps makes reference 
to the Judge’s skill as a hunter, and pays a noble tribute to him as a 
man. Mr. Phelps was instrumental in starting a movement among 
the members of the bar which resulted in the erection of the stately 
monument over the grave of Judge Pierpoint in Prospect Cemetery 
in Vergennes, and he insisted that the stone should bear record that 
he was “Chief Justice” (not Chief Judge, the true title of his office), THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
123 
for he declares that “he was a Chief Justice,” and he was accordingly 
so described on the monument. 
JAMES BARRETT 
1814-1900 
James Barrett was the only Judge of the Supreme Court whose 
re-election was denied by the Legislature in recent years. He was one 
of the great lawyers of Vermont, but was not temperamentally well 
adapted to the work of the bench, at least that part of judicial labors 
which related to the trial of cases at nisi prius. He was born at Straf- 
ford in this State of parents on both sides who were endowed men- 
tally with more than usual strength, and these strong qualities were 
transmitted to him in generous measure. He was fitted for college in 
the common schools, and at the Orange County Grammar School, and 
worked his way through Dartmouth, where he graduated in 1838. He 
first gave his attention to medicine, but soon took up the law, study- 
ing for a while with Charles Crocker, in Buffalo, N. Y., in 1838 and 
1839, and with Charles Marsh in 1839 and 1840 in Woodstock. He 
was admitted to the bar in Windsor county in 1840, and very soon had 
a considerable practice, having located at Woodstock. Here he re- 
mained until 1848, when he removed to Boston where he practiced 
for about one year and returned at the end of that time and resumed 
practice at Woodstock. He was a member of the State Senate in 
1844 and 1845, and State’s Attorney from 1854 to 1856. On his 
return from Boston he became a member of the prominent law firm 
of Tracy, Converse and Barrett. This was made up of Andrew 
Tracy, a leading lawyer, and afterwards a member of Congress, Julius 
Converse, later Governor, and Judge Barrett. The firm did a large 
business in Windsor county and adjoining territory, and throughout 
the State. In 1857 he was elected a Judge of the Supreme Court, 
and served twenty-three years, his term of office ending December 
1, 1880. In the assignment of the Judges to the County Courts, Judge 
Barrett was at first assigned to the counties of Washington and Orange, 
but after the retirement of Chief Judge Redfield from the bench in 
1860, who had the counties of Windham and Windsor, Judge Barrett 
was assigned to those counties, and continued to hold the courts there 
as long as he remained on the bench. Had the system been one of 
rotation of the Judges among all the counties of the State according 
to the plan that is now in vogue, it would have been better, and Judge 
Barrett might have remained on the bench. His was not the only 
case where fault was found with the presiding Judge who held court 
twice a year in the same county. Judge Royce, who later came into 124 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
much favor with the bar when he presided in other counties than his 
own and Lamoille, was the object of attack at home by those who 
did not like the arbitrary manner in which he held court, and Judge 
Ross met opposition so severe at one time, when he held regularly 
the Caledonia County Court, that it looked as though his tenure of 
office would be interrupted. But he was very secure in the affections 
of the bar and the people after he had begun the circuit of the State in 
holding the County Courts. 
Judge Barrett was a man of very great learning and intense appli- 
cation in the law, and he had a taste for good literature, and enjoyed the 
good things of life. He was a man of very high ideals, of unquestioned 
integrity, of recognized honesty, and undoubted purity in public and 
private life. But he was temperamentally unfitted for the agreeable 
discharge of judicial duties, and the friendship of the bar which was his 
in full measure in the beginning of his long career was withheld from 
him at its close without his having sensed the change that his arro- 
gance and partisanship had produced among those who were in frequent 
attendance upon cases before him. If there could have been a con- 
sensus of opinion among those who attended his courts as spectators 
during the time he was presiding at Woodstock and Newfane, and 
especially the latter, as to who was the greatest of all Judges, the choice 
would have fallen unmistakedly to Judge Barrett, for the lookers-on 
had come to have a profound feeling that the lawyers needed disciplin- 
ing and that Judge Barrett was the one of all others to do it. After 
the more than forty years since he left the bench, the opinion still 
abides at Newfane, as a result of his influence, that that sort of conduct 
on the part of the trial Judge is essential to the correct dispatch of 
legal business. My earliest recollections of a judge are of Judge 
Barrett, and I must have seen him at Newfane occasionally in the 
Sixties and very often in the Seventies. I well recall with what rever- 
ence he was regarded among the people, and how much he was looked 
up to whether he was on or off the bench. Everything he did. every- 
thing he said, bore the mark of a strong and positive personality. It 
was seen in his walk as he came to court carrying a cane which he 
lowered at exact intervals and at just such an angle, and then it was 
seen again when business began in the court and it was time for the 
audience to come to a hush, and the wheels of justice began to grind. 
It is a pity unspeakable that such an equipment as he possessed for 
the highest judicial service, should have been beset with a temperament 
so partisan that it almost at once arrayed itself on one side or the other 
of the case, and made the labors of those whose duties had assigned 
them to the other side so onerous and onesided as to be almost unbear- 
able. Had this been the whole complaint against the Judge, he might 
still have retained his place, but to this fault of arraying himself on 
one side of the case was added a spirit of intolerance which found BRADLEY B. SMALLEY 
Born in Jericho, Vt., November 26, 1835. He was 
the son of David A. Smalley, Judge of the United 
States District Court. He removed to Burlington in 
1839 and was educated in the schools of that town. He 
studied law and was admitted to the bar in 1863. He 
was clerk of the United States Court from 1861 to 1865 
and United States Commissioner from 1861 to 1896. 
He represented Burlington in the Legislature in 1874 
and 1878. He was the Democratic candidate for 
United States Senator in 1880 and for Governor in 
1892. He was Collector of Customs for the District of 
Vermont from 1885 to 1889 and from 1893 to 1897. 
He was a delegate to the Democratic National Con- 
ventions of 1872, 1876, 1880 and 1884. For many years 
he was the Vermont member of the Democratic Na- 
tional Committee and was one of the most active party 
leaders of the nation in the direction of its national 
campaigns. He was one of the Vermont Commissioners 
to the World’s Columbian Exposition. He was a di- 
rector of the Central Vermont Railway Company and 
president of the Burlington Trust Company. He mar- 
ried Caroline Baxter of Burlington and one daughter 
was born to them, Caroline, now Mrs. J. Holmes Jack- 
son Mr. Smalley died November 6, 1909. Sjon. HraMpy 1. &mallpg THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
125 
expression in sharp words of correction and reproof which stung the 
unfortunate victims of his wrath. And all the while the Judge was 
unconscious of his manner until he was met by opposition in the Legis- 
lature in 1878. He went to Montpelier and there met some of the 
members of the Legislature, and by his pleasant address made friends 
and secured his re-election. But he was not able to repeat his success 
two years later in the face of the strong opposition against him that was 
brought by the bar of his own county. 
Following his retirement from the bench he removed to Rutland, 
where he was associated with his son, James C. Barrett, until his 
untimely death in 1887, after which he practiced alone until failing eye- 
sight compelled him to relinquish his professional labors. He died at 
Rutland, April 1, 1900. 
LOYAL C. KELLOGG 
1816-1872 
Loyal C. Kellogg was the son of John Kellogg, who was a lawyer 
and lived at Benson, Vt. Loyal C. Kellogg was born at Benson, Feb- 
ruary 13, 1816, and graduated at Amherst College in 1835. He 
studied law in the office of his father, at Benson, and with Phineas 
Smith at Rutland, and was admitted to the bar in Rutland at the Sep- 
tember term, 1839. He located in Benson, which he represented in the 
General Assembly in 1847, 1850, 1851, 1859 and 1870. He was a 
member of the Constitutional Conventions of 1857 and 1870 and presi- 
dent of the former. In 1859 he was elected a Judge of the Supreme 
Court and served eight years. He was elected for a further term, 
but declined to serve. He removed to Rutland while Judge, but re- 
turned to Benson when his judicial duties were at an end. Amherst 
College conferred on him the degree of LL.D. in 1869. 
Judge Kellogg inherited strong judicial qualities of mind from 
his father, as well as high character. He was a learned and sound 
lawyer, but not as quick and ready as some of his brethren, though 
his arguments were exhaustive. He possessed an enviable reputation 
for ability, learning and integrity. He was faithful and conscientious 
in the discharge of his judicial duties, and examined questions with great 
learning, fairness and impartiality. In the trial of jury cases he was 
the opposite of Judge Phelps, being exceedingly slow, and taking weeks 
for the trial of a single cause sometimes. He took full notes of the 
testimony, and if he made a mistake in the formation of a letter, his 
penknife was brought into use and the correction made, the witness 
being halted while this was going on. He so abounded in good quali- 
ties that his care to cross his t’s and dot his i’s was overlooked, and 
the incident delays suffered without complaint. 126 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
After his retirement from the bench he interested himself in his- 
torical matters and wrote many valuable communications for the press 
in connection with the local history of towns and the State. His last 
production was an effort to prove from official records that “Slavery 
had no legal existence in Vermont,” a position which he should have 
been able to establish, because the condition of master and slave, as such, 
was made impossible by the provisions of the Constitution of 1777. 
He wrote one of the best town histories ever written in the State, that 
of his native town. He took high rank as a legislator, and introduced 
a bill “authorizing the formation of railroad corporations and to regu- 
late the same.” It failed of passage at the time, but was taken up 
and passed at the next session. Judge Kellogg resided at the ancestral 
home after his return from Rutland, living there in the family of his 
brother. He never married. He donated his law library to be kept 
in the court house at Rutland for the use of the courts and the pro- 
fession. He died at Benson, November 26, 1872. 
ASAHEL PECK 
1803-1879 
Judge Taft regarded Asahel Peck as the greatest jurist that Ver- 
mont has produced. He was born at Royalston, Mass., February 6. 
1803, and was the son of John Peck who came to Vermont with his 
family in 1806 and settled on a farm in East Montpelier, where he 
died in 1838. Asahel Peck early showed a fondness for books, and 
by the light of the kitchen fireplace prosecuted his studies as a boy far 
into the night. He attended the district schools, and chopped wood to 
obtain money to enable him to attend the academy at Montpelier, 
where he fitted for college. In 1827 he entered the University of 
Vermont in the sophomore class, but left one year later on account of 
his inability to support himself. After leaving college he went to 
Canada and studied French for a year; he became proficient in the 
language and could speak it with facility. He studied law at first with 
his brother, Nahum, at Hinesburg, later with Bailey and Marsh at 
Burlington, and was admitted to the bar at the March, 1832, term of 
the Chittenden County Court. He began practice in Burlington and 
very soon associated with his own name that of Archibald W. Hyde, 
who was Collector of Customs for the district of Vermont, and long 
did business under the firm name of Hyde and Peck, though it is said 
that Hyde never had any interest in the firm, but lent his name for the 
prestige it afforded. In 1837 Governor Van Ness gave up his practice 
in Burlington on becoming Minister to Spain, and turned over to Judge THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
127 
Peck several important cases that he conducted with such ability in the 
Supreme Court as to bring him into notice as an able lawyer. 
In 1848 Judge Peck was associated with Rufus Choate in the case 
of Bank of the United States v. Lyman and others, in the Circuit 
Court of the United States, reported in 20 Vt., 666. Peck made the 
opening argument for the defendant and argued the case so exhaustively 
that Choate was left little to say. Choate was astonished at the great 
learning which Judge Peck had displayed, and asked Lyman if there 
were many such lawyers in Vermont. Choate said that they had not 
got them in Massachusetts, and he urged Judge Peck to go to that 
State and engage in practice, which he assured him would be profit- 
able. In 1848 Judge Peck joined the Free Soil Party, but had before 
that time been a Democrat. He attended the Free Soil Convention 
that year at Buffalo, that was presided over by Salmon P. Chase and 
nominated Van Buren for President and Charles Francis Adams as 
Vice President. When the Republican party was formed he joined and 
remained a member of that party. 
Judge Peck received his first election to the bench in 1851, when 
he became a Circuit Judge. He continued as such until the circuit 
system was abolished in 1857. He remained off the bench from 1857 
to 1860, but in the latter year when Chief Judge Redfield retired, he 
came into the Supreme Court and remained until 1874, when he was 
elected Governor. The day before his election he resigned as Judge, 
and after leaving the bench and while he was yet Governor he 
engaged in practice to some extent and was employed in some of the 
more important cases in different parts of the State. But his affections 
were toward his farm in Jericho, where he tilled the soil with his own 
hand, and spent the evening of his days in quiet and comfort. He 
never married. Here he died May 18, 1879, in the confidence in the 
hereafter which was expressed in his last words, which were: “I have 
no fears but that I shall fare well in the hands of the Great Judge.” 
Judge Peck was perhaps the most unique character who has sat 
on the bench in Vermont. That he had natural qualities of great 
strength is certain, and it is equally sure that these were accompanied 
by an indomitable will, great physical endurance, a capacity to hold to a 
task for a long time without wearying, and an unusually retentive 
memory. These elements in his nature and the midnight oil made the 
great lawyer; and his kindness of heart, tenderness and compassion, 
charitableness and forgiveness made the great Judge. He espoused 
the law, and to it he bent the best energies of his life. But it has been 
said that he was unique. He was so indeed. He would start in the 
morning from his boarding place at the American House in Burlington 
for his office on Pearl Street, and get there perhaps at noon. Then 
he would go back to dinner and after dinner start again for his office 128 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
and reach there by tea time. He had spent his time in conversation or 
in giving advice on the street. His best working hours were at night, 
and he would sometimes go to his office as late as eleven o’clock, where 
he would work until he was tired, then lie down on his office table and 
sleep until morning. He used to say he never lost a paper in his life, 
and never could find one. He kept no books of accounts, relied 
on his docket entries in making his charges, and made no charge unless 
he needed money, but could tell with great accuracy how much his 
client owed him. He did not speak eloquently, but did speak con- 
vincingly. He was the complete master of both the law and the facts 
of his case to the last detail, and convinced jurors by the massive power 
of his statement and the logic of his argument. He was thoroughly 
honest, too, and the jury knew it. He was slow of speech, but quick at 
repartee, as Jacob Maeck found on an occasion when he interrupted 
him in the opening of his argument by saying: “Brother Peck, your 
mill doesn’t seem to go very well,” to which the Judge replied : “When 
it does go it will grind your grist for you,” and it did. The Judge 
wore the ruffled shirt of the period while he was on the bench, and long 
before the week was over the white linen showed unmistakable evi- 
dence of both the snuff and the tobacco in which the Judge indulged, 
but he was not accustomed to make any change in this part of his 
dress until the week-end. It was thought by some of the bar that 
it would be well to appoint a committee to call on the Judge and make 
an appeal to him in behalf of neatness to change his garment during 
the week. Mr. Phelps, who was the natural diplomat of the bar, 
was made familiar with the proposal of reform and asked that the 
matter be left with him to adjust with the Judge. This was accordingly 
done, and at Middlebury, soon after, where they were both in attend- 
ance at court, he sought to discharge his self-undertaken mission in this 
manner. He called upon the Judge in his room quite early in the morn- 
ing and gave him a hint of what he would have done by saying as he was 
about to leave: “Now I am going out to change my shirt. I always 
change my shirt twice a week.” To which the Judge instantly replied: 
“Why, Phelps, what a dirty cuss you must be.” 
Once at least he deviated from his usual custom in dress, for 
when he was at Chelsea he startled and amused the court folks one 
morning by appearing arrayed in two shirts and two collars, each promi- 
nently in sight. Perhaps he substituted paper wads for chewing tobacco 
when he was sitting on the bench. At any rate, he was accustomed 
to carry these in his mouth when in court and there were occasions, 
but they were very few, when he laughed while on the bench and the 
wads were expelled and flew forth like thistledown before the wind. 
It is interesting to hear Senator Dillingham tell of the days when 
he was Secretary of Civil and Military Affairs under Governor Peck THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
129 
from 1874 to 1876, and drove a “spike tail sorrel horse” to Jericho with 
messages to His Excellency. On one of these occasions he carried a 
representative of the State of New York, who had come to ask the 
Governor to grant a requisition for the return of a fugitive from justice 
from that State who had fled to Vermont. The Governor was at 
work among his cabbages, but left his gardening and entered the house 
with his caller. I think the visitor had mistaken Judge Peck for a 
servant and had made inquiry of him where the Governor was and had 
been told that he was the Governor. It was just dusk, and a light was 
needed to examine the papers. The Judge got a tallow dip and lighted 
it, then placed his thumb nails on either side of the lighted wick, and 
using them as a pair of shears, nipped off the wick, and taking up the 
documents read them from beginning to end without saying a word or 
changing his position. When this was done he commenced a discussion 
of the law of requisitions and extended it until it had covered the 
whole subject. His guest had stood spell-bound with admiration while 
this exhibition of learning was going on, and when the Judge had 
finished, he exclaimed to Senator Dillingham: “What a wonderful 
man!” 
At another time Governor Peck was with his staff at Concord, 
Mass., to share in the celebration of the hundredth anniversary of the 
Battles of Concord and Lexington. It was Sunday morning, and 
the party were at a barber shop for the purpose of getting shaves. The 
shop was full of other customers and* the wait promised to be a long 
one for the Vermonters. In this situation Governor Peck made over- 
tures to the barber for a razor and the other accessories and in the 
presence of the crowded shop stood before the glass and shaved 
himself. 
But we are speaking of him as a Judge. An associate of his on 
the bench, himself a lawyer of national repute, says of him that he 
knew more law than any other man with whom he was ever acquainted, 
and this was the common judgment among the profession. His written 
opinions are models of judicial style. They go to the bottom of the 
subject, and are logical in every particular. The language is clear and 
accurate. He said neither too much nor too little. His attention was 
not much engaged in collecting authorities. He resorted principally to 
the early English reports and the classic text books and drew his in- 
spiration from these. 
His success was less at nisi prius than in the Supreme Court. His 
charges were full and clear, but he would give special prominence to 
the side he thought was right. Naturally he did not always know what 
was the right side and so sometimes he espoused the wrong side. Dur- 
ing the early part of his judicial career he was so careful to give 
respondents their full rights that he overdid the matter and many 130 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
escaped punishment who deserved it. Some of these escaped on tech- 
nicalities and others by reason of the caution which the Judge gave the 
jury in his charges. One of these cases was against Henry Welcome 
for larceny. After his acquittal on the charge of larceny he went to 
Hinesburg and murdered one of the Judge’s old friends in cold blood. 
This had a marked effect on the Judge, and it was as easy to convict 
respondents in his court after this time as it was to acquit them before. 
It was said of him, too, old bachelor as he was, that his sense of 
chivalry always caused him to array himself on the side of the woman 
in the case, if there was one, and that she was sure of the verdict. 
And the opposite is said to have been true of his attitude in cases in 
which corporations appeared against an individual. 
He took full notes of the testimony and never decided hastily; 
sifted the wheat from the chaff of the case; delighted in complicated 
questions; had no favorites; was kind to young lawyers; bore him- 
self with dignity and gravity; possessed great caution; read his papers 
in full before signing, and often underscored and interlined them; some- 
times had bursts of passion on the bench, but the sun never went down 
on his wrath; he never harbored resentments or said harsh things of 
anybody; and even his chastisements were regarded as blessings. 
Not alone in the law was he learned, but he had a great store of 
general information with which he could make himself exceedingly 
interesting. He was not a church member, but was a profound student 
of the Bible, and a believer in its doctrines and promises, and was the 
best informed man in that book that Governor Dillingham ever knew, 
which is saying a good deal when it is remembered that he was Paul 
Dillingham’s son. Such was Judge Peck, and if these qualities made 
him the greatest of our Judges, so he was. The judgment is not a far 
cry from the truth. 
HERMAN R. BEARDSLEY 
1800-1878 
Herman R. Beardsley was born in Kent, Conn., July 21, 1800, and 
came to Grand Isle with his father soon after that time. The son was 
placed in charge of Rev. Asa Lyon, a very learned, classical 
scholar, who tutored him and prepared him for college. He entered 
the University of Vermont in 1819, but left in his junior year, 
studied law with Bates Turner at St. Albans, and afterwards with Asa 
Aldis at the same place. He settled and thereafter lived in St. Albans. 
Here his practice was large for more than fifty years. In 1865, on the 
resignation of Judge Asa O. Aldis, he was appointed Judge. His life 
had been passed in the active pursuits of his profession, and as an THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
131 
advocate, and the duties of the bench were not congenial to his tastes. 
His place was as a disputant before the court, and not as one sitting 
in judgment. He was a genuine scholar, a brilliant lawyer, and an 
eloquent advocate. William C. Wilson, of Bakersfield, was elected as 
his successor, and in November Judge Beardsley resigned his office, 
not to take effect, however, until December first. He never sat in the 
Supreme Court. Fie died at St. Albans, March 9, 1878. 
WILLIAM C. WILSON 
1812-1882 
William C. Wilson was born in Cambridge, Vt., July 23, 1812. 
His father was a farmer and until eighteen years of age William 
worked on the farm and attended district school, then went to school 
in Jericho and by teaching got money enough so he could study law, 
which he did first in Cambridge, then for two years in Fairfax, and 
finally in St. Albans. He was admitted to the bar in Franklin county 
at the September term, 1834, settled in Bakersfield and obtained a 
large practice. He was State’s Attorney in 1844 and 1845, Assistant 
Judge of the County Court in 1849, 1850, and 1851, member of the 
Constitutional Conventions of 1843 and 1850, State Senator in 1848 
and 1849, and Representative in the Legislature in 1863, 1864, and 1865. 
In the latter year he was elected a Judge of the Supreme Court and 
served until 1870. He removed to St. Albans in 1867, but after a 
residence of two years returned to Bakersfield. He went to Minnesota 
after his retirement from the bench and died at Rochester in that State, 
April 16, 1882. He did not resume practice after leaving the bench, 
but began writing upon a law work for publication in Minnesota which 
he was unable to finish. By his first wife he had three children, one of 
them, William D. Wilson, well remembered as a lawyer at St. Albans, 
one the wife of M. R. Tyler, a lawyer in St. Paul, and formerly of 
Burlington where he preceded Justice Haselton as Municipal Judge, 
and the third the wife of Judge C. M. Start, of Rochester, Minn., a 
brother of Judge Start of Vermont. 
During the time Judge Wilson was in practice in Bakersfield he 
established a law school there and educated in it and in his office as 
many as eighty students. He shares the honor with Judge Turner 
of maintaining the only law schools in the State. 132 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
BENJAMIN H. STEELE 
1837-1873 
Benjamin H. Steele was the youngest person to be called to the 
bench and the only one of foreign birth. He was born in Stanstead, 
Quebec, February 6, 1837. His parents were of Vermont origin, how- 
ever, citizens of the State, and were temporarily residing in Canada 
at the time of his birth. He was a very precocious child, and when but 
fourteen years of age taught school. George N. Dale, who was the 
faithful biographer of most of the men of his time who resided in his 
part of the State, gives the following picture of Judge Steele at this 
formative period: “He had early selected the road he was to take, and 
was preparing earnestly for his journey, teaching, studying, reading; 
now the most ardent devotee at the Derby and Stanstead academies, 
again reciting Latin and French to the kind Catholic priest; then 
busily learning French five months at the College of St. Pierre; rushing 
into a course at Norwich University and quickly hurrying from there to 
Dartmouth College for want of time to complete a course at both 
institutions; prostrated by sickness; burdened by the care of a family 
which sickness and death threw upon his capable and willing mind, he 
ran towards the city of his destiny with wonderful courage. Thus with 
a long arm and a strong will, he hewed his way through college, over 
the threshold of which he was stepping out into the world as the 
acknowledged leader of his class, when I first saw him.” He graduated 
at Dartmouth in 1857, and began studying law at Barton, where at the 
same time he was principal of the Barton Academy. Typhoid fever 
compelled him to stop, and when he recovered he went to Cambridge, 
Mass., where he intended to pursue his studies in the Harvard Law 
School. He attended the Supreme Court of Massachusetts as a spec- 
tator and was advised to apply for admission to the bar, which he did, 
with the result that he was admitted at the age of twenty-one. He 
was examined by Benjamin F. Butler, who took occasion in recommend- 
ing him to comment on the remarkable manner in which he had acquitted 
himself and pronounced him an example of thorough training in the 
law. He was also commended by Rufus Choate, who heard a part of 
his examination. He prepared to go West, but his friends induced him 
to locate at Derby Line, where by his genius he quickly went to the fore- 
front in his profession. When Judge Poland was appointed to the 
Senate, in 1867, Governor Paul Dillingham filled the vacancy in the 
Supreme Court by the appointment of Judge Steele. Only twenty- 
eight years of age when he accepted service, he was one of the ablest 
Judges during the five years that he remained on the bench. He pre- 
sided with great ease and dignity, was patient in his investigations, and Born in Peru, Vt., November 10, 1843. He was edu- 
cated at Burr and Burton Seminary in Manchester and 
at Middlebury College. He studied law with Judge 
James M. Tyler and at the Albany (N. Y.) Law 
School, and was admitted to the bar in 1866. He prac- 
ticed law for many years in Arlington but in 1884 
opened an office at Bennington, forming a partnership 
with Edward L. Bates. He was State’s Attorney of 
Bennington county from 1874 to 1884 and represented 
Arlington in the Legislature in 1874, 1876 and 1884, 
serving as Speaker in 1884. In 1912 he was a member 
of the Vermont Senate. He was a Presidential Elector 
in 1880 and was appointed by Governor Fuller a com- 
missioner to establish the boundary between Vermont 
and Massachusetts. In 1908 he was elected president 
of the Vermont Bar Association. He is a student of 
Vermont history, particularly that portion dealing with 
Bennington county. 
JAMES K. BATCHELDER THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
133 
disposed of all questions with promptness, care and accuracy. His 
opinions were finely written, the result of his education, scholarly mind, 
literary taste and accuracy of expression. The settlement of the large 
estate of his wife’s father demanded his attention, and he declined 
re-election in 1870. He was appointed a member of the State Board 
of Education the same year, and in 1872 was a candidate for Congress 
against Judge Poland in a contest in which the latter was barely 
successful. He attended the National Republican Convention in 1872 
and drew the civil service and tariff planks in the platform. 
Judge Steele was not only a sound lawyer but a thorough student, 
a profound thinker and an orator. He enjoyed an enthusiastic follow- 
ing among the young men of his party and would have held a high place 
in national legislation had his life been spared. His last years were 
spent at Hartland, where his widow resided after his decease, and not 
many miles from the home of his sister, the wife of Gov. Samuel E. 
Pingree. Those who have known the charm of her personality, the 
graciousness of her manner, and the attractiveness of her countenance, 
can readily realize the leadership which her brilliant brother acquired. 
His brother, Judge Sanford Henry Steele, an eminent lawyer and 
Judge, died in New York in 1920; another brother, Hiram, was a 
Judge in New Orleans. 
In 1873 Judge Steele went to Minnesota, where he hoped to arrest 
the progress of the disease from which he was suffering, tuberculosis, 
but his efforts were unavailing, and he died at Faribault, in that State, 
July 13, 1873. I call Governor Dale again, this time to say the final 
word. It is the tribute which he gave at the commemorative meeting 
of old neighbors and friends at Derby, and is worthy of Ingersoll: 
“A pleasant, happy father, husband, brother, man. From his couch in 
that far off Western town he looked back upon no wild irregularity of 
his youthful or riper years. He looked back with conscious rectitude, 
through the fact that he had done all he could, and with regret that he 
could no longer comfort his friends; and forward, across the river lit 
by the faith of that church, the forms and creeds of which had long 
been pleasant to his mind; then quietly passed beyond our view.” 
JOHN PROUT 
1816-1890 
John Prout was born in Salisbury, in Addison county, November 
21, 1816. His education was in the common schools and at an academy, 
and for a time he followed the printer’s trade. Then he took up the 
study of law with Ebenezer N. Briggs, at Salisbury, and was admitted 
to the bar in Addison county in 1837, and began practice with Mr. 134 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
Briggs. He represented Salisbury in the Legislatures in 1847, 1848, 
and 1851, and was State’s Attorney of Addison county from 1848 to 
1851. He removed to Rutland in 1854, and there pursued his profes- 
sion most successfully until his retirement in 1886. He was a partner 
in Rutland at different times, of Caleb B. Harrington, Charles Linsley, 
Walter C. Dunton, Ner B. Simons, and Aldace F. Walker. He repre- 
sented Rutland in the House in 1865 and 1866, and was a Senator from 
Rutland county in 1867, and the latter year was elected a Judge of the 
Supreme Court, serving for two years and declining re-election. 
Judge Prout was a learned lawyer, and had spent his life studying 
law and advising important clients how to conduct their business along 
legal lines. Many of these clients were corporations and railroads, and 
the Judge had been more active with these clients in the office than in 
the courts. He was regarded highly in the Supreme Court, where he 
argued his cases quietly, in a conversational voice, without the least 
display, sometimes prefacing what he had to say by telling the court 
that he would “like their attention for about thirty minutes.” He had 
a large library and the latest text books, and was well posted in 
the law. His training made Judge Prout well qualified to perform 
the duties of a Judge in the Supreme Court, where he was as well 
equipped as almost any man who has become a member. But he was 
not as much at home with the work of the County Courts. His voice 
was low, and he did not make the lawyers or jury hear him. In one 
case David E. Nicholson said he would take no exception to his charge 
because the jury hadn’t heard a word of it. 
He declined re-election because he did not enjoy travelling about 
the State to attend court, most of which had to be done in the winter 
months, and besides he was in good financial circumstances and not in 
need of the salary. 
He retained his library and office after he had retired from active 
practice, and here he was the best friend of the bar of Rutland county, 
the members of which looked to him and his office as the center of 
legal opinion and judgment, and the county came to look at the matter 
in the same way. 
Judge Prout died at Rutland, August 28, 1890. 
HOMER E. ROYCE 
1819-1891 
Homer E. Royce, nephew of Judge Stephen Royce, was born at 
Berkshire, June 14, 1819, and died at St. Albans, April 24, 1891. He 
was a man of marked natural ability, an able lawyer and a good Judge. 
His education was in the district schools, and at the academies at St. THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
135 
Albans and Enosburg. He studied law in the office of Thomas Child, 
at East Berkshire, was admitted to the bar in 1844 and formed a part- 
nership with his tutor which lasted for two or three years at East 
Berkshire, after which he formed a partnership with his cousin, Heman 
S. Royce, with whom he practiced for about the same length of time 
at Highgate. He was State’s Attorney for Franklin county in 1846 
and 1847, and the latter year represented Berkshire in the Legislature. 
In 1849, 1850, 1851, and again in 1861 and 1868, he was a member of 
the State Senate from Franklin county and did notable work on the 
Judiciary Committee. When he was first elected to the Senate he had 
just passed the age limit and was the youngest member of that body. 
He located in St. Albans in 1856, where he continued to reside until 
his death. In 1856 he was elected to Congress, where he was likewise 
the youngest member of that body, and was re-elected two years later. 
Here he rendered distinguished service and made a notable speech in 
opposition to the acquisition of Cuba. He returned to the practice of 
law in Franklin county, and remained therein until 1870, when he was 
called to the bench, where he was retained in constant service for twenty 
years, when declining health admonished him that he must refuse fur- 
ther service. On the death of Chief Judge Pierpoint, in 1882, he 
became Chief Judge, and remained as such until his retirement, although 
there were one or two spirited contests over his re-election. 
Judge Royce gave one the appearance of solidity rather than bril- 
liancy, but he had both. He had a powerful brain and he possessed the 
graces of an effective speaker. His opinions did not show the genius 
that his labors in the County Courts displayed, but he was a good law- 
yer, a sound reasoner, and his mind went directly to results without 
a long dissertation on the reason of things. His charges to the grand 
and petit jurors were practical, plain and helpful, and his ideas about 
the admissibility of evidence were exceptionally accurate. At one term 
where he presided twelve cases were taken to the Supreme Court, and 
in every one of them the judgment was sustained. He sentenced pris- 
oners in terms so tender and pathetic that they sometimes overwhelmed 
him with thanks. 
He was bold and stubborn in his views and was not moved by 
public clamor. He was true and genuine in all his actions and abhorred 
everything that savored of show or sham. 
TIMOTHY P. REDFIELD 
1812-1888 
When Timothy P. Redfield was elected to the bench he was fifty- 
eight years of age. His brother, Isaac, had then been off the bench for 
ten years. What was lost to the State by the late arrival of Judge 136 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
Redfield to the bench was gained at the bar, where he was distinguished 
as an advocate and able lawyer. He was born at Coventry, November 
3, 1812, and was thus a little over eight years younger than his brother 
Isaac. He prepared for college at Peacham Academy and walked most 
of the way from Coventry to Hanover when he entered Dartmouth, 
where he took up his studies in the freshman class after it had advanced 
eight months in the course. He was without means and could reason- 
ably expect very little help from his father, but by teaching three months 
each winter he added something to his scanty finances and now and then 
a kind and admiring friend gave him financial assistance so that he 
was able to graduate in 1836. This was eleven years after the gradua- 
tion of Isaac, with whom he at once commenced to study law at Derby, 
turning aside for a time while he taught at Brownington Academy. 
But this did not retard his progress toward his profession. He was 
admitted to the bar in 1838 and began practice in Irasburg. He re- 
mained here until 1848, when he removed to Montpelier, where he re- 
sided for the remainder of his life. In 1839 he represented Irasburg 
in the Legislature; in 1848 he was a Senator from Orleans county; 
and in 1869 was a member of the Council of Censors. These and the 
office of Judge were his only public trusts. He was elected to the 
latter office in 1870 and continued until declining health and enfeebled 
mental condition compelled his retirement in 1884. 
He had been in practice continuously for thirty-two years when he 
was called to the bench and was among the foremost lawyers in the 
State. During his practice at Montpelier he was often associated in 
jury trials with Gov. Paul Dillingham, the greatest advocate at the 
bar, who, when the testimony was closed, would say to Judge Redfield, 
“Now, Timothy, you preach, while I, Paul, will pray.” And tradition 
has it that with the preaching of the one and the praying of the other 
they never lost a case. While Judge Redfield was never so ardent a 
student as his brother he was regarded as stronger by nature and I infer 
that he was the better advocate. He possessed an excellent memory, 
fine reasoning powers, a subtle intellect and sound judgment. As 
a practitioner he was self-possessed, cautious, skilful, clear-headed and 
quick to discern the weak points in his opponents’ case and the strong 
ones in his own. He was a careful and wise cross-examiner of wit- 
nesses, and an advocate who impressed the jury with his apparent 
fairness and candor. He usually proceeded in a quiet manner to mar- 
shal the facts, which he impressed on the jury with the aid of many 
anecdotes and illustrations. When he was aroused he spoke rapidly 
and in ringing, incisive tones. The latter characteristic followed him 
to the bench and made itself manifest sometimes to the dismay or 
chagrin of counsel. He had a way of turning a case in the direction 
that he thought it should go by an eloquent pause, after which he would THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
137 
begin with an ominous “but” to marshal the facts upon the other side, 
and to combine them in so striking and suggestive a manner as 
apparently to call for a judgment or verdict directly opposite from 
that suggested by his opening remarks. When he had summed up the 
case in his charge upon his standpoint of its justice he would make 
the lawyer who was getting the worst of it wince and the one whose 
law and facts the Judge thought were right ashamed of himself to 
see how a real artist could do his work. Of unquestioned integrity, 
such was the confidence of the people in the counties of Orleans and 
Washington when he came to the bench that the jury were inclined 
in many instances to render verdicts in accordance with what they 
deemed to be his views of the case, and these views became noticeably 
apparent, we have reason to believe, in many of the cases which he 
tried. The oil painting of the Judge which hangs back of the bench 
in the County Court house at Montpelier is a silent reminder of the 
able, scholarly and upright Judge who presided over the court in Wash- 
ington county for almost a decade and a half. Refinement, dignity, 
character, and stern justice are all marked in the strong lines of the 
intellectual face that looks out upon the bar and court room from 
the draperies behind the presiding Judge. I wonder if any Judge 
ever sat beneath this portrait who did not feel the strength come down 
from the canvas that preserves and reflects so much of the greatness 
that was once in the flesh and speaking from the bench below? It is 
little wonder that the elder Mr. Wing on being asked to contribute 
toward the painting, the gift of the bar, remembering the occasions when 
the countenance of the Judge was his undoing, should have replied 
that he “would cheerfully do so if they would turn the face of the 
picture to the wall whenever the court was charging the jury.” 
As a writer of opinions in the Supreme Court, he was more con- 
cise than his brother. His opinions show good legal scholarship, keen 
perception, sound judgment and fine judicial poise. But it was as a 
trial Judge that he will be longest and best remembered. Here his 
example as a gentleman, and his insistence that the bar should conform 
to like conduct, not because they owed it to him as the Judge, but to 
the law which was greater and nobler than those who administered it, 
gave the courts over which he presided a dignity and decorum that out- 
lasted his own life and are still felt. The rule requiring counsel to rise 
when examining witnesses was, I think, the result of his suggestion, 
and perhaps the rule requiring those in the court room to get up when 
the court comes in. At all events he frequently called attention to 
the reverence which was due to the business which was being trans- 
acted in the courts, and insisted upon decorum, and the bar cheerfully 
acquiesced in and profited from the perfect order that marked the pro- 
ceedings in Judge Redfield’s court. 138 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
He was a fine classical scholar, enjoyed the beauties of the best 
literature and was profoundly learned in the history of the common law 
and the principles that underlie our political development. If the case 
on trial happened to point in the direction of his rare historical knowl- 
edge of the law, he would digress on the subject in his charge or ruling 
with an interest and charm that would captivate his hearers. In social 
life he was a delightful companion. Simple in manner, frank in speech, 
abounding in anecdotes and reminiscences of the bar, it was a joy to be 
in his company. 
Judge Redfield had long entertained a desire to visit Europe. 
This was gratified in 1883 when he visited England, France and Italy. 
From the latter country he wrote a series of letters which were pub- 
lished in the Argus and Patriot. His health did not improve as he had 
hoped, and on his return he voluntarily retired from the bench. He 
died at Chicago, 111., March 27, 1888, and was buried in Green Mountain 
cemetery at Montpelier. 
JONATHAN ROSS 
1826-1905 
Jonathan Ross was first elected in 1870 and took office December 
first of that year, continued therein until his appointment as 
United States Senator, January 11, 1899, and was Chief Judge from 
1890 until his retirement from the bench. Judge Ross was one of the 
best Judges who ever graced the courts of Vermont. 
He was born at Waterford, April 30, 1826. In an evenly balanced 
family of six boys and six girls Judge Ross was the eldest son and the 
third child. 
Until eighteen years of age he worked upon his father’s farm and 
attended the winter terms of school. After that time he taught for 
seven consecutive winters to get funds with which to attend a select 
school in his native town and the academies at Danville and St. Johns- 
bury. He entered Dartmouth in 1847, and graduated in 1851. After 
graduation he taught one year in Craftsbury Academy and two years 
in Chelsea Academy, where he pursued the study of law in the office 
of William Hebard, and was admitted to the bar in Orange county at 
the December term, 1855. He was twenty-nine years of age. In the 
spring of the next year he located in St. Johnsbury, where he remained 
the rest of his life. Here he practiced law, and had as partners at 
different times Andrew J. Willard, Gustavus A. Burbank and Walter 
P. Smith. He was treasurer of the Passumpsic Savings Bank from 
1858 to 1868; State’s Attorney in 1862 and 1863; member of the General 
Assembly in 1865, 1866 and 1867; member of the last Council of Cen- RICHARD A. HOAR 
Born in Houghton, Mich., December 28, 1864. He 
learned the blacksmith’s trade and earned money to 
secure an education. He removed to Barre, Vt., in 
1886, and worked in a granite quarry. Meanwhile he 
studied law and was admitted to the bar in 1889, open- 
ing an office in Barre. He was City Attorney, 1896-97 
and State’s Attorney for Washington county, 1898-1902. 
He was also attorney for the Barre and Montpelier 
Traction and Power Company, and one of the prom- 
inent lawyers of central Vermont. He married Mary 
M. Keith of Barre in 1887, and six children were born 
to them, Ellen M., Bernice W., Lewis K., Richard A., 
Jr., Elizabeth A. and Redfield D. Mr. Hoar died 
November 24, 1920. THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
139 
sors, which met in 1869; and county Senator in 1870. He was elected 
a Judge of the Supreme Court in 1870, and for twenty years continued 
as an Assistant Judge. In 1890 he was elected Chief, and so remained 
until his voluntary retirement in 1899. On January 11 of that year he 
was appointed by Governor Smith United States Senator to fill the 
vacancy caused by the death of Justin S. Morrill. This place he held 
until October 18, 1900, when the Legislature elected William P. Dilling- 
ham to the place. On December 1, 1900, he was appointed chairman of 
the State Railroad Commission, and served as such for two years. 
After his retirement from the office of Senator he returned to the 
practice of law, had a considerable clientage and heard several 
cases as master and referee. He was elected President of the Vermont 
Bar Association in 1900. 
As a practitioner Judge Ross made himself useful to his clients 
by employing his exceptional business judgment in their behalf and 
by the careful attention that he gave to all questions of law that were 
submitted to him. It was as an office lawyer where a good business 
judgment counts that he most excelled in his practice. He was not 
gifted as a disputant in court and it was due to his profound knowledge 
of the law and high standing as a man that he was selected to the 
bench rather than the work he had done before the courts. 
No one ever rendered more conscientious and faithful service on 
the bench. Even to the keeping of all the hours in court he was 
scrupulously faithful. When the work lagged he would get the atten- 
tion of the bar and the Clerk and call the docket. If he lost some time 
in the forenoon he would make this up in the afternoon and if then 
the day’s work did not seem roundly done he would hold a night session. 
Nor was this all that he had done for the dispatch of court work. He 
tried to keep the bar busy—not always an easy task. He would 
admonish the lawyers that they “must go right along and make no 
delays,” cautioning them that “it costs a hundred dollars a day to 
run court.” When a witness left the stand he would tell counsel to 
“call the next witness,” and in this way he tried to accomplish much 
in a short time and to save expense to the State. It was not as 
apparent to counsel as to the Judge that he gained greatly by this 
process and sometimes he was met by a protest from the bar that his 
conduct was not conducive to comfort nor helpful in results. On one 
occasion of this kind when the local bar was moved to call on him to 
ask for more favorable treatment at his hands, he said that he was 
unconscious that he was trying to hurry the bar, expressed his sorrow 
that they should have had occasion to complain, and promised that there 
should be no further cause to do so. Before the second day had passed, 
however, he had returned to his old habit, and was again saying to coun- 
sel : “Call your next.” He looked upon the office of Judge as being 140 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
something more than that of a moderator, and felt that it was his duty 
to see that justice was administered and the law enforced. I received 
from his hands my first appointment as State’s Attorney. There had 
been a vacancy and it became the duty of the Judges of the County 
Court, the presiding Judge and the two assistants, to fill it. As I was 
passing the open door into the Judges’ room I overheard Judge Ross 
inquiring of his associates, who were friendly to me, as I happened to 
know, thus: “Is he a terror to evil doers ?” Once when he returned 
from holding a term in Chelsea, where many criminal cases had been 
tried, he betrayed his sympathy for the side of the State when asked 
how much criminal business had been done, by saying: “We have tried 
thirteen criminals and convicted eleven of them.” He was sure to have 
the respect of the jury and had great influence with them. He talked 
out the law with them in a rather conversational way and without 
strict regard to order or the rules of grammar, but when he had 
finished not much remained to be said and few grounds for exceptions 
were to be found. He had made sure to state the law, although not 
always in the language of the books. Once in a case of intoxication he 
defined that term in so roundabout a way that Judge Bliss, who was a 
ready wit and knew more about the subject than the Judge, said it fur- 
nished its own illustration. But if the definition was intoxicated it 
answered the purposes of the trial, for the respondent was convicted 
and no exception was taken. 
The resourcefulness and ingenuity of Judge Ross were well illus- 
trated in the case of State v. Hodgson. This was a liquor case, a 
class of cases that Judge Ross liked to try almost as well as Judge 
Thompson. He used to say in his peculiar way about such cases that 
the Legislature at each session had strengthened the law and “the 
courts had tried to keep pace with the Legislature.” This was a case 
for selling and the usual statutory words had been employed in the 
information, namely, that the respondent “did at divers times sell, fur- 
nish and give away intoxicating liquor without authority,” etc., without 
naming the persons to whom sales were made. The usual specification 
had accompanied the information in which the persons to whom 
sales were alleged to have been made were named together with the 
times and places of the sales. The proceeding was attacked on the 
ground that the respondent had not been apprised of the nature and 
cause of the accusation against him, rights which were secured by him 
by the Constitution of Vermont and of the United States. Judge 
Ross in the opinion of the Supreme Court of Vermont held that the 
information and the specification should be treated as one accusation 
and when so considered that they answered the constitutional require- 
ments. He declared that the principles in civil and criminal pleadings 
are alike and found an analogy to this case in the action of general THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
141 
assumpsit where specifications are filed. Our Supreme Court reached 
the extreme border line of construction in this case in “trying to keep 
pace with the Legislature,” and Mr. Phelps, who argued the case at 
Washington for the defendant in error was confident that the decision 
would be reversed. It turned out otherwise, but there were misgivings 
on the part of that court, for Mr. Justice Brewer told Governor Allen 
that I “stood on mighty thin ice,” and he said to me: “You noticed, did 
you not, that Mr. Justice Shiras wrote the opinion in your case? Justice 
Shiras is a very ingenious man. The court asked him to write the 
opinion.” An examination of the case will show that what Justice 
Shiras did was to quote the opinion of Judge Ross with approval. 
As a trier of fact Judge Ross was par excellence. He was patient, 
attentive, tireless in receiving and tenacious in holding all the details in 
the case, and absolutely honest-minded when he came to the question of 
the decision. He loved justice, and he would go a long way and over- 
come rather formidable objections to administer it. He acquired 
knowledge with wonderful facility, and retained and handled facts with 
great ease. He left no unfinished business when he left a term of 
court, unless he was compelled to go to other employment before he 
could finish, and he decided his cases promptly, showing again the 
principles of the good business man in his office as Judge. 
He took full notes of the testimony in a hand that formed each 
letter perfectly and was so fine that much was condensed on one page. 
He never stopped the witness to give time for the completion of his 
record, as did Judge Loyal Kellogg, but rather hastened the witness’ 
story, and yet found time to get down the main part of his testimony 
and to add here and there, in parentheses, interrogatory and explana- 
tory expressions which bore on the character of the witness and the 
story he was telling. 
While sitting in banc Judge Ross was an ideal Judge, and he pre- 
sided over the Supreme Court as Chief Judge with dignity, kindness 
and dispatch. He followed attentively the arguments of counsel and 
in writing his opinions stated his points clearly, fully and ably. It is 
an interesting circumstance that while as a speaker there was a halting 
in his phrase and sometimes a disregard of grammar, yet when he 
wrote, his thoughts flowed in unbroken rhythm and in perfect English. 
He had remarkable reserve power. The great questions that arose 
in cases involving new considerations of importance received the most 
careful attention at his hands. He went to the bottom of a subject 
and discussed it learnedly, exhaustively and convincingly. His opinions 
written for the Supreme Court are among the best in its records and 
his tributes to departed brethren of the law and occasional addresses 
conform in style and substance to the best standards. 142 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
On account of the political support for the Senatorship which 
General Grout had on the one side and Senator Dillingham on the other 
it would have been unfair in Governor Smith to have given either the 
advantage by an appointment to the office in 1899 after the death of 
Senator Morrill. In this situation the Senatorship was offered to Mr. 
Fifield of Montpelier, who declined it. Then Judge Ross was tendered 
the place and accepted it. The Philippine Islands had recently come 
to us and the question was soon under consideration in the Senate as 
to whether or not the principles of our Constitution applied to the 
new possessions. It was a question of great importance and it fell 
to Judge Ross as a member of the Committee on Territories to present 
before the Senate the legal arguments in behalf of the claim that the 
Constitution did not ex propriore vigore extend to the Islands. This 
he did in a formal address on the subject of “The Nation’s Relations to 
Its Island Possessions.” Someone in the Senate at the time of its 
delivery, who was at first inattentive to the address, was admonished 
by Senator Morgan, the Democratic leader, to pay attention, for the 
Senate “was listening to a great lawyer,” and so it was. The argu- 
ments which Judge Ross presented in the address were convincing in 
the Senate, and his views were later adopted by the United States 
Supreme Court as the law. 
The picture of Judge Ross is not complete without an allusion to 
his tall form, long sandy beard, high forehead and face of rugged 
strength and marked benevolence. Nor is any outline of his character 
faithful that omits his incapacity for resentment. He always kept his 
poise and was calm and undisturbed in all circumstances. Once I was 
sent by him from the Supreme Court chamber to summon John H. 
Senter, of Montpelier, to argue a case that day that had been assigned 
for the next. Mr. Senter was a brilliant man of high ideals in his 
profession, but very rough. He didn’t want to argue the case that 
day and told me that he would not do so in terms that would not bear 
printing. I delivered his exact words to the Chief Judge, but instead 
of anger on his part was met with this further instruction, made in the 
most kindly manner: “You go to Mr. Senter again and tell him that 
I want him to come to-day.” Mr. Senter returned to court with me 
this time and began his argument immediately. 
Judge Ross was in every sense a good man. He had high ideals 
along all social, political and moral lines and stood for the best things 
in life. He was most companionable; he was kind to the young attor- 
neys and took an interest in their work and welfare; and when he 
retired after his long public service he went back to private practice 
and took up his labors with the utmost cheerfulness and good will. He 
enjoyed service and wanted to render it as long as he was able. He 
was twice married, each time to a companion of culture and refine- THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
143 
ment. His first wife was a sister of Alonzo P. Carpenter, Chief Justice 
of New Hampshire. By this union there were five children, two boys 
and three girls. One of the sons, Jonathan C. Ross, a promising lawyer 
and a member of the New York bar, died suddenly in New York during 
his father’s life, and the other is Dr. Edward H. Ross of St. Johns- 
bury. One of the daughters married John W. Titcomb, former Fish 
and Game Commissioner of Vermont. 
The tragic death of Judge Ross occurred on the twenty-third day 
of February, 1905, while he was driving in a sleigh with his wife from 
East St. Johnsbury to his home. The horse rushed against a moving 
freight train, throwing both out and killing Mrs. Ross instantly. His 
vitality was so great that he lived for two days but did not regain 
consciousness. 
H. HENRY POWERS 
1835-1913 
The father of Judge Henry Powers was Dr. Horace Powers, who 
practiced medicine in Morristown. He came to Lamoille county be- 
fore its organization as such while it was a part of Orleans county, 
and practiced both before and after it was established. From 1844 
to 1846 he was the Sheriff of the county. He was descended from 
Walter Powers who emigrated to this country in the early part of the 
Seventeenth century. He married Love E. Gilman, and of this union 
H. Henry Powers was born at Morristown, May 29, 1835. The year 
1835 was an important one in the history of the bench, for on that 
year were born five of the Judges,—Veazey, Taft, Powers, Tyler and 
Rowell. Judge Powers prepared for college at the People’s Academy 
at Morrisville, and entering the University of Vermont in 1851 
graduated four years later. Following his graduation he taught a few 
months in Huntington, Canada, and in 1857 was called to be the first 
principal of the Lamoille Central Academy at Hyde Park. After a 
residence in Hyde Park of barely twelve months he was elected, in 
1858, to the General Assembly, and enjoyed the peculiar distinction of 
being the youngest member of that body. In the same year he was 
admitted to the bar in Lamoille county at the May term, and was the 
tenth lawyer to be admitted in that county. During his period of 
preparation for the bar he had begun his studies under the direction of 
Thomas deed, of Morrisville, and had completed them in the office 
of Child and Ferrin at Hyde Park. In 1862 he formed a partnership 
with Philip K. deed, a brother of Thomas deed, under the firm name 
of Powers and deed, and practiced at Morrisville until 1874, when he 144 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
was elected to the bench. In 1861 and 1862 he was State’s Attorney 
of Lamoille county; in 1869 was a member of the last Council of Cen- 
sors; in 1870 was chairman in committee of the whole in the Constitu- 
tional Convention of that year; in 1872 was the Senator from Lamoille 
county; in 1874 he represented Morristown in the General As- 
sembly and was elected Speaker. He served on the bench without 
interruption from 1874 to 1890, when he was elected to Congress, 
where he served for five terms, beginning March 1, 1891, and ending 
March 1, 1901. In 1892 he was chairman of the Vermont delegation 
to the Republican National Convention at Minneapolis. 
In the practice of his profession Judge Powers took high rank, 
and the firm to which he belonged was one of the leading ones in 
northern Vermont. Judge Powers had unusual grace and power as an 
advocate; he possessed a wealth of wit and sarcasm; was well equipped 
in the law, and had a personality that was winning. He was a hand- 
some man, and would attract attention in any public gathering. Besides 
these elements of advantage, he had good business judgment, and an 
assurance that made him fearless on the firing line. He inspired his 
clients with confidence, and knew how to acquire and hold an extensive 
clientage. In the legislative duties which he performed he was 
naturally in places of leadership, and commanded attention and respect 
whenever he spoke. His speeches in political campaigns were careful 
and convincing presentations of the issues that were before the public. 
When he came to the bench in 1874, he was at the right age, and 
had had the right preparation in every way for a useful career as Judge. 
His studies and his practice had qualified him for the service, and his 
temperament was ideal for the discharge of his duties. He looked the 
Judge in every way, and this lent not a little to his charm as a presiding 
officer. I saw him preside at Newfane before I became a law student 
in a case where the best men at the bar were employed and while they 
were more than usually insistent on their rights he handled all questions 
with the utmost ease. He was personally an attractive and interesting 
man, and it is natural that he should have enjoyed the confidence and 
warm personal friendship of the bar. 
In the Supreme Court he wrote opinions in one hundred and 
sixty-one cases. These are his permanent monument. They show 
clear thinking, careful examination of authorities, good reasoning and 
simplicity and beauty of diction. In the capacity for direct statement 
in plain and perspicuous terms he was exceptionally happy. His per- 
sonality was such that his influence was bound to be felt strongly 
whether he sat around the counsel table as an attorney, or with the 
Judges in chambers. He saw a point quicker than most others and 
led for the adoption of his views with a great deal of insistence. 
His career in Congress was a honorable one, and there was no MAX L. POWELL 
Born in Richford, Vt., April 26, 1869, being the son 
of Col. E. Henry Powell. He graduated from Ver- 
mont Academy in 1885, from the University of Vermont 
in 1889, and from the University of Geneva, Switzerland, 
in 1892. He studied law with his father and was ad- 
mitted to the bar in 1893. He has practiced law and 
has conducted an insurance business in Burlington. He 
has been president of the Hotel Vermont Company at 
Burlington since its organization, owns the Van Ness 
Hotel in the same city and is actively interested in the 
hotel on the summit of Mount Mansfield. He served 
as Captain on the staff of General Greenleaf in the 
Vermont National Guard, was Deputy State Auditor, 
1888-1892; Assistant Clerk of the House in 1892; Sec- 
retary of Civil and Military Affairs in 1894; Secretary 
of the Senate, 1896-1900; State Senator, 1910 and 1915, 
being President Pro Tem in 1910. In 1910 he married 
Lois S. McBride of Burlington. They have two sons, 
E. Henry and Max L. Powell, .Tr. THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
145 
reason why he should not have continued his service there except that 
others wanted the place, and as he had stayed longer by two years 
than had been the usual term, his defeat was not unexpected. The best 
tribute to his leadership as a lawyer came when he had retired from 
Congress at the age of sixty-six. He had been out of practice since 
1874, a period of twenty-seven years, but he returned and entered it 
again, taking up its duties with success. He became general counsel 
for the Rutland Railroad Company, which he retained for several 
years, and was employed by other corporations and by individuals who 
had legal matters of importance that required attention from a skilled 
lawyer. During a part of the time he was in practice with his son, 
Justice George M. Powers of the Supreme Court. 
Judge Powers married Caroline E., a sister of George L. Water- 
man, a leading lawyer of Hyde Park, and there survive a daughter, 
Carrie L. Powers, and Justice George M. Powers. Judge Powers died 
at Morrisville, December 8, 1913. 
WALTER C. DUNTON 
1830-1890 
Walter C. Dunton was born at Bristol, November 29, 1830. He 
was fitted for college at Franklin Academy, Malone, N. Y., and 
graduated at Middlebury College in 1857. He studied law with Dil- 
lingham and Durant at Waterbury, and with Linsley and Prout at 
Rutland, and was admitted to the bar in Rutland county in 1858. He 
then resided for two years in Kansas, prior to its admission as a State, 
and was a member of the last Territorial Legislature. He returned to 
Rutland in 1861, and was for a time a partner of Judge Prout, and 
subsequently of Judge Veazey. In 1862 he entered the Union army, 
and served as Captain of Co. H, Fourteenth Vt. Vols. In 1865 he 
was elected Judge of Probate for the district of Rutland and served 
until April 14, 1877, when he was appointed a Judge of the Supreme 
Court by Governor Fairbanks, to fill the vacancy caused by promotions 
due to the appointment of Judge Wheeler to the United States district 
judgeship. In 1870 he was the member from Rutland in the Constitu- 
tional Convention of that year. Judge Dunton resigned in October, 
1879, on account of ill health, and was succeeded by Judge Veazey. 
After his retirement his health was to a great extent restored. He 
resumed practice and for one year was professor in the law school at 
Iowa University. He died at Rutland, April 23, 1890. Both Judge 
Dunton and Judge Prout were natives of Addison county; they were 
both born in November, and died the same year. Both of Judge 
Dunton’s partners were Judges. 146 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
WHEELOCK G. VEAZEY 
1835-1898 
Wheelock G. Veazey was born in Brentwood, N. H., December 5, 
1835. This was the home of his ancestors for many generations. He 
prepared for college at Phillips Exeter Academy and graduated at 
Dartmouth in the class of 1859. In 1860 he graduated at the Albany 
Law School, the same year located in practice at Springfield, Vt., 
and was admitted to the bar at the December term of the Windsor 
County Court that year. He enlisted as a private in Co. A of the 
Third Regiment, Vt. Vols. When the company was organized in 
May, 1861, he was elected Captain, and in the following August was 
promoted to the ranks of Major and Lieutenant-Colonel. He was 
sent home to bring out a new regiment in the fall of 1862. In Sep- 
tember of that year he was elected Colonel of the Sixteenth Regiment, 
Vt. Vols., and continued to serve with his men until August, 1863, when 
he was mustered out. He was then assured a Brigadiership by General 
Hancock if he returned to the service, but his health would not permit. 
He took part in many of the battles of the Army of the Potomac. For 
a time he was a member of the staff of General “Baldy” Smith, and 
on several occasions was placed in command of regiments other than 
his own. He commanded his own or some other regiments to which he 
was detailed in the seven days’ battles before Richmond. The Six- 
teenth Vermont was in the three days’ fight at Gettysburg, and the 
second day was stationed between the corps of General Sickles and 
General Longstreet. Colonel Veazey was ordered at the close of the 
second day to take his regiment and others and establish a picket line 
along that portion of the field where the battle of that day had been 
fought. The Sixteenth was stationed along that part of the line where 
Longstreet’s corps made the famous charge the next day, known as 
Pickett’s charge. Colonel Veazey’s regiment was, therefore, in its 
path, and during the morning of the third day was the first to be struck 
by the charging column. The men under his command resisted the 
skirmishers until the enemy’s main line approached. Then instead of 
falling back through the Union lines, he moved his forces back just 
far enough to uncover the enemy front, and thus was able to attack 
their flank as the column passed. At about the same time General 
Hancock, who was in command of that part of the field, dashed to the 
point where Pickett’s charge was directed, and while wounded and 
bleeding, but still clinging to the field, was passed by Colonel Veazey 
who was taking up a new position so as to make a similar attack on 
the forces of Perry and Wilcox. Watching Colonel Veazey, and 
appreciating the movement which he was about to make, General Han- 
cock said: “That’s right, Colonel, go in and give ’em hell on the THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
147 
flank.” He then charged the flank of the two Confederate brigades, 
captured many hundred prisoners and two stands of colors. This 
was the close of the battle. It brought the young Vermont lawyer 
into national fame for breaking the enemy’s charge, and he has been 
justly given credit for initiating the flanking movement which confused 
and shattered the final onrush of the enemy, and ended the greatest 
battle of the Civil War. His part that day secured him a medal of 
honor, under a resolution of Congress, bearing the inscription: “The 
Congress to Col. Wheelock G. Veazey, 16th Vt. Vols. For Dis- 
tinguished Gallantry at the Battle of Gettysburg, Pa., July 3, 1863.” 
Colonel Veazey returned to Vermont, and as soon as his health 
would permit, took up practice in Rutland, continuing in the same 
until his election as a Judge of the Supreme Court in 1879, a position 
which he honored for ten years and until his appointment as a member 
of the Interstate Commerce Commission in September, 1889. He held 
many other positions of honor and trust. From 1864 to 1873 he was 
Reporter of Decisions of the Supreme Court, and in this capacity pre- 
pared nine volumes of the Vermont Reports. In 1872 he represented 
Rutland county in the Senate. In 1874 he became Referee in Bank- 
ruptcy, continuing until the office was abolished. In 1878 he and 
Charles W. Willard revised the statutes of the State. He was one of 
the trustees of Dartmouth for many years; was a delegate at large to 
the Republican National Convention that nominated Hayes for Presi- 
dent; was one of the early commanders of the Grand Army of the 
Republic in Vermont, and in 1890 he was elected Commander-in-Chief 
of the Grand Army of the Republic. He received the honorary degree 
of LL.D. from Dartmouth College in 1887. Judge Veazey died at 
Washington, D. C., March 22, 1898. 
He was an excellent lawyer, and presided with dignity, fairness, 
and ability. His opinions were carefully prepared and are clear, con- 
cise and forcible statements of the law. As a nisi prius Judge he was in 
general favor with the bar, his rulings and conduct of cases were 
sure to be on the side of good sense and justice, and his charges to the 
jury were careful and painstaking. As a public speaker he had more 
gifts than most men, as I well know from hearing his beautiful tribute 
to General Grant made in a Memorial Day address at Newfane, soon 
after the latter had passed from among the living. 
Personally Judge Veazey was a companionable and interesting man. 
He had a gift of humor, a fund of anecdotes, and kindness of disposi- 
tion that attracted men to him. His playfulness is well illustrated in a 
letter which he sent after he had examined the last opinion submitted 
to him for approval from one of the Judges of the Supreme Court. 
It was in the case of State v. Augustine Freeman, 63 Vt., page 496, 
for profanely swearing at a woman. It reads: “Your letter weighed 148 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
down with an opinion, which I approve before reading, lest I could 
not conscientiously afterwards, was a welcome visitor. It brought to 
mind the court as it was, and the fact of the rapid changes since we 
began playing judge. * * * After reading your opinion, I shall 
never ‘profanely swear’. I think it is dangerous, especially to a woman. 
Augustine well knows more if he doesn’t look so well. Had you not 
better remit his fine and submit a reading of your opinion? The only 
criticism I could pass upon it would be, that there is too much learning 
for so small a ‘swear’, but Augustine ought to be grateful because he 
thereby becomes immortal.” 
RUSSELL S. TAFT 
1835-1902 
Russell S. Taft was born in Williston, January 28, 1835, and died 
at Burlington, March 22, 1902. He was twice married and had one 
son, Russell W. Taft, a lawyer who practiced in Burlington and out- 
lived his father but a few years. Judge Taft traced his ancestry 
through many generations and on his father’s side through the same line 
from which President Taft came. On his mother’s side he had the 
same ancestors as Judge Dudley Chase of the Vermont Supreme Court 
and Salmon P. Chase, Chief Justice of the United States Supreme 
Court. He was also remotely related to President John Adams. Judge 
Taft through his father inherited the blood of twenty-three known 
families, and on both sides traced his descent from forty-six allied 
families. His father was Elijah Taft, who was born in Arlington, 
moved to Williston and later to South Burlington, where he died 
in 1881. His mother was Orinda Kimball. Judge Taft was the 
seventh of ten children. He resided in Williston until 1853, when he 
removed to Burlington, where he afterward remained except for 
a few years when he lived on his farm in Williston. He attended the 
district school in Williston until 1851, when he was licensed to teach in 
that town. The next year he was licensed to teach in Richmond, and 
the following year again in Williston. He taught one term at least 
in his own district. Here he would not engage unless it was agreed that 
his youngest brother, Hiram, should not attend, because he was so “full 
of Cain.” His mother was for having Hiram go, but his father settled 
the matter in his favor by saying that he would not teach school 
himself “where that little cuss attends.” In 1854 he attended the 
seminary at Newbury. He apparently studied law while he was teach- 
ing and attending the seminary, for he was enrolled in 1853 as a student 
in the office of George F. Bailey, at Burlington, an attorney who left 
Burlington and became prominent in Chicago. From Mr. Bailey’s THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
149 
office he entered the office of George F. Edmunds and later that of 
Judge Torrey E. Wales, from which he was admitted to the bar in 
Chittenden county, November 12, 1856. He formed a partnership 
with Judge Wales soon after his admission which lasted until 1878, 
when it was dissolved by mutual consent. He was State’s Attorney of 
the county from 1862 to 1865; County Senator from 1865 to 1866; 
Lieutenant-Governor from 1872 to 1874; member of the General 
Assembly from Burlington in 1880, and elected at that time in place of 
Judge Barrett a Judge of the Supreme Court. He remained an Asso- 
ciate Judge until January 19, 1899, when he became Chief Judge, which 
he held until his death. The University of Vermont conferred on him 
the honorary degree of Master of Arts in 1877, and of Doctor of Laws 
in 1899. 
Judge Taft owed his elevation to the bench more to his striking 
appearance, imposing presence, agreeable manner, commanding intellect, 
and political leadership than to his lawyership. Had the selection of 
our Judges been governed by the rule which obtains in Great Britain 
where the Lord Chancellor names the appointees to the bench, he would 
not have been chosen as the successor to Judge Barrett. His election 
was a great shock to Judge Barrett who regarded him as an inferior 
lawyer. But other men who have been elected to the bench because 
they happened to be in the Legislature at the time have usually proven 
to be good Judges. It was so in the case of Judge Taft. 
The firm of Wales and Taft did a considerable business, but not 
one that took them into the courts extensively. It was an office prac- 
tice mainly, and the services of Judge Taft were required in work of 
this nature rather than in trying cases. At the same time he occa- 
sionally appeared in court, and he did this in connection with some 
important criminal cases, one of which he tried by assignment before 
he was State’s Attorney, and others while he held that office. These 
cases he tried well and successfully. But he had the solid qualities 
rather than the alert ones which are adapted to the successful presenta- 
tion of questions to the jury. He was better as a politician than a trial 
lawyer and here his mastery consisted in his capacity for organization, 
his warm personal friendships and his commanding personality. As a 
presiding officer he presented an imposing appearance and dispatched 
public business with dignity and ability. This quality in his make-up 
was a great help when he assumed the duties of a Judge. I saw him 
preside in the first important case he tried after coming to the bench. 
It was at the March term in Windham county in 1881, and the case was 
that of Whitney v. The First National Bank of Brattleboro, reported 
in 55 Vt., 154. The settings of the case could not have been more em- 
barrassing for the new Judge nor more interesting to the spectators in 
the court room. Judge Barrett, whom Judge Taft had deposed from the 
bench, was of counsel for the plaintiff and appeared with Mr. Daven- 150 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
port, the leader of the local liar. He had been called into the case, I 
assume, not so much because he was known to be a great lawyer as that 
he was supposed to have a strong hold on the people of Windham 
county, where he had held court for twenty years. It must have been 
a trying moment for the new Judge when he saw the old one take his 
place in the bar and array himself for the fray, and every one who 
looked on knew that Judge Barrett, whatever were his temperamental 
faults, understood the law in all its intricacies and ramifications more 
thoroughly than almost any man who had sat on the bench in Vermont. 
To a culture that was exceptional had been added the ripeness that came 
from long practice at the bar and twenty years upon the bench. But 
this was not the only feature to make the task of the new Judge a hard 
one. On the other side sat Mr. Phelps, the accomplished leader of the 
bar, who, if he could have had the choosing, would not have named 
Judge Taft as Judge Barrett’s successor. And to add to the Judge’s 
discomfort was the subject matter of the controversy, that of bailment 
growing out of the theft of some government bonds while they were in 
the possession of the defendant. For four hours Mr. Phelps argued 
the law points on his side in a manner so fluent, graceful and dignified 
that I saw him grow from a very homely man in the beginning into a 
very handsome man at the close. I was not as much impressed with his 
power as with that of Mr. Davenport, who answered him, but his man- 
ner in speech, gesture and pose have abided as my pleasantest memories 
of the court room. When I went home from court that day I told my 
parents I was going to study law, and sixteen years later I argued the 
Hodgson case against Mr. Phelps in the United States Supreme Court. 
Mr. Davenport spoke for two hours or more, and Judge Barrett made 
a shorter argument than either of the others. It was during this time 
that Judge Barrett forgot for a moment that he was not sitting in 
judgment, clothed in judicial armor, and let fly at Mr. Phelps an invec- 
tive of correction and reproof such as he had been accustomed to deliver 
from the bench with harmless consequences to himself, to find himself 
suddenly impaled on the shining lance of his adversary. “You must 
remember, Judge Barrett,” said Mr. Phelps, “that you are no longer 
sitting in judgment, but are now practicing your profession with your 
fellow members of the bar, among whom there is still recognized such 
a thing as courtesyThroughout the trial Judge Taft carried himself 
with dignity, nor did he seem disturbed at any turn in the case. He 
read his charge in heavy, solemn tones that neither rose nor fell in 
volume or pitch and made upon his boy listener a rather profound 
impression. But he did not make as good an impression with the 
Supreme Court when the case came up for review, for it was reversed 
on several grounds. THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
151 
Judge Taft wrote many good opinions. The most celebrated is 
that in The Bankers’ Life Insurance Company of New York v. How- 
land and Bacon, 73 Vt., 1. His experience while in practice with insur- 
ance matters made him the oracle of the court on such subjects, and 
enabled him to deal with the questions involved in a masterly way. 
This is the leading case in this country, and the rule laid down therein 
is very generally followed. The case of Dunklee v. Goodenough, 65 
Vt., 257, is one in which he delivered the opinion in a case on special 
pleading. It is one of the most interesting opinions in our reports on 
that subject. 
Judge Taft had the capacity to acquire facts with extreme readiness 
and his memory was remarkable. He did not follow the rules of logic, 
but reached results by processes quite peculiar to himself that were 
very direct. He was not inclined to state his reasons for his judgment, 
and believed that the court’s word for the law was enough. He liked 
to expedite his cases, but was content if counsel were employing their 
time profitably in making settlements. He would sometimes say at the 
end of a day when several cases had been settled: “We have tried — 
cases to-day” (naming those that had been settled). 
Judge Taft spent a good deal of time compiling a Taft genealogy, 
and he wrote several articles that were read at the meetings of the 
Vermont Bar Association. About 1890 he commenced gathering data 
for the Bench and Bar of Vermont. He solicited from each attorney 
of the State personal memoranda for a short sketch. These were 
grouped in counties and were practically complete but were not pub- 
lished. They were the property of Chauncey W. Brownell, who kindly 
tendered them to me for such use as I might make of them in this work. 
They are now in the State Library at Montpelier. Judge Taft pub- 
lished in the Green Bag in 1894 a History of the Supreme Court of 
Vermont. This contains a sketch of each Judge who had served during 
the period from 1778 down to the date of the publication, and much 
valuable data about the courts and changes in the judicial system of the 
State. This is a work of great service in preserving the early Judges 
and courts, and I acknowledge my obligation to Judge Taft for the 
benefit his article has been to me in sketching again the early Judges. 
Whatever I deemed of particular interest in these articles I have made 
use of in this work. 
The most marvelous gift in Judge Taft was his memory. It pro- 
ceeded by no fixed rules nor general principles but attached whereso- 
ever it would upon facts and figures that attracted his attention. He 
would remember your birthday and would tell you on its arrival, if he 
happened to be in your company, how old you were, when perhaps you 
would be quite unaware that your birthday had arrived. He had a good 
verbal memory too. Once a learned young lawyer in northern Ver- 152 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
mont was attempting to recite in the hearing of the Judge the “Bells of 
Shandon.” He went as far as his memory carried him and stopped, 
whereupon to his surprise Judge Taft took up the poem where he had 
left off and recited it to the end. 
He was hindered rather than helped by precedents, unless they 
were of Vermont origin or hoary with antiquity. The precedents of 
other States were not authority here, he said, and were like Swiss troops 
fighting on both sides. The English cases and those that appeared in 
text books and had stood the ravages of time were treated with favor. 
Judge Taft was a true friend and was popular with the bar. He 
was kind to the young attorneys, and I would place a forget-me-not 
flower of appreciation on his grave for the kind words that fell from 
his lips upon me in the early days of my practice. His associates 
admired and loved him for his big heart, his trustful companionship, 
his wit and humor, his good sense and practical wisdom. He admin- 
istered the law in its integrity, was one of the best of our Judges and 
died esteemed by our people. 
The final rites over his body did not take place in a church but- 
in the County Court House in Burlington, where he had spent much 
time in the performance of the duties of his office, and where he hung 
his portrait while he was yet among the living. Here one of his asso- 
ciates pronounced a eulogy and another read a poem in the presence 
of the bar and friends who had met to pay the last token of respect 
to their friend. Resolutions of love and esteem were passed by many 
of the county bars of the State, and the people generally exhibited a 
deep sense of loss. 
JOHN W. ROWELL 
1835- 
John W. Rowell was the first Chief Justice of Vermont, and he 
was longer on the Supreme bench by years than any other man in the 
history of the State. He was born at Lebanon, N. H., June 9, 1835. 
His early education was in the common schools and at the West Ran- 
dolph Academy, where he was thoroughly prepared for admission to 
college a year in advance of his course, but circumstances conspired to 
prevent his graduation. He began the study of law at Randolph in 
1856, in the office of Jefferson P. Kidder, who was Lieutenant- 
Governor of Vermont, afterward one of the Judges of the Supreme 
Court of Dakota, and a delegate to Congress from that Territory. 
From 1857 to the winter of 1858 he studied in the office of Judge 
Edmond Weston, also of Randolph, and attended a course of lectures JOHN W. GORDON 
Born in Vershire, Vt., September 16', 1857. He was 
educated in the Burlington High School, Barre Acad- 
emy and Dartmouth College. He taught school in 
Massachusetts, studied law and was admitted to the 
bar and located in Barre in 1886. He was engaged in 
the granite business for several years, but has devoted 
most of his time to the practice of law. He was Mayor 
of Barre from 1896 to 1900, was a Senator from Wash- 
ington county in 1910, and was elected a member of 
the House of Representatives in 1922. He is a man of 
literary taste and has written some verse. He married 
Maud L. Dunham of Barre in 1884 and live children 
have been born to them, Lillian W., Paul D., Philip C., 
John A.,' and Norman S. Gordon. THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
153 
at the law college established by Judge Hayden and other gentlemen at 
Poland, Ohio. He was admitted to the bar in Orange county at the 
June term, 1858, and at once associated himself in practice with Judge 
John B. Hutchinson at Randolph. This relation existed until the latter 
part of 1859, when Judge Hutchinson accepted the office of cashier 
of the Northfield Bank, a place which he held until 1861, when he 
returned to Randolph and again entered into partnership with Judge 
Rowell and so continued until 1866, when ill health compelled him to 
retire from the firm. Judge Rowell removed to Chicago in 1870 and 
formed a business connection in the practice of law with John Hutchin- 
son, formerly U. S. Consul at Nice, but in September, 1871, returned 
to Randolph and resumed practice, and has ever since resided there. 
He represented Randolph in the General Assembly in 1861 and 1862, 
and with one exception was the youngest member in that body. In 
1862 and 1863 he was State’s Attorney; in 1872 he was appointed 
Reporter of the decisions of the Supreme Court and continued to serve 
as such for eight years; he represented Orange county in the Senate in 
1874, and on January 11, 1882, was appointed by Governor Farnham a 
Judge of the Supreme Court to fill the vacancy on the bench caused by 
the death of Chief Judge Pierpoint and the promotions that were inci- 
dent thereto. He was continued on the bench without interruption 
from 1882 until his voluntary retirement, September 30, 1913, covering 
a period of thirty-one years, eight months and nineteen days, and being 
the longest service in the history of the State. Following the death of 
Chief Judge Taft, March 22, 1902, he became Chief Judge by reason of 
the promotions then made and remained at the head of the court from 
that time until he resigned in 1913, a period of over eleven years. By 
force of the Constitutional amendment adopted in 1912, Chief Judge 
Rowell became the first Chief Justice of Vermont. 
The length of Justice Rowell’s service was not its only distinguish- 
ing feature. He came to the bench fully qualified in every way for the 
discharge of its duties. He had had an extensive practice and enjoyed 
a position of leadership at the bar. His legal scholarship was acute, 
profound, and extensive, and his grasp of affairs as exceptional as his 
learning. He combined in the scholarly and wise lawyer the elements 
of an able business man, an important attribute of a good lawyer and a 
good Judge. Thus equipped by learning, training, and nature he 
entered upon his long term of service. Whenever he presented himself 
as the presiding Judge of the County Courts it was understood that a 
business session was at hand and that business methods would be 
employed on the part of the court and expected on the part of the bar. 
This meant the orderly bringing on of trials and their reasonable dis- 
patch thereafter. It meant a court room dedicated to the purpose of 
justice where order and decorum were observed and respect paid to the 154 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
Judges; where the officers preserved discipline with firmness and dig- 
nity; where the men of the jury attended punctually and answered 
promptly when called for service; where witnesses were expected to be 
on hand when called and to behave with decorum when under examina- 
tion ; and where counsel were relied on to have their cases prepared and 
to present them fairly and courteously, as the officers of the court, and 
where the court reporter was expected to keep “a black and white 
photograph” of everything that occurred in the court room. This was 
the high standard which Justice Rowell had before him as the magis- 
trate and which he followed as a trial Judge. But this was only a 
part of his excellence in that position. His lawyership was always 
apparent in each day’s business. It became impressed on all who 
heard his rare discrimination, fullness of learning and clearness of 
statement in his preliminary charges to the grand and petit jurors, and 
it was apparent whenever anything was being done in court, whether 
he was passing on a question of evidence, charging the jury, ruling 
upon questions of pleading, or hearing questions of fact and making his 
findings. Then when all was over counsel would find that the Judge 
had prepared and signed the bills of exceptions in the cases to go to the 
Supreme Court, and there was no lingering aftermath to the term. 
His opinions, written for the Supreme Court, if they could be 
detached from the others and published by themselves, would furnish 
a body of law that would merit the attention of the legal student and 
practitioner from many standpoints. Some of our best lawyers think 
that these opinions are not surpassed by the work of any other Judge 
in New England during the same time, if they are equalled. To the 
rare and comprehensive learning which they embody is combined a style 
so simple, clear and captivating that it is a pleasure to follow them. 
The deep places in the law are sounded, the obscure recesses explored, 
and the difficult obstructions that cases present overcome; and the 
path is everywhere blazed with so many delightful landmarks that the 
pursuit of the case and its principles is afterwards a pleasure. 
Judge Rowell is an eloquent man and a graceful and fluent speaker. 
He is able to form a telling phrase that will attract and hold the atten- 
tion and while on the bench delivered some charges that were dramatic 
in their efifect on the jury and listeners. Such was his charge in the 
case of State v. Flint, where he discussed the influence on the respond- 
ent of his interest in the case and referred to his imprisonment, if it 
came, as a “mountain of curses,” and his freedom, if it was given, as a 
“mountain of blessings.” 
Those who have not had occasion to know Justice Rowell at his 
home either in a personal way or in connection with the courts do not 
appreciate the warmth of his personality and the fullness of his friend- 
ship. He is president of the national bank and daily considers its more THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
155 
important matters; he still maintains his library and gives legal opinions 
to those who come to him for the law. He received the honorary degree 
of LL. D. from the University of Vermont in 1893, and the same degree 
from Middlebury in 1913. He could do literary work of a high order, as 
is apparent from his Constitutional History of Vermont and the articles 
and addresses he has contributed to the Vermont Bar Association. 
Some one, sometime, doing the work I am now doing, after a more 
careful survey from a wider angle, will declare that Justice Rowell was 
the greatest of all Vermont jurists, and it will be the truth. 
WILLIAM H. WALKER 
1833-1896 
William H. Walker was born in Windham, February 2, 1833. He 
received his primary education in the common schools of Londonderry, 
where his parents removed in 1838, and was fitted for college at Leland 
and Gray Seminary at Townshend and at Black River Academy at 
Ludlow. He entered Middlebury College, and graduated in the class 
of 1858. While pursuing his studies, he was Secretary of the Vermont 
Senate in 1857. In order to secure the necessary funds with which to 
complete his college course, he was allowed to teach during this period 
and he taught a part of the time in a grammar school in Orleans, Mass., 
and one term as principal of the West River Seminary at South London- 
derry. Soon after graduation he was appointed principal of the 
academy at Little Falls, N. Y., wdiere he remained for two years, during 
which time he entered his name as a student in the law office of 
Arphaxed Loomis. In 1860 he resigned his position as principal and 
removed to Ludlow, where he finished his legal studies with Frederick 
C. Robbins, and was admitted to the bar in Windsor county at the 
December term in 1861. He immediately opened an office in Ludlow, 
where he remained in practice until his election to the bench in 1884. 
In 1865 and 1866, and again in 1884, he was a member of the 
Legislature, and was chairman of the Judiciary Committee at the latter 
session. In 1867 and 1868 he was one of the Senators from Windsor 
county. He served as State’s Attorney for Windsor county for two 
years. This was from 1874 to 1876. In 1878 he was appointed a 
commissioner to make an examination of the insane asylum, and was 
Supervisor of the Insane for two years, ending December, 1880. He 
was Judge of Probate from 1878 to 1884, when his term began as a 
Judge of the Supreme Court. He continued on the bench until 1887, 
when he was obliged to resign on account of impaired health. 
He was one of the trustees of Middlebury College, and was presi- 
dent of Black River Academy. In 1862 he was elected Captain in the 156 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
Sixteenth Regiment, Vt. Vols., but was obliged to resign on account of 
an attack of typhoid fever. He died at Ludlow, August 11, 1896. He 
was an excellent Judge in both the County and Supreme Courts and 
gave promise of great usefulness on the bench. 
JAMES M. TYLER 
1835- 
No Judge in the history of the State ever held the courts and 
gave more delight to the bar and to those interested in the courts than 
Judge Tyler. In him the elements of the lawyer and the gentleman 
are happily blended. He began his term of service in 1887, and 
ended it, by voluntary retirement, in 1908, a period of twenty-one 
years. 
James M. Tyler was born in Wilmington, April 27, 1835, the son 
of Ephraim and Mary (Bissell) Tyler. He was educated in the com- 
mon schools of Guilford and at Brattleboro Academy. He studied 
law two years before entering the Albany Law School where he 
graduated in June, 1860. He was admitted to the bar at the Septem- 
ber term of the Windham County Court that year, at once formed a 
partnership with Gen. Stephen P. Flagg of Wilmington, and lived 
and practiced law in that town for the next four years, representing 
the town in the Legislature in 1863, 1864, and in the special session of 
1865. In December, 1864, he closed his partnership with General 
Flagg and moved to Brattleboro, becoming a partner of Charles K. 
Field, which relation continued until Mr. Field’s death, in 1880. Judge 
Tyler was State’s Attorney for Windham county in 1867 and 1868; 
member of the Forty-sixth and Forty-seventh Congresses, but declined 
to be considered a candidate for another term, preferring to return 
to his profession. His term of office began in 1879 and ended in 
1883. In July, 1887, he was appointed by Governor Ormsbee a mem- 
ber of the commission to revise the school laws of the State, but in 
September following resigned that place to accept from the Governor 
the appointment of Judge of the Supreme Court to fill the vacancy 
caused by the resignation of Judge William H. Walker of Ludlow, 
which position he held by successive elections by the Legislature until 
December, 1908, when he declined another election. In July, 1904, 
he received the degree of LL.D. from the University of Vermont. He 
was first married in 1861 to Ellen E. Richardson of Brattleboro, who 
died in 1871; in 1875 he married Jane P. Miles of the same place, 
who died in 1919. In 1911 Judge Tyler was president of the Vermont 
Bar Association. 
In 1909 Judge and Mrs. Tyler visited England and while there 
they attended the courts. He wrote from England a very interesting THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
157 
letter, describing the English Courts, which was later read at the 
meeting of the Vermont Bar Association and published in its pro- 
ceedings. It is as follows: 
“I hoped to have seen the rooms in Brick Court where Blackstone 
lived and where he wrote his commentaries. Oliver Goldsmith’s rooms 
in which he lived and died were right over them; but, alas, when 
I was there the building was being torn down, and I was only shown 
the locality. This court leads out of Middle Temple Lane. Dear 
Goldsmith is buried near by beside the old parish church which he 
attended. The old church, called the Temple Church, St. Mary’s and 
the Round Church, built by the Normans in the Twelfth century, 
but restored in 1842, has a remarkable history, and the ancient archi- 
tecture, which is beautiful, is preserved. Under the dome or round 
part are nine figures of Templars in full armor. Near by are the 
Middle and Inner Temples with immense libraries connected. The 
Middle Temple was built in 1575 and is famous from the fact that 
Shakespeare read one of his plays here, standing upon a place that is 
still pointed out, and it is said that he read it to Queen Elizabeth. 
It is certain that she once dined in this hall, and tradition has it that 
she signed the death warrant of Mary, Queen of Scots, on the same 
table. 
“The Inner Temple is modern. What pleased me most in it were 
life-sized portraits of Coke and Littleton placed on the respective sides 
of the main entrance. This group of buildings and the Rolls of 
Courts, the buildings occupied by lawyers, and the ‘Fields’ that belong 
with them, are just south of noisy Fleet Street, reached by lanes, and 
extend down to the bank of the Thames. On the other side of Fleet 
Street are Lincoln’s Inn and Lincoln’s Inn Fields. 
“In this immediate locality we saw the windows of Doctor John- 
son’s sitting-room and bed-room. Just across on Holborn Street, I 
think it is, is ‘Old Cheshire Cheese Tavern,’ where Dr. Johnson used 
to lunch. The building is small and odd, but is preserved immaculate. 
The chair was shown us where Dr. Johnson sat at table and a little 
room which contains his arm chair and a copy of the first edition 
of his Dictionary. We took our lunch in the Tavern and found the 
table, benches, and table utensils of the plainest kind; but we got 
excellent chops and we were told that fine old ale was on draught. 
The famous Chancery Lane, Gray’s Inn and other lanes and inns 
of court, are around in this vicinity. 
“The Law Courts, or ‘Courts of Justice,’ as a large street sign 
says, are in an immense building, five hundred feet long on the Strand, 
but nearly opposite the Middle and Inner Temples. The Strand and 
Fleet Street come together just opposite the Temples, but are one 
continuous street. 158 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
“Last Tuesday was the opening of Michaelmas term, and, accord- 
ing to custom, the Judges of the higher courts, about thirty in number, 
met at Westminster Abbey and attended divine service, at eleven a. m., 
after which they proceeded to the House of Lords where the Lord 
Chancellor gave them a reception and they lunched in the Commons 
Cafe. They were then taken in carriages, with their robes on, to 
the Law Courts. There were great crowds in the streets through 
which they passed, and the great hall, which they entered through 
which they had to pass to reach the stairway for their court-rooms 
and chambers, was packed with hundreds of people to witness the 
grand display. First came two spindle-legged fellows called tipstaffs, 
in tights, frock coats and silk hats; next the Mace Bearer, followed 
closely by the Lord Chancellor in a heavy black robe trimmed with 
gold lace and ermine. 
“Two officers followed him holding up his robe, which would 
have swept the floor ten or twelve feet. Then came the Lord Chief 
Justice in a rich robe of brilliant colors and followed in like manner; 
next, the Master of the Rolls, followed in like manner, then the Lords 
Judges in scarlet robes with no trains, and finally came an army of 
eminent lawyers, called the King’s Counsel, in plain black robes. I 
need not mention that all wore wigs. In referring to my notes, I find 
I have omitted the Attorney General and Solicitor General who walked 
side by side, next after the Master of the Rolls; also, next after the 
train bearers walked two fine looking gentlemen in silk hats and frock 
coats, who, we were informed, were respectively private secretaries 
and ushers to, in the Courts of Lord Chancellor, the Chief Justice and 
Master of the Rolls. 
“I have thus written, perhaps at too great length, about the courts 
and the grand pageant which we were with some difficulty permitted 
to witness. This was really a ‘dress parade,’ for the Judges sit in 
plain robes. Yesterday was a strenuous one. We went to the Law 
Courts and ‘did’ them, before one p. m. First, we went to the Court 
of the Lord Chief Justice, where he was hearing motions. He with 
associates was hearing a motion about an alleged false imprisonment. 
We stayed and heard several motions argued, but he sat alone after 
the first one. At one time the ‘next case’ was not quite ready, and 
the Chief Justice not being occupied, I ventured to ask an official if it 
would be possible for me to have the honor of just speaking to him, 
and handed him my card, saying I had once been a Judge of the 
Supreme Court of Vermont for more than twenty years. He turned 
and whispered to the Chief Justice who turned toward me and motioned 
me up the stairs to his side, gave me his hand most cordially, bade me 
sit down and immediately asked me if I had known ex-Minister 
Phelps. He said he was one of the dearest friends he ever had, and 
spoke of his visit to America and to Mr. Phelps. Too soon the next Born in West Topsham, Vt., August 23, 1879. He 
was educated at Montpelier Seminary and the Univer- 
sity of Vermont, studied law and was admitted to the 
bar in 1904. He practiced law at Montpelier, 1904-08; 
at Montreal, 1908-15; and at Barre, 1915-17. Since 
1917 he has practiced law at Brattleboro and is a mem- 
ber of the firm of Harvey, Maurice and Fitts. He as- 
sisted in the revision of the Vermont Statutes in 1904- 
06 and 1915-17; assisted in editing the Statutes in 1906 
and was Executive Clerk during the administration of 
Governors Prouty and Graham. 
JOHN N. HARVEY THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
159 
case was ready and I arose to leave when he asked me to remain, 
which I declined, as my ladies were waiting to see the other courts. 
He offered to send his secretary with us, which I said was unnecessary 
as we must go slowly, and I knew the way. I mention this, my dear 
Judge, because it was a compliment to the Supreme Court of Vermont, 
and in no sense made to me, personally. 
“We went into the Court of the Lord Chancellor, where he rarely 
sits in person; the Master of the Rolls’ Court and two or three other 
chancery divisions, and four or five King’s Bench Courts, where cases 
were being tried by the Judges, ‘non-jury,’ and where cases were 
being tried by juries. There are nineteen courts in that building and 
we visited nine or ten of them. 
“The Chief Justice is a man of large frame, with a head larger 
than our late Chief Justice Taft; a broad, full forehead and every 
motion indicative of great mental strength and quickness. He is very 
pleasant in voice and manner in discussing questions with counsel, but 
he has a lion-like expression that is notice that it would not be well to 
cross him. One thing impressed me very much: when he was hearing 
a case he was completely absorbed in it. He was oblivious to every- 
body and everything but the case. One could see by the look in his 
massive face, how intense was his thought, and that though he at 
first sight seemed heavy, it was evident that his mental operations 
were very rapid. 
“The Master of the Rolls, Lord Justice Moulton and Mr. Justice 
Joyc.e, who sat in the Lord Chancellor’s Court, were both fine looking 
men. The trial Judges looked well, but not remarkably so. 
“In the evening Mrs. Tyler and I saw the House of Lords in 
session, and later I visited the House of Commons, a place forbidden 
to women; we got seats through the courtesy of Ambassador Reid. 
It was a time of intense excitement in Parliament over the tax bills— 
the ‘budget.’ There are Socialists and Anarchists in the Commons, 
and an ugly time there last night was avoided only by the skilful 
management of the Speaker. 
“I cannot tell you about Westminster Abbey, the historic Tower 
of London, the National Gallery, and the National Portrait Gallery, 
Hyde Park, and the Albert Memorial therein, nor the other places 
of interest. We went into the country and in that tour of a week, 
visited the birthplace of Shakespeare and the place in front of the 
high altar in the beautiful parish church where he and his family lie 
buried. 
“We make frequent excursions to see interesting places and the 
fine English country. Our time will be out too soon, for on November 
2nd we sail for Boston. 160 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
“I hope this letter will not weary your patience too much. Please 
give my kindest regards to the Judges, and I will close and remain, 
“Sincerely yours, 
“J. M. Tyler/' 
The service which Judge Tyler rendered on the bench was a 
highly creditable one in both the County and Supreme Courts. Before 
coming to the bar he had practiced extensively in the courts, and had 
been accustomed to the discharge of important business outside. At 
Washington he had met many of the great men of the nation, and had 
been broadened by his contact with national affairs. His training 
had been thorough in the principles of the law, and he was regarded 
as a sound, able lawyer. His mind was logical and absolutely honest. 
He was effective, too, as a disputant, and would state his case in such 
a manner that the jury would believe him. In a bar which was made 
up of strong men, he was the favorite among those who wanted to 
make sure they were to have advice that was reliable. Knowing that 
I was to study law my friends urged me to go into his office as a 
student, if I could, and I shall not forget the gratitude I felt when 
he told me I could have the legal crumbs that fell from his office 
table; but he was called to the bench after I had been with him for 
only a month, and so I lost him in one relation in life to find him 
in another. He was most kind to all young attorneys, thoughtful of 
their welfare and anxious for their success. And with the older ones 
he was in favor at all times and under all circumstances as a Judge. 
He was a good lawyer, and took care of all legal questions carefully 
and wisely, and a good magistrate, who conducted the courts with 
discipline, and there was so much of gentleness and sweetness in his 
nature and so much of the disposition to do good that work in his 
court was a pleasure and not a burden. 
His opinions in the Supreme Court will bear comparison with 
those of his associates. Some of them are leading authorities and 
attracted considerable attention at the time they were promulgated. 
They show careful preparation and clear and positive statement. 
Judge Tyler loves the law and regards the profession as a high 
and noble calling. He delighted in the practice and used to discuss 
its pleasures. He believed in the great principles that underlie the 
government of men and have their root in the common law, and he 
liked to practice the law and to administer it for the law’s sake. He 
enjoyed the discharge of his duties as Judge because he believed in 
doing good and in his office found the means to do it. It goes with- 
out saying that such a man would stand the highest test as a lawyer, 
Judge and citizen. Such is the case with Judge Tyler. 
In his eighty-seventh year he holds several important positions of 
trust. He is the president of the Vermont National Bank, one of the 
strongest national banks in Vermont, is the leading trustee in the THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
161 
Vermont Asylum for the Insane, is president of the Home for the 
Aged and Disabled, and has important private trusts that he cares for. 
He is still active in the discharge of his many duties and his kindly 
welcome to the men of the bar makes his house a mecca to those of 
the profession who visit Brattleboro. 
LOVELAND MUNSON 
1843-1921 
Loveland Munson was born at Manchester, July 21, 1843, and 
died at the same place and in the house where he was born, March 
25, 1921. It was in entire harmony with his life that he should have 
always lived and should have died in the same house, for he was a 
conservative in all things and not one to go afield from the environ- 
ment that pleased his childhood fancy and delighted his maturer 
years. Justice Munson was conspicuously a commoner and so intense 
was his regard for the common and accustomed things and so averse 
to new things that he opposed wearing a robe while on the bench, and 
the innovation in this regard was delayed because of his prejudice 
against this form of dress, and not until after his retirement were the 
robes adopted by the Supreme Court. 
He was descended on his father’s side from Capt. Thomas Mun- 
son, a founder of the Hartford and New Haven colonies, and on his 
mother’s side from the Lovelands and Woolcots, all from Connecticut. 
His father was Cyrus Munson, a substantial citizen, respected for his 
integrity and public spirit, who died in middle life, when Justice Mun- 
son was fourteen years old. Justice Munson attended the local public 
schools and Burr and Burton Seminary, where he graduated in 1862, 
and that year began the study of the law in the office of Elias B. 
Burton at Manchester. He was admitted to the bar in 1866, and 
formed a partnership with his tutor. He was chairman of the Repub- 
lican county committee and later of the district committee; editor of 
the Manchester Journal from 1863 to 1866; Town Clerk of Man- 
chester from 1866 to 1873; Register of Probate of the District of 
Manchester from 1866 to 1876, and member of the Constitutional 
Convention in 1870. He represented Manchester in the General 
Assembly in 1872, serving on the Judiciary and Railroad Committees 
and special joint committee to investigate the Central Vermont Rail- 
way Company. This committee met after the session had adjourned 
and made its report to the Governor. He represented his town again 
in 1874, this time serving as chairman of the Judiciary Committee. 
He was a candidate for Speaker against Judge H. Henry Powers but 
was defeated. Four years later he was a Senator from Bennington 
county and in 1882 again a member of the House and an unsuccessful 162 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
candidate for Speaker, this time against Judge James L. Martin. In 
1883 he was appointed Judge of Probate for the district of Manchester 
and served as such until his selection by Governor Dillingham as a 
Judge of the Supreme Court to succeed Judge Veazey. In 1887 he 
was appointed by Governor Ormsbee chairman of a committee to 
revise and re-draft the school laws and incorporate new features to 
improve the schools, and to present the same in the form of a bill 
for legislative action. Such a bill was drafted and with few changes 
became a law in 1888. The appointment as a Judge of the Supreme 
Court came in September, 1889, and from that time until December 
1, 1914, he remained constantly on the bench, having been repeatedly 
re-elected by the Legislatures. Governor1 Fletcher did not appoint 
Justice Munson December 1, 1914, and he remained off the bench until 
the election by the Legislature in January following. He was then 
elected without contest Chief Justice for the term from February 1, 
1915, to February 1, 1917, a position to which he was entitled by the 
usual rules of succession on the resignation of Chief Justice Rowell 
the year before. He would have been retained in this office as long 
as his strength and faculties had been equal to its tasks had he so 
desired but he forestalled any such result by writing and laying away 
in a drawer a memorandum of his purpose to retire at the end of his 
term, and when it was over, in 1917, he carried his purpose into effect 
and did not seek a re-election. He explained his course by saying that 
he had given the State the best years of his life and would not give 
her any of the dregs. 
As a public man, Justice Munson represented the ideal citizen. 
He loved the State and his town, was familiar with the history 
of both and knew the lives of the great men who were the founders 
and builders of our beloved commonwealth. In 1876 he prepared 
and delivered an address on “The Early History of Manchester,” 
which represented an enormous amount of work in search for in- 
formation and truth and is a monument to his patience and accu- 
racy. It will always remain the basis of any future history to be 
written of Manchester. His mind naturally turned to matters of 
early Vermont history. His maiden speech in the House was in 
behalf of a resolution to provide a memorial for the unmarked 
grave of Nathaniel Chipman, soldier, statesman and jurist, at Tin- 
mouth. A similar measure had met with scant attention at an earlier 
time, but Justice Munson’s logic and fervor carried the resolution and 
the monument was erected. It was like Justice Munson to hold long 
to his purpose to visit the grave of Judge Chipman, but the cares of his 
life were too exacting to enable him to do so and it was not until 
1920 that the trip was made. This was on July 21, 1920, and the 
journey was made in an automobile, a means of conveyance that he 
had refused until the last year of his life. It was on the seventy- THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
163 
seventh birthday of Justice Munson that the monument was visited, 
and when he had seen the same he turned to the members of the party 
and read the speech he had made in 1872. He said it was a better 
speech than he thought he had made, that he was glad he had visited 
the monument which his words had helped to build, and that the day 
had been one of the happiest in his life. 
In a local sense he was always the leading citizen. He gave 
freely of his time, strength and ability to Burr and Burton Seminary, 
to the Mark Skinner Library, and to Dellwood Cemetery. He was 
elected a trustee of the seminary in 1873, was made a member of the 
prudential committee in 1875, and became president of the board 
in 1908. Since 1919, when he relinquished the presidency, he had 
been president emeritus, and he continued as a trustee until his death. 
He took an active interest in every movement for the advancement 
of the local institution of learning up to the time of his death, and his 
interest in the Mark Skinner Library and in the Dellwood Cemetery 
Association were not less marked. 
Justice Munson was married May 4, 1882, to May Burton, a re- 
mote relative, who survives him. They had no children. 
As a Judge it can be truthfully said of Justice Munson that never 
a safer man sat in the Supreme Court. He had but one concern, and 
that was to deal justly with every interest that was committed to his 
care. His purpose to do exact justice was proverbial. It was not as 
easy for him to decide cases as it is for some, nor was he as sure 
as some others that he had decided correctly. This was due to his 
intense desire to be right. His opinions are models of clearness and 
strength, for when he had arrived at a decision he stated his position 
in language that was appropriate and readily understood and his 
opinions rank among the best of our highest court. 
As a County Court Judge he was noted for the dispatch of busi- 
ness. He kept the attorneys busy with their cases and made progress 
with the docket. He was not afraid of hard work and would hold 
court late into the night if the condition of his calendar required. 
He had a strong, clear voice and made free use of it while acting the 
part of the magistrate. His rulings were firm and his charges pains- 
taking. 
Justice Munson was one of the best products of his State. He 
was an ideal citizen, a good lawyer, a just Judge, but above all he 
possessed an exalted character that almost distinguished him above the 
good men with whom his useful life was most associated. 164 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
HENRY R. START 
1845-1905 
Two of the best lawyers in Vermont have told me within a year 
that Judge Start was the best trial Judge Vermont ever had. He 
was born at Bakersfield, the son of Simeon Gould and Mary Sophia 
(Barnes) Start, December 28, 1845. He was educated in the common 
schools and in Bakersfield and Barre Academies, and enlisted in the 
army in Co. A, 3rd Regt., Vt. Vols., but the Civil War was at an 
end before there was time for him to see active service. He studied 
law and was admitted to the bar in Franklin county at the April 
term, 1867, and began practice the same year in Bakersfield. From 
1876 to 1878 he was State’s Attorney of Franklin county. He formed 
a partnership with Albert P. Cross of St. Albans, but retained his 
residence at Bakersfield. The firm of Cross and Start had a large 
practice. The work of preparation, examination of authorities, atten- 
tion to office business fell largely to Mr. Cross. He was a lawyer of 
unusual keenness, learning and discrimination and stood very high 
in his profession as a wise counsellor and judge of law. After Judge 
Start was elected to the bench Mr. Cross was afflicted with paresis, 
but in a lucid interval prepared an index of the acts of incorporation 
that had been passed up to that time by the Vermont Legislature. 
It is known as Cross’ Index, and is of great service to the profession. 
Following the publication of this work there was a recurrence of his 
affliction, from which he subsequently died. Mr. Cross was a man 
of diminutive stature, and his personality was not adapted to the trial 
of cases. With such a partner the conduct of the trials fell 
largely to Judge Start, and when he appeared on the bench as a trial 
Judge it was at once manifest to the older members of the bar that 
he had had wide experience as a trial lawyer and knew how a case 
ought to be conducted in court. 
In 1880, Judge Start was elected Senator from Franklin county, 
and among his other duties was that of chairman of the joint standing 
committee on the Reform School. This introduced him to the sub- 
ject of the care of the unfortunate children who were committed to 
this institution, and for the next eight years he was one of the trustees 
of the school, a place in which he took a great interest and was of 
valuable service. In 1888 he was one of the presidential electors who 
cast the vote of Vermont for Harrison and Morton. In 1890 he 
was elected from Bakersfield as a member of the Legislature, and 
was chosen Speaker, a position which he filled with singular fairness 
and ability, and near the close of the session was elected a Judge 
of the Supreme Court to fill a vacancy on the bench caused by the 
refusal of Chief Judge Royce again to become a candidate for re- Born in Cambridge, Vt., August 11, 1871. He was 
educated in the public schools and Johnson Normal 
School. He studied law and was admitted to the bar 
in 1898. He practiced at Montgomery from 1898 to 
1904, at Morrisville from 1907 to 1919, and since 1919 
at Brattleboro as a member of the firm of Harvey, 
Maurice and Fitts. He was president of the village of 
Morrisville, State’s Attorney of Lamoille county, 1908- 
19 and Senator from Lamoille county in 1919. 
MELVILLE P. MAURICE THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
165 
election. Judge Start continued in active service until shortly before 
his death, which occurred at Bakersfield, November 7, 1905. 
Judge Start was one of the best of the Judges, and rendered 
service in both courts that commended him to the bar. As a nisi prius 
Judge, Judge Start was eminently successful. He had the perfect 
judicial poise. I recall trying a case for three weeks before him 
without getting the slightest indication of how he felt about its merits. 
He ruled wisely on questions that arose during the trial, and it seems 
to me now rather more formally than the present Judges are accus- 
tomed to do. He would state the question in tones that Mr. Wilds 
called “elocuting,” present the two sides and announce his decision. 
He stood for what he thought was the truth of the case regardless 
of who the parties were. Once he came to my rescue with all his 
power of statement and argument in a criminal case where the re- 
spondent was a negro of proven bad character, because the Judge 
thought that the respondent could not have committed the crime as 
the State’s witness had testified. Once in another trial that I was 
prosecuting as State’s Attorney he directed me to return certain letters 
in my possession to the respondent, because he justly felt that I had 
no right to them as they were the property of the respondent. He 
grasped the precise point at issue always and directed his rulings to 
it in simple and plain language. Then he spoke in a voice that could 
be readily heard in all parts of the court room. This adds to the 
effectiveness of the work of the presiding officer and is of great 
assistance to counsel, reporter and jury. 
He regarded his labors, whether he sat in the County or Supreme 
Court, as being a search after the truth, and when he had discovered 
this he felt that he would be committing a great wrong if by some 
precedent in some other State he was swerved from what he felt 
was the right. So he held with positiveness to his convictions on 
legal questions and decided questions according to the standards of 
his moral and intellectual honesty. He thought out his opinions in 
the Supreme Court and had a picture of them in his mind before he 
formulated them on paper. Then he wrote them out with directness 
and clearness. His leading characteristics as a lawyer and Judge 
were devotion to the law, mastery of its principles and clearness of 
thought and expression. And he endeared himself to his friends 
and associates by the simplicity of his nature, the kindness of his 
heart and his perfect integrity of character. 
Judge Start had a strong hold upon the affections of those with 
whom he came in contact. This is illustrated by the large attendance 
of men, women and children at his burial, and by the presence of 
more than a hundred members of the bar who journeyed to Bakers- 
field in November to pay their last respects to his memory. 166 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
lhe tribute which was paid to Judge Start by a friend at the 
time of his death, but never published, ought to find a place here. 
It is this: 
“The time has not yet come for a complete account of Judge 
Start’s life or a deliberate and final estimate of his work as a lawyer 
and judge, but it is a fitting moment for the heart to speak and pay 
its tribute to him as a man—and he was all man. There was nothing 
in him that was not worthy of a man. There was nothing that aspired 
or pretended to anything more than that. There is nothing that goes 
to make up a noble man that he did not possess. If there is one 
adjective that describes him more perfectly than any other, it was 
‘magnanimous.’ He was great of soul. There was nothing petty 
in his composition. He could not do a mean or spiteful thing. He 
could not take a prejudicial or narrow view. He would never attribute 
base motives to another. His generosity knew no bounds. It is only 
those who had occasion to make great drafts upon his friendship 
who can ever guess how opulent his nature was. His good-will was 
so great that he might have said to all who needed his forgiveness or 
his kindness, 
My bounty is as boundless as the sea; 
My love as deep; the more I give to thee 
The more I have, for both are infinite.’ 
“No one in Vermont was better known; no one was better loved. 
It is inconceivable that he ever should have had an enemy in the 
world. But oh how many there are who will recall some act of kind- 
ness on his part, some quiet, considerate word that gave them courage, 
some patient hearing of their grievance, some gentle handling of their 
hard case, some generous interpretation of their doubtful doings, some 
merciful tempering of justice which they did not deserve, some striking 
proof that through the heart of the pure and righteous Judge there 
throbbed the quick warm currents of humanity. And there are some 
who found even more than this, because they needed more—who 
sounded depths of generosity undreamed of and who will always say, 
whoever else may win their praise or their allegiance, ‘Take him for 
all in all, he was the noblest man I ever knew.’ ” 
LAFORREST H. THOMPSON 
1848-1900 
Laforrest H. Thompson, who was first elected a Judge of the 
Supreme Court at the same session in which Judge Start was chosen, 
that of 1890, was born in a log cabin in Bakersfield, January 6, 1848. THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
167 
His parents were Levi S. Thompson and Irene (Hodgkins) Thompson, 
and he was the oldest of a family of eight children. His father was 
of Scotch-Irish descent, and his grandfather on his father’s side was 
an early settler in Belvidere, was twice its Representative in the 
Legislature and served in the War of 1812. Judge Thompson’s mother 
was a woman of a proud, loving nature, and pleaded his cause when 
the stern will of his father opposed his aspirations. She died when 
Judge Thompson was eighteen years old. His father supported the 
family by farming, preaching and carrying on his trade as a stone 
mason. He was an eloquent man, who could draw a large congrega- 
tion to listen to his sermons against the sins of the day, and was a 
skilful stone mason and industrious farmer, but was poor and both 
unable and unwilling to help his children to an education, for he be- 
lieved if one had talent it would show itself without the aid of an 
education. 
The family resided in Bakersfield until Judge Thompson was 
seven years old, when they removed to Belvidere, where they re- 
mained for a year. Then they moved to Potton, Quebec, where the 
Judge lived with the family for about eleven years. During the 
formative period of his life he had a great fondness for books and 
obtained a copy of Mrs. Stowe’s “Uncle Tom’s Cabin,” which made a 
great impression on him and left him an ardent abolitionist. When 
about fifteen years old he attended a school taught by Ernest V. Ma- 
loney, an eloquent and enthusiastic Irishman, who discovered Thomp- 
son’s love of books and advised him to obtain a liberal education. 
Without any encouragement from his father, he obtained money by 
trapping and bought books with which to attend school. He was 
unable to do much manual labor because of his frail health, but he 
promised his father that if he would let him go away to school it 
should cost him nothing. To this his father reluctantly assented, and 
in the winter of 1865-66 he entered the Lamoille County Grammar 
School at Johnson, where he met many men who were afterwards 
his friends through life. For the next two years he taught school, 
and in 1868 entered Kimball Union Academy at Meriden, N. H., 
as a student. By taking some private instruction here he became fitted 
for college, and when he got through he had arrangements made to 
teach one year and then enter Dartmouth. Accordingly he taught at 
Craftsbury Academy in the fall of 1868 and spring of 1869, but by 
fall of 1869 he found himself so worn out by the labors of the pre- 
ceding year that he had to lay aside his plans for college. After 
giving up his college course he taught three terms at Craftsbury Acad- 
emy, one term at East Craftsbury, and one at Irasburg; and during 
this time studied law in his leisure hours. He never studied in a 
lawyer’s office, but got books from M. O. Heath of Johnson and 
Charles I. Vail at Irasburg. He was admitted to the bar of Orleans 168 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
county at the February term, 1871. When he was admitted he had 
been in County Court but twice and in a Justice Court not to exceed 
one hour. He at once entered into practice at Irasburg with Leonard 
S. Thompson, who had had little more experience than himself. The 
Judge had previously married, and when he opened his office he set 
up housekeeping at the same time. At the end of two years he bought 
out his partner and from that time practiced alone. In 1874 he was 
elected State’s Attorney, and during his term convicted between sev- 
enty and eighty persons of offenses under the prohibitory law. In 
1876 he was elected Judge of Probate for the district of Orleans, an 
office which he resigned in 1881. In 1880 he represented Irasburg 
in the Legislature and received every vote cast at the meeting except 
four. At this session he was elected one of the Commissioners to 
edit the Revised Laws, but subsequently resigned the position. In 
1882 he again represented the town in the Legislature and was this 
time chairman of the Judiciary Committee. In 1884 he was elected 
Senator from Orleans county and became president pro tem of the 
Senate. Again in 1890 he represented the town in the Legislature 
and at this session was elected Judge of the Supreme Court, a position 
which he held until his death, which occurred at Newport, June 22. 
1900. 
Judge Thompson was a very remarkable man. He achieved 
notable success in his profession, and the rewards of his efforts at 
the bar were as marked in a financial way as his preferments had 
been in the political field. He stood among the leaders of the strong 
bar in Orleans county, and in a forensic way but one man excelled 
him, Charles A. Prouty of Newport. The battles which these dis- 
putants had in court and over the question of the removal of the 
county buildings from Irasburg to Newport, are still fresh in the 
memory of the people of Orleans county. After he took the bench 
he heard Mr. Prouty make one of his old-time arguments and declared 
that he “would give a hundred dollars for a chance to answer it,” to 
which some wag standing near replied: “It would be the dearest 
investment you ever made in your life, Judge.” 
As a trial Judge he was feared by some of the bar, but his ability 
was greatly respected and he dispatched the business of the courts 
in an able manner. He was an intense partisan, and it was felt some- 
times that he took sides, and this was very apt to be the case when 
liquor cases were on trial. His rulings were learned and his charges 
models of clearness. 
As a Supreme Court Judge he was alert and active and formed 
his judgments rapidly about how the cases should be decided. His 
opinions were scholarly and full of research, and his reasons for the 
positions taken in his decisions were stated forcefully and convincingly. THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
169 
He had taste for good literature and his general library as well 
as his law library was large. He loved books and read with delight the 
best authors. He was a valuable member of the court and it was 
a distinct loss that he was taken from it at a time when he was at 
his best. But the system was then a hard one and the labors of the 
Judge severe, and he is generally credited as having been one of the 
victims to the overwork that was incident to the duties of the Judge 
who had to perform service in both the County and the Supreme 
Courts. 
No man on the bench during his time read so much of classical lit- 
erature and poetry or was so conversant with the work of good authors. 
He was fond of art and pictures and on a trip abroad visited many of 
the art galleries of Europe, where he became familiar with the works of 
the great masters and learned to distinguish their characteristics. He 
was a charming letter writer and an interesting conversationalist. In 
all he did he was intense. This element made him require a good deal 
of the bar when he was on the bench, yet no less than he imposed on 
himself. He held himself to a high standard and never excused him- 
self from the discharge of any obligation that he undertook. This 
was why he burned himself out in middle life, but he had already 
accomplished more than most men do who live past three score and 
ten years. 
WENDELL P. STAFFORD 
1861- 
Wendell P. Stafford was born at Barre, May 1, 1861. Plis par- 
ents were Frank and Sarah (Noyes) Stafford. He graduated at 
Barre Academy in 1878, at St. Johnsbury Academy in 1880, and at 
the Boston University Law School with the degree of LL. B. cum 
laude, in 1883. Fie located at St. Johnsbury and was admitted to 
the bar in Caledonia county at the June term, 1882. He practiced his 
profession at this place constantly until his appointment to the bench 
in 1900 to fill a vacancy caused by the death of Judge Thompson. 
For a portion of the time he was in practice he was associated with 
Judge Henry C. Ide, later of the Philippine Commission and Governor 
of the Islands. Judge Stafford represented St. Johnsbury in the Leg- 
islature in 1892, and was Reporter of the Supreme Court of Vermont 
from 1896 to 1900. He was appointed by Governor Smith in 1900 
a Judge of the Supreme Court, and continued as such until June 6, 
1904, when he accepted from President Roosevelt the appointment of 
Associate Justice of the Supreme Court of the District of Columbia, 
which place he has held since June 9 of that year. He was president 170 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
of the Vermont Bar Association in 1898-99. He has been professor 
of equity jurisprudence at the George Washington University since 
September 1, 1908. 
He has published the following books of poems: In 1902, a 
volume entitled “North Flowers”; in 1909, “Dorian Days”; in 1915, 
“Voices, a Dramatic Ode”; in 1916, “The Land We Love”; and 
in 1917, “War Poems.” He published a book of his speeches in 1913. 
He has delivered many addresses and contributed many poems and 
articles to magazines. He was married in 1886 to Florence S. Goss 
of St. Johnsbury, and their eldest son, Edward, who married the 
daughter of Admiral Peary, is in legal practice in Washington, D. C. 
A younger son, Robert, died in 1901. 
In a purely literary sense, Justice Stafford stands alone with Judge 
Royall Tyler among the Judges of the Supreme Court. No other 
member of the court has any claims to literary distinction except in 
the direction of historical and legal writings. Nor has there been 
among the Judges any one who has occupied the same place as an 
orator that Judge Stafford fills. 
As a practitioner, Justice Stafford was a man of high ideals, an 
accomplished lawyer and an eloquent advocate. As a Judge of the 
Supreme Court he held the County Courts and sat with the other 
Judges in the Supreme Court. His high regard for the ethics of the 
profession was felt in both departments of his labors, and his excellent 
lawyership was employed in the effort to secure justice for the inter- 
ests that were before the court. He presided with dignity at nisi prius, 
and his mental alertness enabled him to run ahead of the men at the 
bar who were trying cases before him, and to anticipate and be pre- 
pared for the legal questions that were to come up. He was much 
at home in the Supreme Court, followed all questions and cases easily, 
and wrote his opinions with facility. Here his literary style and 
capacity for direct and clear statement, as well as his legal scholarship, 
are to be noted. 
As a poet and orator the volumes of his works should be con- 
sulted for the formation of a judgment. He ranks with Mrs. Dorr 
as a poet, and as an orator we have had no one on the bench and 
but one at the bar, at least in recent years, with whom he can be com- 
pared. That one is Mr. Phelps. There is a good deal in common 
between these two men from the standpoint of public speaking. Both 
prepared their addresses and had them in such concrete form in the 
mind that they could follow the language as well as the substance of 
the address when delivered. Mr. Phelps did not always let his audi- 
ence understand this, but led them rather to think sometimes, as in 
his address on Chief Justice Marshall, that his professional cares 
had been too exacting to enable him to commit his address to paper, FRANK E. BARBER 
Born in Wardsboro, Vt., April 28, 1878. He was 
educated in the Brattleboro schools, studied law in the 
office of his brother and was admitted to the bar in 
1903. He has practiced law at Brattleboro, being a 
member of the firm of Barber, Barber and Miller. He 
was State’s Attorney of Windham county, 1910-12; 
Judge of the Brattleboro Municipal Court, 1913-17; 
and represented Brattleboro in the Legislature of 1921, 
where he was one of the leaders of the House. THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
171 
while the fact was in this instance that he had dictated it not less than 
five or six times to a stenographer and knew its contents from be- 
ginning to end both in substance and language. Justice Stafford writes 
his addresses and commits them to memory and makes no pretense 
that they are prepared otherwise. He says that this is the only true 
way to make an occasional address. The two men are alike in point 
of fluency, grace and polish. Neither ever halted for a word, took 
an awkward position before an audience, or made an unbecoming 
gesture, and each had the capacity for real eloquence. 
Some of the most notable of Justice Stafford’s addresses are “The 
Making of Vermont,” delivered in the Hall of the House of Repre- 
sentatives at Montpelier in 1900; “Robert Burns, a Poet for the 
World,” delivered in his native town in 1899, on the unveiling of the 
Burns monument; “At Grant’s Tomb,” a Decoration Day address, 
delivered at Grant’s Tomb, New York, May 30, 1906; “Lake Cham- 
plain in History,” delivered at Isle La Motte in 1909 at the Tercen- 
tenary celebration of the discovery of Lake Champlain; “Wendell 
Phillips: The Tribune of the People,” delivered at the Park Street 
Church in Boston, November 28, 1911, on the hundredth anniversary 
of the birth of Mr. Phillips; “A City Without Citizens,” an address 
relating to the status of the District of Columbia, at the complimentary 
dinner to President Taft; and “The College a Training School for 
Public Service,” an address at the sesqui-centennial celebration of 
Dartmouth College, October, 1919. 
SENECA HASELTON 
1848-1921 
Seneca Haselton was appointed to the bench of the Supreme 
Court by Governor Stickney, in 1902, to fill a vacancy in the court 
caused by the death of Chief Judge Taft. He was the only member 
of the court of Democratic affiliations during the time he was on 
the bench. The question of politics did not enter into his appoint- 
ment, however. He was chosen because of his eminent fitness and 
his location at Burlington, where Chief Judge Taft resided. 
Seneca Haselton was born at Westford, February 26, 1848, the 
son of Rev. Amos and Amelia (Frink) Haselton. He acquired his 
preliminary education in the public schools of Jericho and Underhill, 
and in the academies at Underhill and Barre. He graduated from the 
University of Vermont in 1871. During his college course he taught 
several terms in Barre, Shelburne, Richmond and Waterbury, and 
for a year after his graduation occupied the position of associate 
principal of Barre Academy. In 1873 he began the study of law in the 172 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
office of Wales and Taft at Burlington, but soon after accepted the 
chair of instructor of mathematics in the University of Michigan, 
where at the same time he pursued his legal studies in the law de- 
partment of that institution. He returned to Vermont in 1875 and 
was admitted to the bar in Chittenden county at the April term, 1875. 
He had resided at Burlington since that time except during the period 
that he was in South America. He was City Judge of Burlington 
from 1878 to 1886. He represented Burlington in the General As- 
sembly in 1886, and was Mayor of the city from 1891 to 1894. 
He was appointed by President Cleveland as Minister of this coun- 
try to Venezuela, and served in 1894 and 1895. He was Reporter 
of the Supreme Court from 1900 until the time of his appoint- 
ment to the bench. He remained a Judge of the Supreme Court from 
the date of his appointment until December 1, 1906, when he became 
Chief Superior Judge. At the session of 1906 the dual system of 
courts was established by an act which made provision for a Supreme 
Court of four members, and the election of six Superior Judges to 
hold the County Courts. The first four of the Supreme Court Judges 
were elected as the Judges of that court, and the last three Judges of 
the old court of seven members were chosen in the order of their 
service as Superior Judges. Judge Haselton was fifth in the old court, 
and so became first of the Superior Judges, and by the provisions of 
the act the first of the Superior Judges to be elected became the chief 
of that division of the court. He remained as Chief Superior Judge 
from December 1, 1906, to December 1, 1908, when Judge Tyler 
refused a re-election, at which time he again took his seat in the 
Supreme Court, where he remained until his resignation, due to ill 
health, on May 1, 1919. 
Of his work on the bench it is not necessary for me to speak. 
The final word has been said by another better qualified, the lamented 
Alexander Dunnett. 
A word or more should be said of Justice Haselton as a lawyer 
before he came to the bench. He was the best legal scholar at the 
bar of his county, and he shared with Mr. Wilds in the leadership 
of the bar in his part of the State. After the passing of the latter 
in 1901 he stood alone. It was a delight to be either with him or 
against him in the trial of a case. Fair treatment was sure to follow 
in either case, and his presentation of the case, especially in argument, 
was sure to be an illumination of all the points that ingenuity and 
scholarship could call forth. From small beginnings of little facts 
and circumstances he moved on to bigger considerations until all 
the material for argument was involved and urged upon the jury. 
This was presented in a diction that was fascinating and an ingenuity 
that commanded admiration. He was incapable of forgetting anything 
or of omitting anything that the jury ought to know. His memorv THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
173 
served him well, too, in introducing evidence. In a will case when a 
hypothetical question had to be framed for one of the expert witnesses 
it was proposed that he commit the question to paper that night. He 
preferred sleep instead, and the next morning propounded the question 
orally. It took over two hours to do so, but when he had finished, 
every circumstance in the case that bore upon the answer expected 
had been recited. 
Following is the tribute by Mr. Dunnett: 
“Hon. Seneca Haselton 
Has Graced the Supreme Court Bench for 
More Than Quarter of a Century.” 
“The resignation of Honorable Seneca Haselton from the position 
of Associate Justice of our Supreme Court removed from that tribunal 
one of the brightest stars in the galaxy of New England jurists. 
“He has long been recognized as one of the greatest general schol- 
ars in Vermont. It has been his life-long habit not only to acquire infor- 
mation, but to think about it and resolve it into relations with the 
entire system. When he became wedded to jurisprudence he sought 
to reach the bottom of every proposition. He learned the law his- 
torically and philosophically. He loved its authors. He studied the 
works of the masters and he studied the masters themselves, their 
lives, their faces and their works until they became his intimate ac- 
quaintances and associates. He envisaged our ancient jurists and 
made their life and knowledge a part of himself. He kept in the 
closest touch with modern decision and stood for an equitable appli- 
cation of the whole to the cases in hand. 
“Judge Haselton was unique in his modesty, but he never wavered 
or stuttered in his views of the law. While his views were expressed 
with great modesty, he stood on them as firmly as Mount Mansfield 
stands upon its base. Perhaps his attachment to the old mountain 
grew in part from the fact that it was named for the jurist whom 
he most of all admired. 
“He is a gentleman under all circumstances and conditions and 
this quality of being did not forsake him on the bench. While he 
stood by his views as stated, he expressed them in so considerate a 
manner as never to give offense. In judicial work he was a profound 
believer and exemplar of what is known as the ‘higher law/ Per- 
haps he never used this expression and it may be even that he would 
condemn the use of it by another, but while he was a profound be- 
liever in the law and its righteous enforcement, he had a sense of 
justice so strong as to enable him to meet and explain all the techni- 
calities of the law that stood in the way of working out his views of 
justice, and when it was necessary to use these technicalities for the 174 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
same purpose, he had them at his fingers’ tips and marshaled them 
in support of his views. In other words, he was inclined to the equit- 
able view of the law. 
“It must be admitted that he is a bachelor, but it must also be 
admitted that this enabled him to discuss and deal with domestic 
relations with greater freedom and even assurance than fell to the 
lot of his associate benedicts. 
“He has graced the bench as Supreme Court Judge, Chief Su- 
perior Judge, and Associate Justice of the Supreme Court for nearly 
a quarter of a century, has left a pleasant memory with his con- 
temporaries and a goodly heritage of printed opinion clothed in his 
faultless diction to the people of the State.” 
Justice Haselton was one of the best legal scholars to adorn the 
bench of Vermont. His opinions are models of judicial interpreta- 
tion and expression. It has been very rare that any Judge in our 
State has drawn from so many and varied sources for the law and 
has expressed his convictions in language so chaste and expressive. 
In the capacity to acquire facts from books and manuscripts he was 
almost a marvel. He would read through a long transcript in an 
evening and would race down a page of a book in a flash. He read 
my manuscript for this work in large part, some of which did not 
come to his office until on the day that I delivered it to Mr. Crockett. 
I was there at the time and could not at first believe that he had read 
it, but soon became convinced that he was familiar with the substance 
and the form alike. He would go back to some of the earlier of the 
Judges and call my attention to the language that I had used in de- 
scribing them. He resigned from the bench by reason of bodily in- 
firmities but continued to do some work in his office until within a 
few weeks of his death, which occurred at Burlington, July 28, 1921. 
ROBERT E. HEALY 
1883- 
Robert E. Healy, who was appointed by Governor Fletcher as 
fourth Associate Justice of the Supreme Court, December 1, 1914, was 
born at Bennington, March 25, 1883, the son of John M. and Sarah J. 
(Corbet) Healy. He was educated in the common schools and the 
high school of Bennington, studied law in the office of Orion M. 
Barber at Bennington and was admitted to the bar in 1904. From 
this time he practiced with his preceptor until the latter was appointed 
Judge of the United States Court of Customs Appeals in 1910, after 
which and until his elevation to the bench he was a law partner of 
Judge Edward H. Holden in the firm of Holden & Healy, the firm THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
175 
occupying the large and well-equipped office formerly used by Judge 
Barber. He resigned as a Justice of the Supreme Court in January, 
1915, and following his resignation resumed the practice of the law 
with his old partner, Judge Holden. He has been town law agent 
for the town of Bennington and a member of the State Bar Ex- 
aminers continuously since 1909. He is not only a scholarly law- 
yer, but has fine literary taste as well, and has written verse that has 
attracted public attention and been given a place in leading periodicals. 
He has been president of the Vermont Bar Association. He was the 
youngest man to be called to the Supreme Court since the appointment 
of Judge Steele. The latter was twenty-eight years of age when called 
to judicial service. THE PRESENT JUSTICES OF THE SUPREME COURT 
(1922) 
JOHN H. WATSON 
1851- 
JOHN H. Watson, Chief Justice of the Supreme Court, was born 
at Jamaica in Windham county, May 12, 1851. He received a 
common school and academic education, studied law in the office 
of Orin Gambell at Bradford and was admitted to the bar in Orange 
county at the December term, 1877. He at once formed a partnership 
with his instructor, which lasted for six months and at the end of 
that time assumed the control of the business on the dissolution 
of the firm and continued to practice at Bradford until his appoint- 
ment to the bench. He removed to Montpelier and has since resided 
there. In 1882 he was elected captain of the Bradford Guards and 
later became Lieutenant-Colonel of the First Regiment, Vermont Na- 
tional Guard. During the riot at the Ely copper mines, in 1883, he ren- 
dered efficient service as Captain of the Bradford Guards in capturing 
the powder magazine which was in possession of the rioters. From 1886 
to 1888 he was State’s Attorney of Orange county, and was County 
Senator in 1892. He was appointed sixth Associate Judge of the Su- 
preme Court by Governor Edward C. Smith, January 19, 1899, to fill 
the vacancy caused by the resignation of Chief Judge Ross. On July 2, 
1900, he was promoted to the position of fifth Associate Judge, made 
vacant by the death of Judge Thompson, and was elected to the same 
position in 1900. On March 31, 1902, he was made fourth Associate 
Judge by Governor William W. Stickney, this advancement being 
due to the vacancy caused by the death of Chief Judge Taft. He 
was elected to the same position in 1904 and likewise on the change of 
the judiciary system in 1906. In 1908, Judge Tyler declined another 
election and Judge Watson was elected third Associate Judge. On 
the resignation of Chief Justice Rowell, October 1, 1913, he was 
advanced by Governor Allen M. Fletcher to the position of first Asso- 
ciate Justice of the Supreme Court, December 1, 1914. He remained 
the first Associate Justice until his election as Chief Justice. This oc- 
curred January 18, 1917, and his term of office began on February 
1 of that year. He was re-elected in 1919 and 1921. In 1912 he 
was appointed chairman of a commission to inquire into the entire 
educational system and conditions of the State and as such made an 
exhaustive report. In 1920 he prepared an elaborate address, in which 
he established by incontrovertible argument the claim that the first 
Constitution of Vermont was legally ratified and that by its terms THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
177 
human slavery, as such, became impossible in the State. This was 
delivered before the Vermont Bar Association at the annual meeting 
in January, 1921. It is published in the 94th volume of “The Supreme 
Court Reports,” in the proceedings of the Vermont Bar Association 
and in the records of the Vermont Historical Society. 
GEORGE M. POWERS 
1861- 
George M. Powers, of Morrisville, was born at Hyde Park, Vt., 
December 19, 1861. He prepared for college at the People’s Academy 
at Morrisville and graduated from the University of Vermont in 
1883. He studied law in the office of Philip K. Gleed at Morrisville 
and was admitted to the bar in 1886. He practiced his profession 
at Morrisville until called to the bench in 1904. He was Messenger 
of the Senate in 1872 and 1874; Assistant Clerk of the House in 
1884, 1886 and 1888; Secretary of the Senate in 1890, 1892 and 1894; 
represented Morristown in Legislature of 1896; State’s Attor- 
ney of Lamoille county from 1888 to 1890; Reporter of the 
decisions of the Supreme Court from 1902 to 1904. He was 
appointed Associate Judge of the Supreme Court by Governor McCul- 
lough, June 7, 1904, a vacancy having occurred on the bench on ac- 
count of the resignation of Judge Stafford. He held the position of 
Associate Judge of the Supreme Court until December, 1906, when 
by the change in the judicial system the Supreme Court was reduced 
to four members. He was at this time elected a Superior Judge and 
continued to hold the position until January, 1909, when he was elected 
a Judge of the Supreme Court. He remained an Associate Judge 
of this court until October 23, 1913, when, upon the resignation of 
Chief Justice Rowell, he was appointed Chief Justice. This position 
he held until January 31, 1915, he having been elected third Associate 
Justice by the General Assembly of that year. He was elected second 
Associate Justice in 1917, re-elected in 1919, appointed first Associate 
Justice May 1, 1919, and elected in 1921. 
WILLIAM H. TAYLOR 
1863- 
William H. Taylor, of Hardwick, was born at Wheelock, July 
18, 1863. He was educated in the public schools, at Hardwick Acad- 
emy and at Dartmouth College. He graduated from college in 1886 and 
came to Hardwick to become the principal of Hardwick Academy, 178 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
a position which he held until 1889. He studied law in the office of 
Ide and Stafford and was admitted to the bar in 1892. He practiced 
his profession at Hardwick, much of the time in company with Walter 
A. Dutton, until his election to the bench in 1906. He was Supervisor 
of Schools in Caledonia county from 1889 to 1891 and Examiner of 
Teachers in the same county from 1891 to 1896. In 1889 he pre- 
pared and published a manual of the school laws for the benefit of 
teachers, and twice compiled the school laws under direction of the 
Governor. In 1892 he was clerk of the committee on the revision of 
bills, and in 1900 was a member of the House from Hardwick. From 
1894 to 1898 he was State’s Attorney of Caledonia county. In 1906 he 
was County Senator. He remained as one of the Superior Judges from 
his election in 1906 until October 1, 1913, when he was appointed a 
Justice of the Supreme Court by Governor Fletcher to fill a vacancy 
in that body due to the retirement of Chief Justice Rowell. He was 
re-appointed December 1, 1914, by the same executive, was elected 
by the Legislature in 1915 and has been re-elected at each session since 
then. He is now the second Associate Justice of the court. 
WILLARD W. MILES 
1845- 
Willard W. Miles, of Barton, was born February 6, 1845, at 
Albany, Vt. He was educated in the public schools of that town, the 
Barnston and Hatley Academies in the Province of Quebec, and at 
Glover Institute, and was privately tutored in Greek and Latin. While 
teaching school he employed his leisure time in studying law; he 
studied with Charles I. Vail at Irasburg and William W. Grout at 
Barton and was admitted to the bar in Orleans county in 1872. He 
practiced at South Albany until June, 1873, then opened an office at 
North Craftsbury, and in 1881 removed to Barton and formed a 
partnership with Gen. William W. Grout, which continued until 1888, 
when General Grout retired on account of political duties. After that 
time Judge Miles continued in practice at Barton until his appointment 
to the bench, November 29, 1905, to fill a vacancy caused by the death 
of Judge Start. He was Town Clerk of Craftsbury from 1874 to 
1881, and represented Albany in the Legislature in 1872; Craftsbury 
in the same body in 1878 and Barton in 1904; was State’s Attorney 
for Orleans county from 1890 to 1894; and Senator from the same 
county from 1894 to 1896. Upon the reorganization of the courts in 
1906, Judge Miles being the last appointee, was elected the third of the 
Superior Judges. He was elected second Superior Judge in 1908, and 
first Superior Judge in 1910, 1912 and 1915. He became fourth Asso- COLLINS M. GRAVES 
Born in Bennington, November 7, 1871. He was edu- 
cated at the Bennington Graded School and Brown 
University, class of 1895. He studied law in the office 
of Barber and Darling and was admitted to the bar 
in 1904. He was a member of the Legislature of 1904 
and was Postmaster at Bennington from 1906 to 1914. 
Beginning in 1915, and for three terms, he was Legis- 
lative Draftsman. In 1918 he was elected State’s At- 
torney and was re-elected in 1920. He resigned and 
was appointed Federal Prohibition Director and held 
this position for about a year, when he found it was 
impossible to continue his law practice and perform the 
duties of his office, consequently he resigned. He was 
elected a member of the Republican State Committee 
in 1919 and was made secretary of the committee. In 
1916 he was a delegate-at-large to the Republican Na- 
tional Convention. He was married in Hoosick, N. Y., 
to Florence Dewey Quackenbush in June, 1897, and 
they have four sons, Cebra Q., William R., George and 
VanVechten Graves. THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
179 
ciate Justice of the Supreme Court by election in 1917 and was re- 
elected in 1919. He was appointed third Associate Justice May 1, 
1919, and elected to the same position in 1921. The latter vacancy 
was due to the voluntary retirement of Justice Haselton. 
LEIGHTON P. SLACK 
1867- 
Leighton P. Slack, of St. Johnsbury, was born at Woodstock, 
June 18, 1867. He was educated in the public schools and at Black 
River Academy at Ludlow. He studied law at Montpelier with 
Stephen C. ShurtlefT and Melville E. Smilie and was admitted to the 
bar in 1892. He at first located at Barre, where he practiced in com- 
pany with Judge Frank J. Martin, but in 1895 removed to St. Johns- 
bury, where he remained in practice until called to the bench in 1913. 
During all of the time he was in practice at St. Johnsbury he was 
a partner of Alexander Dunnett. He was State’s Attorney of Cale- 
donia county from 1898 to 1900; County Senator in 1904; Lieutenant- 
Governor in 1910; Presidential Elector in 1912. He was appointed 
a Superior Judge October 1, 1913, to fill a vacancy on the bench caused 
by the appointment of Judge Taylor to the Supreme Court. He re- 
mained as such until December 1, 1914, when he was appointed by 
Governor Fletcher as a Justice of the Supreme Court. This position 
he held until January 31, 1915, when he again became a Superior 
Judge, having been elected by the General Assembly to that office, 
and continued to hold the office until May 5, 1919, when he was 
appointed fourth Associate Justice of the Supreme Court to fill a 
vacancy in that court due to the retirement of Justice Haselton. He 
was re-elected to this place at the session of 1921. 
THE SUPREME COURT ROOM 
The Vermont Supreme Court room and Justices’ chambers are 
conveniently located on the second floor of the new State Building. 
Much thought was given to the interior of these quarters, making 
them a fitting home for the highest court. Its paneling of mahogany 
toning with the rich velour old blue rug at once delights the visitor’s 
eye. When court is in session the Justices don their robes and pre- 
side with a dignity which does credit to the State. 
The chambers are richly furnished with mahogany tables and 
leather upholstered chairs. The rugs and hangings in shades of blue 
help create an atmosphere conducive to undisturbed study. THE SUPERIOR JUDGES 
ELEAZER L. WATERMAN 
1839- 
WHEN the dual system of courts was established in 1906, and 
three new judgeships created, the Legislature filled the places 
by the election of Eleazer L. Waterman of Brattleboro, Alfred 
A. Hall of St. Albans, and William H. Taylor of Hardwick, who were 
chosen in the order in which they have been named. Judge Water- 
man was sixty-seven years of age at the time, and with Bates Turner 
of Fairfield he shares the honor of having been the oldest person 
called to the bench in Vermont. Judge Turner was also sixty-seven 
when first called to serve. But there were some advantages to the 
State in having a Judge who had had a long and extensive career at 
the bar, and had seen and been a part of the proceedings and duties 
that make up the life of an active lawyer and a man of large affairs. 
His efficient service on the bench of more than twelve years was a 
justification for his selection and an answer to any claim that may 
be made that it is a mistake to call a lawyer to the bench who is past 
fifty. Had he been elected, however, when he was first nominated 
for a place on the bench in 1880, the State and not his clients would 
have had the benefits of his strength and wisdom during the most 
active years of his life, and he could have performed the duties of a 
Judge of the Supreme Court which his talents and training so well 
fitted him to discharge. 
He was born in Jamaica, the son of Chandler and Polly (Thayer) 
Waterman, July 25, 1839. He was educated in the common schools 
and at Leland and Gray Seminary at Townshend, and studied law in 
the office of Butler and Wheeler at Jamaica. The junior member of 
this firm was Judge Hoyt H. Wheeler, and the senior member John 
E. Butler, an uncle of Judge Fred M. Butler, and a remarkable trial 
lawyer. On his admission to the bar in 1863, Judge Waterman prac- 
ticed for several years in Wilmington, which he represented in the 
Legislature in 1867 and 1868. In 1870 he moved to Jamaica; in 
1872 he was elected State’s Attorney of Windham county; and in 1876 
he represented the county in the State Senate, and was chairman of 
the Judiciary Committee. He remained in practice at Jamaica until 
1886, when he removed to Brattleboro, where he formed a partnership 
wdth Judge James L. Martin, and later with George B. Hitt in the 
same firm. This firm was the leading one in the county, and did 
business under the style of Waterman, Martin & Hitt. On the death 
of Mr. Hitt the firm was known as Waterman and Martin, and con- THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
181 
tinued as such until 1906, when in October the junior member was 
appointed Judge of the United States District Court to succeed Judge 
Wheeler. In 1891, Judge Waterman was appointed special attorney 
for the United States to appear for the Government in claims growing 
out of the Civil War. In 1896 he was elected Judge of Probate for 
the district of Marlboro, and remained as such until his election as 
Superior Judge. From 1896 to 1897 he was president of the Vermont 
Bar Association. He was appointed master by the Federal court 
to sell the Central Vermont Railway; and he brought to a suc- 
cessful termination the Thompson will case whereby the Memorial 
Hospital was established in Brattleboro. In 1900 he represented Brat- 
tleboro in the Legislature, and was chairman of the House Judiciary 
Committee. In 1906 he was elected president of the Brattleboro and 
Whitehall Railroad Company, and at the time of his election to the 
bench was president of the Brattleboro Savings Bank. He married 
in 1864 Jane E. Bemis of Windham, and there are six children, one 
of whom, Capt. Ernest J. Waterman, is a lawyer. He is in charge of 
the trust department in the Chemical National Bank in New York City. 
Judge Waterman was the leading practitioner in Windham county 
at the time of his election to the bench. No man in that section was 
as strong with the jury, and he stood very high with the Supreme 
Court. The firm of which he was the head had a large and lucrative 
business, which required close application and careful attention. The 
burden of this fell upon Judge Waterman, and he performed all his 
trusts as an attorney with great fidelity and ability. 
He was an ideal Judge in the County Courts, where his ripe ex- 
perience and full knowledge of the Vermont cases and the underlying 
principles of law made him the ready master of the questions that 
came to the front during the trial and disposition of cases. He was 
temperamentally well adapted to the service, and commanded the re- 
spect of his associates and all who had to do with the court business. 
He had the graces of the gentleman, and when he had retired from 
the bench in 1919, one of his assistants in County Court said of him: 
“He is a prince.” 
He was called now and then to sit in the Supreme Court, and 
here his legal acumen and knowledge of the law and affairs made 
him a useful member of the court, and he wrote some opinions that 
attracted more than usual attention. In 1917 he received the degree 
of LL. D. from Middlebury College. 
In January, 1919, he decided that he would not longer remain 
on the bench, although he was still well and able to perform the duties 
of his office, and declined to be a candidate for re-election. ,He 
could again have commanded a clientage, but he preferred to retire 
from active pursuits in the law in which he had been engaged for 
fifty-six years. 182 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
I said of Judge Waterman at the time he retired from the bench, 
and I want to repeat it here, that the old-fashioned conception of 
the Judge, that he must be gruff, stern and indeed savage, is passing 
away. We like to think of him as being natural, kindly, human. It 
is easier to live and work in the presence of such a court. These 
qualities Judge Waterman possesses in a high degree, and many a 
young lawyer who tried his first case under his sympathetic guidance 
will ever hold him in kindly reverence. Then, too, he appealed more 
than the rest of us, I think, to those who had to do with the courts 
and were not of the bar—the Assistant Judges, reporters, officers and 
members of the jury. His kindliness, thoughtfulness and personal 
interest in these were reciprocated by admiration for the Judge. 
ALFRED A. HALL 
1848-1912 
Alfred A. Hall, who was elected a Superior Judge in 1906, was 
another Windham county man by birth, but he had gone to Franklin 
county, where he studied and practiced law. He was fifty-eight years 
of age and had had an extensive practice—the leading one in Franklin 
county. He was educated in the common schools and at Leland and 
Gray Seminary at Townshend. Going to St. Albans from Athens, 
where he was born, December 31, 1848, he entered the office of Davis 
and Davis in 1870 as a law student, remained with them for three 
years, and was admitted to the bar in 1873 in Franklin county. Here 
he resided until his death, which occurred at St. Albans, January 
21, 1912. He was in practice constantly from the time of his admission 
until his elevation to the bench, and had for a law partner from 1874 
to 1900, William D. Wilson. He was a member of the Vermont 
National Guard for ten years, and was appointed Colonel and Aide-de- 
camp on the staff of Governor Pingree. He was State’s Attorney 
of Franklin county from 1882 to 1884; State Senator in 1892 and 
president pro tem of that body; chairman of the commission on the 
revision of the statutes in 1893 and 1894. 
He had an eminent career as a Mason, was past Grand Master, 
past Grand High Priest, and past Grand Commander, and was the 
first Mason in the State to receive all these honors. He was a 33rd 
degree Mason and held the highest degree in the Scottish Rites. 
Judge Hall presided in the County Courts with great dignity, 
and enforced the rules and discipline of the court with careful atten- 
tion. No Judge ever took more pride in his position and labors, or 
held a higher regard for the sacred duties which his office called him 
to perform. His long experience before the courts made him con- THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
183 
versant with the questions that were presented to him as a trial 
Judge. These he disposed of at once, giving his rulings without 
delay. Sometimes he found, however, as many another Judge has 
done, that if he had not decided so quickly he would not have decided 
as he did. But he enjoyed the respect and confidence of the bar, who 
lamented that his judicial services were so early terminated. 
ZED S. STANTON 
1848-1921 
Zed S. Stanton, elected Superior Judge in 1908, was born May 1, 
1848, in Roxbury. He was educated in the public schools and North- 
field High School; he studied law first under the direction of Albert 
R. Savage, now Chief Justice of the Supreme Court of Maine, and 
later with Frank Plumley of Northfield and L. L. Durant of Mont- 
pelier; was admitted to the bar of Washington county in 1880 and 
to practice in the Supreme Court in 1882 and the United States Dis- 
trict Court in 1889. He held nearly all the town offices in his town 
of Roxbury, and was Assistant Judge of the Washington County 
Court from 1884 to 1888; State’s Attorney of Washington county 
1890-96; Railroad Commissioner 1896-98, being chairman of the board 
from 1897. He represented Roxbury in the General Assembly in 
1884 and 1886, was Senator from Washington county in 1900, and 
was Lieutenant-Governor 1902-1904. When Judge Tyler announced 
that he would not be a candidate for re-election during the session of 
the Legislature held in 1908, Judge Stanton’s name was brought for- 
ward as a candidate for the new judgeship thus made necessary. Dur- 
ing the summer preceding he had been a candidate for Governor 
against Governor Prouty, had had a very large following among the 
voters of Vermont and enjoyed the deserved friendship of many lead- 
ing men in the State. His election to the judgeship was made without 
serious opposition. He was the Chief of the Superior Judges from 
1919 until his death. 
Judge Stanton died at Roxbury, August 15, 1921. His career 
was one of the most interesting in the annals of the Vermont Judges. 
He commenced life as a railroad brakeman and when so employed 
was accustomed to see those who belonged to a richer and more 
favored class riding in the Pullman cars. It then occurred to him 
that their lot was better than his and he decided that he would become 
one of their class and enjoy the comforts which were theirs in place 
of the service which he was rendering. So he left the railroad, got 
a little schooling, and studied law. During the time he was studying law 
he was night watchman at the State House in Montpelier. He did 184 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
not advance rapidly in his profession and never had the right kind 
of initiative for success in private practice. It was as an office holder 
that he became favorably known. His first important work was as 
State’s Attorney of Washington county. Here he curbed and vir- 
tually stopped the open rum selling that had been going on for many 
years. It was a surprise to the members of the bar who had been 
accustomed to defend these cases, and to their clients, that the new 
official, who had had little practice, should have the ability to defeat 
the strategy that had usually been effective in the defence of these 
cases. It was supposed that the new official could be easily defeated, 
but when the battle was on it was found that he showed elements of 
great strength, and the harder he was pressed the harder and thicker 
were the blows which he gave in return. 
When he was Lieutenant-Governor it was said of him that he was 
one of the best presiding officers the State had had, and when the 
time came for him to become Governor, by the usual advancement, 
after serving two years as Lieutenant-Governor, there were friends 
in great numbers who wished to see him advanced, but the candidacy 
of Governor Prouty was promoted with so much more organization 
that the election fell to him. It was fortunate for Judge Stanton 
that this was the case, for the incoming Legislature, to use the language 
of one of the older Judges, “kicked him upstairs,” by electing him 
Superior Judge, a place made vacant by reason of the retirement of 
Judge Tyler from the Supreme Court. 
On the bench Judge Stanton did his best work. He presided 
with fairness and usually with dignity, and his administration of his 
office appealed favorably to the bar and to the litigants who came 
to his court. He was conscious that he was not a profound lawyer 
and was quite aware that in some departments of the law, particularly 
in equity, he was not well grounded, either by study or experience, 
for the discharge of the duties that fell to him as Judge, but he knew 
the sources to which he should go for aid, and these he sought for 
guidance and seldom went wrong. His strength in this direction was 
in men rather than in books, but his choice of counsellors was sure 
to be a wise one, with the happy result that the case usually received 
at his hands a correct interpretation. 
In the conduct of jury cases he was the most at home, and in this 
department he will be longest and best remembered. He had a com- 
manding presence and good voice, and was by nature eloquent and 
impressive, as was found in his many efforts upon the stump in the 
days before he came to the bench. He usually saw clearly the issues 
that were involved in the trial, and he presented them -to the jury 
in his charges with clearness and force. He saw through any tricks 
that might be lurking in a case, and stood strongly for the defence 
of any interests that seemed poorly defended. Once he left his place ROBERT W. McCUEN 
Born in Vergennes, Vt., May 30, 1880, the 
son of Nicholas J. and Kate H. (Allen) McCuen. 
He was educated at Vergennes High School 
and Middlebury College. He conducted the business 
of the Addison County Newspaper Association at 
Vergennes for ten years. He held many offices in the 
city of Vergennes, including that of Alderman, School 
Commissioner and City Representative to the Legisla- 
ture in 1906 and 1910. After receiving his degree at 
Boston University Law School, he took up the active 
practice of law at Middlebury, Vt. In 1908 he was a 
delegate to the Republican National Convention and 
represented Addison county in the Vermont Senate of 
1912. He served on the Lake Champlain Tercentenary 
Commission, the Macdonough Commission and the 
Deep Water Way Commission of Atlantic States. He 
introduced the resolution which provided for the Cham- 
plain Tercentenary celebration. He has been ex- 
tensively interested in real estate and farming in Addi- 
son county, is a stockholder in the Middlebury Register 
Company, and is a director of the Addison County 
Trust Company of Middlebury, Vt. At the outbreak 
of the World War, Major McCuen was appointed a mem- 
ber of the Public Safety Committee. He attended the 
First Plattsburg Training Camp, where he received a 
commission as Lieutenant and was assigned to duty 
at Camp Greene, N. C., where he won distinction for 
the system which he employed in entraining and de- 
training soldiers. He was promoted to the rank of 
Captain and ordered to France with the Fourth Artil- 
lery Brigade of the Fourth Division (Regular Army), 
and took part in the Aisne-Marne, Chateau Thierry 
and Vesle engagements, the St. Mihiel drive and the 
Great Meuse-Argonne offensive. After the Armistice, 
he joined the Army of Occupation in Germany. While 
in France, he was assigned to duty at headquarters of 
the Fourth Division, A. E. F., as Assistant to G-l, 
Chief of Staff. He was honorably cited, and recom- 
mended for promotion to the rank of Major. After 
his discharge from the Army, he resumed the practice 
of law at Vergennes, and in August, 1921, was appointed 
bv President Harding, Collector of Internal Revenue 
for the District of Vermont. In 1901, Major McCuen 
married Nancy M. Smith of Vergennes, daughter of 
Phelps B. and Mary A. (Wetherbee) Smith. THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
185 
and stood back of a poor woman who was in the witness chair, whom 
he thought counsel were not treating fairly, and gave them to under- 
stand that in this way he had come to her defence. 
The bar loved Judge Stanton and enjoyed his companionship to 
a high degree, and between the bar and him there were the most 
cordial relations. He called the lawyers by their given names, and 
not infrequently these were abbreviated, and sometimes he had names 
of his own that he applied to them, even using these occasionally in 
court toward those whom he knew best. Sometimes the names which 
he assigned to the men of the bar were significant, particularly where 
he had been accustomed to refer to a certain lawyer who was not as 
sure of his law as were more favored members of the profession, as 
“Admiral.” Some one asked the Judge why he used that term in 
speaking of the attorney, and he said: “It is because he is at sea 
on his law.” When counsel sounded the wrong note in argument 
he would call them to account in some quaint way, as was illustrated 
in a case in Lamoille county when an attorney referred in argument 
to an incident which he said merited the fate which befell Lot, who 
was turned into a pillar of salt. The Judge solemnly called the 
attorney to order by knocking on the bench and saying: “That was 
Mrs. Lot, Mr. Attorney.” 
Rugged honesty and native common sense made up for the lack 
of early culture and careful training in the law and gave success to 
a life that had in it the elements of a noble manhood and a large 
outlook upon the affairs of men. Judge Stanton deserves the tribute 
of a close friend and leading lawyer who pronounced him as one of the 
very best of the trial Judges. 
His home life was ideal and his devotion to his wife and daughter 
beautiful. Whenever the work in court stopped, for ever so short 
a time, he made haste to return to his home, there to enjoy its comforts 
with the other members of his family. 
WALTER A. DUTTON 
1860- 
Walter A. Dutton was born at Walden, January 21, 1860, and 
was educated in the common schools, Hardwick Academy, St. Johns- 
bury Academy, Montpelier Seminary, and Eastman’s National Busi- 
ness College. He studied law in the office of Joseph P. Lamson at 
Cabot, in the office of Melville E. Smilie, County Clerk of Wash- 
ington county, at Montpelier, and in the office of George W. Wing 
at Montpelier, and was admitted to the bar at the October term of the 
Supreme Court, 1885. He commenced practice at Hardwick in the 186 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
spring of 1886 and continued during the summer, but without any 
such financial success as warranted his remaining, as it seemed to 
him, and he went to Lowell, Mass., where he accepted a clerical 
position and deserted the law until 1895, when he returned to Hard- 
wick, where he has since remained in practice. In May, 1895, he 
formed a partnership with William H. Taylor, which continued until 
the latter’s election to the bench in December, 1906. In December, 1910, 
he formed a partnership with Barnard J. Mulcahy, which continued 
until the death of the latter in August, 1918. Judge Dutton was Ex- 
ecutive Clerk to Governor Bell in 1914-1916; Clerk to the Committee 
on Revision of Bills, 1910; State’s Attorney, 1912-1914; Superior 
Judge, December 1, 1914, to January 31, 1915; member of the Public 
Service Commission from February 4, 1915, to date, and chairman 
since February 6, 1918. 
JAMES B. DONOWAY 
1869- 
James B. Donoway, of Middlebury, was born in Vergennes, March 
31, 1869. He attended the district schools and New Haven Academy 
and entered Middlebury College in 1889, where he graduated four 
years later. He studied law in the office of Judge Frank L. Fish 
at Vergennes and with Justice Seneca Haselton at Burlington, and 
was admitted to the bar in 1896. He located at Middlebury, where 
he has since practiced. He was State’s Attorney of Addison county 
from 1900 to 1904, and County Senator from 1908 to 1910. He 
was appointed Superior Judge by Governor Fletcher, December 1, 
1914, and served as such until January 31, 1915. After his retirement 
from the bench he resumed practice at Middlebury. THE PRESENT SUPERIOR JUDGES, (1922) 
FRED M. BUTLER 
1854- 
FRED Mason Butler, Superior Judge since 1909, was born at 
Jamaica, May 28, 1854. He was educated in the public schools 
of Jamaica and at Leland and Gray Seminary at Townshend. 
Before leaving school he began studying law with Jonathan G. Eddy 
of Jamaica and later studied in the office of Eleazer L. Waterman 
and Hoyt H. Wheeler. He was admitted to the bar in Windham 
county in 1877 and in August following entered into a partnership with 
Joel C. Baker of Rutland, which was discontinued at the end of one 
year. He came to Rutland to reside in 1877 and has continued to 
live in that city since that time. He afterwards formed a partnership 
with Lyman W. Redington, which continued for six years, and in 
1884 became a partner of Thomas W. Moloney and continued as 
such for twenty-four years, practicing law under the name and style 
of Butler and Moloney. In 1906 he was elected president of the 
Vermont Bar Association; he was for many years director in the 
Baxter National Bank and until his election as Judge, in the Rutland 
Railway Light & Power Company and the State Mutual Fire Insur- 
ance Company. He was active in politics and many times a delegate 
to State and other conventions; Town Grand Juror, 1882-84; City 
Attorney, 1884-89; City Judge, 1889-95; declining further service at 
the end of that period to devote his time to his practice. He was elected 
Senator from Rutland county in 1908 and in January following was 
elected Superior Judge, which office he now holds. Late in the session of 
1908 it was thought wise that the Supreme Court should be composed 
of five rather than four members and an act was passed in that regard 
which resulted in the elevation of Judge Haselton, who had previously 
been Chief of the Superior Judges, to the Supreme Court, and this 
caused a vacancy in the list of Superior Judges, which was filled by 
the election of Judge Butler. On the death of Judge Stanton, August 
15, 1921, he became the Chief of the Superior Judges. 
FRANK L. FISH 
1863- 
I was born at Newfane, September 17, 1863. My mother was 
a practical woman of great force of character and amiability of tem- 
perament; my father was an idealist. He was a wheelwright and 188 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
made all parts of his wagons as strong as the deacon’s “One-Hoss 
Shay.” If they ever went to pieces it should have been 
“All at once and nothing first, 
Just as bubbles do when they burst.” 
His sense of honesty was a predominant characteristic. He was a great 
reader of current events, took and read religiously the Scientific 
American all his active life and enjoyed history and poetry. I at- 
tended the district school and spent most of my time when school 
was not in session in my father’s shop. When I was fourteen he 
gave me a bench and tools and set me at the task of making a wheel- 
barrow. When it was finished he surprised me by saying: “Boy, 
you will stop your work in the shop now. This is a poor business. 
You should find a better one. It may be useful sometime to know 
how to use tools, but I hope you won’t have to earn your living in 
that way.” I obeyed and never did any more work in the shop. 
I was a student at Leland and Gray Seminary at Townshend for 
several terms and at Vermont Academy at Saxtons River for two 
years, graduating in 1886. When I had decided to study law I at 
first registered as a student of Milon Davidson of Newfane and later 
of Addison E. Cudworth of Londonderry, and in 1887 entered the 
office of Judge James M. Tyler at Brattleboro. He was soon ap- 
pointed to the bench and I studied by myself for several months, then 
entered the office of Judge Lavant M. Read at Bellows Falls, where 
I remained until my admission in 1889. 
One of the examining committee was Charles M. Wilds, who 
advised that I locate in Vergennes. This I did in January, 1900, and 
have remained there since. I was in practice until February, 1912, 
when I was appointed a Superior Judge on the death of Judge Hall 
and am still in the discharge of the duties of the office. I had been 
State’s Attorney of Addison county for almost ten years and Na- 
tional Bank Examiner for eight years. I resigned the latter office to 
run for Congress in 1908 but was defeated. It was my purpose to 
become again a candidate, but was elected that fall to the Legislature 
and while there was an unsuccessful candidate against Judge Butler 
for the new judgeship that was created. When the vacancy in Con- 
gress occurred on the death of David J. Foster I had been appointed 
by Governor Mead to the judgeship. I had thought that my talents 
were forensic rather than judicial and had hoped that I might make 
use of these in a career at Washington, but having taken a judicial 
office I abandoned all thoughts of a political one and have found 
great delight in the discharge of judicial labors, and I hope have 
done some good. THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
189 
I hold an honorary degree from Norwich University, and I as- 
sume that I was for a time a trustee there from the fact that I was 
invited to attend one of the meetings of the board, where I presented 
a resolution that resulted in the adoption of the first cavalry unit 
for the University. I had previously raised the money for the pur- 
chase of the horses. I am a trustee of Middlebury College, where my 
three children attended and two of them graduated. I edited the 
book entitled “Horace Ward Bailey—Vermonter” and have made nu- 
merous addresses. 
STANLEY C. WILSON 
1879- 
Stanley C. Wilson, of Chelsea, was elected sixth Superior Judge, 
April 12, 1917. Judge Wilson was born in Orange, September 10, 
1879. He completed his preparatory education at Goddard Seminary, 
where he graduated in the class of 1896; he graduated at Tufts 
College in 1901. He studied law with Dillingham, Huse and How- 
land at Montpelier, and after the dissolution of this firm, with Judge 
Zed S. Stanton and with George W. Wing at the same place. He 
was admitted to the bar in 1904, and following his admission for 
a year practiced at Montpelier. In July, 1905, he located in Chelsea, 
where he practiced until his election to the bench. He was Deputy 
Clerk of the Washington County Court from September, 1901, to 
October, 1902, and of the Orange County Court for several years 
following July, 1905. He was Reporter of the Senate at the sessions 
of 1902 and 1904; State’s Attorney of Orange county, 1908-1912; 
chairman of the Republican State Committee from August, 1915, to 
April, 1917; member of the House from Chelsea at the sessions of 
1915 and 1917, and Speaker the latter year. He was re-elected in 
1919 and 1921 and is the third Superior Judge. 
SHERMAN R. MOULTON 
1876- 
Sherman R. Moulton, of Burlington, was elected the sixth Su- 
perior Judge in January, 1919, and re-elected in 1921. He was born 
in New York City, June 10, 1876, the son of Clarence F. and Annie 
Jane (Roberts) Moulton. His father’s grandfather came to Randolph 
in 1785; his father graduated at Dartmouth College in 1863. The 
latter was engaged in business in New York at the time of the birth 190 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
of Judge Moulton, but returned to Randolph when he was thirteen 
years of age. Judge Moulton was educated at Miss Ketchum’s private 
school in New York, at the Randolph graded and high schools, and 
at Dartmouth College, where he graduated in 1898. He studied law 
in the office of Joseph D. Denison at Randolph and at the Harvard 
Law School, where he graduated in 1901. He was admitted to the 
bar the same year and practiced at Randolph for four months after 
admission. He then spent a year as assistant to Frederick H. Button, 
who was general counsel of the Rutland Railroad, at Rutland, and 
afterwards entered the law office of Townshend and Avery in New 
York, where he remained for seven months, when he returned to 
Vermont and formed a partnership with Clarence P. Cowles at Bur- 
lington under the name of Cowles and Moulton. This was in 1903, 
and the partnership continued until 1911, when Joseph T. Stearns 
was admitted to the firm, which did business under the name of 
Cowles, Moulton and Stearns. In 1912, Judge Moulton retired from 
the firm and continued practice alone until his election as Judge. He 
held the office of City Grand Juror of Burlington for three years; 
was Executive Clerk to Governor Gates; Reporter of Decisions, 1916- 
1919; Senator from Chittenden county in 1919, resigning to become 
Judge. 
HARRIE B. CHASE 
1889- 
Harrie B. Chase, of Brattleboro, was appointed the sixth Superior 
Judge, May 19, 1919, by Governor Clement, to succeed Judge Leighton 
P. Slack, whose resignation to take the place of Justice Seneca 
Haselton on the Supreme Court bench caused a vacancy on the trial 
bench. Judge Chase was born in Whitingham, August 9, 1889, and 
was educated in the public schools of that town, at the Wilmington 
High School, at Phillips-Exeter Academy, where he graduated in 1908, 
and at Dartmouth College. He studied law in the office of his father. 
Charles S. Chase, at Brattleboro, and at the Boston University Law 
School, and was admitted to the bar in October. 1912. He formed 
a partnership with his father, which continued from the time of his 
admission until his elevation to the bench. The firm practiced at 
Brattleboro under the name and style of Chase and Chase. Judge 
Chase is the youngest of the Superior Judges, and with one exception 
is the youngest man to be called to the bench in Vermont. He was 
twenty-nine years of age at the time of his appointment. In 1865. 
Judge Benjamin H. Steele, of Derby, was appointed a Judge of the 
Supreme Court at the age of twenty-eight. HOWARD F. WOLCOTT 
Born in Leroy, Ohio, June 26, 1849. He was educated 
at Ypsilanti, Mich., and at Oberlin College. He 
studied law at Wilmington, Vt., was admitted to the 
bar in 1876 and practiced at Jamaica, Vt., from 1876 
to 1883. Since 1883 he has practiced at Winooski. He 
has been Municipal Judge of Winooski since 1919. Howard F. Wolcott THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
191 
JULIUS A. WILLCOX 
1879- 
Julius A. Willcox, of Montpelier, appointed sixth Superior Judge 
by Governor Hartness to fill the vacancy caused by the death of 
Judge Stanton, was born at Bridport, October 2, 1879. He was edu- 
cated in the schools of Bridport, Vt., and of Crown Point and Port 
Henry, N. Y., and graduated from Middlebury College in 1902. He 
studied law in the office of Stickney, Sargent and Skeels at Ludlow 
and was admitted in 1908. He practiced at Ludlow from 1908 to 
1916 and since has been located at Montpelier. He held some town 
offices in Ludlow; was official Reporter of the Senate in 1906; second 
Assistant Clerk of the House in 1908 and 1910, first Assistant in 
1912, 1915 and 1917; Clerk, 1919; assistant to Commissioner to Revise 
Public Statutes, 1915-1916; one of the editors of General Laws, 1917; 
appointed Secretary of Civil and Military Affairs by Governor Hart- 
ness in 1921. 
THE CIRCUIT JUDGES 
By the provisions of an act which went into effect in the fall of 
1850, a change was made in the judicial system by which a Supreme 
Court of three members was authorized and the State divided into 
four judicial circuits with a Circuit Judge appointed in each circuit 
whose duty it was to preside in the County Courts. Each Circuit 
Judge was a chancellor and the Supreme Court had no equity juris- 
diction except on appeal. The Judges of the Supreme Court had no 
duties to perform in the County Courts. This act was in force for 
seven years and was repealed by an act which took effect in 1857. The 
Judges who served in the circuits and did not become Judges of the 
Supreme Court were Robert Pierpoint of Rutland, William C. Kit- 
tredge of Fair Haven, and Abel Underwood of Wells River. 
ROBERT PIERPOINT 
1791-1865 
Robert Pierpoint was a brother of Chief Judge Pierpoint and 
was born at Litchfield, Conn., May 4, 1791. He came, when a child, 
to Manchester, where he studied law with Governor Skinner and 
later removed to Rutland, where he resided thereafter and died May 
6, 1865. He was County Clerk from 1820 to 1839; member of the 192 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
Constitutional Conventions in 1822 and 1828; member of the Gov- 
ernor’s Council from 1825 to 1830; Judge of Probate from 1831 to 
1832; Clerk of the House from 1832 to 1834; member of the Senate 
in 1838 and 1839; member of the House in 1857; Lieutenant-Governor 
from 1848 to 1850; and Circuit Judge from 1850 to 1856. 
WILLIAM C. KITTREDGE 
1800-1869 
William C. Kittredge, of Fair Haven, was born at Dalton, Mass., 
February 23, 1800. He graduated at Williams College in 1821 and 
studied law in Northampton, Mass. He went to Kentucky and was 
admitted to the bar. For six months he was at Ravenna, Ohio, but 
returned to Vermont and was admitted to the bar in Rutland county, 
December, 1824, and settled in Fair Haven. For eight years he rep- 
resented his town in the Legislature and for two years was County 
Senator. He was State’s Attorney for five years and Judge of the 
County Court for six years. He was Lieutenant-Governor in 1852 
and in 1856 was elected a Circuit Judge and served one year. He 
was three times married and had eleven children. He died at Rut- 
land, June 11, 1869, while on his way to Bennington in discharge of 
his duties as United States Assessor of Internal Revenue. 
ABEL UNDERWOOD 
1799-1879 
Abel Underwood, of Wells River, was born at Bradford, April 
8, 1799, and was an uncle of Levi Underwood, a brilliant leader of 
the Vermont bar and Lieutenant-Governor. He fitted for college at 
Royalton and graduated at Dartmouth in 1824, paying his way.by 
teaching. He studied law with Isaac Fletcher at Lyndon and was 
admitted to the bar in 1824 in Caledonia county. He began practice 
in 1828 at Wells River and was prosperous in his profession. He was 
United States Attorney for the district of Vermont from 1849 to 
1853, and was a Circuit Judge from 1854 to 1857. He died at Wells 
River, April 22, 1879. THE BAR BY COUNTIES 
ADDISON COUNTY 
By the act incorporating Addison county, passed October 18, 
1785, the towns of Addison and Colchester were made half shires, 
and the courts were appointed to be held on the first Tuesday of March 
in the former place, and the second Tuesday of November in the 
latter. The first term of court was held at the dwelling house of 
Zadock Everest, a prominent man among the early settlers in Addison. 
The second term was held at Colchester, but before the time arrived 
for another term at this shire Chittenden county had been organized 
(October 22, 1787) and the courts were afterward held at Addison 
until 1792. These sessions were held at the dwelling house of Jonah 
Case at Chimney Point, the earliest settlement in the town. When 
Middlebury was made the shire town and the courts moved thither 
in the latter part of 1792, they were held for several years in public 
inns, first in that of John Deming, which stood where the Congrega- 
tional Church is located, and later in the tavern of Samuel Mattocks, 
on the present site of the Addison House. The first court house was 
built with money subscribed by the citizens of Middlebury and vicinity, 
on land donated by Gamaliel Painter. He was a leading citizen and 
land owner, a person of great public spirit and already the donor of 
the common in Middlebury village, which has been enjoyed by the 
public since the gift was made. The deed of the court house site is 
dated May 22, 1794, and by its terms the plot is given for the express 
use and purpose of erecting a court house and jail thereon and as a 
common never to be divided or put to any other use. The court house 
was begun in 1796 and finished and occupied in 1798. It stood on 
the brow of the hill five or six rods north of the present Gardner 
Wainwright house, and between that place and the Addison House. 
The jail, which was built before the court house, was erected on 
about the same line of the elevation. It contained a dungeon and 
prisoners’ rooms besides a tenement for the jailor’s family. During the 
time when the Legislature had no fixed meeting place two sessions 
were held at Middlebury, one in 1800 and one in 1806. In anticipation 
of the coming of that body in 1800 the court house was built with 
reference to its use by the legislators. One high room, arched over- 
head, with long windows, and seats rising towards the rear, and a 
gallery over the entrance at the west end constituted the whole in- 
terior of the building. The inhabitants of the town having con- 194 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
tributed towards its erection, it was used also as a town hall. Until 
the completion of the Congregational Church, in 1809, it was occupied 
by that society as a place of worship. It was used, too, as a place for 
public meetings of all kinds, there being no other suitable room for the 
purpose in the village. The jail soon became too unsafe and uncom- 
fortable for use and in 1809 the Legislature assessed a tax for the 
erection of a new one. This, too, was built of stone. 
The old jail was moved to the east of the Addison House and 
converted into a dwelling house. The second jail was used until 
1846, although it had been considered unsafe for some time prior 
thereto. In that year the present brick jail was constructed on Court 
Street. The cells, twelve in number, were strongly built and the 
structure, when completed, was well adapted to the use intended. It 
is still the county jail, but it has received many modern improvements. 
The jailor’s quarters have been remodelled, a piazza has been erected 
across the front, the interior of the jail equipped with secure, modern 
cells, and the whole building made sanitary. As early as 1814 the 
old court house, standing in the center of the common with roads on 
all sides, came to be regarded as a nuisance, and it was then removed 
to the site of the present court house, Judge Painter having deeded 
the land for the purpose. The building was too cold for occupancy 
in the winter, having but one high room. Therefore, in 1829, it 
was divided into two stories. The upper story was finished off for 
the sessions of the court, with one room adjoining for a consultation 
room. Three rooms were fitted up below for jury rooms and other 
uses. The court room when ready for occupancy was said to have been 
the best furnished court room in Vermont. The time came, however, 
when the old building was not adequate or creditable, and a measure 
was inaugurated which resulted in the erection of the present court 
house in 1883. The ancient structure was moved to the fair ground 
and does service there as the floral hall. 
The present court house is situated on the easterly side of Court 
Street and near the northerly end of the street. It is built of red brick 
and is attractive on both the outside and inside. It was not built too 
large for the use of the county and the cost of maintenance has been 
small. On the ground floor are offices for the Judge of Probate and the 
County Clerk with fireproof vaults for the safe keeping of the files and 
records. Here also are rooms for the grand jury when in session 
and for the Sheriff. On the second floor is the court room, and in 
connection with this are rooms for the Judges, lawyers and witnesses, 
while on the floor above is a large room for the use of the petit jurors. 
The sessions of the County Court are held on the first Tuesdays of 
June and December. THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
195 
SAMUEL MILLER 
1764-1810 
One of the early lawyers of high standing in Addison county, 
and the first lawyer to settle in Middlebury, was Samuel Miller. He 
was born at Springfield, Mass., April 2, 1764, and moved to Walling- 
ford, Vt., in 1785. He lacked the advantages of a collegiate education 
but this deficiency was well supplied by his superior talents and thirst 
for knowledge. He studied law in Rutland soon after he came into 
the State and following his admission located at Middlebury, when 
the village was almost a wilderness. He had a mind of unusual 
activity and vigor and was of quick and discriminating perceptions. 
His practice was a large one both in Addison and adjoining counties. 
He ranked with Daniel Chipman in lawyership and these two men 
were at the head of their profession. He was clear and forcible 
in argument and prompt and thorough in his business habits. He 
was not inclined to enter politics, but was elected to the General 
Assembly in 1797, in which he was a prominent member. In manner 
he was courteous and gentlemanly. He was large-minded and be- 
nevolent ; his death occurred April 17, 1810. 
DANIEL CHIPMAN 
1765-1850 
Daniel Chapman, first Reporter of Decisions of the Supreme 
Court of Vermont, was born in Salisbury, Conn., October 22, 1765, 
and came with his father to Tinmouth, Vt., in 1775. He was one 
of six sons of Samuel Chipman. In 1783 he commenced his pre- 
paratory studies with his brother, Nathaniel, who was in practice 
at Tinmouth, and entered Dartmouth College in 1784, where he 
graduated four years later among the first in his class. He com- 
menced at once the study of the law in the office of his brother, 
Nathaniel, at Tinmouth and was admitted in September, 1790. He 
located in Rutland and soon had an extensive practice in Rutland, 
Bennington, Addison and Chittenden counties. In 1793 he was chosen 
a delegate from Rutland to the convention called at Windsor to amend 
the State Constitution. The following year he moved to Middlebury, 
where he retained his practice in all the counties named. In 1798, 
1799, 1800 and several years prior to 1808 he represented Middlebury 
in the General Assembly. The latter year he was chosen a member 
of the Council under the old Constitution, and was annually elected 
to that body for several years. He represented the town also in the 196 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
General Assembly in 1812, 1813 and 1814. In 1813 he was elected 
Speaker, in which office he distinguished himself for his promptness 
and decision. The following year he was re-elected Speaker, and 
the same year was elected a member of Congress. He attended the 
first session, but was unable to attend further on account of ill health. 
The year following, his health being restored, he resumed practice, 
and in 1818 and 1821 represented Middlebury again in the General 
Assembly. In 1822 he published an essay on contracts for specific 
articles. This was highly praised by great jurists and met with 
a large sale. It added greatly to his reputation as a lawyer. In this 
work he urged the importance of having the Supreme Court decisions 
reported. The following year his appeal bore fruit in an act by the 
Legislature providing for the appointment of a Reporter of these 
decisions. This office naturally fell to him, but after publishing two 
volumes ill health compelled him to resign. These reports are known 
as D. Chipman I and II. He recommended a division of the Legisla- 
ture into two branches, by constituting a Senate; he attended as a 
delegate from Ripton, where he had taken up his residence, the con- 
vention called to consider this question in 1836, and took an active 
part in the debate which led to the adoption of the amendment by a 
small majority. In 1846 he published the life of his brother, Nathaniel 
Chipman. He afterwards published the Memoirs of Colonel Seth 
Warner, and Thomas Chittenden, with a History of the Constitution 
during his administration. His last public duty was to attend the 
Constitutional Convention in 1850. While in the discharge of this 
duty he became ill and died April 23, 1850, in the eighty-fifth year of 
his age. It is doubtful if any other man was as familiar with the 
early history of Vermont. He was a plain man, but courteous in 
manner. His addresses and arguments were noted for their strength 
rather than ornament. He was an able lawyer, well grounded in the 
common law, and had quick perceptions and great skill in the examina- 
tion of witnesses. His arguments were rapid, clear and forcible. He 
had great intellectual powers, which were well trained by intense ap- 
plication and contact with the strong men of his day, who, in many 
respects, were his peers. 
HORATIO SEYMOUR 
1778-1857 
Horatio Seymour was born at Litchfield, Conn., whence came so 
many of the great lawyers of the early period of Vermont history. 
The date of his birth was May 31, 1778. His father was a Revolu- 
tionary soldier, and a man of prominence. Horatio Seymour pur- 
sued his preparatory studies under the tuition of his brother-in-law, CHARLES C. JAMIESON 
Born November 3, 1866, in Glover, Vt., being the son 
of William Stuart and Isabella A. Jamieson. His child- 
hood was spent in East Hardwick and Stannard, Vt. 
He entered the State Normal School at Johnson, Vt., 
in 1882 and was graduated in 1885, earning his way 
by working mornings, afternoons, nights and Saturdays 
in a general merchandise store. He taught school, 
studied law, and engaged in various occupations during 
vacations from 1885 until 1888, when he entered the 
United States Military Academy, from which he was 
graduated in 1892. He was Second Lieutenant until 
1895, when he was appointed First Lieutenant, Ordnance 
Department. He served as Lieutenant, Captain and 
Major of Ordnance. At Watervliet Arsenal he was 
in charge of the manufacture of heavy guns until his 
retirement from active service, with the rank of Major, 
in 1910. After retirement he was general superintendent 
of the Walter A. Wood Mowing and Reaping Machine 
Company, later became manager of factories for Deere & 
Company of Moline, 111., and went to New York in 
July, 1915, to engage in the supplying of war material 
to the Allies. He resigned from Deere & Company in 
1916, and opened offices as a consulting engineer in New 
York. When the United States entered the World 
W'ar, Major Jamieson, April 13, 1917, rejoined 
the service as a Major in the Ordnance Department, 
and served in Washington in various positions with 
increasing responsibility until 1918, when he was ap- 
pointed Assistant Chief of Ordnance with the rank of 
Brigadier General, and was placed in charge of produc- 
tion of all ordnance material for the United States 
Army. After the Armistice, he organized the Salvage 
Board of the Ordnance Department. Upon his request 
he was discharged from service January 3, 1919, and 
returned to New York as vice-president of George W. 
Goethals & Company. In 1894 he married Frances 
Parmele Floyd of Highland Park, 111. They have two 
children, Floyd M. Jamieson, who served as a Lieu- 
tenant in the World War, and Eleanor Jamieson. THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
197 
Rev. Truman Marsh, and was graduated at Yale College in 1797. 
After teaching a year he entered Judge Reeve’s law school at Litch- 
field and in October, 1799, came to Middlebury and resumed study 
in the office of Daniel Chipman. In the spring of 1800 he was licensed 
to practice and at once entered upon an active career at the bar, where 
he came in competition with such men as Samuel Miller, Daniel Chip- 
man and others, and rose rapidly in reputation as a lawyer and a man. 
While he did not extend his practice to other counties, it is said of 
him that no one ever had so many cases or so extensive a practice in 
Addison county. These brought him a large income, so much so that 
he was enabled to build the handsome brick house for a home, now 
known as the Philip Battell house, opposite the Congregational Church, 
from his earnings during the two years it was under construction. 
His career as a lawyer was uninterrupted until 1821, although before 
that time he had been Postmaster of Middlebury for nine years and 
a member of the Executive Council for five years. In October, 1820, 
he was elected United States Senator and commenced his duties March 
4 following. At the close of his first term he was re-elected and 
continued in service until 1833, when he returned to the practice of the 
law. This he followed until the infirmities of old age forced him 
to retire. The corporation of Yale College, on the fiftieth anniversary 
of his graduation in 1847, conferred on him the honorary degree 
of LL. D. 
Mr. Seymour, although of exceptional ability, was constitutionally 
diffident and distrustful of himself; he did not seek office and accepted 
public positions with reluctance and only through the solicitation of 
his friends. He was not given to public discussion while in the Senate, 
but his modest opinions and influence were generally recognized and 
he associated with, and enjoyed, the intimate acquaintance of men 
like Adams, King, Clay, Webster and Marcy. It was different with 
him at the bar. Here the rights of his client demanded that he should 
speak and he was wont to defend his position with arguments of such 
power and comprehension that they were hard to meet. He made no 
attempt at display and his delivery was quiet and modest, but he had 
ingenuity, tact and wisdom, sympathy and courtesy and these attributes 
gave him success with jurors. He also enjoyed the confidence and 
friendship of his associates. His death occurred November 21, 1857, 
in the eightieth year of his age. 
DAVID EDMOND 
1778-1824 
With the possible exception of Judge Samuel S. Phelps, who is 
generally credited with having had the most remarkable mentality of 
any man who has adorned the bench or bar of Vermont, the most 198 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
brilliant member of the Addison county bar was David Edmond, who 
was born at Woodbury, Conn., May 15, 1778, and died at Vergennes, 
March 27, 1824. He graduated at Yale College with high honor in 
the class of 1796, in his eighteenth year. President Dwight pronounced 
him a wonderful scholar in the ease and rapidity with which he mas- 
tered his studies. He read law in the office of his brother, Judge 
William Edmond, in Fairfield county, Conn., came to Vergennes in 
1801, and was admitted to the bar of Chittenden county in February, 
1802. He represented Vergennes in the Legislature in 1808, 1809, 
1813, 1814, 1815, 1817 and 1821. He was State’s Attorney for Addi- 
son county in 1808, 1809, 1813, 1814 and in 1819 to 1823, inclusive. 
He was a member of the Constitutional Convention in 1814; Mayor 
of Vergennes from 1819 to his death in 1824. In 1816 an effort was 
made to have him become a candidate for Congress, but he declined 
as he thought he should not leave his extensive and lucrative practice 
until he had made provision for his young and growing family. His 
name, however, was placed on the general ticket as one of the six 
members to which Vermont was entitled, but the party to which he 
belonged was in the minority and their ticket was defeated. In the 
suit instituted in 1817 by the Episcopal Society of Vermont to recover 
lands which the State had appropriated to the use of the schools, and 
which was decided in the Supreme Court of the United States in 1823, 
Mr. Edmond was associated with Daniel Webster on the side of the 
State. Mr. Webster expressed his admiration of Mr. Edmond for 
his excellent lawyership, and said of him that he was as good a lawyer 
as he wished to know. 
This case was of great interest. It will be found in 8 Wheaton 
464 of the United States Supreme Court Reports. Its title is The So- 
ciety for the Propagation of the Gospel in Foreign Parts v. The Town 
of New Haven, and William Wheeler. A brief history is necessary 
to a proper understanding of the case. In the charters of most of 
towns in Vermont, which were issued by Benning Wentworth, Gov- 
ernor of the Province of New Hampshire, one share in the township 
was set aside for the Incorporated Society for the Propagation of 
the Gospel in Foreign Parts, and one share for a glebe for the Church 
of England. As he issued nearly one hundred and forty charters in 
all it became a matter of great consequence whether the lands could 
be held for the purposes intended in the grants as against an act ap- 
propriating them to other uses. Such an act was passed in 1794 and 
by its provisions the glebes were granted to the respective towns in 
which they were situated for the support of religious worship and 
the Selectmen were given authority to obtain possession of the lands 
by writs of ejectment and to let the same for the purposes named 
in the act. In the case of the Propagation Society lands, the Select- 
men were given the same authority to obtain possession by writs of THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
199 
ejectment, and were authorized to lease the same “as long as water 
runs and wood grows,” the rents to be used for the benefit of the 
schools in the town where the land was situated. The rights under 
the grant of the glebe lands, as affected by the act of 1794, were de- 
termined in a suit of which the title is The Town of Pawlet v. Daniel 
Clark and Others. It is reported in 9 Cranch 292, of the United 
States Supreme Court Reports. This suit was brought to the Circuit 
Court for the District of Vermont, was tried by a jury and a verdict 
rendered. The Judges of the court were opposed on the question as to 
whether the judgment should go to the plaintiff or the defendant on 
the verdict. They stated the case fully on the facts and certified 
it to the Supreme Court of the United States for decision. Here 
the case was argued by Mr. Webster for the Town of Pawlet, but 
whether he appeared in the case in the court below the record does 
not show. He was successful in his efforts for his Vermont client 
this time and Justice Story in a long and elaborate opinion discussed 
several reasons why the original grant was invalid, and concluded 
that by the Revolution Vermont succeeded to all the rights of the crown 
in the glebes, and that the latter by the act of 1794 became the prop- 
erty of the towns. 
It is reasonable to assume that the efforts of Mr. Webster in the 
Pawlet case led to his employment in the New Haven case. Be this 
as it may, he appeared with Mr. Edmond at the May term of the 
Circuit Court for the District of Vermont, held at Windsor in 1820, 
and there defended the action of ejectment brought by the plaintiff 
society, the Selectmen of the town having leased the premises to the 
defendant Wheeler. The facts were found in a special verdict and 
the Judges being again unable to agree upon the judgment, whether it 
should be rendered for the plaintiff or the defendants, the case was 
certified to the Supreme Court as was the Pawlet case. Mr. Webster 
argued the case here for the Town of New Haven and Joseph Hop- 
kinson of the Pennsylvania bar for the plaintiff society. The latter 
was distinguished as an eminent lawyer, but is chiefly remembered 
to fame as having been the author of the national anthem, “Hail 
Columbia.” Mr. Webster made use of the same weapons that he 
had employed in the New Haven case, but they were ineffective in 
the Propagation case, where the court, speaking by Mr. Justice Wash- 
ington, held that these rights had become vested before the Revolu- 
tion and had not been devested by anything that had occurred since. 
The result was that the act of 1794, in so far as it applied to the 
Society for Propagating the Gospel in Foreign Parts, was void and 
conveyed no title to the towns. 
This was not the end, however, of the efforts of Vermont to 
secure some benefit from these lands, for in 1824, after the decision 
had been rendered in the latter case, Governor Van Ness submitted 200 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
to the Legislature his correspondence with Mr. Webster, which dis- 
closed that His Excellency was seeking further advice in the case with 
the hope that Mr. Webster would find some means whereby the case 
could again be heard with a more favorable result. The assurances 
on Mr. Webster’s part were not encouraging to the State, but he ex- 
pressed a willingness to go over the matter with its agent if he would 
come to Washington and see him. His letters show that his fee of 
five hundred dollars for the argument of the case at Washington had 
been but half paid, but with his usual disregard for his financial affairs 
he advised the Governor that the rest of the fee had better not be 
sent to him then and stated that he had written Mr. Edmond about 
the matter, but “had not been favored with an answer,” which is 
explained by the fact that Mr. Edmond had died several months before 
Mr. Webster’s letter was written. 
Titus Hutchinson, of Woodstock, afterwards Judge of the Su- 
preme Court, succeeded Mr. Edmond as the agent of the State, and 
the Governor was given authority to settle with Mr. Webster and with 
the representative of the estate of Mr. Edmond, whose fee had not been 
fully paid. Whatever may have been the efforts of the new agent in the 
New Haven case it is certain that no favorable results to the State fol- 
lowed and the decision in that case has been held as decisive of the 
rights of the church in all the lands granted to the society in question. 
The Pawlet case likewise settled the rights in all the glebe lands in 
Vermont in favor of the towns. 
Tradition tells of a brilliant speech of welcome, made without 
preparation, to President Monroe on the occasion of his visit to Ver- 
gennes in 1817. The President asked with surprise and delight: 
“Who is that man?” And on being told, inquired: “Why is he not 
in Congress?” Whenever he argued a justice case in his office a 
crowd was sure to overflow the room to listen to his eloquence. No 
less an authority than Edward J. Phelps declared that he was “one 
of the most finished advocates that ever lived.” 
One of the contemporaries of this remarkable man at the bar. 
Hon. Charles Linsley, has left us this picture of Mr. Edmond: “He 
possessed those rare and striking qualifications as an advocate and 
jury lawyer which captivate the crowd and steal away the hearts of 
the most acute and thoughtful listeners. He was of medium size, 
with a fine form and a countenance dignified and pleasing. With an 
eye dark and pleasing when roused, but in conversation playful and 
sunny, every motion was easy and graceful and every look was genial 
and kind. You saw from the first he was no ordinary man. But 
one must have heard him address a jury—he never wearied them; 
so long as he addressed them every eye was fixed on him with intense 
eagerness. He was always short, rarely exceeding an hour in arguing 
an important case, but that hour was enough for him; for ere that THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
201 
hour was over the jury would be charmed and fascinated by a power 
they could not resist. His voice, soft and melodious in its lower 
tones, was capable of the deepest pathos, or, roused, could reach the 
grand and terrible. His language was carefully chosen, clear and 
plain; it flowed from his persuasive lips like flowing waters, sometimes 
running with a gentle current, then rushing forward with overwhelm- 
ing force, compelling assent to his opinions. He never hesitated; 
seldom paused, never reconstructed a sentence. When the words 
passed his lips they were ready for the press. He was one of nature’s 
orators and fascinated all who heard him. Though he was conscious 
of his great powers, he assumed no airs of superiority; was modest 
and plain in bearing and manner and a great and general favorite 
with his professional brethren.” 
WILLIAM SLADE 
1786-1859 
William Slade was the son of William Slade of Cornwall, who 
was County Sheriff from 1801 to 1810. He was born at Cornwall, 
May 9, 1786. After graduating with honor at Middlebury College 
in 1807 he began the study of law in the office of Judge Doolittle at 
Middlebury and was admitted to practice in 1810, at once opened an 
office in Middlebury and continued in practice, acquiring considerable 
reputation, especially as an advocate, until 1814. At this time he gave 
up the law and became the editor of the Columbian Patriot, a Repub- 
lican (Democratic) newspaper. He found the employment congenial 
and suited to his talents. The paper gave full opportunity, too, for 
the expression of his opinions on the issues of the day, in which he 
became vitally interested for his party, and which he had discussed 
in many public speeches. He established at this time a book store 
and printing office at Middlebury and published several books. This 
enterprise was not successful and was not long continued. His prom- 
inence in his party soon made him an office holder. He was, accord- 
ingly, elected Secretary of State successively from 1815 to 1822, As- 
sistant Judge of Addison County Court from 1816 to 1821, Clerk of 
the Supreme Court for Addison county from 1819 to 1823. In 1824 
he took a clerkship in the Department of State at Washington, which 
he held until 1829, when he returned to Middlebury and resumed 
practice. The next year he was appointed State’s Attorney for the 
county. In 1831 he was elected to Congress, where he continued until 
1843. The following year he acted as Reporter of Decisions of the 
Supreme Court and the same year was elected Governor, continuing 
in that office for two years. From that time to the close of his life 202 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
he was employed as corresponding secretary and general agent of the 
Board of National Popular Education. Governor Slade was charac- 
terized by persevering industry. He possessed a sensitive and ardent 
temperament, which found expression in his political movements, in 
religion and in all enterprises which he thought tended to promote 
the reformation of society. His death occurred January 16, 1859. 
ROBERT B. BATES 
Robert B. Bates was a strong and brilliant man at the Addison 
county bar during the first quarter of the nineteenth century. He 
was admitted to the bar in 1813 and was in practice fifteen or twenty 
years. He was conspicuous as a member of the Legislature from 
1823 to 1829. He held important places on committees, was a popular 
leader, and during the last three years was Speaker of the House. 
He was an accomplished debater, and as a popular orator he stood 
next to Mr. Edmond. But it was as a lawyer that he was mainly 
distinguished. He came to Middlebury thoroughly equipped for his 
profession, but had had no experience. Becoming a partner of Daniel 
Chipman in his large and extensive practice, he had to take up a 
mass of important business, much of which was new to him. This 
he transacted in a creditable manner and retained the confidence of 
clients of the office during the illness of Mr. Chipman and while the 
latter was in Congress. Self-reliant, calm and confident, artful in 
examination and cross-examination of witnesses, clear in statements 
of the law, and powerful as an advocate, he was the best type of the 
accomplished and successful lawyer. 
CHARLES LINSLEY 
1795-1863 
Charles Linsley was born at Cornwall, Vt., August 29, 1795. He 
did not enjoy the advantages of a liberal education, but acquired suffi- 
cient learning for success at the bar. He first engaged in the mer- 
cantile business, which he carried on for but a short time. In 1819 
he commenced to study law in the office of Mr. Starr at Middlebury, 
but completed his course in the office of Chief Judge Stephen Royce 
at St. Albans. In 1823 he was admitted to the bar in Franklin county, 
but came to Middlebury at once and began practice. Here he re- 
mained for thirty-three years, commanding much public respect and 
confidence. In 1856 he removed to Rutland, where he formed a part- 
nership with John Prout and entered into a very large business. In THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
203 
1856 and 1857 he served as Railroad Commissioner by appointment 
of the Supreme Court, being the first incumbent of that office. In 
1858 he represented Rutland in the Legislature and in 1860 held the 
office of Collector of Customs for the district of Vermont under Pres- 
ident Buchanan. He died November 3, 1863. His popularity, legal 
ability, sterling worth and social qualities were generally recognized. 
During the last years of his life he was requested by the Vermont 
Historical Society to prepare sketches of the departed members of 
the Addison county bar. He discharged this task with great discrim- 
ination and thus preserved many facts that would otherwise have 
been forgotten. 
Mr. Linsley was a lover of good society and his taste in this re- 
gard caused him to institute, during the forties, a series of annual 
banquets among the Addison county bar. The first was given at his 
home and such success attended it that the entertainments were con- 
tinued for a number of years at the winter term of the Supreme Court 
for the county. The bar was then made up of brilliant men who 
graced these occasions and brought forward their very best in songs 
written for the occasion and well sung, racy and humorous papers, 
pencil sketches, caricatures in prose and verse; in short, all forms of 
wit, humor, whimsicality and genial sentiment. The meetings were so 
exhilarating that the ever-grave and reverend Judges are said to have 
grown rapidly young as the evening wore on. These were days when 
Edward J. Phelps was a member of the Addison county bar and con- 
tributed to the joy of the annual occasions. These gatherings were 
kept up for a long time and with increasing success, “until,” in the 
words of Mr. Phelps, “death came at last and waited at the feast, 
dispersed the assembly, and put out the lights.” But in the County 
Clerk’s office at Middlebury are said to be preserved the records of 
these entertainments held during the golden age of the Addison county 
bar. 
JOHN W. STEWART 
1825-1915 
John W. Stewart was otie of three great lawyers of the older 
generation of Vermonters who lived far beyond the allotted three 
score years and ten, retaining both physical and mental vigor. The 
other two were George F. Edmunds and Benjamin F. Fifield. He was 
born at Middlebury, November 24, 1825, educated at Middlebury 
Academy and Middlebury College, graduating from the latter in 1846. 
His legal studies were pursued in the office of Horatio Seymour at 
Middlebury, and he was admitted to the bar in January, 1850. Opening 204 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
an office at Middlebury he practiced alone until 1854, when he formed 
a partnership with Judge S. S. Phelps, after the latter’s term had 
expired as United States Senator. This partnership continued until 
the death of the latter in 1855. He was a director of the Middlebury 
Bank from 1858 to 1881, and during several years prior to the latter 
date its president. He was State’s Attorney for Addison county in 
1852, 1853 and 1854, and represented Middlebury in the Legislature 
in 1856, 1857, 1864, 1865, 1866 and 1867. During the last three terms 
he was Speaker of the House. In 1861 and 1862 he was Senator from 
Addison county, serving as chairman of the Judiciary Committee, and 
was Governor from 1870 to 1872. In 1876 he was returned to the 
House and was again its ideal presiding officer. He was in New 
York until the day before the Legislature assembled and arrived in 
Montpelier after the flag had been raised on the State House. The 
roll of the House was being called and he found his way to a vacant 
seat which had been reserved by a friend, and in ten minutes he was 
elected Speaker over his Republican opponent, who had but few votes. 
He was elected to Congress in 1882, 1884, 1886 and 1888, and on 
the death of U. S. Senator Redfield Proctor in March, 1908, he was 
appointed by Governor Fletcher D. Proctor to fill out the unexpired 
term. He formed a partnership with Loyal D. Eldredge, under the 
name of Stewart and Eldredge, which continued until 1883, when 
Mr. Eldredge withdrew and a partnership was formed with Charles 
M. Wilds, under the name of Stewart and Wilds. This continued 
until the death of Mr. Wilds in February, 1901. After this time 
Governor Stewart did no law business, nor was he actively engaged 
in his profession during much of the time after the beginning of his 
Congressional career. His advice, however, was of much assistance 
to Mr. Wilds, to whom the principal labor of the office fell. 
Governor Stewart took high rank as a lawyer. He saw at once 
the salient points of a case and was able to bring these out with 
remarkable clearness and force. His good judgment was sure to put 
him on the right track. He examined and cross-examined witnesses 
with skill and his addresses to the jury were models of forceful argu- 
ment, graceful diction, and polished delivery. He was also a success- 
ful advocate before the Supreme Court. His ability was recognized 
in Congress, where he was one of the leaders. As a public speaker 
he one of the best that Vermont has produced. 
At the time of his death he was the oldest trustee of Middlebury 
College, having served continuously for a period of fifty-seven vears. 
It is doubtful if another term of such duration on the board of any 
American college can be found. He invariably attended the meetings 
of the board when at home and was an active participant in all dis- 
cussions. He received the honorary degree of LL. D. from his college HENRY BATES THAYER 
Born August 17, 1858, in Northfield, Vt., being the 
son of James Carey Barrell Thayer and Martha Jane 
(Pratt) Thayer. Both parents were born in Vermont 
of old New England stock. Some of his ancestors came 
on the Mai)flower. He attended the public schools of 
his native place and graduated from Dartmouth Col- 
lege in 1879. He began work the same year in a 
savings bank in Northfield, and two years later entered 
the employ of the Bell Telephone system as an em- 
ployee of the Western Electric Company at Chicago. 
Within three years thereafter he was made manager of 
the company’s business in New York, being then only 
twenty-six years old, and his progress in the company 
was continuous. From 1884 to 1902 he was manager 
at New York; from 1902 to 1906 he was vice-president. 
In 1907 he became vice-president and general manager, 
and in 1908, president. In 1909 he was elected to the 
vice-presidency of the American Telephone and Tele- 
graph Company, and in 1919 became its president. Mr. 
Thayer is a trustee of Dartmouth College, a director 
of the National Bank of Commerce and a director of 
various telephone and telegraph companies. During all 
these years he has had an important part in the de- 
velopment of the telephone industry, particularly in 
solving the engineering and manufacturing problems, 
both in this country and abroad. He is a member of 
the Metropolitan, Engineers, Lotus, Automobile, Union 
League, University and Delta Kappa Epsilon Clubs of 
New York, also the Union League of Chicago, Chamber 
of Commerce of New York, and the New England 
Society. Mr. Thayer was married April 26, 1887, in 
Ransomville, N. Y., to Carrie M. Ransom, who died 
May 26, 1916. He has three children, Dorothy (Mrs. 
Floyd Noble), Ruth (Mrs. Webb W. Weeks), and John 
A. Thayer. He resides in New Canaan, Conn. THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
205 
in 1876. In 1855 he was County Clerk of Addison county. He was 
a director of the Central Vermont Railway Company and regularly 
attended its meetings. He was usually to be seen at the college func- 
tions and ball games and well merited the title of “Vermont’s Grand 
Old Man.” He died at Middlebury, October 29, 1915. 
CHARLES M. WILDS 
1856-1901 
The two greatest lawyers at the Addison county bar during the 
latter half of the last century occupied houses that stand within a 
few rods of each other on Main Street in the village of Middlebury. 
One was Edward J. Phelps and the other, Charles M. Wilds. The 
former was born in Middlebury, educated at Middlebury College, 
studied law and practiced in his native town before locating at Bur- 
lington. The latter was born at Bristol, graduated from Middlebury 
College, and resided at Middlebury during his professional career. 
Mr. Wilds was the ablest lawyer of his generation who came to the 
bar in western Vermont, and his opinions and sayings were the most 
quoted of any lawyer in the State during the period of his active 
practice. This was due to a combination of qualities which included 
a charming personality, as well as logic, learning and keen discrimina- 
tion. He had a wonderfully pleasing face, a large, strong mouth, 
and a most attractive eye. His figure was commanding; he was over 
six feet in height and well proportioned. Few men in Vermont have 
had more influence with the court of last resort. His birth was at 
Bristol, February 8, 1856. His boyhood was passed in his native 
village, where he fitted for college at the Academy. He entered 
Middlebury College when he was but fifteen and graduated in the 
class of 1875. In college he was honored both for scholarship and 
athletics; he was tireless in mental and physical feats alike. President 
Brainerd gave out to the class in geometry, of which Mr. Wilds was 
a member, a difficult problem which he had been accustomed to give 
each year and which had not been solved by any student up to this 
time. To the delight of his instructor, Mr. Wilds worked out the 
proposition in a short time by a process entirely new and shorter than 
the usual method of solution. On the baseball field he was one of 
the first players to pitch a curved ball. After graduation he took a 
post-graduate course in mathematics at Yale. In 1878 he began study- 
ing law in the office of Wales and Taft at Burlington, where he con- 
tinued until 1879, when he entered the office of Stewart and Eldredge 
at Middlebury and was admitted to the bar in 1880. Soon afterwards 
Mr. Eldredge retired from the firm and in 1883 Mr. Wilds formed 206 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
a partnership with Governor Stewart under the name of Stewart and 
Wilds. This was one of the best known law firms in Vermont and 
its success rested largely upon the efforts of the junior partner. Mr. 
Wilds devoted his energies to the study and practice of the law with 
great ardor and became the best young lawyer in western Vermont. 
He was no less a leader in politics and during the period of his resi- 
dence in Middlebury never once failed in carrying his town for his 
candidate for public office. He declined political office on his own part, 
and preferred to work for his friends rather than be an office holder 
himself. He was fond of giving advice to young attorneys and used 
to admonish them, when speaking of politics, that the true course to 
pursue was to “be in it but not of it.” He served several years as 
State’s Attorney of his county, but regarded this office as a school 
to equip a young lawyer for higher service in his profession. He 
considered the trial of criminal cases as excellent discipline for a 
young attorney and he pointed with pride to his much worn volumes 
on criminal law by Bishop, whom he regarded as a great law writer. 
The only other public trust that he assumed was that of Presidential 
Elector in 1892. He attained local success at once in his profession, 
but this was to him a preparatory period during which he devoted his 
leisure to an exhaustive study of the law and particularly that relating 
to corporations. In this department, as well as in the ordinary branches 
of the law, Mr. Wilds was thoroughly equipped and was able to match 
his learning with some of the best lawyers in the country. He was 
exceptionally strong in the argument of cases before the Supreme 
Court. These he prepared exhaustively and arrayed before the court 
in his briefs all the literature available on the points at issue. His 
presentation was concise, logical, convincing. In 1896, when the Grand 
Trunk Railway Company desired to retain a Vermont lawyer to com- 
mence suit against the Central Vermont Railway Company to recover 
traffic balances, Mr. Wilds was engaged as the best man for this 
service. He brought the suit in the Federal Court that resulted in 
the receivership and had charge of all the legal proceedings. After 
the local road passed to the Grand Trunk system, Mr. Wilds was 
retained by the late Charles M. Hays, president of the Canadian road, 
as leading counsel in connection with the Central Vermont system 
and so remained until his death. During this time he had his office 
with the railroad officials in the station at St. Albans, but retained 
his home at Middlebury. On rendering his final account for services 
in the suit against the Central Vermont Railway Company, Mr. Wilds 
had an experience that falls to the happy lot of but few attorneys. 
It was so modest and the services rendered so valuable that Mr. Hays 
advised that in addition to his fees he be given ten thousand dollars 
in the new bonds of the Central Vermont Company. This advice was THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
207 
followed and so small had been the charges of Mr. Wilds for his 
services as an attorney and so generous his living that this gift con- 
stituted practically his entire estate. In his railroad battles, Mr. Wilds 
met the best lawyers in New England and was never outclassed by 
them. He was well armed for the warfare, but his burning enthu- 
siasm carried him beyond his strength and he died at Middlebury 
of tuberculosis, February 15, 1901, being barely forty-five years of age. 
On the occasion of his funeral the Grand Trunk sent a private 
car, accompanied by many of the officials of the road, to transport his 
remains from Middlebury to Bristol for interment. 
Mr. Wilds had a mind of great natural strength which he culti- 
vated by the constant study of legal principles. He was honest in 
his thinking and saw clearly and quickly the truth. His attractive 
personality, great ability and commanding presence made him a nat- 
ural leader. He was not always successful before a jury, where ap- 
parent success is often attained by making the worse appear the better 
reason, but with the court he had no superiors and almost no equals, 
and in the multitude of duties that a lawyer is called upon to discharge 
no one could do more or better work. His personal friendships were 
many and his early demise a great loss to the legal and political circles 
of Vermont. 
WILLIAM H. BLISS 
1847-1910 
William H. Bliss was born in Royalton, Vt., October 5, 1847, 
and died at Middlebury, November 12, 1910. He was the son of 
Charles and Henrietta Bliss. He fitted for college at the Royalton 
Academy and graduated from the University of Vermont in 1871. 
He studied law in the office of Thomas C. Green, Esq., a leading mem- 
ber of the bar of Providence, and was admitted to the Rhode Island 
bar in 1873. In 1877 he located in Rochester, Vt., where he succeeded 
in practice Christopher A. Webber, father of Marvelle C. Webber, 
of the Rutland bar. Here he remained until 1886, when he moved to 
Middlebury and practiced in partnership successively with Judge 
Lyman E. Knapp, Almon P. Tupper and Homer C. Royce. In 1890 
he was elected State’s Attorney of Addison county, but resigned at 
the end of 1891 at the request of Col. Joseph Battell, who desired to 
retain his exclusive services in the literary pursuits in which he was 
then engaged. During the year he was State’s Attorney he spent seven 
weeks in prosecuting felonies in the County Court, one of these being 
the case of State v. Alphonse Chauquette in which the respondent was 
convicted of murder in the second degree. In 1894, Judge Bliss moved 208 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
to Burlington, where for three years he was in partnership with 
Eleazer R. Hard. He later became associated with Fred B. Deber- 
ville as a law partner at Middlebury, where he returned to take up 
practice. On the death of Judge James M. Slade in September, 1899, 
he was appointed his successor as Judge of Probate for the Addison 
district. This office he retained until his decease. For a number of 
years prior to his death he had no law partner. He was connected with 
the principal trials in Addison county, and following the decease of 
Mr. Wilds in 1901 was the leader of the bar. As a lawyer he had 
few equals in Vermont. He prepared his cases for trial with great 
care, and he tried these skilfully and forcefully. He was particularly 
able in the trial of will cases, in which he had had much experience. 
It was a delight to be associated with him in a case, and a pleasure, 
too, to have him as an opponent, for in either case fair and honorable 
treatment was sure to be accorded. His fine scholarship and menta1 
acumen made him an excellent briefer, and his arguments before the 
Supreme Court were models both in form and matter. He argued no 
less than fifty-six cases before the Supreme Court of Vermont. 
He was a lover of literature, an accomplished scholar and a poet. 
He had written verse from his college days and more than once was 
called on to become the alumni poet of his University. He wrote 
many poems for public occasions, and left much unpublished verse. 
THREE BRILLIANT VERGENNES LAWYERS 
PHILIP C. TUCKER 
1800-1861 
It is natural that the leading lawyers of Addison county should 
have located at the county seat, as business centers where the courts 
are held. David Edmond, Chief Judge Enoch Woodbridge and Chief 
Judge John Pierpoint were the most conspicuous lawyers of Addison 
county who lived outside of Middlebury. These men lived at Ver- 
gennes. The chapter on the Judges contains the outlines of the lives 
of Judge Woodbridge and of Judge Pierpoint, and the brilliant career 
of Mr. Edmond is sketched in this chapter. There were several other 
men, however, who took up the law as a profession and practiced 
in Vergennes, who by natural gifts and legal abilities were equipped 
for the highest service in the profession. One of these men was Philip 
C. Tucker, who was born in Boston, January 11, 1800, and came to 
Vergennes in 1815. He received his early education in the schools 
of Boston, but was a student by nature and habit all his life and his 
attainments in scientific knowledge and belles lettres were of a high THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
209 
order. He studied law in the office of David Edmond and Noah Haw- 
ley at Vergennes and in 1825 was admitted to the Addison county bar. 
He commenced at once the practice of the law at Vergennes and con- 
tinued it with considerable success all his life. In politics he was a 
Democrat. In 1828 he was a member of the State Constitutional Con- 
vention and in 1829 and 1830, of the Legislature. In 1835 the Uni- 
versity of Vermont conferred on him the honorary degree of Master 
of Arts and in 1842 Middlebury College bestowed a similar honor. 
In 1821, Mr. Tucker became a Free Mason and advanced in due course 
to the highest office conferred in the State. For many years he was 
the highest officer in the local bodies and later he became the leading 
Mason in Vermont and held high office in the Grand Lodge and Grand 
Chapter. He lived in th« days of the Anti-Masonic crusade and at 
its beginning was Deputy Grand Master of the Grand Lodge. He 
at once attacked the enemies of the Order with voice and pen and 
became the champion and leader of the faithful in Vermont. In so 
doing he sacrificed business and future prospects in his profession 
and lost the goal he should have attained in the law. In 1847, the 
contest over, he was elected Grand Master of the Masonic Grand 
Lodge and held this office until his death, which occurred at Ver- 
gennes, April 10, 1861, a period of fourteen years. Mr. Tucker was 
distinguished as an able writer and an accomplished advocate and by 
great independence of thought and action. He was dignified and 
impressive in appearance and was a thorough gentleman of the old 
school. His Masonic writings obtained for him more than a national 
reputation, while his literary and professional labors commanded the 
respect of his contemporaries. 
FREDERICK E. WOODBRIDGE 
1818-1888 
Another Vergennes lawyer who belongs in the class now under 
historical review was Frederick E. Woodbridge. He was born at 
Vergennes, August 29, 1818, and died at the same place, April 26, 
1888. He was the grandson of Judge Enoch Woodbridge and the 
son of Enoch Day Woodbridge, the latter of whom was a prominent 
and influential citizen of Vergennes, its Mayor and a member of both 
branches of the Legislature. His mother was Clara Strong, daughter 
of Gen. Samuel Strong, who commanded the Vermont troops in the 
Battle of Plattsburg. One brother, Samuel, graduated at Williams Col- 
lege about 1827, studied law, was admitted to the bar and practiced for 
a time with his father. He combined marked ability with unusual 
amiability of character, and his early death, August 25, 1834, ter- 210 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
minated a career of great promise. Frederick E. Woodbridge was 
graduated at the University of Vermont in the class of 1841. He 
studied law in the office of his father and was admitted to the bar in 
1843, where he soon took high rank as an advocate and speedily 
attained prominence and influence in public affairs. He represented 
Vergennes in the Legislature in 1849, 1857 and 1858; was repeatedly 
Mayor of Vergennes; was State Auditor in 1850, 1851 and 1852; 
from 1854 to 1858 was State’s Attorney of Addison county; for sev- 
eral years was vice-president and active manager of the Rutland & 
Washington Railroad; and was State Senator in 1860 and 1861 and 
president pro tempore at the latter session. In 1862 he was elected 
to Congress and re-elected to the two following sessions. After his 
retirement from Congress he was again several times elected to the 
Legislature of Vermont. Mr. Woodbridge was a very brilliant man. 
He had a fondness for learning, was an accomplished scholar in the 
dead languages, familiar with the best literature, and possessed of a 
great fund of general information. He was, moreover, a gifted speaker, 
whose sentences came in rhythmic flow and whose presence and gesture 
added to the charm of his delivery. He was sure of a hearing when he 
spoke to his fellow citizens at home, or addressed the conventions 
of his party, or appeared as a disputant in political campaigns. In 
Congress his reputation as an eloquent orator assured him of a full 
attendance whenever it was announced that he would speak. He had 
great amiability of disposition and was sympathetic and kind to the 
poor. He was high minded and generous almost to a fault. Had he 
served his profession “with but half the zeal” that he devoted to 
politics he might have stood at the head of his bar, but he gradually 
let go from the study of the law, and in old age found himself without 
clients in circumstances such that he would have been glad to have 
retained them. He was, notwithstanding, an eloquent and persuasive 
advocate, and he achieved a good deal of success with juries, especially 
in his earlier practice. 
GEORGE W. GRANDEY 
1813-1893 
The other member of the Vergennes triumvirate who is entitled 
to notice was George W. Grandey, who was born in Panton, February 
3, 1813, and died at Vergennes, December 14, 1893. He studied law 
and was admitted to the Vermont bar in 1841 and a few years later 
to the bar of the Supreme Court of the United States. He represented 
Vergennes in the General Assembly thirteen years, was County Sen- 
ator for two years; was Speaker of the House in 1854, 1855, 1856, PARTHENIA ROBINSON KENNEDY 
Born in Moretown, Washington county, Vt., 
November 19, 1802. She was sixth in descent from 
Rev. John Robinson, pastor of the pilgrims at Scrooby 
and Leyden. Her grandfather was Gov. Moses Robin- 
son and her father, Elijah Robinson, a captain in the 
War of 1812. Her mother was Lydia Bragg of More- 
town. A private teacher was secured by a group of 
families, including the Robinsons and Governor Skin- 
ner’s family, and Parthenia Robinson secured a better 
education than the common schools of the period 
afforded. She married Leonard Kennedy of Hartford, 
Conn., July 14, 1825. After marriage Mr. and Mrs. 
Kennedy resided for a short time in Utica, N. Y., re- 
moving soon to Hartford, Conn. Later they resided in 
Milwaukee, Wis., for several years, going from there 
to California and returning three years later to Hart- 
ford, Conn., to live and die in the house where most of 
their children were born. The children were Miriam 
Parthenia, Leonard White, Fanny I.ewis, Algernon Sid- 
ney, Samuel Lewis, Susan Skinner, and Elijah Rob- 
inson. Mrs. Kennedy was an intellectual woman, ani- 
mated and entertaining in her relations with others and 
witty in her conversation. She died April 14, 1874. Airs. Parthenia Robinson Kennedy THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
211 
and at the extra session of 1857, and again in 1868 and 1869; was 
County Superintendent of Schools in 1846 and 1847; was Superin- 
tendent of Schools for Vergennes for twenty-four years; member 
of the State Board of Education in 1873 and 1874; State’s Attorney 
for Addison county in 1845, 1846 and 1847, and again in 1869, 1870 
and 1871; was chairman of the Vermont Electoral College at the 
Presidential election in 1868, a delegate-at-large from Vermont to 
the Republican National Convention in 1872 and chairman of the 
Republican State Committee for many years, beginning in 1874 and 
ending a short time prior to his death. For five years he was National 
Bank Examiner for Vermont. General Grandey was a man of very 
exceptional natural gifts. Edward J. Phelps, who was in attendance 
on the occasion of his burial, said of him, in conversation with a friend, 
that he “did not see why General Grandey was not a great man,” 
that “he had read everything and forgotten nothing.” Had circum- 
stances and temperament been in accord for an eminent career at the 
bar, it certainly would have come to General Grandey, but the allure- 
ments of politics drew him away from his books, and he preferred 
to rely on his wits and to do small business rather than devote himself 
to the better things of his profession. He was by nature scholarly 
and his discussion of a legal principle was in the language of the 
books, but he preferred the Justice Courts to the County Court or 
the Supreme Court, for the exercise of his legal talents. He tried 
many justice cases with great success and was here a match for any 
man in the profession. Like Stephen A. Douglas, he was noted for 
his agility in that kind of mental give-and-take that corresponds to 
physical combat, but he shrank from profound legal discussions in 
the higher courts. He was a man of striking presence, had a piercing 
eye, and hair as black as a raven. His mouth was large, strong and 
filled with teeth of almost oversize. He was of medium stature, but 
finely proportioned. His form was erect, and whether he sat on horse- 
back or walked the street or conversed with friends or was in action 
in making addresses he was sure to attract attention. His gestures 
were emphatic and his speech positive and convincing. He drew 
from a great fund of information that he carried at his tongue tip. 
It was definite if not profound. In his day Vermont had no man 
who could preside better over a public assembly, and if ever an abler 
Speaker sat in the chair of the House there was never a more gifted 
one. On the second day of the session he could call by name and 
town every man in the General Assembly. He could bound every 
town in Vermont. As an extemporaneous speaker he had no equal 
in the State. In the discussion of local questions he was usually 
pitted against Mr. Woodbridge, and the arguments of these men were 
sure to enlist the interested attention of the hearers, who hung upon 212 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
their eloquent words and applauded their sallies of wit and thrusts 
of sarcasm. On public occasions speeches were expected from both 
men and their admiring fellow citizens were sure to be filled with 
joy and pride at their efforts. Of the three men, Mr. Woodbridge 
was the most accomplished, while General Grandey had the more 
remarkable natural talents. It is a great misfortune that none of 
the men had an exclusive taste for the law, for the highest success 
would have been sure to have followed. The law is a jealous mistress 
and success at the bar comes not to him who worships at another 
shrine. 
PRESENT MEMBERS OF THE ADDISON COUNTY BAR 
Charles F. Abbott, of Middlebury, was born at Sheffield, 
Conn., August 24, 1868. He was educated at the Stevens High 
School, Claremont, N. H., and at Dartmouth College and Har- 
vard University; studied law at the University of Michigan, where 
he received his degree in 1897; was admitted to the bar of Michigan 
in June, 1897, and to the bar of Colorado in the fall of the same year, 
to the bar of Massachusetts in 1899, and to the bar of Vermont in 
1917. He practiced at Denver from 1897 to 1898 and at Gardner, 
Mass., from 1899 to 1901. In the latter place he was a member of 
the School Board. He is at present a professor in Middlebury College. 
Wayne C. Bosworth, of Middlebury, was born at Bristol, Feb- 
ruary 2, 1891. He was graduated at Middlebury College in 1911 and 
at Trinity College, Oxford, in 1917. He studied law at the New York 
Law School and with Walter H. Cleary and John W. Redmond at 
Newport, and was admitted to the bar in 1917. He has been in 
practice at Middlebury since October 1, 1919. 
Charles I. Button, of Middlebury, was born at Brandon, May 
14, 1877, and graduated from the Brandon High School in 1894. He 
graduated at the head of his class at the University of Vermont in 
1899 and enjoyed a similar honor at the law school of Lake Forest 
University in Chicago, where he graduated in a class of over sixty 
in 1902. He was admitted to the Chicago bar in June, 1902, and 
to the bar of Vermont in January, 1904. In Chicago he was in two 
law offices, that of Church, McMurdy and Sherman and that of Garnet 
and Burnes while he was a student in the law school, and after his 
graduation and before entering the law school he was a student in 
the office of Hon. E. J. Ormsbee at Brandon. He was for a time a 
cataloguer in the Chicago Law Institute, the large library located in 
the Cook county court house. After practicing in Chicago for a year THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
213 
he located at Middlebury, where he was associated with the late Judge 
William H. Bliss in many of his cases and on the death of the latter 
in 1910 he became his successor as Judge of Probate for the Addison 
district and continues to hold that office. Judge Button is one of the 
committee of bar examiners for Vermont. He was elected to the 
General Assembly of Vermont in 1920. 
Ellsworth B. Cornwall, of Middlebury, was born at Princeton. 
N. J., October 21, 1884, and was educated at the Gunnery School in 
Washington, Conn., and at Princeton University, where he graduated 
in 1905. He studied law at the New York Law School and was 
graduated in the class of 1907. During his law school period he 
was in the law office of Henry W. Jessup of New York City. He was 
admitted to the New York bar in 1907 and practiced for one year 
in New York after his admission. He was admitted to the bar of 
Vermont in 1914. 
Albert W. Dickens, of Middlebury, was born at Comstock’s Land- 
ing, N. Y., October 20, 1852. He was educated at “The Old Red 
School House” at Northumberland, Saratoga county, N. Y., Fort 
Edward Collegiate Institute, Princeton University, Union Theological 
Seminary, and Union Seminary. He studied law at Middlebury in 
the office of Hon. L. D. Eldredge, Donoway and Davis, and Ira H. 
LaFleur, and was admitted to the bar May 20, 1903. Since the above 
date he has practiced at Middlebury, where he has held the office 
of Justice of the Peace since 1902; he was Referee in Bankruptcy 
from 1908 to 1917 and since the latter year has been Municipal Judge 
for Addison county. 
Robert D. Hope, of Middlebury, was born in that place March 
11, 1886. He was educated at Middlebury and at Northfield and 
studied law in the office of Ira H. LaFleur; he was admitted January 
14, 1914, to the bar of Vermont. Pie has not been in active practice 
and since 1914 has been assistant treasurer of Middlebury College. 
Edwin G. Hunt, of New Haven, was born at Belmont, N. Y., 
May 6, 1837; he graduated from Middlebury College in the class of 
1857 and studied law in different places and was admitted to the bar 
and practiced in the West. He returned to Vermont several years 
ago and since then has been engaged in farming in the town of New 
Haven. He represented his town in the Legislature of Vermont and 
was a leader in debate. 
Ira H. LaFleur, of Middlebury, was born at Prescott, Ontario, 
March 23, 1870, and was graduated from the Massena Academy, 214 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
Canada, in 1889, and from Middlebury College in 1894. He studied 
law for a short time with Judge James M. Slade of Middlebury and 
for a brief period with A. P. Tupper of the same place, but prepared 
for the bar principally by studying alone. He was admitted in 1898 
and has since practiced at Middlebury. He has held the office of 
Justice of the Peace since 1896 and of School Commissioner since 
1902; was trustee of the village one year and Village Attorney two 
years and now is town Moderator. He represented his town in the 
Legislature in 1917 and his county in the Senate in 1919. 
Robert W. McCuen, of Vergennes, was born there May 30, 1880, 
and was educated at the Vergennes High School, Middlebury College 
and Boston University Law School. He studied law with Judge 
Frank L. Fish of Vergennes, and James B. Donoway of Middlebury, 
received the degree of B. L. from the law school in 1914 and was 
admitted to the bar of this State the same year. He practiced at 
Middlebury and Vergennes from his admission until 1917 and after 
his retirement from the army resumed practice at Vergennes. 
From 1902 to 1912 he was editor and publisher of the Vergennes 
Enterprise and Vermonter; Alderman from 1904 to 1907; member 
of the House in 1906 and 1910 and of the Senate in 1912; delegate to 
the Republican National Convention in 1908; school director; member 
of the Champlain Tercentenary Commission, and of the Macdonough 
Commission and president of the Vermont Press Association. He 
was in the United States Army during the World War from May, 
1917, to April, 1919, and retired from the service with the rank of 
Major. He attended the Plattsburg Training Camp, and was after- 
wards assigned to the Fourth Division Headquarters (Regular Army) 
and was with the American Expeditionary Forces in France and 
Germany ten months. He was in the Fourth Division in the battles 
of Chateau Thierry and the Vesle River, the St. Mihiel Drive, and the 
Argonne-Meuse Forest, and afterwards with the Army of Occupation 
in Germany. He was appointed Collector of Internal Revenue by 
President Harding in August, 1921, with offices at Burlington. 
Jasper G. Page, of Bristol, was born at Lincoln, December 2, 
1874. He was educated in the schools of Lincoln, at Centerville, R. I., 
and at Beeman Academy, where he graduated in 1895. He studied 
law in the office of Davis and Russell at Middlebury and at the Albany 
Law School; was admitted in 1908 and has since practiced at Bristol. 
He held several town offices in Lincoln, was Town Grand Juror in 
Middlebury and has been Town Agent in Bristol. 
Leroy C. Russell, of Middlebury, was born at New Haven, May 
23, 1874, and was educated at Beeman Academy and at Middlebury THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
215 
College, where he graduated in the class of 1897. He studied law in 
the office of Judson E. Cushman at Burlington, was admitted to the 
bar in 1902 and has since practiced at Middlebury. He was State’s 
Attorney of Addison county from 1904 to 1908 and has been Referee 
in Bankruptcy since 1917. 
George W. Stone, of Vergennes, was born in Vergennes, March 
22, 1876, and educated at the Vergennes High School, Vermont Acad- 
emy, and Middlebury College. He graduated from the last named in- 
stitution in 1901, studied law in Atlantic City with Judge Robert H. In- 
gersoll, and was admitted to the bar of New Jersey in 1905 and to the 
bar of Vermont in 1912; practiced at Atlantic City from 1905 to 
1912 and has practiced at Vergennes since then. He was Deputy Clerk 
of the Municipal Courts of Atlantic City from 1903 to 1905, and has 
been City Clerk of Vergennes since March, 1914; was permanent mem- 
ber of the Addison county legal advisory board during the war, Captain 
of the Vermont Volunteer Militia, and member of the House of Rep- 
resentatives in 1915. He was elected State’s Attorney of Addison 
county in 1920. 
Allen R. Sturtevant, of Middlebury, was born at Granville, August 
27, 1879, educated at Beeman Academy and the University of Ver- 
mont, where he graduated in 1901. He studied law in the office 
of Judge Charles I. Button and in the office of Ira H. LaFleur in 
Middlebury, and in the Lincoln-Jefferson University at Hammond, 
Ind., where he received the B. L. degree in 1911. He was admitted 
to the bar of Vermont in 1911 and has since practiced at Middlebury. 
He held the office of State’s Attorney of Addison county from 1914 
to 1921, has been attorney for the village of Middlebury since 1912, and 
is a trustee of the Addison County Trust Company. 
Frank W. Tuttle, of Vergennes, was born at Montpelier, February 
6. 1860, and was educated in the public schools of that city. He 
studied law in the office of Hiram A. Huse and was admitted to the 
bar in 1881. He practiced law in Grand Forks, N. D., for two years 
and then removed to Vergennes, where he has since practiced. He 
was Alderman and Mayor and for ten years preceding 1914, City 
Clerk, and for many years City Attorney; was State’s Attorney for 
six years beginning in 1908, and since that time has been Judge of 
Probate for the New Haven district. In 1917 he represented Ver- 
gennes in the Legislature. BENNINGTON COUNTY 
THE county of Bennington comprises seventeen towns and is the 
only county with two shires. These are Bennington and Man- 
chester. In the former are the towns of Bennington, Glasten- 
bury, Pownal, Readsboro, Searsburg, Shaftsbury, Stamford and Wood- 
ford ; and in the latter are Arlington, Dorset, Landgrove, Manchester, 
Peru, Rupert, Sandgate, Sunderland and Winhall. 
At the time New York claimed to exercise jurisdiction over Ver- 
mont the lands in the present county of Bennington were claimed 
as part of the county of Albany. In 1772 that county was divided 
by an act of the New York Assembly and the county of Charlotte 
constituted, which included nearly the whole of the west side of the 
State of Vermont, with a county seat at Whitehall, N. Y. Cumber- 
land county was established in 1766 and Gloucester county in 1770. 
When the State, on its organization in March, 1778, was divided into 
two counties by the ridge of the Green Mountains the name given 
to the western county was Bennington. This county was divided 
into two shires, the part embracing the present county of Bennington 
being called the Bennington shire, and the county seats being Benning- 
ton and Rutland. 
By act of the General Assembly, passed February 13, 1781, the 
county of Rutland was formed out of that of Bennington, the south 
line of the new county being identical with its present boundary. At 
the same session the towns of Bennington and Manchester were de- 
clared to be “half shires for. holding courts in the county of Benning- 
ton provided the town of Bennington completes a jail by the first 
day of June next and a court house by the first of October next,” 
the courts to be held alternately in the two shires. The court houses 
and jails were subsequently built in each of the shire towns and the 
arrangement then made has continued to the present. The County 
Court sits at Manchester on the first Tuesday of June and at Ben- 
nington on the first Tuesday of December. 
For many years prior to 1915 a court rule was in force which 
permitted litigants so desiring to try their cases in the shire of their 
residence. This gave in effect but Qne term of court a year and re- 
tarded litigation. In 1915 a new rule was adopted which provides 
that if the parties cannot agree that a case shall be tried in the shire 
where the court is in session, the court may order the case for trial 
there or in the other shire, and at the conclusion of the other business 
of the term may adjourn from one shire to the other for the purpose 
of trying a case therein. 
In 1791 the first court house and jail was erected on the summit 
of the hill in the old village of Bennington. This building was re- THEODORE N. VAIL 
Born in Carrolton county, Ohio, July 16, 1845. 
His father removed to New Jersey and later 
the family went to Iowa. The lad studied in 
the old academy at Morristown, N. J. He had 
acquired a knowledge of telegraphy and he secured a 
position as operator at a small station on the Union 
Pacific Railroad. In 1869 he was appointed a clerk in 
the railway mail service. His success in distributing 
and dispatching mail brought him, in succession, the 
appointments of assistant superintendent and general 
superintendent of the Railway Mail Service. His ex- 
ecutive ability attracted attention and he was offered 
the position of general manager of the Bell Telephone 
Company. This he accepted, and although he had many 
obstacles to overcome he was eminently successful. 
From 1885 to 1887 he was president of the American 
Telephone and Telegraph Company and later he served 
as president of the Metropolitan Telephone and Tele- 
graph Company of New York. In 1893 he visited South 
America and organized a trolley service for Buenos 
Aires, Argentina. He purchased a large farm in Lyn- 
don, Vt., known as the Speedwell Farms, where he 
raised horses, cattle and sheep, making the place his 
home for many years. In 1907 Mr. Vail again accepted 
the presidency of the American Telephone and Tele- 
graph Company. In 1910 he was elected president of 
the Western Union Telegraph Company and reorganized 
its business. He was a director in several banks and 
corporations and received honorary degrees from 
Princeton, Dartmouth and Middlebury Colleges, the 
University of Vermont and New York University. He 
founded an agricultural school at Lyndon, Vt. He was 
a delegate from Vermont to the Republican National 
Convention of 1916. He died April 16, 1920. BENNINGTON COUNTY 
THE county of Bennington comprises seventeen towns and is the 
only county with two shires. These are Bennington and Man- 
chester. In the former are the towns of Bennington, Glasten- 
bury, Pownal, Readsboro, Searsburg, Shaftsbury, Stamford and Wood- 
ford ; and in the latter are Arlington, Dorset, Landgrove, Manchester, 
Peru, Rupert, Sandgate, Sunderland and Winhall. 
At the time New York claimed to exercise jurisdiction over Ver- 
mont the lands in the present county of Bennington were claimed 
as part of the county of Albany. In 1772 that county was divided 
by an act of the New York Assembly and the county of Charlotte 
constituted, which included nearly the whole of the west side of the 
State of Vermont, with a county seat at Whitehall, N. Y. Cumber- 
land county was established in 1766 and Gloucester county in 1770. 
When the State, on its organization in March, 1778, was divided into 
two counties by the ridge of the Green Mountains the name given 
to the western county was Bennington. This county was divided 
into two shires, the part embracing the present county of Bennington 
being called the Bennington shire, and the county seats being Benning- 
ton and Rutland. 
By act of the General Assembly, passed February 13, 1781, the 
county of Rutland was formed out of that of Bennington, the south 
line of the new county being identical with its present boundary. At 
the same session the towns of Bennington and Manchester were de- 
clared to be “half shires for. holding courts in the county of Benning- 
ton provided the town of Bennington completes a jail by the first 
day of June next and a court house by the first of October next,” 
the courts to be held alternately in the two shires. The court houses 
and jails were subsequently built in each of the shire towns and the 
arrangement then made has continued to the present. The County 
Court sits at Manchester on the first Tuesday of June and at Ben- 
nington on the first Tuesday of December. 
For many years prior to 1915 a court rule was in force which 
permitted litigants so desiring to try their cases in the shire of their 
residence. This gave in effect but Qne term of court a year and re- 
tarded litigation. In 1915 a new rule was adopted which provides 
that if the parties cannot agree that a case shall be tried in the shire 
where the court is in session, the court may order the case for trial 
there or in the other shire, and at the conclusion of the other business 
of the term may adjourn from one shire to the other for the purpose 
of trying a case therein. 
In 1791 the first court house and jail was erected on the summit 
of the hill in the old village of Bennington. This building was re- THEODORE N. VAIL 
Born in Carrolton county, Ohio, July 16, 1845. 
His father removed to New Jersey and later 
the family went to Iowa. The lad studied in 
the old academy at Morristown, N. J. He had 
acquired a knowledge of telegraphy and he secured a 
position as operator at a small station on the Union 
Pacific Railroad. In 1869 he was appointed a clerk in 
the railway mail service. His success in distributing 
and dispatching mail brought him, in succession, the 
appointments of assistant superintendent and general 
superintendent of the Railway Mail Service. His ex- 
ecutive ability attracted attention and he was offered 
the position of general manager of the Bell Telephone 
Company. This he accepted, and although he had many 
obstacles to overcome he was eminently successful. 
From 1885 to 1887 he was president of the American 
Telephone and Telegraph Company and later he served 
as president of the Metropolitan Telephone and Tele- 
graph Company of New York. In 1893 he visited South 
America and organized a trolley service for Buenos 
Aires, Argentina. He purchased a large farm in Lyn- 
don, Vt., known as the Speedwell Farms, where he 
raised horses, cattle and sheep, making the place his 
home for many years. In 1907 Mr. Vail again accepted 
the presidency of the American Telephone and Tele- 
graph Company. In 1910 he was elected president of 
the Western Union Telegraph Company and reorganized 
its business. He was a director in several banks and 
corporations and received honorary degrees from 
Princeton, Dartmouth and Middlebury Colleges, the 
University of Vermont and New York University. He 
founded an agricultural school at Lyndon, Vt. He was 
a delegate from Vermont to the Republican National 
Convention of 1916. He died April 16, 1920. THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
217 
placed by a brick structure which was authorized by an act of the 
Legislature, passed in 1846. The courts for the southern shire were 
held here until March 26, 1869, when the court house was destroyed 
by fire. By this time the village of Bennington had outstripped the 
old village in population and wealth and had become the business 
center of the town. The County Clerk had found it necessary to 
maintain an office in the principal village for the convenience of the 
bar, and here the important current records of the county were kept. 
An attempt was made to retain the court house in its former location, 
but a portion of the people were in favor of locating the county 
buildings in a central place where all the records could be kept and 
all the courts held, and thus abolishing the two shires. 
An act, passed by the General Assembly, November 15, 1869, 
levied a tax on the county for the purpose of erecting buildings for 
the County Court. This act provided that a vote should be taken in 
the towns of the county at the town meetings to be held on the last 
Tuesday of the February following to determine whether there should 
be county buildings in more than one place. The voters who desired 
but one place for holding court were to designate on their ballots the 
place in which they wished the court house and jail to be erected; 
if there should be a majority of the votes for any place the buildings 
were to be erected there, but if otherwise they were to be located in 
the village of Bennington. All the voters designated the place where 
they wished the new buildings to be erected, if a majority should 
vote for a single place. The vote was in favor of the continuance 
of the two shires and a committee chosen for the purpose erected 
the present court house and jail in the village of Bennington. This 
building has recently undergone repairs. The court room has been 
reduced in size by partitioning off the balcony, the jail has been 
strengthened by the installation of steel cages, and the offices of the 
County Clerk and Judge of Probate and the quarters of the jailor 
have been renovated and improved. 
The court house at Manchester was built in 1822 on land owned 
by the town. This succeeded an older structure wherein were held 
the courts, religious and town meetings. In 1842 the town began 
holding town meetings here every two years. The court room was 
used by the public for meetings of all kinds, the bell was used 
for a fire alarm, and the building was left unlocked. Meetings were 
held in the court house by the village as well as the town of Man- 
chester, and one of the rooms was used for the Town Clerk’s office 
and another for the Tudge of Probate for the Manchester district. 
In 1849 an addition was built on the rear of the building in order to 
give more capacity to the court room and in 1890 further additions 
and improvements were made. It is not surprising that the inhabi- 218 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
tants of Manchester, after having occupied the court house for so 
long a time and in so many ways should have concluded that they 
had some legal rights in it. This opinion was strengthened by the 
fact that the court house had been built on land owned by the town. 
The town undertook in a suit in chancery to have its rights deter- 
mined, in which they made claim that the buildings had not been so 
dedicated to the county’s use that the legal title of the town had 
ceased, and so they claimed the right of occupancy. The Court of 
Chancery held otherwise, as appears by the decision of the Supreme 
Court in County of Bennington v. Manchester, et al., 87 Vt., 555. 
JOHN BURNAM 
1742-1829 
John Burnam, commonly recognized as the first Vermont law- 
yer, was born at Ipswich, Mass., in 1742. He died at Middletown, 
August 1, 1829. When he was nineteen years old he came to Ben- 
nington. In 1764 he bought one hundred acres of land in Shaftsbury 
and the following year located there near the residence of John Munro 
a “Yorker,” who held a commission from New York as a Justice of 
the Peace and became obnoxious to the New Hampshire grantees. 
A dispute arose between Munro and Mr. Burnam and the former 
having prevailed because of his supposed legal knowledge, Mr. Burn- 
am proposed to inform himself on the subject of law so that he 
might understand his own rights. There was no attorney in the 
western Grants at this time or nearer than the village of Lansingburg, 
N. Y. Thither Mr. Burnam went and procured Blackstone’s Com- 
mentaries and a volume or two of New York Colony Laws. These 
he became familiar with, by exhaustive study, and thus became a well- 
read lawyer. This knowledge he put into practice and tendered his 
services to the people in his vicinity and thus became the first lawyer 
upon the Grants. From 1771 to 1779 he resided in Bennington, where 
he was engaged in the mercantile business. The latter year he went 
to Shaftsbury, where he remained until 1785. During this time he 
was a member of the conventions which met in 1776-77, authorized 
a separate State, and formed our first Constitution. He was on the 
committee “to prepare a draught for a declaration for a new and sepa- 
rate State.” He represented Bennington in the first General Assembly, 
which was held at Windsor in 1778. At that session the common 
law of England was established as the law of this State. Mr. Burnam 
is credited by tradition with having defended David Redding, who was 
charged with “inimical conduct” and by a jury of six persons only THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
219 
was convicted. He was sentenced to be executed June 4, 1778. On 
that day Mr. Burnam informed the Governor and Council, then in 
session in Bennington, that no person could be sentenced under the 
common law of England but upon a conviction by twelve of his peers. 
A reprieve was accordingly granted until June 11 at two o’clock in 
the afternoon. The vast multitude that had assembled to witness 
the execution was greatly disappointed and clamorous for action. 
Ethan Allen mounted a stump and told the people to go home and 
come again on the day named, when someone would be hanged, for 
if Redding was not hanged he would be. The case was taken up in 
the General Assembly, June 6, which voted that the petition for a 
new trial be taken into consideration and a committee of five was ap- 
pointed to prepare a bill. In council, June 9, 1778, Ethan Allen was 
chosen to act as State’s Attorney in the case, and on the same day the 
common law trial by a jury of twelve was held, Redding was con- 
victed and executed on June 11, the day fixed in the reprieve. 
The first attorneys under the government of this State were 
Stephen Row Bradley and Noah Smith, who were admitted to prac- 
tice in May, 1779. Nathaniel Chipman was admitted in June and 
Jonathan Bruce in November of the same year, but neither of these 
men was a resident of Vermont until after Mr. Burnam had earned 
the right to be called a lawyer. After the courts were established 
Mr. Burnam appeared in court in several cases tried in Bennington 
and in some of these cases was opposed by Messrs. Bradley and Chip- 
man, who insisted on his taking the attorney’s oath; and he was 
admitted to practice at Bennington in 1780. He moved to Middle- 
town in 1785 and there practiced law for several years, and repre- 
sented the town for six years, beginning in 1788, in the General As- 
sembly. He was declared to be “a man of real abilities and great 
scientific knowledge.” 
AHIMAN L. MINER 
1804-1886 
Ahiman L. Miner held a leading place at the Bennington county 
bar for more than half a century. He was born at Middletown, Vt., 
September 23, 1804. Educated in the common schools and at an 
academy, he studied law in the offices of Mallory and Warner at 
Poultney, Benjamin F. Langdon at Castleton, and Royce and Hodges 
at Rutland, and was admitted to the bar in Rutland county in 1832. 
He soon located in Wallingford, where he practiced for three years, 
after which he removed to Manchester, where he remained until his 220 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
death. During his long career at the bar he held many public offices. 
He was Clerk of the House of Representatives in 1836 and 1837. 
In 1838 and 1839, and 1846, 1847, 1853, 1861, 1862, 1865, 1867 and 
1868, he represented Manchester in the Legislature and in 1840 was 
a Senator from Bennington county. In 1850 he was elected to Con- 
gress ; was the Register of Probate for the Manchester district for 
many years and for three years the Judge of that court. He was 
State’s Attorney of Bennington county in 1843 and 1844, and again 
in 1863, 1864 and 1865. In 1836 he received from Middlebury Col- 
lege the honorary degree of A. M. He was for many years associated 
in practice with Lieutenant-Governor Leonard Sargent. Mr. Miner 
acquired a large clientage and was exceedingly popular as a jury ad- 
vocate. In 1869 there were forty-eight litigated cases set for trial by 
jury at the June term, in all of which Mr. Miner was engaged as coun- 
sel. His excellent personal character as a man and citizen, his amiable, 
kindly and honest disposition were important elements in his success. 
His exceptional ability and large practice should have rewarded him 
with a correspondingly large income and property, but he did not 
avail himself of his opportunities; he worked for small fees, when 
not gratuitously, failed to collect what he had earned, and died poor. 
ABRAHAM B. GARDNER 
1819-1881 
Abraham B. Gardner was born at Pownal, Vt., September 2, 1819, 
and died at Bennington, November 23, 1881. In school he was re- 
markable for his close attention to study and his proficiency in every 
department. He prepared for college at Union Academy, Bennington, 
and graduated from Union College, Schenectady, N. Y., in the class 
of 1841. He studied law in the office of his uncle, Isaac T. Wright, 
of Castleton, and at the April term, 1844, of the Rutland County 
Court was admitted to the bar. Three years later, in Bennington 
county, he was admitted to the Supreme Court. He was pre-em- 
inently a lawyer, and his success was commensurate with his energy 
and ability. Ihe majority of his cases were such as demanded much 
legal acumen; he displayed excellent judgment and profound wisdom 
in their management. His dispassionate manner and the clearness 
and force of his arguments carried conviction. By temperament and 
habit he was sure to see the right side of a case, and his espousal of 
a cause, to those who knew him, was an assurance that he had the 
truth on his side. At the time of his decease Mr. Gardner was as- 
sociated with the late Henry A. Harman, formerly the Clerk of the 
Rutland County Court, under the firm name of Gardner and Harman. THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
221 
He was Register of Probate from 1848 to 1857, Bank Commis- 
sioner from 1855 to 1867; from 1860 to 1865 represented Bennington 
in the Legislature and for the last two years was Speaker. In 1865 
and 1866 he was Lieutenant-Governor. In 1870 and 1872 he was 
Senator from Bennington county. Previously he held the offices of 
Judge Advocate General and State Prison Inspector. In 1872 he 
supported Horace Greeley for the presidency and was himself a can- 
didate for Governor on the Liberal Republican ticket but was defeated. 
After 1872 he continued in affiliation with the Democratic party, but 
gave cordial support to the administration of President Hayes. He 
was once a candidate for Congress, but failed to get nomination. He 
would not consider a judgeship, although well fitted for it, because of 
the long and enforced absences from home which its duties made 
necessary. 
In temperament he was kindly, tender-hearted and devoid of 
malice, and was charitable towards all. Bennington county bar eulo- 
gized him in appropriate resolutions for his “high attainments, unsul- 
lied life and reputation which qualified him for that distinguished 
leadership wherein he adorned the profession and honored the State.” 
JAMES K. BATCHELDER 
1843- 
Mr. Batchelder was born in Peru, November 10, 1843. His 
father, Ira K. Batchelder, was a substantial and influential citizen. 
He spent his active life in Peru and later moved to Townshend, where 
he died at the age of ninety-one years. He took a great interest in 
legal matters and often was called to hear cases as a Justice of the 
Peace. James K. Batchelder was educated in the common schools, 
at Burr and Burton Seminary, where he graduated in 1860, and at 
Middlebury College, where he graduated four years later. He studied 
law in the office of Judge James M. Tyler at Wilmington and Brattle- 
boro, and in the Albany Law School, and was admitted to the bar in 
1866. He settled in Arlington, where he has since resided. With the 
exception of a short period when he had an office in Troy, N. Y., he 
has always practiced in Vermont. Formerly his office was in Ar- 
lington, where he practiced alone for many years, but was for a time 
associated with Judge Orion M. Barber in the firm of Batchelder and 
Barber. About 1884 he moved his office to Bennington, where he 
formed a partnership with Edward L. Bates. This arrangement has 
continued until the present time under the firm name of Batchelder 
and Bates. The usual towm offices have been bestowed on Mr. Batch- 
elder, and he was State’s Attorney from 1874 to 1880. He repre- 222 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
sented Arlington in the Legislature in 1874, 1876 and 1884, and at 
the latter session was honored with the speakership, a position which 
he filled with great ability. He was a Presidential Elector in 1880, 
at the time of the election of Garfield. In 1890-91 he was the acting 
president of the Vermont Bar Association and delivered the annual 
address; in 1908-09 he was president of the Association. In 1912 
he represented Bennington county in the Vermont Senate. He acted 
as one of the commissioners for Vermont, under an appointment by 
Governor Fuller, in establishing the boundary line between this State 
and Massachusetts. 
During the more than fifty years that Mr. Batchelder has been 
engaged in the practice of the law he has been employed in much 
important litigation and is now actively pursuing the duties of his 
profession. He is the last of his generation to be thus actively em- 
ployed. He still tries his cases with vigor and an opponent who under- 
rates his ability is apt to find himself and his client outdone by this 
veteran in the law. He is not less wise in human nature than in the 
law and he knows what to expect of men, an element that makes him 
strong in the preparation of his cases, in the examination of witnesses 
and in argument. His triumphs in the County Courts have been many, 
but his success has not been confined to this field, for he has always 
been recognized as an able lawyer by the Supreme Court, where he 
has won many important cases during his long and eventful career 
at the bar. He has great skill as a woodsman and has been employed 
extensively in running mountain lines and trying cases where bounda- 
ries have been in dispute. 
ORION M. BARBER 
1857- 
Judge Orion M. Barber, of Bennington, was the leader of the 
bar of western Vermont at the time of his appointment to the United 
States Court of Customs Appeals in 1910. He was born at Jamaica, 
Tuly 13, 1857, and later lived at Wardsboro and Jamaica. He was 
educated in the common schools, at Leland and Gray Seminary, Per- 
kins Institute, and Vermont Academy in this State, and at Bernards- 
ton Academy in Massachusetts. He graduated at the head of a small 
but brilliant class at Leland and Gray Seminary about 1880. Principal 
C. C. Boynton of that school recently told me that he was the best 
pupil in Greek that he had had in his fifty years of instruction. He 
studied law in the office of James K. Batchelder at Arlington and at 
the Albany Law School, and was admitted to the bar in 1882 in Ver- 
mont and New York and the same year located in Minneapolis, where EUGENE N. FOSS 
Born in West Berkshire, Vt., September 24, 1858. 
He was a student in the University of Vermont, 1877- 
1879. In 1882 he engaged in manufacturing in Boston. 
He is now president of the B. F. Sturtevant Company, 
and the Maverick Mills. He was elected to Congress 
at a special election held in 1910. Later in the same 
year he was elected Governor of Massachusetts as a 
Democrat and was twice reelected. In 1912 he was a 
candidate for the presidential nomination in the Demo- 
cratic National Convention. He is a trustee of the 
University of Vermont, which has conferred upon him 
the degree of LL. D. His residence is at Jamaica 
Plain, Mass. In 1912 he married Lilia Sturtevant- of 
Boston. THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
223 
he remained until the following spring, when he returned in response 
to an invitation of Mr. Batchelder and formed a partnership with him 
in the name of Batchelder and Barber, which continued until 1888, 
after which time he practiced alone at Arlington until 1897, when 
he removed to Bennington and formed a partnership with Judge 
Charles H. Darling in the name of Barber and Darling, which was 
dissolved on the appointment of the latter as Assistant Secretary of 
the Navy in 1901. After the retirement of Judge Darling, Judge 
Barber continued the practice with the assistance of the young men 
who had been students in the office and had remained after their ad- 
mission, Judges Holden and Healy and William J. Meagher. These 
men succeeded to his practice when he went to Washington in 1910. 
Mr. Meagher left the office to become State’s Attorney and the firm 
of Holden and Healy was formed, which has continued until the 
present time. While at the bar Judge Barber held many offices. He 
was Superintendent of Schools at Arlington; State’s Attorney, 1886- 
1888; member of the House from Arlington, 1892-1894; County Sen- 
ator, 1894-1896; member of committee to revise statutes in 1892; 
chairman of committee to edit and publish statutes in 1894; Railroad 
Commissioner, 1896-1898; auditor of accounts, 1898-1902; chairman 
of special committee on taxation, 1906-1908; chairman of committee 
to procure digest of Vermont Reports, 1909. Since 1910 he has been 
Judge of the United States Court of Customs Appeals at Washington. 
When he retired from practice, Judge Barber had an extensive 
and valuable clientage. His library was one of the best and he pur- 
sued a question of law among the books with a delight that made 
romance out of work. One of his students says of him: “Somehow 
he disguised work so that it did not seem to be work at all and there 
Seemed to be no end to his energy or length of time which he could 
work without stopping. He used to tire us all out even when we 
worked with him in shifts.” He excelled in all departments of legal 
work, in the trial of cases before the courts of nisi prius and of re- 
view, in the clear elucidation of complicated questions at the counsel 
table, in the giving of opinions, and in the presentation of matters 
before legislative committees. His written opinions and his Supreme 
Court briefs were among the most finished products that left his office, 
and he had great talent in the drafting of all kinds of legal papers. 
In this line of work he had rare discrimination and the utmost capacity 
and patience over details, and he was called on from many sources to 
employ his talents in this direction. Whether the work was in drawing 
a declaration, a bill in chancery, a trust or a contract, he was sure to 
have on paper its essentials expressed in language that was fitting, 
concise and unambiguous. He has, moreover, great influence with men 
and can organize and lead them as few men can do. 224 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
FRANK C. ARCHIBALD 
1857- 
Frank C. Archibald, of Manchester, was born at Exeter, N. H., 
December 31, 1857. He was educated at Middlebury High School 
and at Vermont Academy, and studied law with Joel C. Baker at 
Rutland. He was admitted in 1886 and from the date of his admis- 
sion until 1888 practiced at Rutland, and since 1888 has practiced 
at Manchester Center. He was State’s Attorney from 1892 to 1894 
and again from 1914 to 1918; he was a member of the House from 
Manchester in 1904 and 1906; and County Senator in 1910. He was 
elected Attorney-General in 1918 and still holds that office. Mr. 
Archibald is a man of brilliant mind and he is sure to arrive at results 
quicker than other men with whom he is associated. This was con- 
spicuously true of him in the Senate, where he was recognized as 
the leader of that body. As a trial lawyer he has few equals. His 
presentation of criminal cases as Attorney-General, while fair to 
respondents is energetic and able. 
TRIAL OF JESSE AND STEPHEN BOORN 
The trial and conviction of Jesse and Stephen Boorn furnishes 
one of the most remarkable chapters in the history of criminal pro- 
cedure. The circumstances were peculiar and the results startling. 
The case deserves extended notice. The two respondents lived with 
their father, Barney Boorn, in the town of Manchester; their sister, 
Sally, married Russell Colvin, and they with their two children also 
lived in the family of Sally’s father. Barney Boorn and his wife were 
respectable people, but the younger members of the family were wild 
and reckless. Colvin was weak mentally and at times insane; he 
had a custom of absenting himself for days at a time and once was 
gone for eight or nine months, though during this time he corre- 
sponded with the family. It was his custom when on these excur- 
sions to take with him his favorite boy, then a young lad, and carry 
him most of the way on his back. In May, 1812, during the absence 
of Mrs. Colvin, he suddenly disappeared; no search was made for 
him as the Booms reported that he had gone on one of his customary 
journeys. Days, weeks, months and years rolled by and nothing was 
heard of the missing man. When inquiries were made as to what 
had become of him, ugly rumors were circulated and suspicions of 
foul play were freely hinted at. To add to the suspicion of something 
wrong it was recalled that the respondents had spoken strangely of 
the disappearance of Colvin, one of them having said that he knew THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
225 
Colvin was dead and the other that they had put him where potatoes 
would not freeze. It was also known that Colvin and the Booms 
had not been on good terms and had sometimes quarreled. With 
these circumstances in circulation the conclusion was reached by the 
community that Colvin had been murdered and that the Boorns were 
the murderers. There was, as yet, no direct proof. It was not long, 
however, before the links in circumstantial evidence were being formed. 
Some children at play near the Boom place found a hat in a moldy, 
dilapidated condition, which was recognized as the hat Colvin wore 
at the time of his disappearance. This led to a search for the bones 
of the unfortunate man. At about the same time an uncle of the 
respondents had a dream that Russell Colvin came to his bedside 
and told him that he had been murdered and asked him to follow 
him and he would show him the spot where he was buried. This 
dream was repeated three times. The place of burial as described 
was an old cellar hole about four feet square over which a house 
had formerly stood and which was used at the time of Colvin’s 
disappearance as a place for burying potatoes. About this time a 
barn on the Boorn place was burned and it was conjectured that the 
body might have been concealed under it. A boy with a dog was 
walking a short distance from Barney Boom’s when the animal began 
to dig furiously under an old stump; some dry bones were dug out, 
which were pronounced to be human; this circumstance greatly ex- 
cited the inhabitants. Stephen Boorn had recently removed to the 
State of New York, but Jesse was arrested and brought before a 
Justice of the Peace on binding over proceedings. This was on April 
27, 1819, nearly seven years after the supposed murder. This ex- 
amination commenced Tuesday and lasted all the week. It was at- 
tended by a large concourse of people, and the country was scoured 
for evidence. The old cellar hole was reopened and a large knife, 
a penknife and a button were found. The large knife and button 
were identified as having belonged to Colvin. The bones found in 
the hollow stump were produced in court and four physicians were 
called, who, after an examination, pronounced them to be the bones 
of a human foot, together with some toe nails and perhaps a thumb 
nail. A subsequent examination on the part of the physicians, how- 
ever, caused them to believe that the bones were not human. This 
revelation would have resulted, probably, in the discharge of Jesse 
and the termination of the case had he not made a statement in which 
he expressed the belief that Colvin had been murdered and that his 
brother, Stephen, was the murderer. In this connection he referred 
to a quarrel during which his brother struck Colvin on the back of 
the head with a club and fractured his skull. He stated at this time 
that he did not know what had become of the body, but mentioned 
where it might be found. The motive for this was probably an at- 226 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
tempt to save himself from the effect of the evidence which he had 
heard, and it added immensely to the fuel which was already in a 
blaze of excitement. A systematic and general search was imme- 
diately made for the remains of Colvin. Stumps were overturned, 
cellar holes examined and the premises near the residence of the 
Booms were carefully searched, but no human remains were found. 
This, howeyer, did not dampen the ardor of the people. A warrant 
was issued against Stephen and officers dispatched to New York 
with instructions to arrest him and bring him to Vermont. He was 
apprehended and on his way back an effort was made to induce him 
to confess, but he stoutly maintained his innocence both at this time 
and later when confronted by Jesse. The examination was continued, 
but no new facts were developed. Both respondents were held to 
await the action of the grand jury at the September term following. 
The father, Barney Boorn, was also charged with being an accessory 
to the murder, but after a severe examination, much to the indigna- 
tion of the public, was discharged. The grand jury indicted both 
Jesse and Stephen for murder. The principal witness before the 
grand jury was one Silas Merrill, who was confined in the jail with 
the two respondents on charge of forgery. He testified to a confes- 
sion made to him in jail by Jesse. Public feeling against the prisoners 
was intense and they were almost without exception believed to be 
guilty. People were allowed to visit them freely in jail and consider- 
able pressure was brought to bear upon them to confess, as in that 
case it was urged that their sentence would be commuted to im- 
prisonment for life in case they were convicted of murder. Con- 
vinced that this was their only hope, Stephen made a written con- 
fession, in which he claimed that he killed Colvin with a beech stick, 
after Colvin had made an assault upon him with it, and gave full 
details as to the disposition of the body afterwards. This coincided 
with the circumstantial evidence which had been previously adduced, 
and confirmed the story of a son of Colvin’s, who claimed he saw 
a quarrel between his father and the Booms the day his father dis- 
appeared, during which blows were struck. 
The trial took place in the Congregational Church at Manchester, 
in November, 1819, before Chief Judge Chase and Judges Joel Doo- 
little and William Brayton of the Supreme Court. State’s Attorney 
Sheldon prosecuted and Richard Skinner, formerly a Judge of the 
Supreme Court, and afterwards Governor, Wellman, and Leonard 
Sargent, afterwards Lieutenant-Governor, defended. The court house 
was entirely inadequate to accommodate the vast throng of people who 
desired to hear the trial and this was the reason for holding it in the 
house of God. The evidence against the prisoners was largely unim- 
portant, with the exception of the confessions, which were objected 
to by counsel on the ground that they were not voluntary and that THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
227 
they did not corroborate each other. The case was ably tried. Judge 
Doolittle charged the jury in relation to the law of the case and Judge 
Chase on the question of the bearing of the evidence. In this con- 
nection he instructed the jury that no weight should be attached to 
confessions incited by hope or fear and left it to the jury to 
determine whether the confessions were so influenced. Later rulings 
of the court would have excluded the confessions from the case as 
a matter of law, it being the province of the court to determine as 
to the admissibility of confessions and not that of the jury, and there 
was much evidence in the case that these confessions were not vol- 
untary. Judge Chase was, however, regarded as one of the ablest 
jurists of his time. He was an uncle of Salmon P. Chase, Chief Justice 
of the United States Supreme Court. 
The jury, after considering the case for an hour, returned a 
verdict of guilty of murder in the first degree against both respondents, 
a result which gave unqualified satisfaction to the crowd in attendance 
upon the trial. The prisoners were brought into court for sentence 
and on being asked if they had anything to say why the sentence 
of death should not be pronounced upon them both stoutly protested 
their innocence. They were sentenced to be executed January 28, 
1820. 
Notwithstanding the general feeling against the prisoners there 
were a few who, though they thought the prisoners guilty, yet had 
some sympathy for them. This resulted in a petition to the Legisla- 
ture for a pardon or commutation of the sentence. Here the case 
was fully presented by able counsel. The result was a commutation 
of sentence in the case of Jesse to imprisonment for life, but no relief 
from the full penalty in the case of Stephen. Jesse was much elated 
and Stephen correspondingly depressed by the result. Stephen pro- 
tested his innocence in the strongest terms and urged his counsel to 
make an effort by newspaper advertising to locate Colvin. But two 
months intervened for this purpose, and it was thought that the 
effect would be of no avail, for it was generally believed that Colvin 
was murdered. A description was, however, procured of the supposed 
dead man and the Rutland Herald published the same with a brief 
reference to the case in which the persons had been convicted and 
an inquiry as to Colvin’s whereabouts, if alive. In the same issue 
the paper maintained editorially that there was no possibility of a 
doubt that Colvin had been murdered and ridiculed what it termed a 
foolish attempt to advertise for information concerning him. This 
notice was copied in the New York Evening Post and was read aloud 
in one of the hotels in New York in the presence of a former ac- 
quaintance of Colvin’s who at one time lived in Manchester. Another 
listener, who lived in New Jersey, thought, on reflection, that a man 
then living with his brother-in-law in Dover, N. J., answered the 228 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
description of Colvin. This resulted in further newspaper corre- 
spondence which was brought to the attention of the people of Man- 
chester; but they scouted all suggestions that Colvin might be living. 
At length Mr. Whelpby, of New York, the former resident of Man- 
chester referred to, determined on his own account to find out the 
truth. He located the man in question at Dover and learned that 
while he had once given his name as Colvin, this he had since changed 
for another name. He found Colvin at work in the field and recog- 
nized him, but the latter denied all knowledge of Manchester and 
claimed his name was not Colvin. He then called his attention to a 
scar on Colvin’s forehead and asked when he got it, and Colvin re- 
plied, “chopping on the mountain” for such a man, naming one of 
his old neighbors in Manchester. This circumstance Whelpby knew 
to be true. Then he gradually drew Colvin out by interesting him 
in former Manchester friends and getting him to relate several inci- 
dents and matters which left no doubt as to his identity. Whelpby 
then proposed that he go to Manchester on a visit, but Colvin utterly 
refused and stratagem was used to get him as far as New York. On 
arriving at New York, Colvin wanted to return to New Jersey, but 
Whelpby took him on board a boat to Troy instead of a ferry across 
the river. This he claimed to Colvin was a mistake on his part. When 
Troy was reached he was so near Manchester that he was prevailed 
on to proceed to Vermont. On arriving at Bennington it was found 
that the County Court was in session. Some one rushed into the 
court room and announced that Colvin was outside. This caused the 
court to break up in the greatest confusion and Judges, officers, law- 
yers and spectators rushed out to see the man whom all had believed 
dead and for whose supposed murder some of them had been instru- 
mental in having the two Booms sentenced to be hung. He was 
immediately recognized by all who formerly knew him. He soon left 
for Manchester, whither a courier had been sent to announce his 
coming. All along the journey crowds gathered to see him and when 
the stage reached Manchester a large number of people had assembled 
and the wildest excitement prevailed. Cannon were brought out and 
Stephen Boorn was taken from jail to fire the first in token of his 
deliverance from death. The most extravagant expressions of joy 
were indulged in by the people now that they found that the Booms 
were innocent. On being brought into the presence of Stephen, who 
was in fetters, Colvin asked what these were for and was told by the 
prisoner that it was claimed that he murdered Colvin. Colvin answered 
that Stephen never hurt him, but that Jesse struck him with a briar 
once but did not hurt him much. Colvin’s wife was presented to him. 
but on looking upon her he remarked “that is all over with,” and 
would take no further notice of her. For several days large crowds 
came from neighboring towns to see Colvin. After remaining in THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
229 
Manchester for a short time he asked to be taken back to New Jersey, 
which was done, and he died there a few years afterwards. 
There was no doubt of the innocence of the prisoners, but they 
were still in custody and must be released by due process of law, so 
thought the officers at least. Judge Skinner wrote the Judges of 
the Supreme Court that Colvin was alive and in Manchester. The 
Judges wrote the State’s Attorney that they did not believe it could 
be Colvin and directed the most searching examination to be made 
in order to guard against deception. Colvin was questioned closely 
by the officers; he told many incidents in which he showed he was 
not an impostor and was finally asked who built the tavern in which 
they were sitting, to which he replied: “Captain Munson, and it is 
all of the best oak timber, too,” which was a fact. He also recognized 
and called by name many former acquaintances. 
A few days before the execution was to have taken place the 
Judges met at Manchester. The case was without precedent and there 
were several different opinions as to what should be done. Finally 
it was decided that the State’s Attorney should bring a petition for 
a new trial on the ground of newly discovered evidence, which was 
done, and on the petition being granted a nolle prosequi was entered. 
Thus ended one of the most remarkable cases known to the criminal 
law. A good many of those familiar with the case believed that the 
Booms had killed Colvin, or at least that he had died from the effects 
of an assault made upon him. The latter theory, while accounting 
for the confessions in part, would not account for the story as to the 
disposition of the body. The fact that Stephen was the first to suggest 
advertising for Colvin indicates that he believed him to be still alive. 
Those who believed that Colvin was really murdered and that 
the man who claimed to be Colvin was some one else were confirmed 
in their theory by a statement by Jesse, when he was later arrested 
in Ohio for forgery, that the man who appeared in Manchester was 
not Colvin and that his brother, Stephen, actually murdered him. No 
one who examined the proofs of the identity of Colvin, however, be- 
lieved this story for a moment, and the fact seems to have been as 
well established as any fact can be by human evidence that Colvin 
was not murdered, and that it was he who was in Manchester after 
the conviction of the Booms. 
The confessions of the respondents were the most remarkable 
part of the evidence and it was these that induced the jury to convict. 
At the time of the trial the law did not permit respondents to testify 
in their own behalf, so the confessions were unexplained and uncon- 
tradicted. It is plain that the confessions were not voluntary, but 
were induced by promises of favor. That of Jesse was made, if we 
can believe it was made at all, to one Silas Merrill, a fellow prisoner, 
who appears to have got some favor himself after he had reported 230 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
the confession to the officers. This confession, as reported by Mer- 
rill, was in substance that Stephen struck Colvin twice with a club, 
crushed his skull, but did not kill him; that the father of the re- 
spondents was present and assisted them in carrying Colvin to the 
old cellar in question, where the father cut his throat with Stephen’s 
penknife; that they buried the body in the cellar; that eighteen months 
afterward the two respondents took up the body, put it in a basket 
and placed it under the floor in a sheep barn; that the next spring 
the barn burned; that they then took the bones and pounded them up 
and put them in a deep hole in the river; that the skull bone burned 
so that it crumbled to pieces, and these the father buried in a hollow 
birch stump near the road. 
The oral confession of Stephen having been admitted, contrary 
to the expectation of his counsel, his written confession was offered 
in his behalf by Judge Skinner. It is as follows: 
“May, the 10th, 1812. I, about 9 or 10 o’clock went down to 
David Glazier’s bridge, and fished down below uncle Nathaniel Boom’s, 
and then went up across their farms, where Russell and Lewis were, 
being the nighest way, and sat down and began to talk, and Russell 
told me how many dollars benefit he had been to father, and I told 
him he was a damned fool, and he was mad and jumped up, and 
we sat close together, and I told him to set down you little Tory, 
and there was a piece of a beech limb, about two feet long, and 
it it up and struck at my head as I sat down, and I jumped up 
and it struck me on one shoulder, and I it out of his hand and 
struck him a back handed blow, I being on the north side of him, and 
there was a knot on it about one inch long. As I struck him I did 
think I hit him on his back, and he stooped down and that knot was 
broken off sharp, and it hit him on the back of the neck, close in his 
hair, and it went in about half of an inch in that great cord, and he 
fell down, and then I told the boy to go down and come up with 
his uncle John, and he asked me if I had killed Russell, and I told 
him no, but he must not tell that we struck one another. And I told 
him when he got away down, Russell was gone away, and I w'ent 
back and he was dead, and then I went and took him and put him in 
the corner of the fence by the cellar hole, and put briars over him 
and went home and went down to the barn and got some boards, 
and when it was dark I went down and took a hoe and boards, and 
dug a grave as well as I could and took out of his pocket a little 
barlow knife, with about half of a blade, and cut some bushes and 
put on his face and the boards, and put in the grave, and put him in 
four boards on the bottom and on the top, and t’other two on the 
sides, and then covered him up and went home crying along, but I 
want afraid as I know of. And when I lived at Wm. Boom’s I 
planted some potatoes, and when I dug them I went there and some- GEORGE W. BROWN 
Born in Northfield, Vt., August 30, 1841, being the 
son of Isaac W. and Sylvia (Partridge) Brown and a 
descendant of Jonathan Brown, taken captive by the 
Indians at the burning of Royalton. He was educated 
at the Orange County Grammar School, the Northfield 
Academy and Newbury Seminary. He began his busi- 
ness career as a timekeeper in the Central Vermont 
shops at St. Albans, 1859-65. Later he engaged in 
business for himself in St. Albans in the firms of 
Hyde and Brown and McGowan and Brown, 1865-69. 
He held the office of Auditor of Motive Power on the 
Central Pacific Railroad, 1869-70. Returning East, he 
established sewing machine agencies, 1871-76, and be- 
came manager of the Wheeler and Wilson Manufac- 
turing Company, 1876-92. He was manager and treas- 
urer of lasting machines companies, 1892-99; manager 
and treasurer of the United Shoe Machinery Company, 
1899-1910, and since 1910 its vice-president. He is a 
director of the First National Bank of Boston and a 
vice-president and director of the New England Con- 
servatory of Music. He gave a public library to North- 
field. He married Addie E. Perkins of St. Albans, who 
died in 1900. George W. Brown THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
231 
thing, I thought, had been there, and I took up his bones and put them 
in a basket, and took the boards and put on my potato hole, and 
when it was night, took the basket and my hoe and went down and 
pulled a plank in the stable floor, and then dug a hole, and then car- 
ried him up, and went in the house and told them I had done with 
the basket, and took back the shovel, and up my potatoes that 
evening, and then when I and in the west mountain, Lewis came 
and told me that father’s barn was burned up, the next day or the 
next day but one, I came down and went to the barn and there were 
a few bones, and when they were at dinner I told them I did not 
want my dinner, and went and took them, and there were only a few 
of the biggest of the bones, and throwed them in the river above 
Wyman’s, and then went back, and it was done quick, too, and then 
was hungry by that time, and then went home, and the next Sunday 
I came down after money to pay the boot that I gave oxen, 
and went out there and scraped up them little things that were under 
the stump there, and told them I was going out fishing, and went, 
and there was a hole, and I dropped them in and kicked the stuff, 
and that is the first any body knew it, either friends or foes, even my 
wife. All these I acknowledge before the world. 
Stephen Boorn, 
Manchester, Aug. 27, 1819.” 
The case has been many times cited as a warning against cir- 
cumstantial evidence and in favor of the strongest proof in criminal 
prosecutions. It is apparent that the court erred in admitting the 
confessions, and it was unfortunate that the respondents could not 
testify in their own behalf. Some progress has been made in the 
trial of criminal cases, for respondents can now testify if they desire 
and it is not likely that another case will arise where the law will 
carry so near to death’s door those who are innocent of crime. 
PRESENT MEMBERS OF THE BENNINGTON COUNTY BAR 
Ernest D. Barber, of Bennington, was born at Bennington, March 
12, 1878. He was educated in the graded and high schools of Ben- 
nington and studied law with Batchelder and Bates at the same plage 
and was admitted in 1905. He has practiced at Bennington since his 
admission. He has held the offices of School District Clerk, Justice 
of the Peace, and corporation attorney for the village of Bennington. 
Edward L. Bates, of Bennington, was born at Bennington, Jan- 
uary 24, 1859. He was educated in the public schools of the village 
of Bennington and at Kimball Union Academy at Meriden, N. H. 232 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
He studied law with Gardner and Harman and with John V. Hall 
at Bennington, and was admitted in 1882. He has been in practice 
at the latter place since his admission and for much of the time with 
James K. Batchelder. He has held the office of Deputy County Clerk, 
Village Clerk, was State’s Attorney from 1884 to 1898 with the ex- 
ception of two years; special prosecutor from 1890 to 1894; attorney 
of the village of Bennington from 1893 to 1898; Colonel on the staff 
of Governor Fuller in 1892; Judge Advocate General from 1894 to 
1900; Bennington Municipal Judge, 1902 to 1908. 
Edward C. Bennett, of Bennington, was born at Bennington, 
September 5, 1873. He was educated in the Bennington graded and 
high schools, and at Norwich University, where he graduated in 1893. 
He studied law at Boston University, taking a special course, and 
with Barber and Darling at Bennington. He was admitted in 1900 
and has since practiced at Bennington. He was Deputy State Auditor, 
1898-1902; Judge of Probate, district of Bennington, since 1917. 
Henry Chase, of Bennington, was born at Logansport, Ind., No- 
vember 1, 1868. He was educated in the public and high schools of 
this place, and studied law with his father, Judge G. H. Chase, there. 
He afterwards studied with Batchelder and Bates at Bennington, was 
admitted to the bar in 1914, and has since practiced here. He was 
County Fish and Game Warden from 1905 to 1911, and has been 
village attorney since 1918. He was elected a member of the House 
of Representatives in 1920. 
William B. Edgerton, of Manchester, was born at Danby, No- 
vember 14, 1867, and was educated in the common schools and at 
Burr and Burton Seminary, where he graduated in 1888. He studied 
law in the office of Martin and Archibald at Manchester and was 
admitted in 1893. He was School Director, 1895-1920; Register of 
Probate. 1894-1898; Judge of Probate, 1898-1910. He has practiced 
at Manchester since his admission. 
Joseph W. Fowler, of Manchester, was born at Manchester, May 
15, 1857, and was educated at Burr and Burton Seminary and at 
Bingham’s Military Academy, North Carolina. He studied law in 
the office of his father, H. K. Fowler, at Manchester, and was ad- 
mitted in 1879. He has practiced at Manchester since admission and 
has held all town offices; he was a member of the House in 1902 
and of the Senate in 1904. 
Collins M. Graves, of Bennington, was born at Bennington, No- 
vember 7, 1871. He was educated at the Bennington graded school, THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
233 
the Vermont Academy, and Brown University. He studied law in 
the office of Barber and Darling at Bennington, and was admitted in 
1904. He has practiced at Bennington, which he represented in the 
House in 1904. He was Postmaster of Bennington from 1906 to 
1914; legislative draftsman, 1914-1919; delegate to the Republican 
National Convention, 1916; State’s Attorney, 1919-1921. He was the 
Prohibition Enforcement Agent for the State of Vermont, with head- 
quarters at Rutland, 1921-22. 
Edward Griffith, of Manchester, was born at East Dorset, Jan- 
uary 7, 1871. He was educated at Burr and Burton Seminary, where 
he graduated in 1889, at Dartmouth College, where he graduated in 
1893, and at the New York Law School, where he graduated in 1896. 
He studied law with Philip Carpenter in New York and was admitted 
in that State in 1896 and in Vermont in 1909. He practiced in New 
York from 1896 to 1900, and in Manchester from 1909 to date. He 
has been Judge of Probate for the district of Manchester since 1910. 
Edward H. Holden, of Bennington, was born at Manchester, 
April 7, 1872. He was educated in the common schools of Arlington 
and at Burr and Burton Seminary, and studied law in the office of 
Judge Orion M. Barber at Arlington and with Barber and Darling 
at Bennington. He was admitted in 1889 and practiced from 1900 
to 1902 at Manchester Center and since 1902 has practiced at Ben- 
nington. He has been Deputy County Clerk since 1897, was Municipal 
Judge of Bennington from 1908 to 1918; president of Bennington 
village, 1917-1918; village attorney since 1912. 
George F. Lawrence, of Manchester, was born at Manchester, 
July 3, 1882, and was educated at Burr and Burton Seminary. He 
studied law with Frank C. Archibald and at the Albany Law School, 
where he graduated in 1905. He was admitted to the bar in Vermont 
in 1906 and to the bar of New York in 1908. He practiced at Man- 
chester until 1907 and in New York from 1907 to 1911. Since 1911 
he has resided at Manchester, where he has been engaged principally 
in selling real estate. 
Reuben Levin, of Manchester Depot, was born at Bennington, 
June 8, 1896. He was educated at the Bennington High School, at 
Cornell University, and at the University of Maine. He studied law 
at the last named institution and at Cornell, where he took a course on 
torts. He was admitted to the bar in Maine in 1918 and in Vermont 
in 1919. He practiced at Bangor for a year and since his admission 
in Vermont has practiced in Manchester. 234 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
Charles H. Mason, of Bennington, was born at Royalton, March 
3, 1856. He was educated in the common schools and at the State 
Normal School at Randolph, and at Royalton Academy. He studied 
law in the office of Nelson L. Boyden at Randolph, in the office of 
William E. Johnson at Woodstock, and in the office of Dudley C. 
Denison at Royalton. He was admitted in 1883 and has practiced 
at Bennington since his admission. He was Judge of Bennington 
Municipal Court, 1886 to 1888; village attorney, 1884-1886; State’s 
Attorney, 1891-1892. 
George A Mathers, of Bennington, was born at Bennington, 
December 11, 1887, and received his education at the Bennington 
High School and at Cornell University, where he graduated in 1909. 
He studied law at the College of Law at Cornell and was admitted 
to the bar of New York in 1911 and to the bar of Vermont in 1914. 
He practiced at Troy, N. Y., from 1911 to 1915 and has since practiced 
at Bennington. He is State’s Attorney of Bennington county. 
Charles A. Maurer, of Bennington, was born at Walloomsac, 
N. Y., November 2, 1869, and was educated at the Bennington graded 
schools. He studied law at the Albany Law School, where he grad- 
uated in 1894, and with Charles H. Mason at Bennington. He was 
admitted in 1895 and has since practiced at Bennington. He was 
corporation attorney for four years and has been Referee in Bank- 
ruptcy since 1916. 
William J. Meagher, of Bennington, was born at Bennington, 
August 3, 1876, and was educated in the Bennington graded and high 
schools. He studied law in the office of Barber and Darling at 
Bennington and was admitted in 1900. He has practiced at Ben- 
nington since his admission and has held the following offices: cor- 
poration counsel; State’s Attorney, 1906-1914; Judge of Municipal 
Court since 1919. 
John V. D. S. Merrill, of Bennington, was born at Bennington, 
August 25, 1844, and was educated in the private and public schools 
of that place and at Mount Anthony Seminary. He studied law with 
Batchelder and Bates at Bennington and was admitted in 1899. He 
has since practiced at Bennington. In .conjunction with Mrs. Merrill, 
Mr. Merrill wrote “Sketches of Historic Bennington,” four editions 
of which have been published and sold. 
Jacob J. Shackshober, of Bennington, was born at Arlington, 
May 6, 1865. He was educated in the common schools and studied 
law with Judge Orion M. Barber at Arlington and at the Albany Law THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
235 
School. He was admitted in 1896 and practiced at Arlington from 
the time of his admission until 1907, when he removed to Bennington, 
having been appointed County Clerk. He was Superintendent of 
Schools, Auditor, and Town Agent in Arlington; he was State’s 
Attorney, 1900-PX)4; and has been County Clerk since July, 1907. 
William B. Sheldon, of Bennington, was born at East Dorset, 
June 15, 1842, and was educated by private tutors and in the public 
schools at Factory Point and Dorset, and at Burr and Burton Sem- 
inary, where he graduated in 1859. He studied law with Ahiman L. 
Miner and with Burton and Munson at Manchester and at the Albany 
Law School, and was admitted in New York and Vermont in 1872. 
He has practiced since his admission at Bennington. He was Register 
of Probate for the Bennington district, 1874-1876, and also made 
the records for this court for the sixteen years previous under an act 
of the Legislature; State’s Attorney, 1876-1878; Moderator and law 
agent of the town of Bennington for many years; Moderator of the 
Bennington graded school district since 1897; Referee in Bankruptcy, 
1903-1909. CALEDONIA COUNTY 
IN 1781 the northeastern part of the State was set off as Orange 
county, with Newbury as the shire. In 1792 all north of the pres- 
ent county of Orange was incorporated as Caledonia, the old 
Roman name of Scotland, the birthplace of many of the settlers. In 
1798 Orleans and Essex counties were taken from Caledonia. In 
1811 four towns, and later, two more were annexed to Washington 
county, leaving the seventeen towns that now constitute the county 
of Caledonia. In 1796, when the county was organized, Danville was 
made the shire and remained such for sixty years. The first court 
house was erected upon the corner of the streets northwest of the 
common. It was built of wood and contained a large room for the 
court and two smaller ones for the jury and attorneys. It was in 
process of construction as early as 1797 and was not finished in 1801. 
Some years prior to 1855 the building was moved back some distance 
and was raised up, thus giving room on the ground floor for a town 
hall, and pillars were added to the front. The first jail was built in 
1799. It was made of logs, hewn square and matched at the ends 
so as to interlock with each other, and pinned together. The second 
jail, which was built by subscription, was made of immense granite 
stones, some of them twenty feet in length, quarried at Danville. 
These were hewn and dowelled together. The notorious counterfeiter, 
“Bristol Bill,” was confined here awaiting trial. The authorities in 
Boston, who were interested in his conviction, sent an officer to Dan- 
ville with the purpose of having the prisoner taken to Boston for safe 
keeping, but finding the jail secure he returned and reported that 
was safer in the Danville jail than he would be in Boston. During 
the trial of his case at Danville the prisoner made an attack on Bliss 
N. Davis, the State’s Attorney, with a case knife, stabbing him in 
the throat and barely missing taking his life, as more fully appears 
in the sketch of Mr. Davis. In 1838 the court ordered a picket post 
fence constructed around the jail. Accordingly, a solid fence ten 
or twelve feet high, built of plank, each sharpened at the top, was 
erected around the jail. In 1842 land was purchased on which to erect 
a building for the County Clerk’s office and his records. This was 
made of brick and was built just west of the court house. After the 
removal of the shire to St. Johnsbury it served as a library until the 
great fire on May 9, 1889, when, with the court house, it was burned. 
The building of the Passumpsic Railroad made St. Johnsbury 
the business center of the county and the most suitable and convenient 
place for holding the courts. The question of a change from Danville 
to the larger town was under discussion for many years preceding 
1855. In the latter year, by an act of the Legislature, a committee GEORGE H. BICKFORD 
Born in Barton, Vt., October 10, 1868, being the son 
of a Methodist clergyman. He attended the public 
schools at Keene, N. H., Montpelier (Vt.) Seminary, 
and entering Wesleyan University, he graduated with 
honor in 1891. He won every oratorial prize offered 
in his seminary and college career and was a notable 
football player. After graduation he became an in- 
structor in Haverford College, Haverford, Pa. In 
1898 he went to Hardwick, Vt., as a partner in the 
granite firm of Bickford, More and Company. The 
Woodbury Granite Company was soon organized to 
take over the business of the first-named company, 
with Mr. Bickford as general manager and treasurer. 
In fifteen years the business, under his capable man- 
agement, grew from one quarry, a single hanclpower 
derrick and a payroll of six men, to four quarries, 
three granite plants, a payroll of 1,800 men and set- 
ting crews working in a dozen cities. He had secured 
contracts for State Capitols and other great public 
edifices and had made Hardwick the center of the 
building granite trade of the world. Mr. Bickford was 
president of the Granite Trust Company, treasurer of 
the Hardwick and Woodbury Railroad Company and 
the Gaysville Electric Light and Power Company. 
He was also a member of the executive committee of 
the Vermont State Bankers’ Association, the Granite 
Manufacturers’ Association and the Greater Vermont 
Association and alumni trustee of Wesleyan Univer- 
sity. Mr. Bickford was an eloquent public speaker 
and was interested in public affairs. On October 9, 
1894, he married Alice Holden of Bennington. Four 
children were born to them, George F., Holden B., 
Beatrice and John, the two last-named dying while 
young. Mr. Bickford died June 3, 1914. THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
237 
of three disinterested persons was appointed to examine and select 
the best location between Barnet and Lyndon for the court house 
and other county buildings. The committee consisted of Thomas 
Reed of Montpelier, Judge Hebard of Chelsea, and John Pierpoint 
of Vergennes. At a meeting held at St. Johnsbury in November of 
that year the several claims of Lyndon, Barnet and St. Johnsbury 
were urged by able counsel before the committee. The result was 
the selection of St. Johnsbury for the shire. The bill authorizing 
the change of shire directed the county Judges to purchase suitable 
grounds and make contracts for the erection of the buildings. The 
old burial ground was immediately purchased, from which all the 
bodies had been removed in anticipation of the event. Questions as 
to the title having arisen, a bond in the sum of ten thousand dollars 
was given the Judges by citizens whose aggregate wealth was over 
half a million dollars, conditioned for the quiet enjoyment and pos- 
session of the premises. The court house, as originally planned, was 
to cost thirteen thousand dollars, but to secure better architectural 
features individuals subscribed an additional sum of one thousand 
two hundred dollars. The building erected is of brick with brown 
stone trimmings in Italian style. It fronts on Main Street 96 feet 
and encloses a court room 52 x 57 feet on the second floor and a town 
hall 52 x 65 feet on the first floor, with requisite rooms on the first 
floor for the Judge of Probate and County Clerk and on the second 
floor for lawyers and jury. The town paid about two-fifths of the 
cost of construction and the county the balance. Thirty-three years 
later important improvements were made on the interior and in an 
annex on the east side a commodious vault was installed at an expense 
of ten thousand dollars. This work was done under direction of the 
late Jonathan Ross. The original building was completed in season to 
accommodate the court at the December term, 1856, at which Judge 
Poland presided. The first county jail was constructed on Cherry 
Street. It was a substantial building, well suited in its time for keep- 
ing in custody those who transgressed the law. This became inadequate 
in course of time for the needs of the county and the present brick 
buildings were erected near the old jail. 
The County Courts are held in Caledonia on the first Tuesdays 
of June and December. 
JAMES BELL 
1776-1852 
James Bell was born at Lyme, N. H., December, 1776, and died 
at Walden, April 17, 1852. He was made a lawyer by necessity. 
Becoming- personally involved in protracted litigation he became too 238 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
poor to employ counsel and was obliged to defend himself and plead 
his own cause, and in so doing displayed such wit and eloquence 
that he was more than a match for his legal antagonist whom he drove 
from the field. He located in Walden in 1804 or 1805 and began 
in 1810 to settle the farm where he lived thereafter. He practiced 
law for several years before being admitted to the bar and later was 
admitted in Caledonia county. In 1815 he was elected to the Legis- 
lature ; he was again elected in 1818, and for ten successive years 
thereafter. He was chosen a member of the Council of Censors in 
1848, which was the last public service in which he was engaged. 
Coming to the bar at a time when a remarkable array of men of first 
talents were engaged in the practice, he became the peer of any of 
them, and in mother wit surpassed them all. He had an immense, 
persuasive influence with the jury; his sympathies were strong and 
he was sure to hit upon the point that would sway them. His client’s 
wrongs were his own and he defended him with a zeal and enthusiasm 
that never flagged. One of his last appearances in court, perhaps 
his last, was at the December term of the Orleans County Court, 1847, 
when he defended Mrs. Hannah Bell for the murder of her own child. 
Stoddard B. Colby, who was present, says of the argument: “I have 
never heard nor felt a deeper pathos than the tones of his voice bore 
to the heart, as he stood up in the dignity of old age, his tall, majestic 
form overleaning all the modern members of the bar, tremulous slightly 
with emotions that seemed thronging up from the long past, as the 
old advocate yielded for a moment to the effect of early associations 
and introduced himself and his fallen brethren, whom his eye missed 
from their wonted seats as it glanced along the vacant places among 
the bar. He said : 
“‘May it please Your Honor and Gentlemen of the Jury: 
“ ‘I stood among giants, though not of them. Fletcher, the un- 
tiring and laborious counselor, the persuasive advocate, the unyielding 
combatant, is where ? Eternity echoes, here! Cushman, the courtly 
and eloquent lawyer, the kind and feeling man, the polished and social 
companion and friend, where now is he? The world unseen alone 
can say. 
“ ‘Mattocks lives, thank God, but is withdrawn from professional 
toil, from the clash of mind on mind, the combat of intellect and 
wit, the flashing humor and grave debates of the court room, to the 
graceful retreat of domestic life. I am alone, an old tree, stripped of 
its foliage, and tottering beneath the rude storms of seventy winters; 
but lately prostrate at the verge of the grave I thought my race was 
run; never again did I expect to be heard in the defence of an un- 
fortunate accused, but heaven has spared me, another monument of 
its mercy, and I rejoice in the opportunity of uttering, perhaps, my THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
239 
last public breath in defence of the poor, weak, imbecile prisoner at 
the bar. 
“ ‘Gentlemen, she is a mother, she is charged with murder of her 
own child, arrayed here a friendless stranger; she is without means 
to reward counsel, and has not the intelligence, as I have the sorry 
occasion to know, to dictate to her counsel a single fact relating to 
her case. I have come to her defence without hope of reward, for 
she has nothing to give but thick, dark poverty, and of that, too, I 
have had more than enough. But it gives me pleasure to say that 
the stringent hardships of her case have won her friends among 
strangers and the warm sympathies which have been extended to 
my client, and the ready and useful aid I have received during this 
protracted trial, from various members of the bar, strongly indicate 
the great hearts and good minds of my departed brothers have left 
their influence upon these, their successors.’ ” This remarkable appeal 
was undoubtedly successful. It is a splendid example of the oratory 
of the olden day in the court room, a style of speaking unhappily that 
has passed in the rush and hurry of today, but which could be studied 
and practiced with profit by the modern advocate. It was charac- 
teristic of the man and it called forth from one of his colleagues, 
John Mattocks, an equally characteristic tribute which deserves to 
be preserved: 
“Peacham, January 16, 1847. 
“Brother Bell:—In the Watchman I have just seen a specimen 
of your speech in the murder case. It is worthy of being inserted in 
the next edition of ‘Elegant Extracts in Prose.’ Sir, you are the last 
of the Mohicans and the greatest, and when you die (which I fear 
will be soon, for from the moment I hear of your effort in the cause 
of humanity it was all but a superhuman brightening before death) the 
tribe will be extinct. You have justly called our two lamented friends 
giants, and with the discrimination of a reviewer, have given to each 
the distinguishing traits of excellence; and although your introducing 
me with them was gratuitous, it was kind, and the traits you have 
given me I owe to your generosity. You say: ‘I was not of them’; 
this was fiction, used in an unlawyerlike manner to prevent self-com- 
mendation, unless, indeed, you meant as Paul might have said, that 
he was not of the prophets, because he was a head and shoulders 
above them. I am proud that you have sustained and surpassed the 
old school of lawyers. Sir, you are the nestor of the bar, and may 
be truly called the ‘Old Man Eloquent.’ 
“I am, sir, with the greatest respect, 
“Your friend and humble servant, 
“John Mattocks. 
“N. B. I reserve the all-important part of the letter to stand by 
itself. Let us hold fast to our hope in Christ. We near the brink.” 240 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
JOHN MATTOCKS 
1777-1847 
The sketch of John Mattocks appears among the Judges, but 
as he served but briefly in the capacity of a Judge, and the judgment 
of lawyers accords to him the position of leadership at the bar in the 
northeastern counties of the State during nearly half a century, it is 
in place to mention him in this chapter. His father was Samuel Mat- 
tocks, one of the early pioneers from Connecticut to settle in Tinmouth. 
He was State Treasurer and one of the Judges of the Rutland County 
Court. His daughter, Rebecca, married Samuel Miller of Middlebury, 
and before the college was established in the latter town young Mat- 
tocks began the study of law in the office of his brother-in-law. He 
completed his studies with Bates Turner at Fairfield and was the first 
lawyer to be admitted to the bar in Franklin county. The same year, 
1797, he opened an office in Danville, but removed to Peacham a 
year later, where he practiced for almost fifty years, and in the mean- 
time held nearly all the public offices within the gift of his constituents. 
By his brilliant talents, cordial manners, and manly bearing he won 
the esteem and respect of his fellow men. He met with marked 
success from the first and soon found himself in the front rank of 
his profession. His practice extended from Caledonia into Orleans 
and Essex, which then made a part of the circuit of most of the early 
lawyers of the three upper counties. Those counties, although set 
off from Orange in 1797, were not organized until later—Caledonia 
in 1799, and Orleans and Essex in 1800. He was the first lawyer to 
settle within the area of these counties and was followed soon after 
by William A. Griswold and William Mattocks in Danville in 1798 and 
Samuel Prentiss in Montpelier, then part of Caledonia, in 1800; General 
Seth Cushman in Guildhall about the same time; by William Baxter in 
Brownington in 1801, and by Joshua Sawyer in Hyde Park in 1810, 
to be followed some years later by such lawyers as Isaac Fletcher, 
Ephraim Paddock and James Bell. During the early part of the 
preceding century the lawyers of these three counties were second 
to none in the State, and among the brilliant array Mattocks stood at 
the head. If he lacked the graceful style and courtly bearing of Cush- 
man, the exaltation and simple pathos of Bell, the legal knowledge and 
persistent energy of Fletcher, or the astute learning of Paddock, yet 
in the general scope and variety of qualities that go to make up a great 
lawyer he excelled them all. While some of these leading lawyers 
moved away, four of them remained for a long time foremost in the 
trial of causes in those upper counties: Cushman, Bell, Fletcher and 
Mattocks. These, by general consent, were extraordinary men. Each 
differed from the other, but all were of exceptional intelligence, gen- THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
241 
erous impulses and uncommon force. They were rightly called the 
giants of the bar. Although often matched against each other in 
trials where many a hard knock was given, they maintained a per- 
sonal friendship that was never interrupted. 
GENERAL ISAAC FLETCHER 
1784-1842 
Isaac Fletcher was born at Dunstable, Mass., November 22, 1784. 
He commenced fitting for college in 1803 and entered Dartmouth in 
1804, where he maintained a high standing for scholarship and was 
elected to the Phi Beta Kappa society his junior year. After leaving 
college he taught in the academy at Chesterfield, N. H.; studied law 
with Prescott and Dunbar at Keene, N. H., and was admitted to the 
bar of the County Court at Newfane, Vt., at the December term, 1811. 
In 1812 he opened an office at Lyndon, where he continued to devote 
himself to the business and study of his profession till near the close 
of his life. He very soon commanded an extensive practice in the 
three northeastern counties, which he maintained without abatement 
and with increasing popularity till about the time of his election to 
Congress, when he wholly abandoned all professional undertakings. 
This occurred in 1836; he was re-elected in 1838 and served two full 
terms. His duties here he discharged with general acceptance. About 
1823 he was for a number of successive elections the member of the 
House of Representatives from Lyndon, and at the time of his re- 
tiring from that body its Speaker. He was military aide to His Ex- 
cellency, Richard Skinner, during his term of office, and for many 
years Adjutant and Inspector-General of the Vermont militia. In 
this capacity he was in attendance upon His Excellency, C. P. Van 
Ness, during the visit of the venerable Lafayette to Vermont. 
It was as a lawyer that General Fletcher excelled. He discharged 
his official duties well and his addresses on many public occasions met 
with considerable favor, but his work at the bar was what gained him 
distinction. Here his learning, great love of method and surprising 
industry made him the peer of the great men who traveled the northern 
circuit with him from his advent into the profession until his election 
to Congress. He died October 19, 1842, leaving behind a very enviable 
professional reputation. 
BLISS N. DAVIS 
1802-1885 
Bliss N. Davis died at Danville, February 11, 1885, at the age 
of eighty-three years. He had been a leading citizen of Danville and 
a prominent lawyer since 1850. He was State’s Attorney in 1850 242 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
and State Senator in 1858-59. For twenty-five years he was a director 
of the Caledonia Bank and for several years its president. While he 
lacked the polish which is given by a classical education, his endow- 
ment of common sense and the skill with which he made use of it 
made him a formidable opponent in debate. He is best known to fame 
on account of his prosecution, in 1850, of “Bristol Bill” and Meadow, 
two celebrated counterfeiters, who were indicted, tried and convicted 
in the County Court at Danville. The respondents were vigorously 
and ably defended by two Boston lawyers. A recess followed the 
verdict of the jury before the respondents were called into court to 
receive sentence. When the court assembled they were brought in 
with shackles on their legs, but with hands free. Judge Poland, the 
presiding Judge, imposed sentence of ten years’ imprisonment in State 
Prison. Following this, and while Mr. Davis was speaking with 
Meadow, “Bristol Bill” suddenly plunged a sharp, pointed case knife 
into Mr. Davis’ neck which barely missed the jugular vein. It was 
at first supposed that the wound was mortal, but a rapid recovery 
followed and Mr. Davis was a vigorous and useful man for thirty-five 
years. After the prisoner had been secured and the court had ad- 
journed, Judge Poland went at once to the room of Mr. Davis and as 
he entered the latter said: “I am not dead yet, Judge, and you and 
I will live to punish a good many rascals yet.” 
THOMAS BARTLETT, JR. 
1810-1876 
The lawyers of a generation ago were eloquent in their praise 
of Thomas Bartlett, Jr., of Lyndon. He must have been a very 
eloquent, ingenious, and remarkable man. He was born in Burke, 
June 18, 1810, and died at Lyndon, September 12, 1876. He was the 
son of Thomas Bartlett of Plymouth, Mass., who was one of the first 
settlers of Burke. In this place Thomas Jr. received a common school 
education, and he later studied law with George C. Cahoon and with 
Isaac Fletcher, both at Lyndon, and was admitted to the bar in 1835. 
He served as State’s Attorney of his county in 1839, 1841 and 1842. 
He was a member of the Vermont Senate in 1841, 1842 and 1843, 
represented Lyndon in the General Assembly in 1850, 1854 and 1855, 
and was a member of Congress from 1851 to 1853. The foregoing 
dates compass the public offices that he held, but they give little idea 
of the man and the influence that he exerted, the sympathy and ad- 
miration that the public cherished for him, and the hold which he had 
on his acquaintances. He was of singular and impressive appearance, 
six feet or more in height, with a palsied arm and leg. occasioned by JAMES M. BOUTWEI.L 
Born in Montpelier, Vt., May l(j, 1856. He 
studied in the public schools and at Goddard Sem- 
inary at Barre. While only a lad he entered a 
machine shop. When the Montpelier and Wells River 
Railroad was opened, he secured a position as fireman, 
and at the age of eighteen he was running an engine, 
in which capacity he became famous for his skill. He 
was given charge of building a railroad to the Barre 
granite quarries. He accepted the position of man- 
ager of a small granite quarry that had not been pros- 
perous and was successful in the enterprise. Five 
years later he purchased the quarry. The business 
grew, an area of dark Barre granite was acquired, and 
the firm of Boutwell, Milne and Varnum was formed. 
This has developed into one of the largest and most 
famous granite firms of the world. Mr. Boutwell is a 
man of most unusual energy and capacity. He has 
served several terms as Mayor of Montpelier. In 1880 
he married Jennie E. Ramsey of Wells River. THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
243 
overexertion and exposure on the farm. This deformity made it 
difficult for him to rise from his chair and to stand while speaking 
and gave him a halting walk. But instead of suffering from his in- 
firmity he profited by it, for it commanded charity and respect. 
His massive form, powerful voice, and true eloquence stood out the 
more vividly against his physical weakness. He had unusual gifts 
as a public speaker and rose rapidly in favor as a jury advocate, but 
was not as happy in his efforts in the Legislature of the State or in 
Congress. He lacked the initiative and learning to become a leader 
in the national House. He made some good speeches, however, in 
both bodies, but in the latter place he met his downfall at the hands 
of Mr. Polk of Tennessee. It came about in this fashion: On a 
certain Fourth of July he had attempted to deliver an oration at St. 
Johnsbury which was interrupted and finally suppressed by the hoots 
and horns of a crowd of riotous Dartmouth students. Instead of 
keeping silence under the unpardonable treatment—in which he would 
have had the sympathy of the public—he wrote an ill-judged letter 
of remonstrance, which drew forth in turn a cruelly clever reply 
from the culprits in which all of Mr. Bartlett’s peculiarities were 
exposed, burlesqued, and made ridiculous. A copy of this production 
was laid on the desk of every member of Congress and was intended for 
Mr. Bartlett’s humiliation should he attempt to speak. The occasion 
came when he rose to endorse a proposition which had just been 
vigorously attacked. He began: “Sir, were it not for the rules of 
the House I would pour upon the opponents of this measure the vials 
of my wrath.” He got no further, for Mr. Polk was upon his feet in 
a moment, moving with every appearance of eager interest, “that the 
rules be suspended and the gentleman allowed to pour.” There was 
but one thing to do in the face of the mortifying laughter that fol- 
lowed and that was for the speaker to subside into silence and his 
seat. Such an experience was not easy to be recovered from and it 
was natural that Mr. Bartlett should soon return to his old forum in 
Caledonia county. The extravagance of his style was better suited 
to the court room than to the halls of Congress. In court his style 
of speaking was almost a wonder. It was replete with unexpected 
pictures and striking illustrations, racy and filled with bursts of thrill- 
ing eloquence. He was prosecuting a traveling circus that held itself 
out as Sears & Co.’s Circus. The action was for negligently putting 
up seats that fell and injured the plaintiff. The defence was that 
the circus belonged to a Mr. Faxon of Liverpool, and that he alone 
was responsible. Said the advocate: “Gentlemen, I have a dog, 
and a mean cur he is, too. He comes when I whistle. He goes when 
I say ‘ste-boy.’ He follows me whereever I go. *T. Bartlett’ is 
marked on his collar. I am out with him on a day, and he ravenously 
attacks my neighbor’s sheep. I am called on for damages. I reply: 244 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
‘Sir, my name is on the collar of that cur. He goes when I say ‘ste- 
boy,’ comes when I whistle, follows me and is under my direction 
entirely, but I can’t pay you; that dog belongs to Mr. Faxon of 
Liverpool.’ ” It hardly needs saying that the defence was overwhelmed 
and the verdict won. In another case he took the part of a poor widow, 
whom two rich plaintiffs had got involved in legal trouble. He 
came into the case to assist a young attorney. In conclusion he said: 
“I am here at the solicitation of my young brother without script and 
without price. I told him I would charge nothing. I reconsider. I 
will charge and I ask him here and now to promise to discharge the 
obligation. When my now shattered form shall be laid in the tomb, 
my lips sealed with death, my voice silent in the grave, my wife set 
upon by legal robbers, and he is standing by, with ripened experience 
and a warm heart, I ask him to walk as boldly to her defence and 
with as pitying a heart as I have come out to the defence of this poor 
woman.” Then lifting up his palsied arm with the hand of the other, 
and turning to his young associate, he added with terrible emphasis: 
“Will you do it?” The eyes of his listeners were dimmed and there 
was no noise in the court room. 
He had a faculty of sudden transition from stirring passages 
to the quiet, deliberate, pathetic style of speaking. In a moment the 
whole man—voice, mode, attitude—would be changed, and that, too, 
without any unpleasant sensation to the listener. He was very adroit 
and exhibited great courage in turning a tide of sentiment when he saw 
it setting against his client. 
In a trial in which the party claimed he did not have time to get 
off the crossing and thus avoid a collision, not having over two minutes 
in which to do so, Mr. Bartlett suddenly stopped in his argument and 
looked at the clock. His impressive manner having produced breath- 
less silence, he addressed the clock, saying: “Tell me, thou ingenious 
chronicler of time, how long will you be in telling us two minutes?” 
He then commenced moving his hand to and fro in correspondence 
with the sound of the seconds, and counting them for two minutes. 
It was the longest two minutes that his opponent ever listened to and 
the jury were convinced that there was time enough to have escaped 
from danger. 
He had a client whose village residence had been nearly ruined 
by the erection by a railroad company of an embankment nearby. The 
company proposed to settle on the basis of the land taken. Mr. Bart- 
lett answered their argument in this way: “Gentlemen, I have a nice 
broadcloth coat. It cost me one hundred dollars. The cloth was five 
dollars per yard. The company sends his agent and he cuts one- 
fifth of a yard out of the part most prominent to view, and the com- 
pany say: ‘Mr. Bartlett, you have been damaged for my convenience THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
245 
and ought to be paid for it, and by heaven, you shall be. Here is 
one dollar—every cent the cloth cost.’ ” 
Mr. Bartlett was remarkable in the spontaneity of his nature, 
his vivid imagination, warm social qualities, generous sympathies, 
tender-heartedness, and lion-like make-up mentally and physically. 
The late George N. Dale, of Island Pond, an experienced biog- 
rapher and a man of remarkable discrimination, says of Mr. Bartlett, 
that his life created interesting incidents enough to fill a volume, and 
he ventures the judgment that the variety and style of his oratory were 
seldom equalled. He says in closing a tribute to him: “His personal 
influence was great, his presence warm, impressive and enlivening, and 
the impress of his absence correspondingly deep. The sun never set 
on a sadder day to his immediate personal friends than that on which 
he died, nor did eternal night ever close down upon a life which was 
succeeded by a more lonely stillness.” 
Albro F. Nichols, the long-time Clerk of the Caledonia County 
Court, who has seen the men at the bar come and go for the past 
fifty years in the northeastern counties of Vermont, says of him: “He 
was a natural orator, an advocate against whose resistless powers of 
eloquence few could stand. It never has been my lot to know a man 
possessed of so wonderful a power of illustration and aptness of 
anecdote in explanation of argument as that possessed by Thomas 
Bartlett.” 
HENRY C. BATES 
1843-1909 
One of the best trial lawyers that northeastern Vermont has 
produced was Henry C. Bates, who was born at Derby, January 29. 
1843, but spent the most active part of his professional career at St. 
Johnsbury. Brought up to labor on the farm, he attended the com- 
mon schools and later the academy at Derby. He then taught in 
the common schools and the Essex County Grammar School, read 
law in the office of Edwards and Dickerman, and in December, 1866, 
was admitted to the bar in Orleans county. He served in Company 
C, Fourth Massachusetts Heavy Artillery, in the Rebellion. He first 
located at Wheelock and later at West Concord and Guildhall. At 
the latter place he remained until 1873, when he formed a partnership 
with O. S. Burk at St. Johnsbury. He practiced at St. Johnsburv 
as a member of the above firm until it was dissolved by Mr. Burk’s 
death in September, 1876. He remained alone in practice until 1882, 
conducting a large and increasing business, when he became the 
senior partner in the firm of Bates and Mav. In 1870 he served as 246 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
census enumerator for Essex county, from 1880 to 1882 as State’s 
Attorney of Caledonia county, and from 1892 to 1894 as County 
Senator. In 1898-1900 he was Lieutenant-Governor. In 1901 he 
was appointed by the Philippine Commission, of which his towns- 
man, Henry C. Ide, was a member, a trial Judge at Iloilo on the 
Island of Panay, a position which he held until the summer of 1907, 
when he resigned. He died at Berkeley, Calif., in April, 1909. Judge 
Bates belonged to the common people, to whom his warm heart went 
out in tender sympathy. Pie commanded the confidence of jurors 
in an unusual degree. The law of the case was well understood by 
him, but better still the human nature that made up the panel. Strength, 
honesty, adroitness and eloquence equipped him for splendid service 
in the courts; with the court he was frank and open, honest and help- 
ful. He never set traps for the court or his opponent, but fought 
his cases in the open. 
HENRY C. IDE 
1844-1921 
Henry C. Ide, of St. Johnsbury, was born at Barnet, September 
18, 1844. He completed his preparatory education at St. Johnsbury 
Academy and graduated from Dartmouth College with the highest 
honors in the class of 1866. He was principal of St. Johnsbury Acad- 
emy from 1866 to 1868, after which he was for one year principal 
of the Cotting High School at Arlington, Mass. He studied law at 
St. Johnsbury with Judge Jonathan Ross and with Judge Benjamin 
H. Steele, and was admitted in 1871 to the bar of Vermont and sub- 
sequently to that of the United States District, Circuit, and Supreme 
Courts. He practiced at St. Johnsbury and had a large clientage 
both at home and in other counties and jurisdictions. He was State’s 
Attorney in 1876 and 1877, and State Senator from 1882 to 1886. In 
1884 he was president of the Vermont Republican State Convention 
and as such made the first speech for Blaine in the campaign of that 
year. In 1888 he was a delegate to the Republican National Con- 
vention in which Vermont voted unanimously on every ballot for 
Benjamin Harrison. In 1891 he was appointed by President Harrison 
as the United States member of the International Samoan Commis- 
sion, of which he afterwards became chairman. In 1893 he was made 
Chief Justice of Samoa by agreement between England, Germany 
and the United States and continued as such until 1897, when he 
resigned. In March, 1900, he was appointed by President McKinley 
as a member of the Philippine Commission, and upon the organization 
of the government was made Secretary of Finance and Justice. It THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
247 
became his duty in this connection to organize a Department of Justice 
and to supervise the finances of the islands. In 1904 he became Vice- 
Governor, in 1905 was acting Governor-General and in 1906 became 
Governor-General. During his period of service which ended in 1906, 
he was the author of more than three hundred laws of the Philippine 
Islands. These were of great value in the administration of public 
affairs. Soon after his return from the Philippines he was made 
receiver of the Knickerbocker Trust Company of New York, which 
had deposits of over $60,000,000. Within less than a year the institu- 
tion was able to resume business. In 1909, President Taft appointed 
him Envoy Extraordinary and Minister Plenipotentiary to Spain. 
He remained in that office until August, 1913, when he resigned. He 
received the degree of LL. D. from Dartmouth and from Tufts Col- 
lege. He died June 13, 1921. Mr. Ide was one of the best lawyers 
that Vermont has produced. 
ALEXANDER DUNNETT 
1852-1920 
Alexander Dunnett was born at Peacham, Vt., November 29, 
1852. He was of Scotch origin, and the third of six children of An- 
drew and Christiana (Galbraith) Dunnett. Andrew came to America 
from Scotland in 1842 and married about five years later, settling 
first on a farm in Peacham, and later in West Newbury. The church 
and business center was at South Ryegate, where the family took 
up their residence when Alexander was fourteen years of age. Andrew 
was a farmer, elder in the Reformed Presbyterian Church, and a thor- 
ough Bible student. 
He spent the formative period of his boyhood at South Ryegate, 
where he attended church and school. His academic training was 
acquired at Newbury and Mclndoes Academies, and at Randolph 
Normal School. He graduated from the normal school in 1874 and 
studied law in the office of Nelson L. Boyden at Randolph and at 
Boston University Law School. He was admitted to the bar at the 
Tune term of the Orange County Court, 1877, and began his pro- 
fessional career at South Ryegate, where he practiced until 1883, when 
he removed to St. Johnsbury and formed a law partnership with Albro 
F. Nichols, which lasted for three years. In 1896 he formed a part- 
nership with Leighton P. Slack, which continued until the latter was 
appointed Superior Judge, October 1, 1913. Shortly after this he 
formed a partnership with Charles E. Leslie, which continued for 
two years, when Mr. Leslie retired from the firm and Charles A. 
Shields entered it. The firm of Dunnett and Shields was enlarged 248 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
in September, 1917, to admit David S. Conant, who, with Mr. Shields, 
continued as a partner of Mr. Dunnett in the firm of Dunnett, Shields 
and Conant until the death of the senior member. 
An accident occurred to Mr. Dunnett during a vacation in his 
early years which made it expedient, if not imperative, that he should 
henceforth earn his living by mental rather than physical exertions. 
When at work with a railroad construction gang a large stone fell 
on him, crushing his pelvis. This was a kind of injury that up to 
that time had with but few exceptions proved fatal, but not so with 
Mr. Dunnett. His life was despaired of but his Scotch determination 
won out and he retained a degree of strength that few possess, as 
was evidenced by many a wrestling bout in his younger years. He 
suffered a slight deformity from the accident, but he was erect in 
carriage, was over six feet in height, and impressive and interesting 
in appearance. 
He taught many terms of school, beginning when he was but 
seventeen years old, and he held the usual public offices that fall to 
the lot of a wise and respected citizen. From 1886 to 1890 he was 
the State’s Attorney of Caledonia county, and from 1906 to 1915 
United States District Attorney for Vermont. He resigned the latter 
office in order to become a candidate for Congress, in which aspiration 
he was defeated after a long contest in the convention. He repre- 
sented Caledonia county in the State Senate in 1890, attended as an 
alternate the Republican National Convention in 1916 held at Chicago, 
and was a delegate to the national convention of the same party held 
at the same place in 1920, being chairman of the delegation. He was 
a member of the National Bar Association and had been president of 
the Caledonia Bar Association and of the Vermont Bar Association. 
He was a trustee of Norwich University, and in 1917 received from 
that institution the honorary degree of Master of Science. An ex- 
cessive blood-pressure, which was discovered about a year before his 
death, led to the admonition of his physician that he must relax from 
his arduous duties in order to preserve his health. This advice came 
at a time when his labors at the bar were at the flood and it was not 
easy to resist the current that was sweeping on to success and fortune. 
Many important cases were before the courts which required the 
personal attention of Mr. Dunnett. This he bestowed in full measure, 
to the impairment of his vitality. It was soon discovered that a severe 
kidney trouble had developed which the doctors and a course of treat- 
ment in a sanatorium failed to correct. In this unhappy physical 
state he insisted on attending the convention at Chicago, although it 
might “take six months from his life,” and there made himself heard 
in the great convention hall as he seconded in behalf of the State of 
his birth the nomination of Calvin Coolidge for Vice-President. Not HUGH J. M. JONES 
Born in Ebensburg, Pa., of Welsh parentage, Febru- 
ary (i, 186,5. In the spring of 1877 he removed to Zanes- 
ville, Ohio, where he was educated in the high school and 
later was employed in a mercantile establishment. In 
1882 Mr. Jones was employed as a travelling salesman 
by the granite firm of Jones Brothers. Gradually he 
worked his way up until he was placed in charge of the 
great Barre plant, the largest monumental granite works 
in the world, which, in normal times, employs from 
four hundred to five hundred persons. Mr. Jones has 
been president of the Barre Granite Manufacturers’ 
Association and is treasurer of the Wells-Lamson 
Quarry Company and vice-president of the Quarry Sav- 
ings Bank and Trust Company. For many years he has 
served as a member of the Montpelier School Board, 
much of the time as chairman. He was a member of 
the State Barge Terminal Commission. During the 
World War he held the responsible position of State 
Fuel Administrator and appointed one hundred and 
thirty-three local fuel committees throughout the State. 
One of his rulings was to the effect that no private 
person should have permission to obtain coal in car- 
load lots, that privilege being restricted to the State. 
He was reappointed State Fuel Administrator during 
the Fuel crisis of 1922. Mr. Jones was one of the 
Vermont delegates to the Republican National Con- 
vention of 1920. He married Miss Dell B. Brandom 
of Mount Sterling, Ohio, July 9, 1889. Their children 
are Robert B., Marjorie D., and Hugh B. One son, 
George I.., died in infancy. The family became resi- 
dents of Montpelier in 1896. THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
249 
long after his return from Chicago he went to his summer home at 
Groton, where he remained for most of the time, but going now and 
then to his office in St. Johnsbury on important business until his 
death, September 14, 1920. His funeral services were held at the 
old Presbyterian Church at South Ryegate in the presence of a large 
assembly of relatives, acquaintances and prominent men from all 
parts of the State, and his body was conveyed to rest in the family 
burial lot at South Ryegate. 
Alexander Dunnett was a remarkable man. He was the most 
interesting man at the Vermont bar, the most unique, and I think, 
all things considered, the wisest. He was of a character distinct 
from any one else and of a type all his own. The Scotch in his nature 
was always apparent, but there were elements of attractiveness in 
his make-up that were wholly personal. One of these was his un- 
failing courtesy to the members of the bar who were opposed to him. 
No ill will was ever cherished and no ill word spoken of such a 
brother. Toward the courts he held the highest ideals and for them 
he had the highest respect. But neither his friendship for his fellow 
members of the bar nor his regard for the courts ever caused him 
to withhold one word of criticism that he thought the case merited 
when he was presenting it in court. If his remarks were sometimes 
caustic they were, nevertheless, enjoyed by the court, who understood 
the kindly nature from which they came. In the first place, Mr. 
Dunnett was a great student. He liked to pore over books day after 
day and night after night until the body was exhausted and had to 
recuperate in rest and sleep. This made him a profound lawyer and 
an educated man, for he studied history, literature and poetry with 
the same passion that he studied law. Then he practiced law with 
the same intensity that he studied it. He gave his days to the courts 
and his nights to the preparation for the coming day. It is natural 
that powers of ready acquisition and unusual capacity for assimilation 
and retention should have been drawn on by clients from all parts of 
the State, especially when accompanied by a careful judgment and a 
personality as winning as that of Mr. Dunnett, and it is not sur- 
prising that the load he carried had to be laid down before the journey 
of life should have ended. If the cases, should be examined in the 
reports of the Supreme Court it will be found that Mr. Dunnett 
argued many of them, and if his briefs were read it will appear 
that he made the most of his points and fortified them by decisions 
gathered from all reasonably available sources. His success was great 
with this court. It was marked in the trial courts also, where he 
was sure to make the most of his case in the examination of witnesses. 
There were others, however, who could make more of a bad case 
with the jury. With Mr. Dunnett the case had to stand on fair 250 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
argument and this he would send home with a logic and earnestness 
that were convincing. 
It is in a personal sense that Mr. Dunnett will be the most missed 
and the longest remembered. His coming was sure to bring delight 
to all who were within the area of his kindly influence. He was as 
good a listener as he was a story teller and if anyone dropped a new 
story into his already crowded storehouse it would be recognized 
when brought forth at some future time by Mr. Dunnett, for it would 
appear in perfect reproduction, the same in substance and in words 
as it was received. 
It will be a long time before the lawyers of his acquaintance will 
cease to relate anecdotes in the life of Mr. Dunnett. These cover 
a wide range and relate to a good many subjects. They illustrate 
the many phases of his character, but none so emphatically as his 
imperturbability. Once an oil stove had been installed in the home 
at St. Johnsbury against his wishes, and in an evil hour it caught 
fire. Mr. Dunnett was sitting on the front porch, with legs crossed, 
reading. The fire department was called from the rear part of the 
house and when the firemen arrived they asked in excitement of the 
head of the family where his fire was. Without changing his position 
or showing any interest in the important event that was taking place 
at the other end of the house, and still holding his reading, he said: 
“I haven’t any fire. That’s Mrs. Dunnett’s fire in the other part of 
the house.” 
As soon as the automobile came into general use Mr. Dunnett 
was the owner of a car. He had several and used to drive himself 
and that at a rate intended to frighten his passengers, if any accom- 
panied him. His accidents were many and it is a marvel that he was 
permitted to survive them all. While at Ryegate figuring up the 
amount due on a note he left his car standing on an incline without 
fixing the brakes. The car obeyed the laws of gravity, started back- 
wards and landed in the edge of the river. A woman saw it and 
rushed breathlessly into the house where the figuring was still going 
on and exclaimed: “Oh, Mr. Dunnett, your car has run into the river.” 
She repeated her warning before she got any response, and then with- 
out stopping his computation he said: “Then I don’t suppose it will 
go any further.” When the note had been finished he leisurely pro- 
cured a team and had the car drawn into the highway. 
His frankness was always in evidence and he never sought to 
conceal the fact that his Scotch blood made him in harmony with 
other things that were “Scotch” also. His automobile was wrecked 
at a Canadian crossing and he brought suit against the King (the 
road being a government road) on the theory that the whistle was 
not blown. The case came before the court and judgment was en- THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
251 
tered for the plaintiff. A specification of the articles damaged and 
lost had to be made and when the list had been furnished the Judge, 
he inquired with apparent seriousness if all the articles lost had been 
specified. On getting an answer in the affirmative he said: “You 
were going on a fishing trip, were you not, Mr. Dunnett, and were 
these all the articles you had in the car?” To which the latter replied: 
“I did have a bottle of Scotch.” “And was this of no value ?” inquired 
the Judge. “It was priceless,” said Mr. Dunnett. On this or another 
occasion they asked him if the whiskey was hurt. He said “it wasn’t 
hurt, it was spilled.” 
PRESENT MEMBERS OF THE CALEDONIA COUNTY BAR 
Harry Blodgett, of St. Johnsbury, was born in Canaan, March 
31, 1852, and was educated in the common schools and at Colebrook 
Academy. He studied law at Colebrook with Judge Edgar Aldrich, 
at St. Johnsbury with O. S. and C. C. Burke, and was admitted in 
1873. He has practiced at St. Johnsbury since his admission. He 
was State’s Attorney, 1882-1884, 1898-1900, and was appointed Cal- 
edonia county Municipal Judge, February 1, 1921. 
Brian Brown, of Danville, was born at Peekskill, N. Y., Novem- 
ber 10, 1868. He studied law at the New York Law School, Brook- 
lyn Law School, and at St. Lawrence University. He was admitted 
to the bar of New York in 1904 and to the bar of Vermont in 1917. 
He practiced in New York from 1904 to 1916, and in Caledonia county 
has practiced since 1917. 
Harvey Burbank, of Danville, was born at Walden, July 5, 1868. 
He was educated in the public schools of Walden, at Hardwick 
Academy, and at Orange County Collegiate Institution, Orange, Calif. 
He studied law with Harry Blodgett at St. Johnsbury and at the 
Boston University Law School, where he received the degree of LL. B. 
in 1900. He was admitted in 1900 and until 1907 practiced at Danville 
and St. Johnsbury. He has held many town offices in Danville, has 
been president of the Caledonia County Teacher’s Association, of 
the Vermont Association of District Superintendents of Schools, and 
has been District Superintendent of Schools in Caledonia South Central 
district since 1907. 
James B. Campbell, of St. Johnsbury, was born at Stowe, October 
31, 1883, and graduated from the Stowe High School in 1905 and 
from the University of Vermont in 1909. He studied law in the office 
of Albro F. Nichols at St. Johnsbury and in the George Washington 252 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
University Law School, and was admitted in 1912. He was Assistant 
Clerk of the court while studying at St. Johnsbury, and has been 
State’s Attorney of Caledonia county since 1916. He was associated 
with Elisha May in practice at the time of the death of Mr. May in 
1918. 
David S. Conant, of St. Johnsbury, was born at Thetford, De- 
cember 7, 1866. He was educated in the district schools, at Thetford 
Academy, and at St. Johnsbury Academy, graduating from the latter 
school in 1887, and from Dartmouth College in 1891. He studied 
law in the office of John H. Watson at Bradford and at the Boston 
University Law School. He was admitted in 1898 and practiced at 
Bradford from his admission until 1917, when he moved to St. Johns- 
bury and became a member of the law firm of Dunnett, Shields and 
Conant. He has since practiced at the latter place and is now a 
member of the firm of Shields and Conant. He was State’s Attorney 
of Orange county, 1900-1904, and State Senator, 1914-1916. 
Sumner E. Darling, Jr., of Hardwick, was born at Hardwick, No- 
vember 12, 1886. He attended Hardwick Academy and Montpelier 
Seminary, graduating from the latter institution in 1905. He grad- 
uated at Tufts College in 1909. He studied law in the office of his 
uncle, Charles H. Darling, at Burlington, and was admitted to the 
bar in 1912. He was in service in the late war with Germany and 
was discharged as a Sergeant. 
George Clinton Frye, of St. Johnsbury, was born at Concord, 
September 17, 1873, and was educated at the St. Johnsbury Academy, 
where he graduated in 1892. He studied law at the Boston University 
Law School, graduating in 1897, and with Albro F. Nichols at St. 
Johnsbury, and was admitted in 1897. He has practiced at St. Johns- 
bury since admission. He was Referee in Bankruptcy from 1910 to 
1915 and was Judge of the Caledonia County Municipal Court from 
1915 to 1921. 
Joseph T. Gleason, of Lyndonville, was born at Lunenburg, June 
18, 1844, and was educated in the district schools of Lunenburg. 
He studied law in the office of J. P. Lamson at Cabot and in the office 
of W. W. Eaton at Concord. He was admitted in 1876, and practiced 
at Concord from 1875 to 1878, and has since practiced at Lyndon- 
ville. He was a soldier in the Civil War; has held many of the town 
offices; Assistant Judge of the County Court; County Senator; vice- 
president and president of the Caledonia Bar Association. 
Arthur L. Graves, of St. Johnsbury, was born at Wells River, 
July 30, 1887. He graduated at the Wells River High School in THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
253 
1904; at Phillips Academy, Andover, 1905; Dartmouth College, 1909; 
and at Harvard Law School, 1912. He studied law in the office of 
Simonds and Searles at St. Johnsbury, and was admitted to the bar 
in 1913. He has practiced at St. Johnsbury since his admission and is 
a member of the firm of Searles and Graves. 
Guy W. Hill, of St. Johnsbury, was born in Waterford, April 
26, 1878, and was educated in the common schools of Waterford and 
at St. Johnsbury Academy, where he graduated in 1897. He studied 
law in the office of Dunnett and Slack at St. Johnsbury and was ad- 
mitted in 1901. He has practiced at St. Johnsbury since his admis- 
sion. He was secretary of the Vermont Bar Association for two 
years. 
Alphonzo D. Kimball, of Hardwick, was born at Cabot, August 
24, 1860. He was educated in the common schools of Cabot and at 
the Randolph State Normal School, where he graduated in 1882. He 
studied law in the office of Charles H. Heath at Montpelier and was 
admitted in 1889. He practiced at first at Plainfield and afterward 
at Hardwick. He was located in Woodbury for a time and removed 
to Hardwick in 1909. He has done much teaching and farming and 
has not practiced to any considerable extent. He has been Superin- 
tendent of Schools in Woodbury and a member of the school board. 
Jutten A. Longmoore, of St. Johnsbury, was born at South Rye- 
gate, December 17, 1892. He was educated in the public schools, 
at St. Johnsbury Academy, at Newbury Seminary, and at the Univer- 
sity of Southern California. He studied law at the last named insti- 
tution, with Albro F. Nichols at St. Johnsbury, and was admitted in 
1917. He was enrolled in the war with Germany, April 21, 1917, 
enlisted May 10, 1917, served in France and Germany, and was 
discharged August 15, 1919. He has practiced at St. Johnsbury since 
September 5, 1919, and is a member of the firm of Porter, Witters 
and Longmoore. 
Melvin G. Morse, of Hardwick, was born at Elmore, February 
27, 1873. He was educated at the People’s Academy, where he grad- 
uated in the class of 1897. He studied law at the Boston University 
Law School, with Philip K. Gleed at Morrisville and with Bates, May 
and Simonds at St. Johnsbury, and was admitted in Vermont and 
Massachusetts in 1897. He has practiced at Hardwick since 1900. 
He was State’s Attorney in 1902-1904; member of House in 1915; 
Senator in 1917; Reviser and Editor of General Laws; Municipal 
Judge of Caledonia county from February until August, 1917; Legis- 254 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
lative Reference Librarian from July 1, 1919, to May 1, 1920; Com- 
missioner of Taxes from 1920 to 1921; was in Y. M. C. A. service 
overseas in World War. He is now in practice at Hardwick. 
Albro F. Nichols, of St. Johnsbury, was born at Lyndon, March 
24, 1850. He was educated in the common schools, at Colby Academy 
and New Hampton Institute, graduating in the classical department 
of the latter school in 1871. He studied law in St. Johnsbury in the 
office of Belden and May and in the office of Belden and Ide, and 
was admitted in 1873 to the County Court and in 1878 to the Supreme 
Court. He practiced at Lyndon from 1874 to 1876, at West Concord 
from 1876 to 1883, and from 1883 to 1888 at St. Johnsbury. He 
was State’s Attorney of Essex county, 1878-1883; Senator, Caledonia 
county, 1890-1894; County Clerk since January 21, 1888. 
Nathan A. Norton, of Lyndonville, was born at Glover, September 
21, 1865, and was educated in the common schools and at Johnson 
Normal School. He studied law in the office of Edwin A. Cook at 
Newport and at the University of Michigan Law School, and was 
admitted to the bars of Michigan and of Vermont in 1895. He prac- 
ticed at Glover from his admission until 1900, and has since practiced 
at Lyndonville. He was State’s Attorney from 1914 to 1917. 
Frank M. Page, of Groton, was born at Topsham, September 
23, 1845, and educated at the Spaulding Academy, Barre. He studied 
law with Capt. J. O. Livingston at Montpelier, and was admitted in 
1873. He has practiced at St. Johnsbury and at Groton. He was 
Assistant Judge of the Caledonia County Court, 1908-1912; member 
of the House in 1876; member of the Senate, 1914-1915. 
Loren E. Pattridge, of Peacham, was born at Peacham, February 
12, 1867, and was educated in the Caledonia County Grammar School, 
from which he graduated in 1888, and from Dartmouth College, from 
which he graduated in 1892. He studied law in the office of David 
J. Foster at Burlington and in the office of Norton Brothers of Buffalo. 
N. Y. He was admitted to the bar of New York in 1896 and to the 
bar of Vermont in 1902. He practiced at Buffalo from 1896 until 
1901, and since that time has practiced at Peacham. He has held minor 
town offices. 
David E. Porter, of St. Johnsbury, was born at Oshkosh, Wis., 
July 16, 1872, and was educated at St. Johnsbury Academy and at 
Michigan University. He studied law at the Ann Arbor Law School 
and in the office of Bates and May at St. Johnsbury, was admitted 
to the bar of Michigan in 1892 and to the bar of Vermont in 1895. THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
255 
He has always practiced at St. Johnsbury. He was Referee in Bank- 
ruptcy, 1898-1902; State’s Attorney, 1902-1904; State Senator, 1910; 
Caledonia County Municipal Judge, 1910-1915. 
Samuel E. Richardson, of St. Johnsbury, was born in Waterford, 
May 13, 1884, and was educated in the district schools, at St. Johns- 
bury Academy and at Harvard College, where he graduated in 1907. 
He graduated at the Harvard Law School in 1910, was admitted to 
the Massachusetts bar in 1910 and the bar of Vermont in 1912. He 
practiced with the firm of Howe and Hovey at St. Johnsbury during 
1911 and 1912, when he went to New York and entered the legal 
department of the American Sugar Refining Company, where he 
remained until 1916. He was unable to resume practice until 1917 
on account of ill health, when he entered the office of Porter and 
Witters at St. Johnsbury, where he remained until 1918, when he 
went into business. He has practiced law to a limited extent at St. 
Johnsbury since 1918. 
J. Rolf Searles, of St. Johnsbury, was born in Holland, Vt., March 
22, 1881, and was educated in the district schools of Holland and 
Derby and at Derby Academy, graduating from the latter in 1899. 
He studied law with Porter and Thompson and with Albro 
F. Nichols at St. Johnsbury, was admitted in 1904 and has since 
that date practiced at St. Johnsbury. He became a member of the 
Republican State Committee for Caledonia county in 1914 and soon 
was made vice-chairman and secretary. He succeeded Judge Stanley 
C. Wilson as chairman, continuing in service until 1919, when he 
resigned. 
Oscar L. Shepard, of Hardwick, was born at Albany, Vt., March 
24, 1894. He graduated at Hardwick Academy in 1913 and at Lowell 
Commercial College (Mass.) in 1914. He studied law in the office 
of Walter A. Dutton at Hardwick, with whom he has formed a part- 
nership in the name of Dutton and Shepard. He was admitted in 
1919 and has practiced at Hardwick since his admission. He served 
in the army in the late war with Germany from February, 1918, to 
January, 1919. 
Charles A. Shields, of St. Johnsbury, was born at Fairfield, Pa., 
November 17, 1878. He was educated in the Michigan graded schools, 
the high school at Wayland, Mich., and Valparaiso University, Indiana. 
He graduated from the College of Law in the latter institution after 
a two-year course of forty weeks each with the degree of LL. B. 
in 1902. He studied law in the office of F. B. Lambert at Wahpeton. 
N. D., and was admitted to the bar of that State in 1902 and to the 256 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
bar of Vermont in 1915. He practiced for a part of the time in 
the years 1902, 1903 and 1910 in North Dakota and since November, 
1915, has practiced at St. Johnsbury. He is a member of the firm 
of Shields and Conant. 
Preston A. Smith, of Groton, was born at Hope, Me., May 14, 
1859. He was educated in the common schools of his native State, 
graduated at Union High School, Union, Me., in 1877, and at Gorham 
Normal School in 1881. He studied law with D. Thompson at Hart- 
land, True Pierce at Rockland, and James Gray at Lubec, and was 
admitted to the bar of Maine in 1896 and to the bar of Vermont in 
1908. He practiced at Thomaston, Me., 1896-1898. Mr. Smith 
preached at the Richford Methodist Church on coming to Vermont. 
He has not been in active practice in the law and is now secretary- 
treasurer of the Groton Manufacturing Company. 
Aimer B. Thomas, of Hardwick, was born at Woodbury, August 
2, 1862. He was educated in the common schools and at Hardwick 
Academy. He studied law in the office of Josiah O. Livingston and 
in the office of Joseph A. and George W. Wing at Montpelier and 
in the office of Joseph P. Lamson at Cabot. He was admitted in 1883 
and located at Redfield, Dakota, where he remained for three years 
in practice. He returned to Randolph, where he practiced for three 
years, when he removed to Hardwick, where he has remained since, 
but has not practiced since about 1900. He was prosecuting attorney 
for two years in Spink county, Dakota. Mr. Thomas is a mechanic 
and has spent considerable time during the last twenty years in work 
upon different mechanical devices, for which he has obtained patents. 
Walter W. Wesley, of St. Johnsbury, was born at Bethlehem, 
N. H., October 6, 1890. He was educated at the St. Johnsbury Acad- 
emy, where he took both a general and commercial course, graduating 
in the latter in 1909. He studied law at St. Johnsbury in the office 
of David E. Porter and at the Boston University Law School, and 
was admitted in 1913. He practiced at St. Johnsbury from 1914 to 
1919, when he was appointed Probate Judge for Caledonia county. 
Harry W. Witters, of St. Johnsbury, was born at St. Albans, 
March 18, 1889, and was educated in the public schools and in the 
high school at St. Albans, graduating from the latter in 1908. He 
studied law at the University of Michigan, where he received the 
degree of LL. B. in 1911. He was admitted to the bar of Michigan 
and to the bar of Vermont the year of his graduation from the law 
school. He has practiced at St. Johnsbury since December, 1911, and 
is a member of the firm of Porter, Witters and Harvey. He was a 
member of the House from St. Johnsbury in 1919. FREDERICK H. BABBITT 
Born in Keene, N. H., November 23, 1859. 
He removed to Bellows Falls in 1864 and has 
resided there since that time. He was educated 
in the public and private schools. He has 
been engaged in the manufacture of paper for many 
years and is one of the most prominent manufacturers 
in Vermont. He is president of the Robertson Paper 
Company, the largest manufacturer of oiled and waxed 
paper in the United States. He has held all the im- 
portant municipal offices and represented his town in 
the Legislature in 1910, being one of the leaders of 
that body. He was chairman of the Committee on 
Internal Affairs and second on the Ways and Means 
Committee. He was a Senator from Windham county 
in 1912, being President Pro Tem of the Senate and 
chairman of the Finance Committee. He has served 
on important State commissions, has been president of 
the Greater Vermont Association and prominent in 
Masonic circles, being a member of the Grand Com- 
mandery and a 33rd degree Mason. CHITTENDEN COUNTY 
BY an act of the Legislature passed October 22, 1787, the comity 
of Chittenden was established, and Colchester became the shire 
town. Here the Supreme Court held the annual sessions, be- 
ginning at the August term, 1789. The County Court held at the 
same place six terms, commencing with February term, 1788. By 
a special act, passed October 27, 1790, the County Courts were re- 
moved from Colchester to Burlington. In the summer of 1796 a 
court house was built in the center of Court House Square. This 
was replaced by another which was built in 1802 on the site of the 
Fletcher Free Library building. The new court house was burned 
in 1828, and another one erected on the same site. The building is 
the same that was later used by the Fletcher Free Library. It is a 
two-story brick building, forty-six feet wide and sixty feet long. The 
court room was in the upper story. In 1829 the property was leased 
to the county as long as wood grows and water runs for a normal 
rental if demanded. The town paid one thousand five hundred dol- 
lars toward the building on condition that it should have the exclusive 
use of the basement for town purposes. Here the town meetings 
were held until 1854. The building was used for a court house until 
1873, when the present court house was completed. The latter is a 
handsome structure of cut and hammered stone, two stories in height, 
with a mansard roof. It was two years in process of construction and 
cost between fifty thousand and sixty thousand dollars. 
The first jail stood near the northeast corner of Court House 
Square, about the site of the Strong block. A lot on Church Street, 
between Bank and Cherry Streets, was purchased by the county in 
1807, and here was erected a jail and jail house. In 1851 this was 
destroyed by fire and new jail buildings were at once erected on the 
same site. These premises were sold in 1887, and in that year the 
county purchased the lot on Main Street, where the present jail 
stands. This jail was completed in 1888, and has been changed from 
time to time, as occasion required. 
WILLIAM A. GRISWOLD 
1755-1845 
William A. Griswold, who is said by his biographer to have been 
an excellent specimen of an honest politician, was born at New Marl- 
boro, Mass., September 15, 1755. When he was ten years old his 
father moved to Bennington. He graduated from Dartmouth College 
and studied law with Judge Jonathan Robinson. He acquired an 258 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
appointed to the office of State’s Attorney in 1803 in Bennington 
county and with few interruptions continued to hold it until he moved 
to Burlington in 1821. He was elected to the Legislature in 1807 
and remained a member until 1811. He urged the Legislature to 
abandon the branding-iron, pillory and whipping post and to sub- 
stitute a kind of punishment intended for the reformation of the 
criminal. In 1812 he was chosen a Presidential Elector and voted 
for James Madison. In 1813 he re-entered the Legislature and con- 
tinued therein until 1819, being Speaker from 1815 to the end of his 
service. During the stormy years of the War of 1812 he was the 
leader of his party in the House. President Monroe appointed him 
United States District Attorney, a place which he held until 1829. 
He was a member of the Council of Censors in 1828, and Presidential 
Elector in 1836, voting for Harrison. He represented Burlington in 
the Legislature in 1841. After his removal to Burlington he formed 
a law partnership with his brother-in-law, Judge Follett, and pursued 
his profession as long as his health permitted. He was a follower 
of Jefferson in politics, a supporter of President Adams’ administra- 
tion and an earnest admirer of Henry Clay. 
CHARLES ADAMS 
1785-1861 
One of the leading lawyers of the old school was Charles Adams, 
who was born at Arlington, Vt., March 12, 1785, and died January 
12, 1861. He graduated at the University of Vermont at the age of 
nineteen, being one of the three forming the first graduating class. 
He studied law in the office of William C. Harrington in Burlington 
and was admitted to the bar in Chittenden county. He served as one 
of the Governor’s Council. During the visit of General Lafayette 
in 1825 he acted as aide to Governor Van Ness. He was widely 
known throughout the State for his ability and public services for 
more than forty years and esteemed by his fellow-men for the purity 
of his character and his generous and earnest public spirit. His 
practice at the bar was large. This was characterized by integrity, 
prudence, learning, knowledge of men and affairs and power of per- 
suasion. When he passed from among the living, one of the few 
remaining lights of the old common law was extinguished. 
TIMOTHY FOLLETT 
1793-1857 
Timothy Follett was born at Bennington, January 5, 1793. At 
the age of ten years he moved to Burlington, where he graduated THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
259 
from the University of Vermont in 1810. He studied law at the 
extensive practice, much of it being in the Federal Courts. He was 
Litchfield Law School and was admitted to the bar in Chittenden 
county in February, 1814. In 1819 he was appointed to the office 
of State’s Attorney and was elected to the same office in 1820-21 and 
1822. In 1823 he was elected Judge of the County Court and his pro- 
fessional life continued until he was obliged to abandon it on account 
of ill health. In 1830-31 and 1832 he was Town Representative; from 
1832 to 1841 was engaged in the settlement of the large bankrupt 
estate of Horatio Gates & Company of Montreal. In the latter year 
he became a senior member of the firm of Follett and Bradley, which 
did an extensive mercantile business. He was the chief projector of 
the Rutland and Burlington Railroad. He was elected president of 
the corporation in 1845 and in December, 1849, a train of cars passed 
over the entire line from Boston to Burlington. He continued as 
president and sole constructing agent until January, 1852, when he 
surrendered the trusts which the corporation had committed to his 
care. 
JACOB MAECK 
1798-1873 
One of the most interesting as well as one of the brightest mem- 
bers of the Chittenden county bar was Jacob Maeck. He was born 
at Shelburne, Vt., February 14, 1798. His father was a physician 
of prominence at the latter place, and his grandfather a surgeon in 
the Hessian army that surrendered at Saratoga. He graduated from 
the University of Vermont with honors in the class of 1818; studied 
law with Sanford Gadcomb and was admitted to the bar in Chittenden 
county in 1820. He began practice in Essex, but soon went to Jericho, 
where he remained until 1829, when he removed to Burlington, which 
he made his home thereafter. He was a partner of David A. Smalley 
from 1837 to 1841. He was the first counsel of the Vermont Central 
Railroad and a strong friend of Governor Paine during its construc- 
tion. He never held public office and was for most of his life an in- 
dependent in politics. In later years he acted with the Democracy. 
He was an excellent lawyer and successful in his practice. He pos- 
sessed a pronounced character, was eccentric and extremely witty. 
Many anecdotes and witty sayings are credited to him which are still 
cherished and quoted at the local bar. He was a confirmed bachelor 
and avoided the society of women. He was small, slight and frail 
physically. When inquiry was made about his health he would say: 
“I don’t know, for I never had any.” In spite of this misfortune 
his keen, strong intellect and caustic speech gave him great weight 
before court and jury. His death occurred November 4, 1873. 260 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
GEORGE P. MARSH 
1801-1882 
George P. Marsh, the most widely known of the distinguished 
family of that name, was born at Woodstock, this State, March 15, 
1801, and died at Valambrosa, Italy, July 24, 1882. He graduated 
at Dartmouth College in 1820 and for a year was a tutor therein. 
He was distinguished at an early age for his linguistic acquirements. 
He came to Burlington in 1823 and formed a partnership with Ben- 
jamin F. Bailey under the name of Bailey and Marsh. In 1835 he 
was elected one of the Governor’s Council. In 1842 he was elected 
to Congress. After serving six years in Congress he was appointed 
by President Tyler Minister to Turkey. While in Turkey, in 1852, 
he was charged with an important mission to Greece. Returning 
home in 1853 he served as Railroad Commissioner for Vermont. In 
March, 1861, he was appointed by President Lincoln Minister to Italy 
and never again returned home. He represented his country abroad 
for many years. He possessed large learning and his interests were 
as wide as the world. He published the following works: A gram- 
mar of the “Old Northern or Icelandic Language”; “The Camel, His 
Organization, Habits and Uses, With Reference to His Introduction 
into the United States”; lectures on the English Language, Origin 
and History of the English Language, and of the early literature 
it embodies. All but the first of these subjects were treated in the 
form of lectures and were originally delivered at the Lowell Institute. 
Boston. They passed through many editions and are recognized 
authority upon the subjects treated. “Man and Nature,” published in 
1864, was afterwards revised and appeared in 1874 under the title, 
“The Earth as Modified by Human Action.” He also published at 
different times a number of lectures, speeches and addresses. He was 
the greatest general scholar who ever came to the Vermont bar. 
DANIEL ROBERTS 
1811-1899 
Daniel Roberts, son of Daniel and Almira Roberts, was born 
at Wallingford, Vt., May 25, 1811. His parents came from Litch- 
field, Conn., early in the century and located in Rutland county. Daniel 
Roberts was fifth in a family of ten children. He entered Middlebury 
College at the age of fourteen and graduated in the class of 1829. 
He appeared in college clad in homespun and did not have his first 
suit of broadcloth until his graduation. The class was famous for 
its longevity. At its semi-centennial anniversary thirteen of the orig- THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
261 
inal eighteen members were still living. Mr. Roberts studied law in 
the office of Harvey Button of Wallingford, and was admitted to the 
bar of Rutland county at the September term, 1832. That fall he 
started out to find a place in which to locate, visiting Grand Gulf, 
Natchez and New Orleans. The next spring he visited his cousins 
in Morgan county, Illinois. He formed a partnership with Murry 
McConnell at Jacksonville, 111., but returned to Vermont in 1835 and 
afterwards remained in his native State. In 1834-35, Stephen A. 
Douglas taught the winter term of school in Winchester, which is 
near Jacksonville, came to the latter place in the spring of 1834 and 
was admitted to the bar before he was twenty-one. Mr. Roberts, 
who knew him at this time, describes him in the following interesting 
manner: “When elected Attorney-General, I remember him as he 
started out on the circuit, astride of a three-year-old colt, his short 
legs reaching hardly below the saddle-skirts, and in his saddle-bags 
his whole library, consisting of a book on criminal law which I had 
loaned him.” It will be recalled that the length of Mr. Douglas’ legs 
was the subject of comment at one time and President Lincoln was 
asked how long a man’s legs ought to be and gave the characteristic 
answer, that they ought to be long enough to reach from his body 
to the ground. In the spring of 1836, Mr. Roberts took the office 
and business of Milo L. Bennett of Manchester, afterwards a Judge 
of the Supreme Court, and remained in practice in Manchester until 
1856, when he moved to Burlington and formed a partnership with 
Lucius E. Chittenden. Here he remained in practice during the 
remainder of his long life, succeeding to the place of Edward J. 
Phelps, who had formerly been a partner of Mr. Chittenden and had 
at this time removed to New York. The new firm was known as 
Roberts and Chittenden. It had a large practice at a bar composed 
of the greatest lawyers in the State. Some of the most conspicuous 
of these were George F. Edmunds, Edward J. Phelps, Asahel Peck, 
Jacob Maeck, Levi Underwood and Eleazer R. Hard. In 1861, Mr. 
Chittenden was made Register of the Treasury and removed to 
Washington, after which Mr. Roberts remained alone in practice 
until in later years his son, Robert Roberts, became associated with 
him in the firm of Roberts and Roberts. 
Mr. Roberts held few public offices. He was once State’s Attor- 
ney of Chittenden county. The service for which he will be re- 
membered in a public way was the publication in 1878 of “Roberts’ 
Vermont Digest.” This was a digest of the decisions of our Supreme 
Court, to which he afterwards added a supplement. It was published 
at the direction of the court and was in general use until 
1910. It was a valuable contribution to the law of our State, com- 
bining as it did the learning of a great lawyer with a careful and 
accurate analysis and statement of the law as settled by our highest 262 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
court, and it was the handbook of every lawyer in Vermont for a 
generation. In the latter year Robert Roberts, his son, published 
the “Vermont Digest” and at the same time the West Publishing 
Company, under contract with the State, published a digest of the 
Vermont decisions. These took the place of “Roberts’ Vermont 
Digest” and brought the decisions to date. 
Mr. Roberts was in active practice for more than sixty years. 
His name appears as attorney in sixty-two volumes of the Supreme 
Court Reports. There is probably not another such record in the 
history of the bar of Vermont. Mr. Roberts was a thoroughly-trained, 
scholarly and resourceful lawyer. He knew the law in all its ram- 
ifications, and daily during his long life was its devoted student. Na- 
ture was kind to him and kept all his mental faculties well in store 
until shortly before the end. 
Mr. Roberts was warmly attached to his friends and old asso- 
ciates. Those who had the pleasure of seeing will not soon forget 
the three venerable patriarchs who annually attended the bar meetings, 
Joseph A. Wing of Montpelier, George W. Harman of Bennington, 
and Mr. Roberts. At the banquets Mr. Roberts led the singing of 
“Auld Lang Syne,” sharing the place of honor at the table with the 
other two venerables until the last survivor of the venerable trio 
was lost to sight. In 1898 he attended the bar meeting for the 
last time, and on that occasion read a memorial sketch of Mr. Har- 
man, who had gone on before. He died at Burlington, October 6, 1899. 
LEVI UNDERWOOD 
1821-1902 
A great lawyer of the Chittenden county bar fifty years ago was 
Levi Underwood. He ranked with Edmunds, Phelps and Hard. He 
was born at Hardwick, Vt., December 24, 1821, the son of Silas 
Underwood, who was a farmer and inventor. His mother was Lucy 
Leslie, sister of Myron Leslie, one of the leaders of the St. Louis 
bar. Governor Underwood was educated at Craftsbury Academy 
and studied law with Luke P. Poland. Long before he was twenty- 
one he was qualified for admission to the bar, but the court rules 
forbade his becoming a member. While waiting for admission he 
taught school, gave lessons in penmanship and lectured on geology. 
After his admission he located in Burlington, where he enjoyed a lucra- 
tive practice. He was for a time a partner of Eleazer R. Hard. He 
was counsel for the receivers of the Vermont Central and Vermont 
and Canada Railroads in the suit which commenced in 1856 and con- 
tinued as such until 1860, when a final decree was made. This re- 
ceivership was unprecedented in judicial annals because it did not NATHAN GALLUP WILLIAMS 
A descendant of Richard Williams, a founder of 
Taunton, Mass., and of Oliver Cromwell, was born in 
Pomfret, Conn., October 31, 1844. He was educated 
in the public schools of Worcester, Mass., and resided 
in Providence, R. I., from 1863 to 1873. He was mar- 
ried in 1871 to Sarah Phillips Carr, daughter of Capt. 
Harry Phillips Carr, U. S. Navy. She died in 1884. 
They had three children, Charles Ernest (died in 1882), 
Elizabeth Carr (Mrs. James Arthur Pearson), and 
Genevieve. In 1886 he married Mrs. Emily Frances 
Smith, who died in 1901. In 1906 he married Abhie 
Lucinda Haines of Waterbury, Vt. He began the 
mercantile business in St. Louis, Mo., later spent two 
years in business in Iowa, and from there went to 
Chicago. He was called from Chicago to Bellows Falls, 
Vt., in 1877 to take charge of and reorganize the Ver- 
mont Farm Machine Company. He was elected its 
treasurer, later its manager and then its president, 
holding the offices of president and manager for over 
forty years. Under his management the business in- 
creased until it became the largest manufacturing 
plant of dairy and maple sugar apparatus in New 
England. The number of persons employed increased 
from eighty to nearly a thousand. During the World 
War the company manufactured shrapnel and high 
explosive shells for the Russian and United States 
governments. He was superintendent of the First 
Congregational Sunday School twenty-nine years, and 
deacon from 1904 to the present time (1922). He has 
been vice-president and president of Old Rockingham 
Meeting House Association. He was one of a com- 
mittee to lay out and build a sewerage system for the 
village of Bellows Falls, a trustee of New England 
Kurn Hattin Homes for Boys from its organization, 
and chairman of the executive committee from 1905 
to 1921, chairman of the executive committee, vice- 
president, 1905-1900, and president of the Vermont 
State Sunday School Association, vice-president and 
president of the Vermont Domestic Missionary Soci- 
ety, member of State committee of Young Men’s Chris- 
tian Association for over twenty years, chairman of 
the executive committee of the Vermont Commission 
to the Tennessee Centennial Exposition in 1897, and 
delegate to the Republican National Convention in 
1908. He was elected by the Legislature of Vermont 
in 1904 and 1906, Judge Advocate of Vermont, with 
the rank of Brigadier-General. He was appointed by 
the Governor in 1904 chairman of a committee to 
investigate State institutions. THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
263 
cease until 1880. He was the leading attorney for the mortgagees 
in the foreclosure proceedings against the Rutland Railroad and the 
records show that he made one charge of thirty thousand dollars in 
this case. Other counsel, however, shared in the fee. For a good 
many years he was located in New York City, where he had as clients 
James Gould, James Watson Webb and the Erie Railroad. He was 
a member of the Peace Conference at Baltimore, but bolted the con- 
vention because he said he could hear the guns booming on Fort 
Sumter. He was Lieutenant-Governor from 1860 to 1862. Governor 
Underwood was commanding in appearance. He was six feet tall, 
of blond complexion, light hair and bluish-gray eyes. His eyes were 
very penetrating when his mind was in full activity, but in social 
intercourse they sparkled with fun and good humor. One of his 
great contemporaries gives him unstinted praise: “I never knew a 
man who could grapple with a complicated state of facts and analyze 
them correctly and reach a legal result so quickly and so accurately 
as he could. He had the habit of knitting his brows to an unusual 
degree when his mind was concentrated in thought, which would 
arrest the attention of anybody, but when his mental activities ceased, 
his face beamed with the joy of a schoolboy who had worked out 
a mathematical proposition which had been given to him by his pre- 
ceptor. Intellectually he had no superior in the legal profession in 
Vermont, and that is saying a good deal, considering the standing 
and ability of the bar in these days.” His mind was brilliant and 
his memory phenomenal. He could once read a chapter in a book 
and recite the whole chapter. He possessed a strong understanding, 
had good legal sense and was a great wit. His description of Judge 
Asahel Peck is characteristic. The Judge was a great snuff taker. 
Governor Underwood said the Judge began with common snuff and 
when that ceased to bite he took Scotch snuff, which he followed with 
red pepper and finally with carpet tacks. 
Governor Underwood married, June 17, 1851, Cornelia Van Ness 
Chamberlain of Burlington. There are now surviving of the family, 
Thomas C., Cornelia C. and Violet (Mrs. Edward Hoyt). He died 
March 13, 1902, and Mrs. Underwood a few hours before. 
EDWARD J. PHELPS 
1822-1900 
Edward J. Phelps was the most accomplished lawyer that Ver- 
mont has produced. He was the son of Judge Samuel S. Phelps of 
the Vermont Supreme Court; was born at Middlebury, July 11, 1822, 
and died at New Haven, Conn., March 9, 1900. He entered Middle- 
bury College at the age of fourteen and graduated in 1840. He 264 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
taught school in Virginia for a year after completing his college course 
and attended a course of lectures in the New Haven Law School. 
Returning to Middlebury he took up the study of law in the office 
of Horatio Seymour and was admitted to the bar in 1843 and 
commenced practice at Middlebury. Two years later he re- 
moved to Burlington, where he resided for the rest of his life, with 
the exception of a short time, when he lived in New York. In 1851 
he was appointed by President Fillmore second Comptroller of the 
United States Treasury, a position which he resigned later. Re- 
turning to Vermont, he became a leader at the bar. For forty years 
he was recognized as the most brilliant lawyer in Vermont. He had 
a profound knowledge of the law, was a close and correct reasoner, 
and he presented his views with an elegance of diction and a charm of 
manner that distinguished him from all others. During the years 
of his active practice he appeared in nearly all the great cases that 
came before the Vermont courts. In his later years he gave up his 
home office and devoted his entire time to practice in the Federal 
Courts. He frequently appeared before the United States Supreme 
Court, where no man at the American bar was in greater favor. The 
Justices enjoyed his arguments no less than his charming personality, 
and Justice Brewer once told me that he was the most scholarly man 
that he had ever known. 
Without previous knowledge on his part, on account of the in- 
fluence of his friend, Senator Edmunds, who recommended him to 
President Cleveland in 1885, he was appointed by the latter as Min- 
ister to the Court of St. James. The selection of a lawyer from a 
small State for this high office must have been attended with not a 
few misgivings on the part of those who did not know the eminent 
qualifications of the appointee, but history accords to Mr. Phelps 
the prestige of having maintained the high traditions of the great 
office with the exercise of such tact and judgment as to reflect credit 
upon his nation. He managed to the satisfaction of both nations the 
Sackville-West affair, the negotiations for an extradition treaty, and 
the controversies over the rights of the American fishermen and 
the destruction of seals in Behring Sea. He subsequently repre- 
sented the United States in the tribunal of arbitration held in Paris 
in 1893 on the Behring Sea controversy. This important appointment 
came to him from President Harrison. The court sat for fifty-four 
days and Mr. Phelps made the closing argument, occupying eleven days 
and extending over three hundred and twenty-five printed pages. At 
the close of his address the court warmly commended the ability, 
dignity and courtesy of the American advocate. 
In 1881, Mr. Phelps was president of the American Bar Associa- 
tion; he was professor of medical jurisprudence in the University 
of Vermont from 1881 to 1883, and delivered a course of lectures THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
265 
which have been printed; he was lecturer on constitutional law in 
Boston University in 1882, and was Kent professor of law in Yale 
College from 1881 to his death, except during his absence in England. 
In 1877 he presided at the centennial celebration of the battle of Ben- 
nington and on the occasion of the dedication of the monument in 
1891 was the orator of the day. The latter address was scholarly 
and eloquent. It is doubtful if any other Vermonter during Mr. 
Phelps’ time delivered any speech that is its equal. His address on 
Chief Justice Marshall before the American Bar Association in 1876, 
and that on Judge Samuel Prentiss in 1882, are classics in biographical 
discrimination. In 1886 he delivered before the Philosophical Society 
of Edinburg an address on “The Law of the Land,” which brought him 
the respect and admiration of English litterateurs. On the occasion 
of his leaving England he was given a dinner by the Century Club 
of London. At this, Lord Chief Justice Coleridge linked his name 
with that of Everett, Buchanan, Adams, Motley and Lowell, and said 
that no one of these predecessors had ever been the recipient of such 
unanimous and cordial expressions of regard, and that no American 
minister had ever left England amid more universal regret. The re- 
sponse made by Mr. Phelps to this generous expression of praise and 
regret was one of the happiest speeches he ever made. It charmed 
his listeners and appealed with such force to Lord Rosebery that he 
sent a note to Mrs. Phelps in which he said that Mr. Phelps had quite 
outdone the other speakers at the brilliant party that had met to bid 
him adieu. The principal orations and essays of Mr. Phelps were 
published by Harper’s after his decease. They fill a volume of nearly 
five hundred pages. 
Mr. Phelps was devoid of political ambition. He represented 
Burlington in the Constitutional Convention in 1870; he was the 
Democratic candidate for Governor in 1880, but, of course, was un- 
successful. He was an ardent Democrat, but he broke from the party 
in the early campaign in 1872, in 1890 supported Mr. Blaine’s Behring 
Sea policy, and in 1896 supported McKinley for the presidency. 
He was a great lawyer. He understood law as a science. He was 
thoroughly grounded in its fundamental principles and readily made his 
way to these in a given case. He could analyze and generalize equally 
well. He would have made an admirable Chief Justice of the United 
States Supreme Court, an office which he deserved and would have 
received but for the interference of a miserable political cabal. This 
office would have been a fitting close of his professional career. It 
would have given Vermont, too, the honor of a representation on 
the highest court, a distinction that has not yet come to the State. 
In personal character Mr. Phelps was of the old school. He 
loved the old manly virtues and could not endure sham or falsehood. 
He loved art and had a special fondness for the old songs and ballads. 266 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
His poet was Byron and Shakespeare his dramatist. But his first 
two books as models of literary excellence as well as guides to a 
model life were the King James Bible and the Book of Common 
Prayer of the Church of England. I think he was a student of Daniel 
Webster’s orations, and I found not long since in the Middlebury 
College library a volume of Webster’s speeches that formerly belonged 
to Mr. Phelps and bore his autograph. He was in Washington in 
the days of Webster’s glory and heard him argue cases in the Supreme 
Court. He was no mean poet, although he made no pretensions in 
this regard. His best known verse is his satire on Essex Junction: 
The Ballad of Essex Junction 
With saddened face and battered hat 
And eyes that told of blank despair, 
On wooden bench the traveler sat 
Cursing the fate that brought him there. 
“Nine hours,” he cried, “we’ve lingered here, 
With thoughts intent on distant homes, 
Waiting for that delusive train 
That, always coming, never comes; 
Till weary and worn, cold and forlorn, 
And paralyzed in every function, 
I hope in hell 
Their souls may dwell 
Who first invented Essex Junction. 
“I’ve traveled north, I’ve traveled south, 
O’er mountain, forest, prairie, river, 
In ocean storm, in desert drouth, 
Thro’ railroad smash and steamboat shiver, 
While hope and courage faltered not 
Nor strength gave way, nor faith was shaken 
Until I reached this dismal spot, 
Of man accursed and God forsaken, 
Where strange new forms of mystery 
Assail men’s lives without compunction, 
And I hope in hell 
Their souls may dwell 
Who first invented Essex Junction. 
“Here Boston waits for Ogdensburg, 
And Ogdensburg for Montreal; 
And late New York long tarrieth, 
And Saratoga hindreth all; THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
267 
From far Atlantic’s wind-swept bays 
To Mississippi’s turbid tide, 
All accidents, mistakes, delays, 
Are gathered here and multiplied. 
Oh, fellow-man! avoid this place 
As you would plague or Peter Funk shun; 
And I hope in hell 
Their souls may dwell 
W’ho first invented Essex Junction. 
“And long and late conductors tell 
Of trains remote, shipwrecked and slow, 
Till ee’n the engine’s dismal bell 
Takes up the cry: ‘No go! no go!’ 
Oh! let me from this hole depart 
By any route so ’tis a long one,” 
He cried and with a sudden start 
He jumped aboard a train (the wrong one), 
And as he vanished in the smoke, 
Pie shouted with redoubled unction 
“I hope in hell 
Their souls may dwell 
Who first invented Essex Junction.” 
To My Cousin Jack 
The following lines were dedicated to his cousin, Chief Judge 
Pierpoint: 
Cousin, more years have flitted by 
Than we might choose to tell, 
Since sworn moss-troopers you and I 
Have lived beneath each summer sky 
So heartily and well. 
And little cared we all the while 
How fast those years were flying 
And little marked how youth’s bright smile, 
That did their flight so well beguile, 
From off the world was dying. 
Worthy of thine old-fashioned race, 
Well hast thou borne thy part, 
And, spite the gathering years, we trace 
Few wrinkles on thy manly face, 
And none upon thy heart. 
In sooth, old Time has hardly cast 268 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
A shadow on thy track, 
Though, as life’s summer day flies past, 
The harvest moon is rising fast 
Above us, Cousin Jack. 
The woodcock in the tangled brake 
Marks well thy whistle’s note; 
The deer that by the wood-fringed lake 
A moment halts his thirst to slake, 
For thee looks sharply out; 
The wild duck, as he scuds along, 
Seeth thine eye of black, 
And cries with shrill, despairing tone, 
“Don’t shoot, old boy, I’m coming down! 
I know you, Cousin Jack!” 
Thou shouldst have lived in that old day, 
Long famed in song and story, 
Of baron bold and lady gay, 
Of tournament, of feast and fray, 
Love, chivalry and glory, 
When faces were of hearts the token, 
And hearts were true, like thine, 
When manly thoughts were boldly spoken, 
And healths were drunk and heads were broken 
O’er sparkling Rhenish wine. 
Those blufif and hearty times are gone 
From off the changeful earth, 
Their monuments have crumbled down, 
And the sham virtues, then unknown, 
Are now of passing worth. 
But in the few and rare like thee, 
Left to this modern day, 
We sometimes yet are fain to see 
That frank, old-fashioned chivalry 
Has not all passed away. 
When o’er the woods another fall 
Its lingering charms has thrown, 
My gun will hang upon the wall, 
My horses learn another’s call, 
My dog a stranger’s tone, 
But still may thou, aye kindly known 
On Champlain’s glorious water, 
Till many a year has come and gone, 
Wake the wild woodland echoes on 
Dead Creek and Little Otter. GEORGE O. GRIDLEY 
Born in Harwinton, Conn., September 5, 18(59. He 
was educated in the public schools. He located in 
Windsor in 1899 and was at the head of a machine 
tool business which was built up into one of the largest 
manufacturing enterprises in Vermont. He has held 
important local offices and represented his town in the 
Legislature in 1916, where he was chairman of the 
House Fish and Game Committee, and served on the 
Banking and Public Buildings Committee. He was a 
delegate to the Republican National Convention of 
1920. THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
269 
LUCIUS E. CHITTENDEN 
1824-1900 
Lucius E. Chittenden, great-grandson of Thomas Chittenden, 
Vermont’s first Governor, was born at Williston, May 24, 1824. He 
received his early education in the district schools and the academies 
of Williston, Hinesburg and Cambridge, Vt. He studied law at first 
in the office of his uncle, Norman L. Whittemore, at Swanton, then 
taught school; afterwards attended the legal lectures of Judge Turner 
at St. Albans, studied with John G. Saxe, the poet, and Corydon 
Beckwith, afterwards an eminent corporation lawyer in Chicago, and 
was admitted to the bar in Franklin county in September, 1844. In 
May, 1845, he opened an office in Burlington, where he practiced 
with success in partnership, successively, with Wyllys Lyman, Edward 
J. Phelps and Daniel Roberts. Mr. Chittenden was not satisfied with 
His limited education and he pursued the study of Latin and several 
of the modern languages under private tutors. As early as 1846 he 
became interested in politics. He was prominent in the anti-slavery 
and Free-Soil movements and edited the Free-Soil Courier in the cam- 
paign which resulted in the election of John S. Robinson as Governor 
of Vermont. He was State Senator from Chittenden county in 1856- 
60 and an influential legislator. In 1861 he was appointed a delegate to 
the famous Peace Conference at Washington to take measures for 
averting the Civil War. In this way he became acquainted with 
Salmon P. Chase, President Lincoln’s Secretary of the Treasury, 
who tendered Mr. Chittenden the office of Register of the Treasury, 
which he held during President Lincoln’s first term. He left the 
treasury on account of failing health, having broken down under the 
excessive burdens of the office. He left poor in pocket, but without 
the loss of a dollar by theft, fraud or errors during his administration. 
After the close of the war he located in New York City, where he 
practiced his profession during the remainder of his life. He died 
at Burlington, July 22, 1900. He was the author of several books, 
pamphlets and speeches. These include an edition of “Reeves’ Do- 
mestic Relations,” with notes; “The Debates and Proceedings of the 
Peace Conference at Washington in February, 1861”; a centennial 
address on the capture of Ticonderoga, May, 1876; an address on 
the dedication of the monument to Ethan Allen at Burlington in 1878; 
“Recollections of President Lincoln and His Administration”; “The 
Speeches, Addresses and Letters of Abraham Lincoln”; “An Un- 
known Heroine, a Story of the Civil War”; “Personal Reminiscences”; 
“A Biography of Thomas Chittenden, the First Governor of Ver- 
mont” ; and many magazine and historical articles. 270 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
He collected a library which was especially rich in rare volumes 
relating to the early history of his native State and to the history of 
engraving and printing. This collection of Vermont books was pur- 
chased, largely by private subscription, for the University of Ver- 
mont. They are now a part of the library of that institution. 
ELEAZER RAY HARD 
1824-1899 
For more than half a century Mr. Hard was in practice in Chit- 
tenden county. He was recognized as one of the ablest lawyers at the 
Vermont bar. He was born at Essex, Vt., February 24, 1824, and 
died at Burlington, December 25, 1899. His education was in the 
common schools. He at first entered a law office at Jericho and later 
resumed his studies with David A. Smalley at Burlington. In 1845 
he was admitted to the bar and shortly afterwards opened an office 
in Jericho. In 1852 he moved to Burlington, where he remained 
during the rest of his life. In practice here he had as partners at 
different times Levi Underwood, Jeremiah French, William G. Shaw, 
Henry Ballard, Alfred G. Safford, Judson E. Cushman and William 
H. Bliss. He was State’s Attorney for Chittenden county from 1857 
to 1860, and again in 1869 and 1870. In 1867-68 he represented 
Chittenden county in the State Senate. 
Mr. Hard’s life was devoted exclusively to the law. His office 
was not only his work-shop, but the place to meet his friends and 
exchange social greetings as well. It was ideal in all its appointments. 
He had a large and well-selected library, the rooms were spacious 
and convenient, and furniture substantial and attractive. Moreover, 
order and neatness were everywhere apparent. Here sat the coun- 
sellor all the days of the week and evenings, too, during much of his 
life, nor was the Sabbath kept otherwise. 
Although his education must have been meagre in the beginning, 
yet, by self improvement, he became a master of the English language 
and thoroughly conversant with the best literature. His inclination 
was toward books and in these were his work and his recreation. His 
speeches, correspondence, legal documents and arguments were models 
in accuracy and choice English. He had, too, the gift of being fluent. 
His original draft of any document was almost certain not to contain 
any interlineations or erasures. By nature his mind was strong, his 
judgment quick, his endurance phenomenal, his memory retentive, his 
observation searching, his courage undaunted, his industry untiring, 
his love of knowledge intense, and his detestation of sham and incom- 
petency bitter. THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
271 
GEORGE F. EDMUNDS 
1829-1919 
George F. Edmunds was the greatest lawyer Vermont has pro- 
duced. He was born at Richmond, this State, February 1, 1828. His 
education was obtained in the public schools and under a private 
tutor. At eighteen he began the study of law in Burlington and con- 
tinued it in the office of his brother-in-law, Aaron B. Maynard at 
Richmond. This was in 1846-47. The two following years he was 
a student in the office of Smalley and Phelps at Burlington, where 
he was admitted to the bar in March, 1849. This was followed by 
a partnership with Mr. Maynard at Richmond, which continued with 
success until 1851, when Mr. Edmunds removed to Burlington, which 
afterwards became his home until his retirement from the United 
States Senate, when he left Vermont on account of his health and 
that of his family. He spent his last days in Pasadena, Calif., where 
he died, February 27, 1919. When Mr. Edmunds was appointed to 
the United States Senate, by Governor Paul Dillingham, to succeed 
Senator Solomon Foot, deceased, he enjoyed the largest and most 
lucrative practice in Vermont. 
In point of legislative service in State and Nation, Mr. Ed- 
munds fills the largest page in our history. In 1854 he made his 
first appearance in local politics as the Moderator of the Burlington 
March meeting and soon after followed his election as Representative 
of the town in the Legislature. He was a member of the House in 
1854-55-56-57-58-59, and Speaker during the last three sessions. In 
1861, against his protest, he was sent to the Senate from Chittenden 
county; he was re-elected to the same office in 1862, and each time 
was chairman of the Judiciary Committee and president pro tempore 
of that body. April 5, 1866, he began that long Senatorial career, 
which honored his State and country and gave him national fame. 
This continued until 1891, when he resigned after a service of a quar- 
ter of a century. His impress on national legislation was greater 
than that of any other man of his time, and for years he was the 
foremost Senator. His pro tempore presidency of the Senate is over- 
shadowed by his real leadership. In 1876, when the question of suc- 
cession to the Chief Magistracy was thrust upon the country, after 
the Hayes-Tilden election, Mr. Edmunds took the position of leader- 
ship in the Senate. He submitted a resolution referring a message 
from the House on the subject of the count of the electoral vote to 
a committee of seven Senators having power to prepare and report 
such a measure as would secure a lawful count and the best disposi- 
tion of the questions connected therewith. The resolution was adopted 
and Mr. Edmunds made chairman of the committee appointed. In 272 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
the discussion which followed he devised the Electoral Commission 
bill. He was appointed on the commission and contributed efficiently 
to the solution of the dangerous problem. 
As a lawyer, no one stood higher than Mr. Edmunds either at 
home or in Washington. In the field of constitutional law he was 
at the head. During his service as Senator he was employed in many 
great cases before the United States Supreme Court. Here no one 
outranked him in effective preparation and presentation of a case or 
in influence before that learned tribunal. He was employed by clients 
who had great interests and great sums at stake, who looked to him 
as the wisest counsellor and ablest advocate. The preparation of these 
cases necessarily consumed a good deal of time and the emoluments 
were large. It was at a period, however, when, not as now, it was 
customary for lawyers who were in the Senate, to practice in the 
courts, and no criticism was made because Mr. Edmunds’ services 
were in such demand or so much employed in this regard. 
His was an intense and powerful mentality. He was gifted, 
beyond most others, in the capacity of acquisition and assimilation 
of knowledge. His memory was unfailing. He saw at once the vital 
points in a case and these he stated with the utmost readiness on 
paper or orally in tense, vigorous, though sometimes homely, phrase 
and in the fewest words of any one at the bar. His great power of 
concentration and perfect system enabled him to do a vast amount 
of work, and so orderly and correct were his mental processes and 
application that he rarely changed his manuscript when once written. 
He was a highly technical lawyer in the days of his practice in the 
Vermont courts and he was accustomed all his life to employ the 
keenest discrimination in all his mental efforts. 
LAFAYETTE WILBUR 
1834-1918 
LaFayette Wilbur was a conspicuous example of a useful and 
successful country lawyer. He added, too, to the historical literature 
of his State. He was born at Waterville, May 15, 1834, and died 
at Portland, Ore., August 11, 1918. He was educated in the com- 
mon schools and at the academies in Fairfax, Bakersfield, Underhill 
Center and Morrisville. His period of schooling was short in each of 
these institutions, but he supplemented his early training by intensive 
reading and study throughout his long and busy life. He purchased 
his time of his father and by his labor and school-teaching acquired 
the means to attend school and prepare for his profession. He studied 
law in the office of Thomas Gleed at Morrisville and was admitted THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
273 
in 1856. He spent most of his life in Jericho. He began practice 
in Underhill, but removed at the end of six months, and later in life 
practiced for twelve years in Burlington. Afterwards he practiced 
for many years in Jericho, where he had his residence until shortly 
before his death. When he first moved to Jericho he was the only 
lawyer in that vicinity and his clientele was a large one. He told his 
clients what the law was, drafted their legal papers, tried their cases 
in Justice and County Courts, and argued questions of law in the 
Supreme Court. He had a good library, prepared his own briefs 
with great care, and was often called on by other members of the 
profession to draw briefs for them. He was a safe lawyer, went to 
the bottom of a case, and industriously worked out the solution of 
the law that applied to it. He did much reading on any point that 
he was interested in and retained what he read remarkably well. He 
did not confine his labors to the law, but read extensively outside of 
his profession, and in his later years did more literary work than has 
been done by any present member of the bar of Vermont, with pos- 
sibly one exception. In 1881 he published his first writing. It was 
a history of his life and contained a genealogy of his family and three 
addresses which he had delivered. One of these is a temperance 
speech, another discusses the “Philosophy of Success,” and the third 
is a religious discourse. These addresses were carefully prepared; 
they are well thought out and indicate unusual strength of mind. 
When he was sixty-six, Mr. Wilbur wrote and published four volumes, 
which are entitled the “Early History of Vermont.” In these books 
an immense amount of data is collected, some of which can be found 
in none of the other histories of the State. His last literary effort 
was the preparation of the history of the town of Jericho. This 
enterprise was shared with Judge Chauncey H. Hayden, Luther C. 
Stevens, and Rev. S. H. Barnum. This is a volume of between six 
hundred and seven hundred pages and is a monument to the industry 
of its compilers. Mr. Wilbur died at the home of his son, Ralph 
W. Wilbur, a leading lawyer of Portland. His other son, Rev. Earl 
M. Wilbur, is a prominent divine at Berkeley, Calif., and the president 
of the Unitarian Theological Seminary in that city. The father moved 
to Burlington to educate these sons and he drew great inspiration 
and help from them in the literary efforts of his later years. 
JEREMIAH FRENCH 
1835-1868 
Jeremiah French early acquired success at the bar, due to his 
brilliant faculties. He was born at Williston, April 10, 1835. He 
received an academical training in his own town and was for a time 274 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
a student in the University of Vermont. In February, 1855, he 
entered Harvard Law School, where he graduated with honor after 
a full course in 1856, receiving one of the prizes awarded for a legal 
essay. He at once began practice in Burlington in company with 
Levi Underwood. He had a special aptitude for his profession and 
very soon had a large county court practice. He had a constant 
struggle with disease, and died of consumption at the early age of 
thirty-three, after a practice of but eleven years. 
WILDER L. BURNAP 
1839-1905 
Wilder L. Burnap was a scholarly lawyer. He was born at 
Canajoharie, N. Y., September 3, 1839. His father removed to Graf- 
ton, Vt., when he was a young lad and thereafter made that town 
his home. The boy did not take to his father’s grist and saw mill, 
but found his delight in books. He attended the district schools and 
Leland and Gray Seminary at Townshend, and in 1859 was enrolled 
as a student at Dartmouth College. The war broke out in his junior 
year and his name is found near the head of the roster of those who 
enlisted. He bore his part manfully in the service of his country 
and returned in season to graduate with honor in 1863. The same 
year he went to Burlington, where he entered the office of Solomon 
Wires as a student, and afterwards resumed his studies with Wales 
and Taft. While in the latter office he was Register of Probate under 
Judge Wales until his admission to the bar in 1866, and for a short 
time following. In 1868 he opened an office in Burlington for himself 
and began an active practice. This increased steadily and on his de- 
cease he was the leader of the bar of Chittenden county. Possessed 
of a wonderful memory, he not only knew the law but where to find 
it. He could cite you to a case in point on the instant, often giving 
you the volume and page where it could be found. He was not a 
successful jury advocate. He disliked this branch of the law; but 
in the preparation of briefs and special pleadings he had no superior. 
He was a great student and loved the law. His office was his work- 
shop and his books were endeared as tools of his trade. His office 
was the Mecca to which the young lawyer fled for assistance. His 
industry, care in the preparation of his cases and legal acumen gave 
him an eminence in his profession which was generally recognized. 
He was a staunch Republican in politics, but not an office-seeker. 
In 1872 he was elected State’s Attorney of Chittenden county, and in 
1882 was State Senator. He held also many minor offices in the 
city of Burlington. In 1885 he was appointed professor of medical HENRY T. CUSHMAN 
Born in North Bennington, May 16, 1844. He was 
of Puritan ancestry, being a direct descendant of Rob- 
ert Cushman, who sailed for Plymouth in the famous 
Mayflower. He studied at Bennington Academy, en- 
listed at an early period in the Civil War, and was 
commissioned as First Lieutenant and regimental 
Quartermaster, being, perhaps, the youngest quarter- 
master to serve in that capacity in the army. Later 
he was a member of the staff of Gen. Lewis A. Grant, 
commander of the First Vermont Brigade. After the 
close of the war Mr. Cushman returned to Bennington 
and engaged in the manufacture of fine furniture 
specialties. He was president of the H. T. Cushman 
Manufacturing Company. Mr. Cushman was Senator 
from Bennington county in 1910 and for eighteen years 
in succession was president of the village of North 
Bennington. He had been president of the Military 
Order of the Loyal Legion of Vermont; president of 
the Bennington Battle Monument and Historical As- 
sociation; trustee of the Putnam Memorial Hospital, 
and president of the board of trustees of the Soldiers' 
Home in Bennington. 
Mr. Cushman was married in 1867 to Eliza Davis 
Hall and five children were born to them, Arthur Hall, 
John Henry, William Carroll, Frederick Bennett and 
Caroline Eliza Cushman. He died May 11, 1922. THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
275 
jurisprudence in the University of Vermont, succeeding Edward J. 
Phelps, and continued to perform its duties for ten years, when he 
was compelled to resign on account of his increasing practice. In 
1903 he was elected president of the Vermont Bar Association and 
on his retirement delivered one of the most scholarly addresses ever 
heard before that body. At the time of his decease he was president 
of the Dartmouth Alumni Association of Vermont; vice-president of 
the University Club of the University of Vermont; chairman of the 
Executive Committee of the General Association of Dartmouth Col- 
lege ; president of the Algonquin Club; and president of the Chittenden 
County Bar Association. He was a man of commanding personality, 
robust in physique, slightly above the average in height, with a well- 
rounded head, deep-set but penetrating eyes and favoring the Roman 
type in facial expression. Being well informed on all topics of the 
day, well versed in literature, art and sciences, and of sunny tem- 
perament, he made an enjoyable companion and friend. He died at 
Burlington of appendicitis, July 7, 1905. 
HENRY BALLARD 
1839-1906 
As a successful trial lawyer, no one at the Chittenden county bar 
excelled Henry Ballard in his prime. He was born at Tinmouth, 
Vt., April 20, 1839, and died at Burlington, September 23, 1906. He 
prepared for college at Castleton Seminary and graduated at the Uni- 
versity of Vermont in 1861. He entered the army and served in 
the Peninsular Campaign and was present at the battles of Lee’s 
Mills, Williamsburg, and the Seven Days’ fight before Richmond. 
He was compelled to resign from the army in July, 1862, on account 
of ill health. In September following he entered the Albany Law 
School and completed his course in 1863. He was a good student and 
received flattering commendation from his instructors. He removed 
to Burlington at once after his graduation and entered the office of 
Daniel Roberts, where he remained until his admission to the bar 
in September of that year. He then opened an office in Burlington. 
In politics he was a Republican. In 1878 he was elected to the State 
Senate and in 1888 represented Burlington in the Legislature. In 
1884 he was a delegate to the Republican National Convention at 
Chicago, where he was chairman of the committee on credentials. He 
was an effective public speaker and from 1868 until shortly before 
his death his services on the stump were in demand in Vermont and 
other States. He sometimes made as many as one hundred speeches 
in a campaign. He was a ready speaker upon all occasions, frequently 276 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
appearing on the lecture platform. For years he was a member of 
the Webster Historical Society of Boston and of the American Insti- 
tute of Civics, New York City. He was a charter member of the 
Vermont Commandery of the Loyal Legion and of various social clubs. 
Early in practice Mr. Ballard won wide reputation as a trial 
lawyer, particularly in criminal cases. It is said of him that for 
thirteen years he defended criminal cases in Addison county without 
a defeat. For many years his strong will kept alive his frail body, 
which was inclined towards tuberculosis, and made him the hardest 
antagonist for his opponent as well as the most trying disputant for 
the court. He was slow, emphatic and exhaustive and no fretting 
by counsel or snubbing by court could stop him. He moved the jury 
also, for he had a keen discernment for the elements of the case which 
affect the judgment of the jury. He took hold with them and did 
not let go until he had convinced the panel, or at least some of them. 
It sometimes seemed as if he bore down on them until he had ex- 
hausted them and then took their wills captive. He was sure to carry 
the large audience along with him, which invariably filled the court 
room whenever he spoke, and the response of his listeners in quiet 
signs of approval too often had its effect on the jury. He participated 
in many important trials, both civil and criminal, and usually took 
the leading part on his side. 
He was a delightful companion, especially during his later years; 
but it was a greater pleasure for his brother attorneys to meet him 
out of than in court. But toward the close of his life his manner 
in court changed and he was more inclined to conform to the better 
conventions of the bar. 
RUFUS E. BROWN 
1854-1920 
Rufus E. Brown was born at Dickinson, Franklin county, N. Y., 
December 3, 1854, and died at Burlington. June 15, 1920. He was 
educated in the common schools, at Lawrenceville Academy and at 
Amsterdam Academy. He graduated from the latter school in 1876 
and soon thereafter commenced to study law in the office of Wales 
and Taft at Burlington. He was admitted in 1880, but did not begin 
practice in Vermont until 1891, when he opened an office in Burlington, 
where he continued to practice with great popularity as a lawyer until 
his death. He was State’s Attorney from 1894 to 1900; County 
Senator in 1900; City Attorney from 1902 to 1904; president of the 
Vermont Bar Association in 1911; Attorney-General from 1912 to 
1914; and Judge of the Burlington Municipal Court for a short pe- 
riod in 1919. THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
277 
Mr. Brown was the leading trial lawyer in his comity for many 
years and was active in trial work for a good deal of the time during 
the latter years of his practice. His labors in this regard extended 
into most of the counties in western Vermont. He was eminently 
successful in his practice and enjoyed to a marked degree the con- 
fidence of his associates at the bar and the Judges of the courts. It 
is doubtful if there was another lawyer in practice in the State who 
was as frequently called in to assist other counsel in cases, or one 
whose aid was as eagerly sought or satisfactorily received. He was 
sure to answer with the full measure of his ripe judgment and fine 
ability whether the call came from the poor or the rich, the high or 
the lowly. He took little note of what his fee should be or whether 
it would ever be paid. Service was the principal thing with him and 
this he enjoyed for the work’s sake. It naturally followed that the 
rewards that come to a few in the profession were not for him. Such 
a lawyer is bound to live and die a poor man by the standards of this 
world. What was true of his work as a lawyer applies also to his 
attitude towards his friends who were in need of political assistance. 
On his own initiative and at his own expense he would enlist himself 
in the cause of his friends, canvass his county for some local aspirant 
or go to Montpelier and canvass the members of the Legislature for 
some one who was looking for higher honors—and fortunate was the 
man who had the benefit of his assistance. 
As a lawyer the bottom for his success was his true judgment. 
He was as sure as any human person could be not to make any mis- 
takes. He had the rare sense to know what to do and what not to 
do in the trial of a case and no one had a finer intuition as to how 
the case was being received in the jury box. When the case came 
to him he outlined the course it should take in his client’s interest, 
and this was decided upon without much regard to the law books, 
but rather along lines of common sense and human experience. He 
would follow his plan with fewer false motions than any one at the 
bar, and it was very difficult to win a case from him if the evidence 
was not strongly in his opponent’s favor. In the trial of all kinds 
of cases for a quarter of a century Mr. Brown was easily the favorite 
with local jurors, as his success in getting verdicts attests. He was 
strong with the courts, too, for he was invariably fair and honorable 
and made no claims that did not come within the scope of good argu- 
ment. In his work as State’s Attorney he tried many important cases 
in which he was opposed by able counsel and his success was marked. 
His skill as a trial lawyer was put to the test in his work as Attorney- 
General, and he was never found wanting in the discharge of any of 
his duties in that office. 
As a cross-examiner, he had few peers. I saw the last of his work 
in court. It was in a will case where much was involved. Mr. Brown 278 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
was trying to break the will and it became his duty to cross-examine 
two attorneys of his own bar who had to do with drawing the will. 
It was a delicate task and was performed at a time when Mr. Brown 
was enduring great physical suffering and so weak that he was obliged 
to steady himself on the rail of the bar as he carried on the long 
examinations. His voice was never raised above the conversational 
tone and no sharp words were spoken, but every question called for 
just the truth he was seeking, and the transcript, if it is ever written, 
will disclose one of the cleverest bits of cross-examination in our 
court records. The exhausting labors of this case were too much 
for Mr. Brown, who had not been well for several years, and he was 
obliged to retire from the case before it was finished and died soon 
after. 
DAVID J. FOSTER 
1857-1912 
David J. Foster was born at Barnet, June 27, 1857, and died at 
Washington, D. C., where he was serving as a member of Congress 
from Vermont, March 21, 1912. He graduated from St. Johnsbury 
Academy in 1876 and from Dartmouth College in 1880. He was ad- 
mitted to the bar in 1883 and practiced at Burlington until 1901, when 
he entered Congress. He was State’s Attorney of Chittenden county 
from 1886 to 1890; County Senator from 1892 to 1894; Commissioner 
of State Taxes from 1894 to 1898; chairman of board of Railroad 
Commissioners from 1898 to 1900. He was elected to Congress to 
succeed Judge IT. Henry Powers in September, 1900, and began his 
first term March 4 following. Here he remained until his decease. 
He was chairman of the Committee on Foreign Affairs, was active 
in procuring legislation for the improvement of the consular service, 
and was an important factor in bringing about the rural free delivery 
of the mails. He represented his country at the centennial celebration 
in Mexico in 1910. He was an active supporter of President Taft’s 
peace policy and delivered addresses on the subject of peace in all parts 
of the country. In 1911 he was chairman of the delegation of the 
United States to the General Assembly of the International Institute 
of Agriculture at Rome. 
Mr. Foster was an astute lawyer and an eloquent advocate and 
orator. He had great charm of manner and enjoyed a large circle 
of personal friends. THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
279 
JUDSON E. CUSHMAN 
1860-1916 
Judson E. Cushman, of Burlington, was born at Braintree, April 
27, 1860, the son of Earl S. and Mary E. (Lamb) Cushman. He was 
educated in the public schools and at the Randolph State Normal 
School. He taught school in the villages of South Royalton and 
Richmond, studied law in the office of Nelson L. Boyden at Randolph, 
was admitted to the bar in 1886 and began practice at Randolph. In 
August, 1887, he removed to Burlington and formed a partnership 
with Eleazer R. Hard, which lasted for several years. Later he 
formed a partnership with Edmund C. Mower, which lasted from 
1896 to 1900. He was State’s Attorney of Chittenden county from 
1890 to 1894; professor of medical jurisprudence in the medical de- 
partment of the University of Vermont from 1895 until his death, 
and Commissioner of State Taxes from 1900 until 1912. He was an 
able and painstaking lawyer, an active and conscientious State’s At- 
torney, and the first real tax commissioner that the State had. He 
brought the files and records of the office from Vergennes, where his 
predecessor resided, in a small package which could be carried in the 
hands, and under his leadership the office became one of the important 
departments of the State government and one of the principal sources 
of revenue. He was untiring in his efforts for the good of the State, 
was the author of much of the legislation that made the office im- 
portant and drafted the bills that later became laws for the collection 
of the State revenues. He died at Burlington, February 12, 1916. 
PRESENT MEMBERS OF THE CHITTENDEN COUNTY BAR 
George L. Agel, of Burlington, was born in Boston, Mass., De- 
cember 2, 1898, and was educated in the public schools of the city of 
Burlington; graduated from the Burlington High School in 1916 
and from the Boston University School of Law in 1919; studied law 
with John S. Dorsey of Rutland, Vt., and also R. E. Brown, late of 
Burlington, was admitted to the Vermont bar in 1921, and is located 
in Burlington in practice. 
Warren R. Austin, of Burlington, was born at Highgate Center, 
November 12, 1877. He was educated in the common schools, at 
Brigham Academy, and at the University of Vermont, where he 
graduated in 1899. He studied law in the office of his father, Chauncey 
G. Austin, at St. Albans and was admitted in 1902 to the bar of Ver- 
mont and in 1914 to the bar of the United States Supreme Court, 280 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
and in 1917 to the bar of the United States Court for China. He 
practiced at St. Albans from 1902 to 1916, was employed in legal 
work in China in 1916 and 1917 and since the latter date has practiced 
in Burlington. He was State’s Attorney of Franklin county in 1904; 
Mayor of St. Albans, 1908; United States Commissioner, 1908-1918; 
Representative to the Congress of the Mint, 1912. 
Mr. Austin’s employment in China was in behalf of the American 
International Corporation. He was engaged to assist its officers and 
the officers of the Seims-Carey Railway and Canal Company in the 
negotiation of two loans to the Republic of China. One of these 
aggregate(I approximately $100,000,000 for the National Railways, 
and the other $30,000,000 for national conservation work and the 
dredging of the Grand Canal. This employment finally involved 
negotiations with Japan, which related to that part of the canal which 
was in Shantung Province. Mr. Austin was also required to act as 
attorney for other corporations and projects in which the American 
National Corporation was interested in the Orient. These were the 
International Banking Corporation, The Pacific Mail Steamship Com- 
pany, The Manchurian Development Company, The China Corpora- 
tion, and the Carter-Macy Company, Limited. 
Ezekiel A. Ashland, of Burlington, was born at Champlain, 
N. Y., June 10, 1859. He was educated in the common schools and 
at the New York State Normal School at Potsdam. He studied law 
with Wilmer H. Dunn at Champlain, N. Y., and in the office of Wilson 
and Hall in St. Albans. He was admitted in 1887 and practiced 
at St. Albans until 1906, when he removed to Burlington, where he 
has since practiced. Mr. Ashland was City Grand Juror and Justice 
of the Peace in St. Albans. He was also Register of Probate and 
acting Judge of Probate for Franklin county, and for a time was 
assistant to the County Clerk. 
Clark C. Briggs, of Burlington, was born in Franklin, April 6, 
1871. He graduated from the Burlington High School in the class 
of 1890, and from the University of Vermont in the class of 1894. 
He graduated at the Columbian Law School, Washington, D. C., in 
1897, and studied law at Burlington in the office of Charles T. Barney. 
He was admitted in 1897 and has practiced at Burlington since his 
admission. 
Guy W. Bailey, of Burlington, was born at Hardwick, May 
7, 1876. He was educated at the Burlington High School, where 
he graduated in 1896, and at the University of Vermont, from which 
he graduated in 1900. He studied law in the office of Brown and Taft 
at Burlington and was admitted in 1904. His practice was at Essex THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
281 
Junction. He was a member of the House, 1904-1906; Commissioner 
to edit Public Statutes, 1906; Secretary of State, 1908-1917. After 
his retirement from the office of Secretary of State he became Comp- 
troller of the University of Vermont. Following the resignation of 
President Benton in 1919 he was acting president of the University, 
and in 1920 was elected president. 
Henry A. Bailey, of Winooski, was born at Winooski, January 
22, 1893. He graduated at the Burlington High School in 1911 and 
at the University of Vermont in 1915, and at the Harvard Law School 
in 1918. Pie studied law in the office of Rufus E. Brown at Burling- 
ton, was admitted in 1918, and has practiced at Winooski and at Bur- 
lington since his admission, except during the time he was in the 
service of the government during the World War. He was, until 
the death of Rufus E. Brown, associated with him in practice at 
Burlington. After serving four months in the infantry he was called 
to Washington as Special Assistant to the Solicitor of the State De- 
partment and later became Law Clerk in the same department, where 
he was employed for nearly a year in a computation of the losses 
inflicted upon American citizens on land and sea, both by military 
authority and civil confiscations, by the Germans, Austrians, Bul- 
garians and Turks, for the purpose of fixing the indemnity to be paid 
by the nations named. He was elected from Colchester to the General 
Assembly in 1920. 
Charles F. Black, of Burlington, was born in Burlington, March 
5, 1884. He graduated at the Burlington High School in the class 
of 1902, at the University of Vermont with the degree of Ph. D. in 
the class of 1906, and at the George Washington University Law 
School with the degree of LL. B. in 1910. He studied law at Bur- 
lington in the office of Judson E. Cushman, was admitted to the bar 
of the District of Columbia in 1910 and to the bar of Vermont in 
1911. He practiced at Washington, D. C., 1910-1911; at Burlington, 
1911-1915; was general attorney of the Central Vermont Railway 
Company at St. Albans, 1915-1919; and since 1919 has been in gen- 
eral practice at Burlington. He represented Burlington in the House 
of Representatives in 1915. 
Chauncey W. Brownell, of Burlington, was born at Williston, 
October 7, 1847. He was educated in the academies at Williston 
and Alburg and at the University of Vermont, where he graduated 
in 1870. He studied law in the office of Wales and Taft at Burlington 
and at the Albany Law School, where he graduated in 1872. He 
was admitted in Vermont and New York the year of his graduation 
at Albany and has practiced at Burlington. He was State’s Attorney, 282 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
1884-1886; Assistant Secretary of the Senate, 1874-1880; Secretary 
of the Senate, 1880-1890; Secretary of State, 1890-1898; State Senator, 
1902-1903; and President pro tempore of the Senate. He is a director 
of many corporations and is extensively engaged in farming. 
Vernon A. Bullard, of Burlington, was born at Hyde Park, 
October 14, 1858. He was educated in the public schools, at Central 
Academy, Hyde Park, and at the State Normal School at Johnson, 
where he graduated in 1880. He studied law at the University of 
Michigan, where he obtained the degree of LL. B. in 1884, and before 
this time had studied in the office of Brigham and Waterman at 
Hyde Park. He practiced his profession at Underhill from 1884 to 
1894, when he removed to Burlington, where he has since practiced. 
He represented Underhill in the House in 1890, held various town 
offices from 1884 to 1894 while residing in Underhill; was United 
States inspector of Customs from 1892 to 1896; chairman of the 
Vermont delegation to the Democratic Convention at St. Louis in 
1904; member of the School Board in Burlington from 1904 to 1911 
and chairman for the last four years; member of the House from 
Burlington in 1904; City Attorney in 1905; and United States Attor- 
ney for the district of Vermont since March, 1915. 
Mr. Bullard’s career at the bar has been an active one. He has 
been engaged usually in the important cases tried in the local courts 
and has enjoyed a large clientage on the part of those who were seek- 
ing advice in important and intricate business matters. His predom- 
inant quality is that of force. He tries a case effectively, examines 
and cross-examines witnesses with skill, and is eloquent and persua- 
sive in argument. He is strong with the jury and his aggressive man- 
ner in cross-examination is usually taking with the members of the 
panel. In the prosecution of the criminal law in the Federal Court 
he has been very successful. The administration of his office during 
the late war was particularly efficient. 
Henry Conlin, of Winooski, was born at Milton, June 25, 1867, 
was educated at the high school in Milton, and studied law in the 
office of H. F. Wolcott at Winooski and in the office of J. W. Russell 
at Burlington. He was admitted in 1897 and from his admission 
until 1919 was in practice at Winooski. He was a member of the 
House, 1906-1908; village clerk ten years; Library Commissioner 
twelve years; Judge of Winooski Municipal Court, 1909-1919; Clerk 
of the United States District Court since April 21, 1919. 
Clarence P. Cowles, of Burlington, was born at Albany, Vt., 
August 30, 1875. He graduated from St. Johnsbury Academy in the 
class of 1894, from Princeton College in the class of 1898, and from FRANK H. BROOKS 
Born in St. Johnsbury, Vt., November 24,1868. He was 
educated in the public schools and at St. Johnsbury 
Academy. For several years he was the active head 
of the St. Johnsbury Scale Works and president of the 
First National Bank of St. Johnsbury. He was a mem- 
ber of the commission to investigate the educational 
system of Vermont and for nearly ten years a mem- 
ber of the State Board of Education. THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
283 
the New York Law School in 1901. He was admitted to the bar in 
Brooklyn in 1901 and for two years was in the office of Alexander 
and Colby in New York. He was admitted to the bar in Vermont in 
1904 and has since practiced at Burlington. 
Charles H. Darling, of Burlington, was born at Woodstock, May 
5, 1859. He was educated at Green Mountain Perkins’ Academy, 
Montpelier Seminary, and Tufts College. From the latter he grad- 
uated in 1884 and received the degree of LL. D. in 1903. He studied 
law in the office of Norman Paul at Woodstock and in the office of 
Powers and Powers at Houlton, Me. One of his tutors in Maine 
later became Governor and the other Attorney-General. He was 
admitted in 1886 and began practice in Bennington soon after, where 
he continued until he went to Washington in the fall of 1901 to accept 
the position of Assistant Secretary of the Navy. While in Benning- 
ton he was a partner of Judge Orion M. Barber in the law firm of 
Barber and Darling. He was appointed Municipal Judge of Ben- 
nington in 1887 and reappointed by each successive Governor until 
he left for Washington. He represented Bennington in the House in 
1896; he was president of the Vermont Bar Association in 1899-1900. 
In 1905 he resigned his position in Washington to accept the office 
of Collector of Customs for the district of Vermont, which place he 
continued to hold until 1914. He is a trustee of Tufts College and 
president of the board of trustees of Goddard Seminary. 
Judge Darling was in practice at Burlington to a limited extent 
during the administration of his office as Collector and since his re- 
tirement from the same has been in active practice. He enjoys a 
large and important clientage, and has been called to the discharge of 
important private trusts. He is frequently called upon for public 
addresses and to preside over meetings of a public nature in Bur- 
lington. 
John J. Enright, of Burlington, was born at South Burlington, 
April 6, 1861. He was educated in the district school at South Bur- 
lington and graduated at the Burlington High School in 1877. He 
studied law in the office of Hamilton S. Peck arid in the office of Henry 
Ballard at Burlington, was admitted to the bar in 1882 and has since 
practiced at Burlington. He is United States Commissioner at the 
present time. 
Clarence J. Ferguson, of Burlington, was born at Westford, Jan- 
uary 8, 1860. He was educated at the Essex Classical Institute and 
the Burlington High School, studied law in the Boston Universitv 
Law School and with Wilder L. Burnap at Burlington. He was ad- 
mitted in 1892 and has practiced at Burlington since admission. 284 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
Eugene W. J. Hawkins, of Burlington, was bom at Starksboro, 
July 28, 1851. He was educated in the common and select schools in his 
native town and studied law in the office of his father, Ansil M. Haw- 
kins, at Starksboro. He was admitted in 1873 and practiced at Starks- 
boro from the date of his admission until 1890, when he removed to 
Burlington. He held several town offices in Starksboro, was State’s 
Attorney of Addison county, and in Chittenden county has held the 
office of Justice of the Peace, that of License Commissioner, Alderman 
of the City of Burlington, and City Judge. 
Theodore E. Hopkins, of Burlington, was born at Aurora, 111., 
January 27, 1874. He was educated in the common schools of Cham- 
paign, 111., and at Toledo, Ohio, and at the Burlington High School 
and the University of Vermont, where he graduated in 1895. He 
studied law with Rufus E. Brown at Burlington and was admitted 
in 1899. He has practiced at Burlington with the exception of a few 
months in 1900, when he was associated with Joseph C. Enright at 
Windsor. He was County Auditor, 1902-1912; State’s Attorney, 1912- 
1917; and member of the House, 1919. 
Ezra M. Horton, of Burlington, was born at Vergennes, Decem- 
ber 28, 1869. He was educated in the public schools and at the Uni- 
versity of Vermont. He studied law at Burlington with David J. 
Foster, Julius W. Russell and M. A. Bingham, and was admitted in 
1900. He has practiced at Burlington since his admission. He was 
Register of Probate, 1898-1900; City x\ttorney, 1912-1913; Grand 
Juror and Justice of the Peace. He was elected State’s Attorney 
of Chittenden county in 1920. 
Harry S. Ploward, of Burlington, son of Gen. O. O. Howard, 
was born at Washington, D. C., July 25, 1869. He was educated in 
the public schools and in the Omaha High School. He graduated at 
the New York University Law School in 1899. He studied law in 
the office of Hamilton S. Peck at Burlington, was admitted in 1900 
and has practiced there since. He is a Justice of the Peace. 
Jed P. Ladd, of Burlington, was born at Alburg, November 9, 
1867. He was educated in the district school at Alburg, at the St. 
Albans High School, Rock Point Institute, under a private tutor, and 
at Cornell University. He studied law in the office of his father, 
Jed P. Ladd, at Alburg, was admitted in 1894. and has practiced at 
Alburg and at Burlington. He was State’s Attorney in Grand Isle 
county and school director, and at Burlington has been a Justice of 
the Peace and was Judge of the Burlington City Court from 1919 
to 1921. THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
285 
Leon D. Latham, of Milton, was born at Royalton, September 
21, 1874, and was educated in the common schools of Royalton and 
at the Randolph High School. He studied law in the office of Joseph 
D. Denison at Randolph, and was admitted in 1897. He located in 
Milton in 1899 and has remained there since. He is Town Clerk and 
Treasurer and Town Agent. He was a member of the House in 1906. 
Matthew G. Leary, of Burlington, was born at Jericho, May 5, 
1873. He was educated in the common schools and at the Green 
Mountain Seminary. He studied law in the office of C. F. Clough 
at Waterbury, in the office of Farrington and Post at St. Albans, and 
was admitted in 1899. He practiced from his admission until 1902 
at Richmond, and has since practiced at Burlington. He was State’s 
Attorney, 1902-1904; City Attorney, 1905-1908; member of a com- 
mission to propose amendments to the Constitution, 1909; member 
of the House, 1908; and Referee in Bankruptcy since 1915. 
Edward J. Lockwood, of Burlington, was born at Brandon, De- 
cember 22, 1886. He prepared for the law at the Boston University 
Law School, where he graduated in 1917, and in the office of Lawrence, 
Lawrence and Stafford at Rutland. He was admitted in 1917. 
Joseph A. McNamara, of Burlington, was born at Fair Haven, 
August 4, 1892. He was educated in the grammar and high schools 
at Fair Haven and at Holy Cross College, where he graduated in 
1915. He studied law in the office of Thomas W. Moloney at Rutland 
and at the Harvard Law School, where he remained from 1915 to 
1918, but was prevented from graduating because of entering the 
United States Army for service in the war with Germany. He has 
practiced since October, 1919, in Burlington, the same being the date 
of his admission. He is Judge of the Burlington Municipal Court. 
James H. Macomber, of Burlington, was born at Westford, April 
18, 1867. He was educated at the St. Johnsbury Academy and the 
University of Vermont. He studied law at the Boston University 
Law School and with John W. Redmond at Hyde Park and with 
David J. Foster at Burlington. He was admitted to the bar of this 
State and Massachusetts in 1895, and has since practiced at Burlington. 
He was City Clerk in 1903; City Attorney, 1907-1909; Judge of Pro- 
bate, district of Chittenden, since December, 1910. 
Allen Martin, of Essex Junction, was born at Williamstown, 
August 14, 1875. He graduated at St. Johnsbury Academy in 1893 
and studied law in the office of John W. Gordon at Barre. He was 286 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
admitted in 1898 and has since practiced at Essex Junction. He rep- 
resented Essex in the House in 1908, has been Town Clerk since 
1902, and State’s Attorney from February 1, 1917 to February 1, 1921. 
John H. Mimms, of Burlington, was born at Southwark, Surrey 
County, England, February 19, 1852. He was educated at the Queen 
Elizabeth School, London, passed the required examination and was 
selected for admission to Oxford or Cambridge, but did not attend. 
At fourteen years of age he left school and went to work to earn his 
own living. He came to America in 1874 and began employment 
as a shorthand clerk with the Grand Trunk Railway in Montreal. 
He traveled in the same capacity with Dr. O. S. Fowler, the celebrated 
phrenologist, the following year. In 1875 he came to St. Albans and 
was employed as a stenographer in the office of the Central Vermont 
Railway Company. His first work as a stenographic reporter was in 
the Central Vermont investigations before Paul Dillingham, Dudley 
C. Denison and John L. Edwards, special masters. His first appoint- 
ment as a Court Reporter came in 1876, when he was given the coun- 
ties of Franklin, Grand Isle, Orange and Lamoille. He has reported 
since then in every county in the State, either temporarily or by per- 
manent appointment. He moved to Burlington in 1909, having been 
appointed official reporter of Chittenden county. He reported for this 
county and Windsor and Grand Isle until 1914, when he opened a 
law office in Burlington and resigned as the reporter in Windsor 
county. He had studied law while residing in St. Albans in the office 
of Davis and Stevens and at the Columbia Law School and had been 
admitted in 1882. He has practiced at Burlington since 1914 and 
at the same time has reported for this county and Grand Isle. He 
was appointed chief of staff by Governor Stickney with the rank of 
Colonel. He was elected secretary of the Vermont Bar Association 
in 1890 and held that office and that of Treasurer until 1918, when he 
resigned. He was for eight years Captain of Co. B., V. N. G., St. 
Albans, and then Major and Lieutenant-Colonel of the First Regi- 
ment. In the last office he served in the Spanish-American War and 
commanded the regiment for most of the time while in service. 
John Morton, of Richmond, was born in Georgia, January 18, 
1877, and was educated at the St. Albans High School. He studied 
law at the Boston University Law School, at the Albany Law School, 
and with Vernon A. Bullard at Burlington. He was admitted to the 
bar in 1902 and has since practiced at Richmond. He has held several 
town offices. 
Edmund C. Mower, of Burlington, was born in Morristown, Feb- 
ruary 22, 1869. He was educated at the People’s Academy, 1884- THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
287 
1888; University of Vermont, 1888-1892; University Law School, 
New York City, 1894-1896. He studied law in the office of Judson 
E. Cushman at Burlington and was admitted in 1896 and has since 
practiced at Burlington. He was State’s Attorney, 1900-1902; Mu- 
nicipal Judge, 1905-1911; State Senator, 1915-1917; Trustee, Uni- 
versity of Vermont, 1907-1917; vice-president, Burlington Trust Com- 
pany from 1910 to 1920; and is professor of constitutional and com- 
mercial law in the University of Vermont. 
Guy M. Page, of Burlington, was born at Cambridge, May 15, 
1886. He graduated at the Bristol High School, class of 1903; Uni- 
versity of Vermont, class of 1907; Boston University Law School, 
class of 1910. He studied law in the office of Darling and Mower 
at Burlington and was admitted in 1910, and has practiced at Burling- 
ton since admission. He was Assistant Secretary of the Vermont 
Senate, 1908-1915; Secretary, 1915 to 1919; member of the Repub- 
lican State Committee, 1917 to date. 
Joel W. Page, of Burlington, was born at Waterville, September 
5, 1852. He was educated in the State Normal School at Johnson, 
at People’s Academy, and at Montpelier Seminary. He studied law 
at the University of Michigan Law School with Henry R. Start at 
Bakersfield and with Brigham and Waterman at Hyde Park. He 
was admitted in 1878, practiced at Waterville for five years, then at 
Jeffersonville until 1893, when he removed to Bristol, where he re- 
mained until 1903. Since 1903 he has resided at Burlington. He 
was State’s Attorney of Lamoille county, 1890-1892. 
P. Marrs Page, of Burlington, was born at Chesterfield, N. Y., 
December 12, 1866. He was educated at the Essex Institute and 
studied law with Marshall H. Alexander at Jericho and at the Boston 
University Law School. He was admitted in 1899 and practiced at 
Jericho from the time of his admission until 1914, when he removed 
to Burlington. 
Hamilton S. Peck, of Burlington, was born at Royalston, Mass., 
October 22, 1845, and was educated at the University of Vermont. 
He studied law in the office of Wales and Taft at Burlington and 
was admitted in 1873. He has practiced at Burlington since admission 
and has held the following offices: State’s Attorney, 1878-1879; Aider- 
man, 1883-1884; City Judge, 1888-1894; Mayor, 1896-1898; City Rep- 
resentative, 1910-1912; Senator, 1917-1918; City Attorney, 1916, 1917, 
1918. 
Max L. Powell, of Burlington, was born at Richford, April 26, 
1869. He was educated at the Richford High School, at Vermont 288 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
Academy, where he graduated in 1885, at the University of Vermont, 
where he graduated in 1889, and at the University of Geneva, Switzer- 
land, where he graduated in 1892. He studied law with his father, 
E. Henry Powell, at Burlington, and was admitted to the bar in 1893. 
He was Deputy Auditor in 1888-1892; Assistant Clerk of the House 
in 1892; Secretary of Civil and Military Affairs in 1894; Secretary 
of the Senate, 1896-1900; Senator, 1910 and 1915; Captain and 
A. D. C., Vermont National Guard. 
Robert Roberts, of Burlington, was born at Manchester in 1848. 
He was educated at the Burlington High School, Burr and Burton 
Seminary, and at the University of Vermont, where he graduated in 
the class of 1869. He studied law with his father, Daniel Roberts, 
and at the Columbian Law School, and was admitted to the bar in 
1871. He has resided in Burlington since his admission except during 
the years of 1876 and 1877. He represented Burlington in the House 
in 1882; was Senator in 1900-1902; City Attorney, 1887-1889; Mayor, 
1899, 1900, 1901, 1910, 1912. 
Charles J. Russell, of Burlington, was born at Bridport, March 
31, 1859, and was educated in the common schools of Bridport and 
Cornwall, at Beeman Academy, Castleton Normal School, Howard 
Medical College, Washington, D. C., Union University, Law Depart- 
ment, Albany, where he graduated in 1901. He was admitted to the 
bar of Vermont in 1901 after studying in the office of David J. Foster 
at Burlington, and at once formed a partnership with him, and the 
next year Cornelius L. Palmer joined the firm. Doctor Russell con- 
tinued a member of the firm until December 1, 1905, when he became 
County Clerk. Doctor Russell practiced medicine in the towns of 
Monkton and Hinesburg from 1883 to 1898 and held numerous town 
offices; he twice served as chairman of the Republican County Con- 
vention and in 1892 was County Senator. 
Henry B. Shaw, of Burlington, was born at Burlington, Novem- 
ber 30, 1873. He was educated in the public schools of Burlington 
and at the University of Vermont, where he graduated in 1896. He 
graduated at the Harvard Law School in 1900 and was admitted to 
the bar of Michigan in 1900 and to the bar of Vermont in 1902. He 
practiced at Detroit, 1900-1902, and since 1902 has practiced at Bur- 
lington. He was State’s Attorney, 1908-1912; State Senator, 1915- 
1917; Commissioner on uniform laws, 1913-1917; Major, Judge Advo- 
cate, U. S. A., 1917-1918; member of Board of Contract Adjustment. 
War Department, November 10, 1919, to date. Appointed Judge of 
the Burlington City Court, February 1, 1921. He was appointed F RAN KLIN G. BUTTERFIELD 
Born in Rockingham, Vt., May 11, 1842. He was 
educated in the public schools and at Saxtons River 
Academy. He entered Middlebury College but left 
during his junior year, in 1861, to enter the Union 
Army. After the war, the college gave him the de- 
gree of A. M. In 1912 he was regularly graduated as 
of the class of 1863, with the degree of A. B. He en- 
listed as a private in Company A, 6th Vt. Volunteers. 
He was promoted through the various commissioned 
grades until at the age of twenty-two he was Lieu- 
tenant Colonel, commanding the regiment. During the 
Chancellorsville, Gettysburg and Mine Run campaigns 
he served as aide-de-camp on the staff of Gen. L. A. 
Grant, commanding the Vermont Brigade. He was 
mentioned in general orders for conspicuous bravery 
and was awarded a medal of honor by Congress. He 
resigned in 1864 as a result of wounds received in bat- 
tle. From 1865 to 18T7 he engaged in mercantile pur- 
suits at Saxtons River. He studied law but before his 
admission to the bar he was appointed Supervisor of 
Census for Vermont. He was also sent to South Caro- 
lina to investigate the alleged census frauds. Later 
he was transferred to the Bureau of Pensions, where 
he occupied positions of great responsibility. Having 
become associated with his brother in the manufacture 
of taps and dies at Derby Line, Vt., he resigned from 
the government service in 1892. He held the office of 
Judge Advocate General of Vermont. He represented 
Derby in the legislature in 1898, was a Senator from 
Orleans county in 1910 and was a Presidential Elector 
in 1908. He married Maria Smith in 1866 and two 
children, Benjamin F. and Esther E., were horn to 
them. General Butterfield died January 6, 1916. THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
289 
Secretary of Civil and Military Affairs by Governor Hartness to suc- 
ceed Judge Willcox and resigned in September, 1922. 
Alfred L. Sherman, of Burlington, was born at Charlotte, April 
23, 1870. He was educated in the common schools of Charlotte, 
Castleton Normal School, from which he graduated in 1887, Vermont 
Academy, St. Johnsbury, and the University of Vermont. He grad- 
uated at the Boston University Law School in 1898 and prepared 
for the bar by study in the office of his brother-in-law, Judson E. 
Cushman, at Burlington. He was admitted in 1898 and has since 
practiced at Burlington. For five years he was a partner of Mr. 
Cushman. He was State’s Attorney, 1904-1908, and City Attorney, 
1914 and 1915. 
Adrian J. Simays, of Burlington, was born at Burlington, July 
7, 1892. He studied law at Georgetown University, where he grad- 
uated in 1917. He prepared for admission in the office of Cowles 
and Stearns at Burlington and was admitted in 1917. He was in army 
service from May, 1918, to July, 1919, and is now engaged in practice 
at Burlington. 
Levi P. Smith, of Burlington, was born at Burlington, August 
30, 1885, and was graduated from the Burlington High School in 
1904 and from the University of Vermont in 1908. He studied law 
at the Law School of Harvard University and was graduated in 1911 
and admitted to the bar of Vermont the same year. He has practiced 
at Burlington since admission. He is vice-president of the Burling- 
ton Savings Bank. 
Wesley A. Sturges, of Burlington, was born at Fairfield, No- 
vember 3, 1893. He prepared for the law at the Columbia Law 
School, 1915-1919, and was admitted to the bar of Vermont the latter 
year. Since his admission he has practiced at Burlington. 
Elihu B. Taft, of Burlington, was born at Williston, March 25, 
1847. He was educated at the Williston Academy and at the Univer- 
sity of Vermont, and studied law in the office of Wales and Taft 
at Burlington; was admitted to the bar in 1873 and has since prac- 
ticed in Burlington. He was State Senator in 1888-1889, and has 
held the offices of School Commissioner, Alderman and City Attorney. 
Martin S. Vilas, of Burlington, was born in Colchester, March 
1, 1870. He graduated at the Burlington High School and at the 
University of Vermont, studied law in the office of Henry Ballard 290 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
in Burlington, and was admitted to the bar of this State in 1902, to 
the bar of California in 1913, and to the bar of the State of Washing- 
ton in 1915. He has practiced at Burlington since his admission with 
the exception of the year from September, 1913, to October, 1914, 
when he was in practice in San Francisco. He was City Attorney 
of Burlington for two terms; United States Commissioner for the 
district of Vermont; member of the Senate, 1917-1923. 
Fred G. Webster, of Burlington, was born in Braintree, July 
21, 1872. He was educated in the public schools of Braintree and 
Randolph, and graduated at the high school in the latter place in 1893. 
He studied law in Burlington with S. M. Flint and Rufus E. Brown, 
was admitted in 1899 and has since practiced in Burlington. He held 
the office of Grand Juror in 1904, 1908 and 1909. 
Clarence R. White, of Burlington, was born at Colchester, No- 
vember 10, 1888. He studied law at the Law School of Columbia 
University, where he graduated in 1914, and with Theodore E. Hop- 
kins at Burlington. He was admitted in 1915 and has since practiced 
at Burlington, where he has held the office of City Grand Juror for 
two terms. 
Howard F. Wolcott, of Winooski, was born at Leroy, Ohio, June 
26, 1849. He was educated at Ypsilanti, Mich., and at Oberlin Col- 
lege. He studied law in the office of Oscar E. Butterfield at Wil- 
mington and was admitted in 1876. He practiced at Jamaica, 1876- 
1883; since 1883 he has practiced at Winooski. He has been Town 
Agent, Grand Juror, Justice of the Peace, License Commissioner, and 
Municipal Judge at Winooski. ESSEX COUNTY 
BY an Act of the General Assembly passed November 5, 1792, 
Orange and Chittenden counties were divided and limited, and 
from the two counties were constituted the counties of Franklin, 
Caledonia, Essex and Orleans. Orange county was limited to twenty 
towns, Caledonia to twenty-one and Essex embraced all the remaining 
towns of Orange county except Greensboro, Glover, Barton, Browning- 
ton, Navy, Caldersburgh, and Holland. It was provided by the act con- 
stituting these new counties that the court business should be done in 
certain other counties until such time as the courts were established 
in the new counties. 
Essex county was not organized until 1800. The first term of the 
county court was held at Lunenburg in December of that year; the 
second term was held at Brunswick on the third Monday of June, 
1801, the third term at Lunenburg in December, 1901. Meanwhile 
Guildhall had been made the county shire and here the fourth term of 
court was held on the third Monday of June, 1802. In September, 1797, 
Eben W. Judd granted land to the county on which to build a court 
house and jail. This grant included the hill back of the common in 
Guildhall, on which the first court house was built. The first jail was 
an old block house. The first court house probably was built soon 
after 1800 and the jail in 1808 or 1809. In 1831 the court house was 
removed to the common, in front of the hill where it formerly stood, 
and was rebuilt, serving for many years as a court house, church and 
district school house. The present court house was built in 1850 and 
the present brick jail in 1885. The court house has been thoroughly 
remodeled on the inside within recent years and is admirably adapted 
to the needs of the county. It has an office for the County Clerk and 
a room for lodging the jury when they are obliged to be kept together. 
Like Newfane, the town of Guildhall has no resident lawyer; neither 
has it a hotel. The court house is the central place for meeting when 
court is in session, on the part of attorneys, jurymen, officers, witnesses 
and parties. For all purposes but dining and lodging it serves as a 
hotel during the sessions of court. The terms of court are held on 
the fourth Tuesday of April and the fourth Tuesday of October. 
Some of the earlier lawyers in Essex county who made Guildhall 
their home were Hezekiah May, Daniel Dana, Elijah Foote and Joseph 
Berry, and afterwards Seth Cushman, James Steele, John T. Wells, 
William Heywood, William T. Barron, William H. Hartshorn, Ira A. 
Ramsey, George N. Dale and Henry Heywood. Perhaps the ablest 
man in this list was Gen. Seth Cushman, who was the son of Isaac 
Cushman, whose ancestors came over in the Mayflozver. 292 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
GEN. SETH CUSHMAN 
1782-1845 
Gen. Seth Cushman of Guildhall, who belonged to the big four, 
made up of Mattocks, Bell, Fletcher and Cushman, died at Guildhall, 
March 18, 1845, in the sixty-third year of his age. He was born in 
Connecticut, but the place of his birth is not given in any biographical 
sketches. His father was a farmer in Guildhall and for a time held 
the office of Judge of Probate. His mother was a sister of Judge 
Paine, who for forty years was United States District Judge of Ver- 
mont. He acquired his military title in the militia, and he was for 
a short time in the army during the War of 1812, holding a commission 
on the regimental staff. He expected a political appointment at one 
time from General Jackson and moved to Montpelier where he lived 
about a year, but the patronage was not given so he returned to Guild- 
hall, where he remained until his death. He was an Anti-Masonic can- 
didate for Congress and came near being elected, but was defeated by 
General Cahoon of Lyndon. He practiced in his own county and in 
Orleans and Caledonia in Vermont and in Coos county in New Hamp- 
shire. He was usually engaged in all the important trials in these 
counties. While not a deep student in the books, he was possessed of 
remarkable intuition and skill in the conduct of a case and had forensic 
gifts of a high order. His perceptions were so quick, his resources so 
remarkable and his facility to acquire the details of a case so excep- 
tional that he could sit down to the trial of a new, strange case and as 
it proceeded gain such knowledge that he could present it effectively. 
He was an accomplished and eloquent advocate and was especially 
successful in criminal defences. He was a man of handsome presence 
and gentlemanly manners. His ability was such that he would have 
been distinguished in a much larger field, but he had failings which 
prevented a greater measure of success. Few men in Vermont pos- 
sessed talents of greater variety and power. He was graceful and 
entertaining at home, in the social circle, at the bar and as an officer in 
the field. He was the peer of John Mattocks. Janies Bell and Isaac 
Fletcher, and is referred to by Bell as the “courtly and eloquent lawyer, 
the kind and feeling man, the polished and social gentleman and 
friend,” a eulogy in which Governor Mattocks joined. 
GEORGE N. DALE 
1833-1903 
George N. Dale was one of Vermont's greatest men of his genera- 
tion. Born at Fairfax, this State, February 19, 1833, he removed with 
his father's family when a small boy to Waitsfield. His boyhood days THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
293 
were given up to incessant labor on the farm, which gave him little 
opportunity to attend school. By making good use of such time as 
was allowed, and by diligent reading and study at home, he became 
equipped for the duties of a teacher in the district schools. In this he 
was eminently successful, both in point of instruction and control. 
His large, powerful frame and capacity to discipline made him excep- 
tionally useful in those districts where the custom of “carrying the 
teacher out” had obtained. Early in life he decided on the law as a 
profession and bent all his energies to that end. His earnings from 
teaching school enabled him to attend Thetford Academy for two or 
three years, during which time he took such courses as would best 
equip him for the legal profession. After this preparation he entered 
the office of Dillingham and Durant at Waterbury, Vt., where he re- 
mained until his admission to the bar at the March term of Washing- 
ton county court in 1856. In December following he located at Guild- 
hall, where he formed a partnership with William H. Hartshorn, 
which continued for two years. He continued alone in a growing and 
lucrative practice after this time, until 1861. During the latter period 
he was for most of the time State’s Attorney for Essex county. He 
represented Guildhall in the Legislature in 1860 and again in 1861. In 
June of the latter year he became Chief Deputy Collector of the port 
at Island Pond, a position which he retained until 1864, when he was 
elected to the State Senate, to which he was re-elected in 1865-6-7-8 
and ’69. In 1870 he was elected Lieutenant-Governor. In 1871 he 
was reappointed Chief Deputy Collector of the port of Island Pond, a 
position which he held until he resigned in 1882. In 1885 he was 
elected President of the Vermont Bar Association. When Judge 
Steele was elevated to the bench, Mr. Dale was substituted for him in 
the co-partnership of Steele and Robinson, under the name of Dale and 
Robinson, having offices at Derby Line and at Barton. Soon after he 
formed a co-partnership with B. F. D. Carpenter at West Charleston, 
and continued these several business connections for several years, 
keeping his own office at Island Pond, where he resided and practiced 
his profession. In 1892 he served in the Legislature as the member 
from Brighton and rendered valuable service on the judiciary com- 
mittee. In 1894 he represented Essex county again in the Senate. 
He declined the office of National Bank Examiner, tendered him by the 
State delegation in Congress, because he feared he was not equipped 
to discharge its duties. He was United States Consul at Coaticook, 
Canada, from October, 1901, to October, 1902. 
Mr. Dale was a careful and able lawyer, and a powerful advocate. 
He was in much demand as a referee, commissioner and master in 
chancery, both in Vermont and New Hampshire. His studies reached 
beyond the law into the best English classics. This gave him a 
style that was clear and captivating. The Essex County Herald pub- 294 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
lished from time to time over one hundred memorial sketches, which 
were prepared by him. His son, Porter H. Dale, Congressman from 
the second Vermont district, assembled and published these sketches 
following his father’s decease in a volume of nearly four hundred 
pages. His death occurred January 29, 1903, at Island Pond. 
These sketches were dictated to his daughter, who took them down 
as they fell from the lips of Governor Dale who poured them out of 
his fund of information without the aid of notes or data of any kind. 
Whenever he read a sketch before the Bar Association he was sure of 
an attentive hearing. William E. Johnson, of Woodstock, told me that 
he was so impressed with the personality of Governor Dale himself 
on one of these occasions that he forgot all about the character that he 
was portraying. 
ZOPHAR M. MANSUR 
1843-1913 
A very successful lawyer in Essex county was Zophar M. Mansur, 
who spent most of his active life at Island Pond. He was born at 
Morgan, Vt., November 23, 1843, and he died at Burlington, March 28, 
1914. He was educated in the common schools and at Derby Academy. 
He enlisted in Company K, Tenth Vermont, in 1862, and was dis- 
charged in 1865; serving in several of the principal battles of the war 
and losing his right arm at Opequan Creek in 1864. On being dis- 
charged he attended school at Derby Academy in the fall of 1865, 
taught school the following winter and located at Island Pond in 1866. 
In February, 1867, he was appointed Postmaster of Island Pond and 
continued to hold the office for several years. He studied law with 
George N. Dale at Island Pond and was admitted to the bar in Essex 
county at the March term, 1879. He represented Brighton in the 
Legislature in 1886 and was State’s Attorney for Essex county from 
1886 to 1888. In the latter year he was elected Senator from Essex 
county. He was elected President of the Vermont Officers’ Reunion 
Society in 1889 and in 1898; in 1890 he was elected Department Com- 
mander G. A. R., and President of the Vermont Society, Sons of the 
American Revolution in 1894. In the same year he was elected Lieu- 
tenant-Governor. He served as Deputy Collector of Customs in 
charge of Island Pond for four years under Collector Benedict. He 
was one of the trustees of the Methodist Seminary at Montpelier, was 
trustee of the Soldiers’ Home at Bennington, director of the National 
Bank of Derby Line from 1884 and president after 1905. He was ap- 
pointed Collector of Customs for the Memphremagog district October 
1, 1897, and continued therein until 1906. At the time he assumed the 
duties of this office he moved from Island Pond to Newport, which ALBERT B. CHANDLER 
Born in Randolph, August 20, 1840. He was edu- 
cated in the public schools and learned the printing- 
trade and telegraphy. He became a railroad telegrapher 
and in 1863 was assigned to duty as cipher telegraph 
operator in the War Department at Washington, acting 
as one of the confidential operators for Secretary of War 
Stanton and President Lincoln. He also served as dis- 
bursing clerk for the Superintendent of Military Tele- 
graph in the Department of the Potomac. In 1866 he was 
placed in charge of the trans-Atlantic and Cuba cable 
traffic of the Western Union Telegraph Company. In 
1875 he became Assistant General Manager of the At- 
lantic and Pacific Telegraph Company and was ad- 
vanced, step by step, until he became president of the 
company. When this company was combined with the 
Western Union, he was chosen president of the Fuller 
Electrical Company. In 1884 he became counsel for 
the Postal Telegraph and Cable Company and in 1866, 
its president. In 1887 he was elected president of the 
Commercial Telegraph Company. After forty-seven 
years of service, he retired but continued as chairman 
of the board of directors. He served on the staffs of 
Governors Woodbury and Grout. In 1864 he married 
Manila E. Stedman of Randolph. She died in 1907. 
In 1910 he married Mildred Vivian of New York. 
Three children were born of the first marriage, a 
daughter who died in childhood and two sons, Albert E. 
and Willis D. Chandler. THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
295 
thereafter was his home. In any department of life Governor Mansur 
was successful. He was aggressive, alert, persistent, patient, industri- 
ous and able. He looked ahead and made wise provisions for the 
future. While acting as Postmaster he studied law in his leisure hours 
so as not to be without a salary and occupation when his term of 
office should end. As a lawyer he was enterprising, bold, inquisitive 
and effective. As State’s Attorney he was zealous, but he excelled as a 
business man. His administration of the office of Collector was one of 
the best. As a public citizen Governor Mansur enjoyed the confidence 
and esteem of the whole State. His counsel was often sought in busi- 
ness, social and political matters and no one in his community and few 
in the State enjoyed greater confidence. 
JOSIAH H. BENTON 
1843-1916 
Josiah H. Benton was born at Addison, Vt., August 4, 1843, the 
son of Josiah H. and Martha Ellen Danforth Benton. He received his 
education at the Literary and Scientific Institute at New London, 
N. H., and studied law at the Albany Law School, which gave him 
his degree of LL. B. in 1866. He was admitted to the bar in 1866 and 
began practice in Bradford, Vt., which place he left soon after to take 
up practice in Lancaster, N. H., where he remained until 1873. In 1869 
and 1870 he was private secretary to the Governor of New Hampshire 
and in 1870 and 1872 clerk of the House of Representatives. 
He located in Boston in 1873 and there built up an extensive and 
lucrative practice. He was general counsel for the Old Colony Rail- 
road and Steamboat Companies and later for the New Haven interests. 
He had been a director and counsel for the Northern Railroad of New 
Hampshire and in this capacity had been engaged in many notable 
cases. He lectured on corporations and railroads at Boston University 
Law School from the early nineties until 1906. 
An interesting story is told of him and his father,—the latter being 
a retired clergyman who made a success of farming in Maidstone after 
finishing his career as a preacher. Once in his early and ambitious days 
the son came to visit the father at the farm. The latter, the day previ- 
ous, had sold some steers for five hundred dollars. He told the son 
that farming was good business, that the day before he had sold some 
steers for five hundred dollars; whereupon the son replied, “Father, 
the law is a good business. I argued a case yesterday for which I was 
paid five hundred dollars.” 
Colonel Benton served in the Vermont Volunteers in the Civil 
War. He was trustee of the Boston Public Library and its president 296 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
for many years. He was also trustee of Boston University and a mem- 
ber of many clubs. He was the author of many addresses. He died at 
Boston, February 5, 1916. 
PRESENT MEMBERS OF THE ESSEX COUNTY BAR 
Harry B. Amey, of Island Pond, was born at Pittsburgh, N. H., 
December 21, 1868. He graduated at Dartmouth College in 1894, 
studied law in the office of Ladd and Fletcher and in the office of 
Shurtleff and Sullivan in Lancaster, and was admitted to the bar of 
New Hampshire in 1898. He practiced at Milton, N. H., from 1898 
to 1902, when he located in Island Pond. He was State’s Attorney of 
Essex county from 1904 to 1908; member of the House, 1910-1912; 
and County Senator, 1919-1920. 
Oliver H. Cameron, of Island Pond, was born in Norton, July 27. 
1886, and was educated at the Island Pond High School, Coaticook 
Academy, and the University of Maine, College of Law. He studied 
law in the office of Harry B. Amey at Island Pond, with Simonds, 
Searles and Graves at St. Johnsbury, and was admitted November 10, 
1916. He was a member of the firm of Searles, Graves and Cameron 
from January, 1917, to January, 1918; and in company with Harry B. 
Amey after that date. He has been School Director and Selectman in 
Norton and represented the town in 1910 and 1912 in the Legislature. 
He was elected State’s Attorney of Essex county in 1920. 
Porter H. Dale, of Island Pond, was born at Island Pond. 
March 1, 1867. He was educated in the Island Pond High School, 
Newport Academy, Washington County Grammar School, Eastman 
Business College, and by private instructors in Philadelphia and Bos- 
ton. He studied law in the office of Armstrong Taylor at Minneapolis, 
and in the office of his father, George N. Dale, at Island Pond. He 
was admitted in 1896 and has resided at Island Pond, where his legal 
work has been confined to business enterprises in which he has been 
interested. He is president of the Island Pond National Bank, of the 
Island Pond Electric Company, of the Fitzgerald Land & Lumber 
Company, of the Fitzdale Paper Company; was Chief Deputy Col- 
lector United States Customs at Island Pond; Judge of Brighton Muni- 
cipal Court, 1910-1912; State Senator, 1910-1912; member of Congress 
since March 4, 1915. 
Franklin D. Hale, of Lunenburg, was born at Barnet, March 7, 
1854. He was educated in the common schools, at Northfield High 
and Graded School, and at St. Johnsbury Academy. He read law 
while teaching and studied in the office of Hutchinson and Savage at THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
297 
Lewiston, Me. He graduated from the Law School of Michigan Uni- 
versity in 1877, and was admitted to the bar of Michigan in 1877 and 
to the bar of Vermont in 1884. He practiced in Lewiston, Me., from 
1878 to 1881 and in Lunenburg from 1884 to 1902. He was State’s 
Attorney of Essex county for eight years; represented Lunenburg in 
the House in 1884, 1898, 1900; was County Senator in 1886; Auditor 
of Accounts, 1892 to 1896; Chairman Town-site Board of Trustees, 
Oklahoma, 1891; Chief Clerk to the Treasurer of Cuba, 1899-1900; 
American Consul at Coaticook, 1902-1918. 
Henry W. Lund, of Canaan, was born in Granby, October 11, 
1854, and was educated in the common schools and at St. Johnsbury 
Academy. He studied law in the office of Henry C. Bates at St. 
Johnsbury and was admitted to the bar in 1881. He has practiced at 
Canaan since admission and has held the various town offices and was 
State’s Attorney, 1890-1893, 1899-1900, 1903-1904; member of the 
House in 1915, and Judge of the Essex County Municipal Court since 
1916. 
Clare R. Powell, of Island Pond, was born at Barton, October 
18, 1881. He was educated at the Barton Academy and studied law 
with Justice Willard W. Miles in Barton. He graduated from the 
academy in 1900 and was admitted to the bar in 1903. He practiced 
at Barton from 1903 to 1911 and since 1911 has practiced at Island 
Pond. He was State’s Attornev from December 1, 1912, to February 
1, 1921. FRANKLIN COUNTY 
THE county of Franklin was incorporated by the General As- 
sembly by an “Act for dividing the Counties of Orange and 
Chittenden into six Separate and Distinct Counties”, passed 
November 5, 1792. The county was materially reduced in size by an 
act, passed in November, 1802, which took from it the towns of Alburg, 
Isle La Motte, and North Hero, and by a further act of the General 
Assembly, passed in October, 1835, which took from it the towns of 
Belvidere, Cambridge, Johnson, Sterling and Waterville. The county 
buildings were erected at St. Albans at an early date. The first court 
house was built of wood, and as was usual at the period, it was used for 
religious worship and for town meetings. The shire was always at St. 
Albans, but there was much wrangling over the location in which 
Fairfield is said to have taken a part. The first court house later was 
surrounded by brick, and the Universalist Society built an addition to 
the building. The court house bell came from Troy, N. Y., and 
was purchased by the ladies of St. Albans in 1810. It became cracked 
from long and constant use and was re-cast at Troy. The first jail 
was built in 1798. Before that time debtors and other persons liable 
to imprisonment were taken to Burlington or Vergennes. The next 
jail was built a few rods east of where The Tavern now stands. The 
third jail, which stood south of St. Luke’s Church, was burned in 
1813. The only tenant at the time could not be reached by the door 
and was taken out with much difficulty through a hole cut in the roof. 
The fourth jail was located near the Tremont House. It was burned 
and the fifth jail erected in the same place. This was taken down later 
and the frame put up a little farther south. The present jail stands a 
little east of the court house, is built of brick, is modern, sanitary and 
secure. The present court house was erected in 1872. It is built of 
brick with granite foundations and sanded trimmings. At the front 
corners are towers which extend a little above the roof. The structure 
was designed for convenience, comfort and safety for the public records 
rather than for beauty. The lower floor is occupied by the Judge of 
Probate and the County Clerk and here are rooms for the State’s At- 
torney and the jury. On the second floor is the court room and in 
connection with the same are rooms for the judges, lawyers and wit- 
nesses. The county courts are held on the second Tuesday of March 
and September. 
As appears elsewhere the first lawyer to be admitted in Franklin 
county was the gifted John Mattocks. This occurred in 1793. The 
first State’s Attorney was Gen. Levi House. For several years he was 
the most conspicuous figure at the bar in St. Albans. He was fond of 
show and indulged his taste in erecting the finest residence in the THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
299 
county. This stood on the present site of the Warner Hospital. It 
was octagonal in shape and the parlor curtains were made of hundred- 
dollar counterfeit bills. He was a man who assumed much pomp and 
his presence never failed to create a sensation among the early settlers. 
His rotund form and ruddy complexion easily distinguished him from 
his fellows. His importance was enhanced by reason of his election 
as a Brigadier-General of the militia, and when he was authorized by 
the Legislature to organize two companies to protect the shipping in 
St. Albans Bay he had reached the topmost round of his military 
ambition. It is sad to record of him that history says that his military 
glory and the rum of the period were his undoing and that he died an 
object of charity. 
Soon after the shire was established other lawyers located at the 
county seat in considerable numbers. Many of these were men of 
great ability who afterwards filled high offices in the State. These 
men included Thaddeus Rice, Seth Wetmore, Asahel Longworthy, Ros- 
well Hutchins, Abner Morton, General Fassett, Bates Turner, founder 
of the Vermont Law School and Judge of the Supreme Court; 
Cornelius P. Van Ness, Governor, Judge of the Supreme Court and 
Minister to Spain; Asa Aldis, Chief Judge of the Supreme Court; 
Benjamin Swift, United States Senator; John Smith, member of 
Congress; William Brayton, Judge of the Supreme Court and author 
of Brayton’s Reports; Stephen Royce, Chief Judge of the Supreme 
Court and Governor; James Davis, a sound lawyer and able writer. 
The courts in the days of these men were conducted with great dig- 
nity. The Sheriff, with drawn sword, escorted the Judges across the 
common to the bench and the court was opened with the Sheriff stand- 
ing in like manner. The Judges wore ruffled shirts with majestic 
collars and long broadcloth cloaks faced with velvet, appearing the 
embodiment of justice and lofty dignity. 
Law School in Vermont 
As appears in the sketches of the Judges, Judge Bates Turner 
conducted a law school in Franklin county. This he established in the 
town of Fairfield early in the last century. He was reputed to have 
had the ability to fit his students for admission and practice in much 
less time than was ordinarily spent in preparatory studies. Hence, 
many young men resorted to him for the purpose of being fitted for 
admission to the bar in a shorter time than the rules of the court 
required when their studies were pursued in law offices. Nearly one 
hundred and seventy-five students were entered in his office, a number 
exceeding by far that of any law office in the State and a larger num- 
ber than attended most of the private law schools in New England. 
In 1812 he removed to Middlebury with the purpose of establishing a 300 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
law school there, but not receiving adequate encouragement he re- 
turned to Fairfield. The three-story wooden building still stands in 
Middlebury village where the law school was to have had its seat. Judge 
Turner was a sound lawyer, a fair-minded and skilful practitioner, and 
he enjoyed the confidence and esteem of the bar of his county for half 
a century. Few men entertained so high a respect for the profession 
of the law. He loved it for its own sake, and in the recollections it 
furnished he found an unfailing source of gratification, even after the 
infirmities of age had withdrawn him from its active pursuits. 
JOHN SMITH 
1789-1858 
John Smith was an early leader of the Franklin county bar. He 
was the father of John Gregory Smith and the grandfather of Gov. 
Edward C. Smith. He was born at Barre, Mass., August 12, 1789, 
and died in 1858. The Smith family moved to St. Albans in 1800 
where John was educated in the common schools. He prosecuted his 
legal studies in the offices of Roswell Hutchins and Benjamin Swift, 
and was admitted to the bar in 1810. He early became a partner of 
Benjamin Swift, who was a man of talent but left the law early in 
life to seek political office. In the latter field he was successful. He 
represented his district in Congress and his State in the United States 
Senate. The firm of Swift and Smith ranked among the first in 
Franklin county at a time when Asa Aldis, Cornelius P. Van Ness, and 
Stephen Royce were at the bar. Upon the election of Mr. Swift to 
Congress in 1827 the firm was dissolved and Mr. Smith continued for 
some years in practice alone. In 1827 he was elected State’s Attorney 
of Franklin county and continued to hold this office for seven years. 
During his term of office he prosecuted Curtis Wilkinson for erecting 
a barn on the public square known as Taylor Park and established the 
right of the people of St. Albans to the use and enjoyment of this 
park as public property. He represented St. Albans in the General 
Assembly for ten years and for two terms was Speaker. In 1839-1840 
he represented his district in Congress. As an attorney he ranked with 
the leaders of the local bar and was associated in the prosecution or 
defence of the principal cases tried in the courts. In 1841 John 
Gregory Smith was admitted to practice and thereupon formed a part- 
nership with his father, which continued until the latter’s death. They 
were counsel for some years of the Central Vermont Railroad Com- 
pany. This led to the appointment of John Gregory Smith as a 
trustee and manager of the Vermont Central and Vermont and Canada 
Railroads and his retirement from the practice of the law. John Born in Underhill, Vt., March 26, 1854. He removed 
with his family to Cambridge, attended a few terms of 
district school, worked for his board and attended a 
term of school at Westford. After attending part of a 
term of school at Underhill he left for parts unknown 
to his family, his cash capital being a half cent. He 
worked at odd jobs in various places. He learned the 
painters’ trade and later worked for a detective agency. 
Suffering severe injuries while painting, he studied 
shorthand. While in Washington he studied in a busi- 
ness college, graduated from courses in medicine and 
law and also took a course in mineralogy, assaying and 
mining engineering. During this time he was working 
in government departments, being advanced, in process 
of time, to an important position as examiner of pension 
claims. The confinement in government work having 
become irksome, Mr. Whitcomb resigned. He pur- 
chased the first typewriting machine sold in Washing- 
ton and later became an agent. He took out several 
typewriter patents. His inventions of a ratchet and back 
spacer are in general use in typewriters. He also took 
out a patent on the one-arm chair used in lecture halls, 
lunch rooms, etc. Starting with a capital of $183 he 
organized the Baltimore Dairy lunch and developed the 
plan until he had 138 places, each of which served from 
1,000 to 5,000 persons daily. He aided in forming the 
Master Bakers’ Association of America and the Lunch 
and Restaurant Men’s Association of America. He is 
a member of many clubs and has travelled extensively 
in this country and Europe. He married Virginia H. 
Cammack of Washington in 1882. Three children have 
been born to them, and two of them, Virgil M. and 
Paul, are living. 
JAMES A. WHITCOMB THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
301 
Smith was President of the Vermont and Canada Railroad from 1847 
until his death, and chief trustee of the Vermont Central and Vermont 
and Canada railroads from 1852 until his death. 
ORLANDO STEVENS 
1797-1879 
Orlando Stevens was born at Rutland, October 12, 1797. While 
he was quite young his father moved to St. Albans, where he attended 
the public schools and the Franklin County Grammar School. At the 
age of eighteen he entered the office of the elder Judge Aldis as a 
student, and in 1819 was admitted to the bar in Franklin county. He 
commenced the practice of his profession in Swanton, where he mar- 
ried the daughter of James Fisk, who was at the time the Collector of 
the port of Vermont and had been a Judge of the Supreme Court and 
United States Senator. Mr. Stevens began practice in St. Albans in 
1829 and continued for forty years. He then removed to Winona, 
Minn., where he practiced for a few years. Later he returned to St. 
Albans, where he died in March, 1879. He was State’s Attorney of 
Franklin county from 1839 to 1842 and again in 1849. In the latter 
year he represented St. Albans in the lower House and in 1853 was 
County Senator. During his residence in Minnesota he was a member 
of the Legislature of that State. Mr. Stevens was a man of great 
native ability and the peer of the best men in the State in his profes- 
sion ; he possessed a cool, calculating mind, had excellent judgment, 
and was well versed in the principles of the common law. He was 
preeminently a man of the people and boasted that he knew almost 
every man in Franklin and Grand Isle counties. This made him 
formidable before juries, where his arguments were models of brevity, 
conciseness and force. His quick mind seized the strong points of the 
case and on these he spent his energies. He was a man of large 
stature, with a head covered with a thick mass of curly hair, which 
gave him the soubriquet of “Curley.” His face was indicative of 
great firmness and strength of character. Had it not been for his 
besetting sin against himself he could hardly have failed of leadership 
in the State and nation. 
HEMAN S. ROYCE 
1818-1885 
Heman S. Royce was the son of Caleb Royce, who was a brother 
of Stephen Royce, the father of Chief Judge and Gov. Stephen Royce. 
Caleb Royce moved from Tinmouth to Richford and was one of the 
early settlers of the town. Heman was one of eleven children and, 302 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
as might be expected, had to work his own way. He earned funds 
with which he attended two terms at the academy in Bakersfield. 
He taught several terms of district school, and in 1842 became a stu- 
dent in the law office of Thomas Child at East Berkshire. He was 
admitted to the Franklin county bar in April, 1844, and was for a 
short time a partner of his cousin, Homer E. Royce. In 1848 he was 
appointed Deputy Collector of Customs at Highgate, at which place he 
commenced his more active practice of the law. He removed to St. 
Albans in 1859, where he remained in practice until his decease, Jan- 
uary 14, 1885. In 1853 and 1854 he was elected State’s Attorney of 
Franklin county, and in 1856 and 1857 represented the county in 
the Senate. 
As a lawyer he enjoyed an extensive practice. He was conspic- 
uous in the important trials in his own county and was frequently 
called into trials in Orleans, Lamoille, Chittenden and Addison coun- 
ties, and in United States Circuit Court. 
Mr. Royce was not a brilliant man, but was notably a man of 
strength, both intellectual and physical, and was possessed of great 
will power. He was most effective as a jury advocate. He argued 
his facts from a written brief and no point was left untouched. His 
manner was the quiet, conversational one and when he approached 
closely to the jury and leaned over the railing to address them the 
lawyers used to pass the word: “Now look out, for Mr. Royce is 
whispering to the jury.” He was capable, when aroused, of intense 
opposition to his opponent’s case, and at such times was earnest and 
impressive in his strength. If his exterior seemed cold and gruff, his 
fine instincts came to the surface as soon as the strife was over. 
Socially, he was keenly humorous and entertained with rare grace 
and unassumed dignity. 
GEORGE A. BALLARD 
1839-1898 
George A. Ballard was born on a farm in Georgia, October 
28, 1839. He was educated in the common schools, at Georgia Acad- 
emy, and at New Hampton Institute. He studied law in the office 
of Herman R. Beardsley at St. Albans, and was admitted in 1861. He 
practiced for a few years in Georgia, then removed to Fairfax, where 
he continued to reside until his death. His practice extended through- 
out his own county and the counties adjoining. In 1869 and 1870 
he represented Fairfax in the House and in 1872 was County Senator. 
He was elected State’s Attorney in 1872 and appointed to the same 
office in 1886. For a quarter of a century Mr. Ballard was a leading THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
303 
lawyer, whose services were in demand in the important cases in his 
county and vicinity. He was well grounded in the principles of the 
law; his common sense was employed rather than legal technicalities 
or subtle reasoning. The former he despised, sometimes to his cost, 
but he threw his whole energy into the preparation and trial of the 
case and never faltered until he won or lost, and if it was the latter 
he went down with colors flying. His splendid physique, clear and 
logical mind, good presence and deep, pleasing voice added to his 
charm and effectiveness. And he had rare and excellent qualities of 
heart as well as head. These faculties made him an advocate of 
recognized ability, and gave him power as a platform speaker second 
to few in the State. In conventions and upon the stump his rugged 
eloquence and forceful logic were employed with marked effect. One 
of his best oratorical efforts was the nomination of Gov. Edward 
C. Smith, a service most gratifying to Mr. Ballard because of the 
life-long friendship between Mr. Ballard and the father of his can- 
didate. He died December 19, 1898. 
HENRY E. RUSTEDT 
1847-1904 
The tragic death of Henry E. Rustedt, of Richford, removed 
a useful and respected member of the Franklin county bar. This 
occurred on March 27, 1904. The ice in the Missisquoi River at 
Richford had broken up and the force of the current had driven great 
cakes upon the bank. Mr. Rustedt, with many others, went down 
to the river bank to a point fifteen or twenty rods above the dam to 
view the ice that was piled at that place. He took a position on a 
large cake that overhung the water, which tipped with his weight and 
slid into the river, throwing him onto his hands and knees. He clung 
to the cake, which was soon far out in the current and carrying him 
swiftly toward the dam. There were many near to help, but there 
were no ropes nor was there time to get them. When within a few 
rods from the dam Mr. Rustedt took off his coat and laid it on the 
ice beneath him and plunged into the water. He made a heroic effort 
to save his life by swimming ashore, but the swift current was too 
much for his strength and he was carried over the dam, through 
the rapids, and down the river to a small island about one-third of a 
mile below the place of the accident, where his body was found a 
week later. Mr. Rustedt was a conspicuous example of the useful 
country lawyer. He was born in England, December 25, 1847. His 
father was a Congregational minister, who moved to America when the 
son was ten years old. He was educated at Barre Academy and the 304 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
University of Vermont, graduating from the latter institution in 1871. 
He studied law with Judge Henry R. Start at Bakersfield and was 
admitted in 1873. He practiced for a short time with his tutor, but 
in 1874 removed to Richford, where he practiced until his death. In 
1889 he formed a partnership with Wallace B. Locklin, which con- 
tinued during the rest of his life. He was State’s Attorney from 
1880 to 1882; Supervisor of Schools from 1880 to 1890; Superin- 
tendent of Schools from 1894 to 1904; member of the House in 1894; 
member of the Library Commission from 1894 to 1904; president 
of the Richford Savings Bank from 1889 until his death. He had 
high ideals as a lawyer, was studious, thoughtful, honest and just. 
His gifts were not forensic and he did not shine in the court room. 
But he was wise as a counsellor, and exceptionally efficient as a trier 
of cases as a special master, referee or commissioner. His knowledge 
of the law, habitual honesty and fairness gave him fine qualifications 
for this service, and his professional brethren kept him employed to 
an extent that was enjoyed by no other member of the bar, for the 
last twenty years of his life, in this department of labor. His re- 
ports showed careful attention to all details of the cases and they 
were filed before the cases took on the moss of age—which is more 
than can be said of some lawyers who undertake this kind of em- 
ployment. 
FELIX W. McGETTRICK 
1847-1919 
For a good many years Felix W. McGettrick of St. Albans and 
Henry Ballard of Burlington were regarded as the leading criminal 
lawyers in Vermont. Mr. McGettrick was born at Fairfield, No- 
vember 20, 1847, and died at Arlington, Mass., June 13, 1919. His 
early educational advantages were limited to the district school and 
a few terms in a select school. He did not enter school until he was 
twelve years of age and in his sixteenth year enlisted in Co. E, United 
States Sharpshooters, serving throughout the Civil War. He was 
in the battles of the Wilderness and Spottsylvania and in the latter 
action was seriously wounded. Following the war he entered the 
New Hampton Institute at Fairfax, Vt., and later began the study 
of law in the office of Charles J. Alger in Burlington. He finished 
his legal studies with Edson and Rand at St. Albans and was admitted 
to the bar of Vermont in 1869. He taught school during the time he 
was preparing for the law and after his admission. He first located 
at Fairfield, but soon removed to St. Albans, where he remained until 
December, 1904, when he removed to Boston. He was admitted to THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
305 
the bar of Massachusetts in 1905 and from that time until his death 
was engaged in company with his son, Edward, who had been in 
practice for several years before his father joined him and was 
Assistant Corporation Counsel of the city. Mr. McGettrick was In- 
spector of Public Buildings and United States Commissioner for 
Vermont under appointment of President Cleveland. He was a can- 
didate for Congress in 1888 on the Democratic ticket and for Governor 
in 1902. He was twice a delegate to the National Democratic Con- 
vention, and once served on the committee on resolutions. He was 
Assistant District Attorney of Suffolk county under John B. Moran 
and after the death of the latter was the acting District Attorney until 
his successor was chosen. In this connection he came into prominence 
during the bribery investigation at the State House. He was exten- 
sively engaged while in practice in Vermont in the defence of crim- 
inal cases and after removing to Boston had the reputation of handling 
more homicide cases than any lawyer in Massachusetts. He was a 
good trial lawyer and in the department in which he specialized was 
very able. He was adroit and resourceful in the presentation of the 
evidence and eloquent and ingenious in argument. In a public way 
his talents as a speaker were frequently employed either in addresses 
on patriotic occasions or in appeals in behalf of his party in political 
campaigns. 
HIRAM F. STEVENS 
1852-1904 
Hiram F. Stevens was the son of Dr. Hiram F. Stevens, who 
was an eminent physician of St. Albans. His father was president 
of the Vermont Medical Association, an army surgeon during the 
Civil War, and a member of both Houses of the Legislature. The 
junior Stevens was born at St. Albans, September 11, 1852. He was 
educated in the public schools of St. Albans, at Kimball Union Acad- 
emy, and at the University of Vermont. He graduated from college 
in 1872; studied law at Columbia Law School, from which he grad- 
uated in 1874, and was admitted to the bar in Vermont in September 
of the same year. He practiced at St. Albans until 1879, when he 
removed to St. Paul, where he practiced until his death, March 9, 
1904. Before leaving Vermont, Mr. Stevens attained considerable 
reputation as a keen, able lawyer, and in the wider field of his prac- 
tice became a leader at bar. At the time of his death he was at the 
head of a large law firm in St. Paul, was vice-president and general 
counsel of the Canadian Atlantic Transit Company, and was counsel 
for many large corporations. He was the first secretary of the Ver- 306 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
mont Bar Association and the first secretary of the Minnesota Bar 
Association, which was organized in 1883. Of the latter he afterwards 
became vice-president and president. He assisted in organizing the 
St. Paul Bar Association and became its president. He likewise 
assisted in organizing the American Bar Association, was the first 
vice-president from Minnesota, and after 1899 was chairman of the 
general council of the association. Mr. Stevens wrote many articles 
on the judicial history of St. Paul and was editor-in-chief of the 
“Bench and Bar of Minnesota,” published in 1903. He was a lecturer 
on real property at the University of Minnesota from 1892 to 1900, 
and after that date president and dean of the St. Paul College of Law. 
He was a member of the American Association of Law Schools, chair- 
man of the Minnesota Statute Revision Commission, member of the 
International Law Association of London, and of the American Acad- 
emy of Political and Social Science. For ten years he was in the 
Legislature, of his adopted State, beginning as a member of the lower 
House and ending in the Senate. In the latter he was chairman of 
the Judiciary Committee. As a legislator he took part in shaping 
some of the most important legislation in the history of his State, 
and had great influence and was at times the dominating force. He 
was an able lawyer, and a man of genial and kindly disposition and 
broad sympathies. 
H. CHARLES ROYCE 
1864-1912 
H. Charles Royce, son of Homer E. and Mary Edmunds Royce, 
was born in Berkshire, February 16, 1864, and died at St. Albans, 
November 24, 1912. He belonged to a family of great lawyers. His 
father was Chief Judge of our Supreme Court and his grand-uncle, 
Stephen Royce, held the same office and that of Governor of Vermont. 
H. Charles Royce was educated in private schools, at the St. Albans 
High School, and at the University of Vermont, where he graduated 
in 1884. He was distinguished in college for the excellence of his 
scholarship and was elected to the Phi Beta Kappa Society. He 
studied law at Columbia Law School in 1886 and 1887 and was ad- 
mitted to the bar of Vermont the latter year. The following year 
he began the practice of his profession at Vergennes, where he re- 
mained for about a year, when he removed to Middlebury, where he 
formed a partnership with Judge William H. Bliss. This continued 
until September, 1891, when he returned to St. Albans, where he 
practiced until his death. For about eight years he was associated 
with Charles P. Hogan under the firm name of Hogan and Royce. THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
307 
He was president of the village of St. Albans from 1895 to 1897; a 
member of the prudential committee of schools until the city charter 
took effect; chairman of the school commissioners of St. Albans city 
from 1899 to 1902; trustee of the St. Albans Free Library and of the 
Franklin County Grammar School; clerk of the committee of revision 
of bills in the legislative session of 1894; County Senator in 1900; 
a commissioner to prepare with two others the present digest of the 
Supreme Court reports; and Referee in Bankruptcy from 1907 until 
his death. 
Mr. Royce was a born scholar and a natural lawyer. His mind 
was judicial. Books were easily mastered. He lived in their atmos- 
phere. He enjoyed the languages and delighted in literature. Law 
to him was a science rather than a means to get a living. He took 
up any intricate question and solved it without difficulty. His opinions 
were clear and scholarly and his briefs models of legal learning. He 
had no delight in the practice before the trial courts. He was not 
physically strong enough for success in this field, but before the Su- 
preme Court he was entirely at home and was sure to delight the court 
with his erudition and discrimination. He took his bar examination 
in 1887 in company with the late George B. Hitt of Brattleboro, and 
it is doubtful if any two applicants for admission ever ranked higher 
in their marks. Mr. Royce had a percentage of ninety-seven and 
one-half and Mr. Hitt of ninety-five. It is now no secret that Mr. 
Royce wrote some of the opinions which his father handed down 
while he was Judge. Mr. Royce would have succeeded to the vacancy 
on the bench caused by the death of Judge Alfred A. Hall had he 
been physically able to assume the duties of the office. He had been 
very ill preceding Judge Hall’s death, and Governor Mead, who was 
a skilled physician, was convinced that he could not long discharge the 
duties of the office if appointed—a conclusion which was verified by 
his death later in the year—and so the honor which his great talents 
merited was denied him. His son, Alexander, a graduate of Yale 
and of the Harvard Law School, is engaged in practice in the office 
of Elihu Root in New York City. 
PRESENT MEMBERS OF THE FRANKLIN COUNTY BAR 
Marshall H. Alexander, of St. Albans, was born at St. Albans, 
September 24, 1862, and was educated in the common schools, St. 
Albans High School, and by a private tutor. He studied law in the 
office of Farrington and Post and was admitted to the bar of Ver- 
mont in 1883 and to the bar of New York in 1897. He practiced 
at Jericho, 1884-1891; Burlington, 1891-1896; New York, 1897-1898; 308 
PI I STORY OF VER MONT 
St. Albans, from 1897 to date. He was Superintendent of Schools, 
Justice of the Peace, and Constable and Collector of Georgia, and 
member of the House from that town in 1906-1908; member of House 
from St. Albans, 1918-1920. He was elected State’s Attorney of 
Franklin county in 1920. 
Chauncey G. Austin, of St. Albans, was born at Westford, Oc- 
tober 21, 1845. He was educated in the common schools and at the 
New Hampton Institute, where he graduated in 1867. He studied 
law in the office of George A. Ballard at Fairfax and was admitted 
to the bar in 1870. He practiced his profession at Highgate from 
1870 to 1899 and since has practiced at St. Albans. He retained 
his residence in Highgate and in 1919 represented his town in the 
Legislature. He has been president of the County and State Bar 
Associations. 
Roswell M. Austin, of St. Albans, was born at Highgate, Sep- 
tember 23, 1887, and was educated in the common schools of High- 
gate, the St. Albans High School, Philips Andover Academy, where 
he graduated in 1906, and at Yale University, where he graduated 
in 1910. He studied law in the office of C. G. Austin and Sons in 
St. Albans and was admitted to the bar in 1912. He has practiced 
at St. Albans since admission in company with his father, Chauncey 
G. Austin. He has been City Attorney of St. Albans since 1915, and 
was Assistant Clerk of the House for several years. In 1921 he was 
elected Clerk of the House. 
Eugene A. Ayers, of Swanton, was born at Bakersfield, March 
26, 1861, and received his education in the common schools and at 
Brigham Academy. He studied law with Judge Henry R. Start at 
Bakersfield, with John A. Fitch at Highgate and with Chauncey G. 
Austin at Highgate, and was admitted in 1886. He has practiced at 
Swanton since 1887. He has held the offices of Town Grand Juror, 
village president, member of the House and Referee in Bankruptcy. 
George S. Burleson, of East Fairfield, was born in Franklin, 
May 1, 1875. He was educated at the St. Albans High School and 
at Brigham Academy, studied law with Isaac N. Chase and Fred S. 
Tupper at East Fairfield, and was admitted to the bar in 1898. He 
practiced at Fairfax and Highgate until 1904, when the loss of eye- 
sight necessitated his retirement from active practice. 
Charles A. Coan, of Richford, was born at Montgomery, October 
16, 1877, and was educated at Brigham Academy and at Boston Uni- 
versity. He studied law with Guy H. Start at Bakersfield and with JAMES F. DEWEY 
Born in Montpelier, Vt., March 7, 1883, being the 
son of William T. ancl Alice (French) Dewey. He 
graduated from the Montpelier High School in 1900, 
Worcester (Mass.) Academy in 1901, and the Lowell 
(Mass.) Textile School in 1904. He entered the em- 
ploy of the A. G. Dewey Company of Quechee, woolen 
manufacturers, and is now (1922) vice-president and 
superintendent of the corporation. He is vice-president 
of the Hartford Savings Bank and Trust Company, a 
director of the Green Mountain Mutual Fire Insurance 
Company, and president of the Associated Industries of 
Vermont. During the war he was a member of the 
Vermont Labor Board and Windsor county chairman 
of all Liberty Loan and Red Cross drives. Mr. Dewey 
is a member of the Windsor County Republican Com- 
mittee and in 1920 was a delegate to the Republican 
National Convention. He is a trustee of the Lowell 
(Mass.) Textile School, a director of the Vermont 
Tuberculosis Association, a member of the Vermont 
Historical Society, the Sons of the American Revolu- 
tion, the Society of Colonial Wars, and various frater- 
nal organizations and social clubs. On October 6, 1909. 
he married Emily S., daughter of John J. Dewey. Two 
children, William T. and Anna M., have been born to 
them. THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
309 
Melville E. Maurice at Montgomery, and was admitted in 1901. He 
has never been in practice and since 1902 has been Deputy Collector 
in Charge of Customs at the port of Richford. 
Patrick H. Coleman, of Montgomery, was born at St. Albans, 
March 17, 1859, and was educated at the St. Albans Academy. He 
studied law in the office of Henry C. Adams at St. Albans and was 
admitted in 1879. He practiced at East Berkshire from 1880 to 1885 
and since 1900 has practiced at Montgomery. 
Stephen S. Cushing, of St. Albans, was born in Nashua, N. H., 
March 20, 1884. He was educated in the Laconia High School, Dart- 
mouth College, and Middlebury College. He studied law at St. Albans 
in the office of Judge Alfred A. Hall and with Gen. Lee S. Tillotson, 
and was admitted to the bar in 1909. He practiced at Newport in 
1909-1910 and has practiced at St. Albans since. He has been City 
Attorney of St. Albans and State’s Attorney of Franklin county. 
William LI. Fairchild, of Fairfield, was born at Fairfield, De- 
cember 31, 1853. He was educated at Montpelier Seminary, where 
he graduated in 1873, and at Wesleyan University, where he left in 
his sophomore year on account of poor health. He studied law in 
the office of John L. Stevens in Ames, Iowa, and with Charles P. 
Hogan at Sheldon; he graduated in the Law Department of the Uni- 
versity of Michigan in 1877 and was admitted to the bar of this State 
in the same year. He has since practiced at Fairfield, and he has 
held the office of clerk and treasurer of the town since 1883; was a 
member of the House of Representatives in 1888-1890 and 1915-1917, 
and of the Senate in 1890-1892 and 1917-1919. 
Daniel G. Furman, of Swanton, was born at Elizabethtown, N. Y., 
August 22, 1854. He studied law with George Newton at St. Albans 
and with Henry A. Burt at Swanton, and was admitted in 1876. He 
practiced at East Berkshire in 1877 and 1878, and since 1879 has 
practiced at Swanton. He represented Swanton in the Legislature 
in 1888 and was United States Consul to Stanbridge, P. Q., 1893-1897. 
Alva A. George, of St. Albans, was born at St. Albans, February 
8, 1868, and educated at the St. Albans High School, from which he 
graduated in 1886. He studied law with Farrington and Post at St. 
Albans and was admitted in 1889. He has practiced at St. Albans 
since his admission. He was a member of the House in 1900; Mayor, 
1904; United States Commissioner, 1917-1919. 310 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
George M. Hogan, of St. Albans, was born at Sheldon, October 
1, 1874. He was educated in the district school of Sheldon and in 
the grammar and high schools at St. Albans, and graduated from the 
University of Vermont in 1897. He studied law in the office of his 
father, the late Charles P. Hogan, at St. Albans, and was admitted 
to the bar in 1899. He has practiced at St. Albans. He was Secretary 
of Civil and Military Affairs, 1898-1900; City Attorney, 1909; State’s 
Attorney, 1910-1912. He has been Commissioner of Uniform Laws 
for Vermont since 1918 and secretary of the Vermont Bar Associa- 
tion since 1920. 
Clarence A. Hull, of West Berkshire, was born at Berkshire, 
October 19, 1871. He was educated in the common schools of Berk- 
shire and at Brigham Academy. He studied law with Isaac N. Chase 
at East Fairfield and was admitted to the bar in 1898. He has prac- 
ticed at West Berkshire. He has held several town offices and was 
a member of the House in 1919. 
Addison H. King was born at Georgia, January 9, 1874. He 
was educated in the public schools, at the Georgia Academy, and at 
the St. Albans High School. He studied law in the office of Wilson 
and Hall at St. Albans and was admitted to the bar in 1898. He 
practiced at Berkshire from 1899 to 1903, at Richford from 1903 to 
1912, and since then has been located in Montreal. He was Super- 
intendent of Schools of Berkshire and held the same office in Rich- 
ford. He was Deputy Collector of Customs in Vermont and held 
a similar position in Canada, and since 1919 has been United States 
Treasury Attache for Canada, with his official residence at Montreal. 
Gaylord F. Ladd, of Richford, was born in Enosburg Falls, June 
21, 1871, and was educated at the high school in Enosburg Falls, and 
St. Johnsbury Academy. He studied law at the Boston University 
Law School and in the office of Harry E. Rustedt and Wallace B. 
Locklin at Richford, and was admitted to the bar in 1895. He has 
practiced at Richford since, where he has been attorney for the town 
and village. He was State’s Attorney, 1912-1915. 
Wallace B. Locklin, of Richford, was born at Fairfield, Decem- 
ber 21, 1855. He was educated in the common schools and at Barre 
Academy, where he graduated in 1876. He studied law in the office 
of H. E. Rustedt at Richford and was admitted to the bar in 1880. 
He practiced at Tower City, N. D., 1881-1885, and has since practiced 
at Richford. He was school director for twenty-six years; State’s 
Attorney, 1892-1894; member of the House, 1908; and State Sen- 
ator, 1915. THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
311 
Emmett McFeeters, of Enosburg Falls, was born at Sheldon, 
April 22, 1855. He was educated in the common schools of Sheldon, 
at Franklin Academy and the Bakersfield Academy. He studied law 
with Chauncey G. Austin at Highgate, at the Ann Arbor Law School, 
and was admitted to the bar of Michigan and the bar of Vermont in 
1880. He has always practiced at Enosburg Falls and has held the fol- 
lowing offices: State’s Attorney, 1896-1898; member of the House, 
1900 and 1902; State Senator, 1912. 
William R. McFeeters, of St. Albans, was born at Enosburg 
Falls, April 7, 1885. He was educated in the public schools of Enos- 
burg, at Norwich University, and at Dartmouth College. He studied 
law at the Harvard Law School and was admitted to the bar of Mas- 
sachusetts in 1908 and to the bar of Vermont in 1911. He practiced 
at Enosburg Falls, 1911-1917; since 1917 has been in practice in St. 
Albans; Executive Clerk to the Governor in 1912-1914; treasurer, 
Republican State Committee, 1914-1916; State’s Attorney, 1915-1917, 
and February, 1917, to March, 1917. He is in partnership with Charles 
D. Watson in the firm of Watson and McFeeters and is attorney for 
the Central Vermont Railway Company. 
Nathan N. Post, of St. Albans, was born in Georgia, March 10, 
1852. He was educated in the public schools, at Georgia Academy 
and by Rev. C. C. Torrey of Georgia, who taught a private preparatory 
school at that place. He studied law in the office of Farrington and 
McIntyre at St. Albans, was admitted to the bar in 1878 and has 
practiced at St. Albans since his admission. He was for many years 
a partner of Willard Farrington in the firm of Farrington and Post. 
He was Superintendent of Schools and Assistant Town Clerk in 
Georgia; village trustee in St. Albans; Register of Probate for two 
years; and has been Judge of the St. Albans City Court since 1906. 
Arthur B. Rowley, of Richford, was born at Sheldon, in August, 
1873. He was educated at the Westford Academy in Massachusetts, 
studied with a private tutor and studied law with A. K. Brown at 
Richford. He has practiced at Richford since admission and was 
State’s Attorney of Franklin county from 1917 to 1921. 
Stephen E. Royce, of St. Albans, was born at East Berkshire, 
October 13, 1852, and was educated in the common schools and by 
private tutors. He studied law in the office of his father, Homer E. 
Royce, Chief Judge of the Supreme Court at St. Albans, and was 
admitted to the bar in 1880. He was actively engaged in practice 
from 1880 to 1896 at St. Albans, and since that time has given his 
attention to business. He was Deputy Clerk of Franklin county for 312 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
three years, and town agent; editor of the St. Albans Daily Advertiser; 
chairman of the board of License Commissioners; and is an officer in 
several corporations. 
Henry F. Rustedt, of Richford, was born at Richford, December 
31, 1885. He attended the Richford High School, Brigham Academy, 
University of Vermont, and Harvard Law School, and graduated 
from them all. He studied law in the office of Gaylord F. Ladd at 
Richford and was admitted to the bar in 1912. He has practiced 
since at Richford and has held the office of village trustee. 
Edward C. Smith, of St. Albans, was born at St. Albans, January 
5, 1854, and was educated at the academy at St. Albans, at Philips 
Academy and at Yale, where he graduated in 1875. He studied law 
in the Columbia Law School and with Noble and Smith at St. Albans, 
and was admitted to the bar of Franklin county in 1877, to the Su- 
preme Court in 1878, and to the Supreme Court of the United States 
in 1880. He practiced in St. Albans until 1881, when he became vice- 
president of the Central Vermont Railroad Co. He represented St. 
Albans in the Legislature in 1890 and was Governor, 1898-1900. He 
has been president of the Central Vermont Railroad Co. since 1891 
and of the Central Vermont Railway Co. since 1913. 
Fuller C. Smith, of St. Albans, was born at St. Armand, P. Q., 
February 16, 1862. He was educated in the common schools and at 
Brigham Academy. He studied law in the office of Edson, Cross and 
Start at Sf. Albans and in the office of Frederick E. Woodbridge at 
Vergennes, and was admitted to the bar in 1885. He practiced at 
Vergennes from 1885 to 1888 and at St. Albans following 1888. He 
was Mayor, 1897-1898; chairman, Vermont State Railroad Commis- 
sion, 1902-1906; National Bank Examiner, 1908-1913. Mr. Smith 
is now retired from practice and is engaged in the investment business. 
Frank A. Start, of Bakersfield, was born at Bakersfield, March 
1, 1881, and was educated in the public schools there and graduated 
at Brigham Academy in 1902. He studied law in the office of H. F. 
Brigham and G. H. Start, and was admitted to the bar in 1907. He 
has been a Lister and Collector of Taxes. 
Daniel W. Steele, of Highgate, was born at Highgate, October 
13, 1862. He was educated in the common schools and at the St. 
Albans Academy. Pie studied law in the office of Chauncey G. Austin 
at Highgate and was admitted to the bar in 1890. He was State’s 
Attorney, 1898-1902; Deputy Collector of Customs at port of High- 
gate, 1902-1915; a member *of the House, 1917; and State Senator, THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
313 
1919. In 1921 he was appointed Judge of Probate to succeed Judge 
Kelton. 
George C. Stevens, of St. Albans, was born at St. Albans, April 
10, 1864. He graduated at the St. Albans Academy in 1883 and at 
the University of Vermont in 1888. He studied law with Cross and 
Start and with Wilson and Hall at St. Albans and was admitted to the 
bar in 1894. He was Deputy Collector of Customs, 1890-1893 ; Deputy 
County Clerk, 1901-1910; and County Clerk since March, 1910. He 
practiced at St. Albans, 1904-1910. 
William D. Stewart, of Fairfax, was born at Manchester, Jan- 
uary 11, 1852. He was educated at the New Hampton Institute at 
Fairfax and at Johnson Normal School. He studied law in the office 
of W. D. Wilson at St. Albans and was admitted to the bar in 1873 
in company with Judge Alfred A. Hall. He practiced at Bakersfield 
in 1875-1902, and has practiced at Fairfax since leaving Bakersfield. 
He was Superintendent of Schools and town agent in Bakersfield, and 
represented the town in the General Assembly of 1900. 
Charles D. Watson, of St. Albans, was born at St. Albans, July 
29, 1860. He was educated at the St. Albans High School and at the 
University of Vermont. He studied law at the Boston University 
Law School and with Noble and Smith at St. Albans, and was ad- 
mitted to the bar in 1886. He has practiced at St. Albans since 1890. 
He was City Attorney, 1909-1910; member of the House in 1908 and 
1912; chairman of the Public Service Commission, 1913; President 
of the Vermont Bar Association, 1915; United States Commissioner, 
1920. 
Fred L. Webster, of Swanton, was born in Franklin, July 21, 
1876. He was educated in the public schools and in the Law De- 
partment of the Southwestern University at Jackson, Tenn., where 
he graduated in 1901. He studied law in the office of Daniel G. 
Furman at Swanton and was admitted to the bar in 1903. He has 
practiced at Swanton since 1906. He represented Swanton in the 
House in 1910 and again in 1919; has been a member of the school 
board of Swanton since 1915; and was a member of the Board of 
Penal Commissioners, 1911-1913. In 1919 he was tendered the ap- 
pointment of sixth Superior Judge by Governor Clement, but declined. 
H. Elmer Wheeler, of St. Albans, \vas born in Berkshire, Sep- 
tember 21, 1864, and was educated at Brigham Academy and Mont- 
pelier Seminary, where he graduated in 1887. He studied law at St. 
Albans in the office of Cross and Start and was admitted to the bar 
in 1891. He has since practiced at St. Albans. He was Superintendent 
of Schools in Berkshire; secretary of the Franklin County Board of 
Education, 1888-1889; and Mayor of St. Albans, 1905-1906. GRAND ISLE COUNTY 
BY an act of the General Assembly, passed November 1, 1802, a 
county was formed from the towns of South Hero, Middle Hero, 
and the islands near, in Chittenden county, and North Hero, Isle 
LaMotte and Alburg in Franklin county, and was named Grand Isle 
county. The county buildings, located at North Hero, comprise a 
court house and jail. They were constructed in 1824 of Isle La Motte 
marble. The court house was first occupied in September of that 
year. In 1867 an addition was erected for the accommodation of the 
jailor. The building is happily located so that it overlooks the lake, 
is attractive in appearance, and well suited to the needs of the island 
county. Below are suitable offices for the County Clerk and the Judge 
of Probate, while above is the large court room for the sessions of 
the County Court. The County Clerk occupies the residence con- 
nected with the county buildings. The jail is in the court house 
building. 
Before the erection of the present court house the courts were 
held at the residence of Jedediah P. Ladd at North Hero in his 
“ball room.” The jail for keeping the prisoners was located in the 
upper story of his house. A ponderous oak door, barred and bolted 
in a substantial manner, was supposed to make the place secure, but 
in the rear was a window which opened out on a shed connected with 
the dwelling which afforded an easy access of escape. The first 
session of the court was held on the first Monday of March, 1806. 
One of the cases tried was that of Samuel Campbell v. Samuel Hous- 
ton. The action was for slander and the gravamen of the charge 
was that the defendant falsely and maliciously proclaimed in a loud 
voice in the hearing of several faithful citizens that the plaintiff “was 
a pumpkin thief, and stole money from Timothy Lovell of Grand 
Isle; and apples from me (meaning the defendant) ; and he (meaning 
the plaintiff) stole a goose from William Stewart and potatoes from 
Law’s Island,” to the damage of the plaintiff fifteen hundred dollars. 
The jury awarded damages to the plaintiff in the sum of one hundred 
dollars and the costs amounted to two hundred and forty-three dollars. 
The first important criminal case was tried at this term. It was 
for larceny and was entitled State v. Isaac Stevens. The respondent 
was represented by Cornelius P. Van Ness of St. Albans, but his 
efforts were unavailing. A verdict of guilty was returned and the 
court imposed the following sentence: “You, Isaac Stevens, are 
brought before this court for feloniously taking, stealing and carrying 
away three yards of blue broadcloth and forty dollars in silver, the 
just property of James Gilbert. You have plead not guilty of the HENRY EDWARDS BRADFORD 
Born in Southbridge, Mass., Sept. 19, 1819. He 
Temoved to Vermont and was pioneer of 
the knit goods industry in Bennington. His opera- 
tions in founding this industry began in 1853, when 
he became the owner of the Wills and Fairbanks prop- 
erty, and in the spring of 1854 put it in operation in 
the manufacture of woolen cloths. He was the young- 
est of a family of eight children and at the age of 
nine years was put at work sorting wool. In the course 
of time he saved some money and about 1847 he en- 
gaged in the manufacture of woolen cloths at Millbury, 
Mass. At the end of four years he sold out to his 
partner and went to North Amherst, Mass., where he 
again engaged in the textile business. Looking about 
for a desirable place to locate an independent business, 
Mr. Bradford discovered an opening in Bennington 
and in 1853 he purchased the old Wills and Fairbanks 
property that had formerly been a cloth factory. At 
the end of three years the character of the business 
was changed and the first mill for the manufacture of 
knit goods was established there, under the firm name 
of H. E. Bradford and Company. The business was 
soon made a successful and profitable one and enlarge- 
ments were necessary to meet the increasing demand 
for the product. Mr. Bradford gave liberally of his 
means to the support of the church of which he was a 
member, the Methodist Episcopal, as well as to all 
other worthy objects. He was an earnest advocate of 
the graded school for the village, and when that insti- 
tution was erected gave generously and donated to the 
trustees apparatus for experiments in the scientific de- 
partment. Mr. Bradford died April 10, 1878. THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
315 
crime; you have shown no signs of repentance, but have behaved 
with a show of arrogance. The court, notwithstanding, have feelings 
for you as men and severely lament your deplorable condition and 
situation; but as ministers of the law, they cannot flinch from their 
duty. 
“Therefore the court give judgment and pronounce sentence, that 
you, Isaac Stevens, shall, between the hours of twelve o’clock noon 
and two o’clock in the afternoon of the 1st day of March A. D. 1808, 
receive twenty stripes on the naked body, and pay forty-five dollars 
as treble damages to the party aggrieved; pay costs of prosecution 
and stand committed until judgment be complied with.” The sen- 
tence was carried into effect on the day appointed before a large 
crowd of people who had assembled to witness its execution. Stevens 
was brought down from the jail and bound to one of the posts sup- 
porting the shed, where he received the twenty stripes with apparent 
indifference. 
The present terms of County Court are held on the fourth Tues- 
day of April and October. There are no resident lawyers in Grand 
Isle county. The offices of Judge of Probate and State’s Attorney 
are held by laymen. The law business is not large. Frequently the 
winter terms do not last for more than one day. On the other hand, 
there are occasional trials that last for several weeks. Lawyers from 
St. Albans and Burlington try most of the cases. 
MURDER IN ISLE LA MOTTE 
At least one murder was committed in Grand Isle county, but 
as the offenders were committed to the jail in St. Albans and tried in 
Franklin county, the affair was considered as belonging to that 
county. It occurred during the time our fleet was located in waters 
adjacent to the islands during the War of 1812. Three sailors from 
the fleet went ashore with a subordinate officer and visited the dwelling 
house of Judge Hill, who kept an inn on the islands. After they had 
been in the house for a time, Judge Hill, for some unaccountable 
reason, took up a musket and called on the men to surrender as his 
prisoners. The officer in command ordered his men to fire. They 
did so and Judge Hill was instantly killed. The sailors at once took 
refuge on the vessel to which they belonged. The people of the town 
were highly excited, as Judge Hill was one of the most respected 
citizens. 
The next day an officer and posse of men were sent on board 
the vessel to arrest the offenders. The three sailors were surrendered, 
but Commodore Macdonough refused to give up the officer in com- 
mand. The sailors were committed to the jail at St. Albans and tried 316 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
for murder at the next term, and the jury returned a verdict of man- 
slaughter. At the next session of the Legislature they were all par- 
doned. 
The only explanation of the conduct of Judge Hill that has been 
made is that he thought the men to be English sailors and so decided 
to arrest them, not taking into account that there were four of them 
while he was alone. 
JED P. LADD 
1828-1894 
The most conspicuous member of the Grand Isle county bar in 
recent years was Jed P. Ladd, who was born at North Hero, Sep- 
tember 28, 1828, and died at Alburg Springs, December 29, 1894. 
He was educated at the St. Albans and Georgia Academies and com- 
menced the study of law with Giles Harrington in 1844. He was 
admitted to the bar in Grand Isle county and continued in practice 
until his death. 
No man was more prominently connected in his time with the 
civil and political history of his county than Mr. Ladd. There was 
hardly an office, either in town or county, that he did not hold. He 
lived at North Hero until thirty-five years of age and then moved to 
Alburg, where he remained the rest of his life. He was Town Clerk 
of North Hero; County Clerk from 1856 to 1862; State’s Attorney 
for a time by appointment; Representative to the General Assembly 
from Alburg in 1874, 1876, and again in 1894, 1902 and 1904; County 
Senator in 1868 and 1869; State Auditor and Comptroller from 1876 
to 1878. During the Civil War he was superintendent of the recruiting 
service in Grand Isle county. 
JAMES L. COLLINS 
James L. Collins, of East Alburg, was born at Noyan, Canada, 
February 16, 1867. He was educated in the common schools and at 
the high school in Swanton. He studied law with Jed P. Ladd at 
Alburg and was admitted to the bar in Vermont in 1898. After 
practicing for two years in Alburg he went to New York, where he 
was employed in the claim department of the Metropolitan Street 
Railway for a time and later with the Employers’ Liability Assurance 
Corporation at the same place. Four years ago he returned to Ver- 
mont. He is station agent at East Alburg, practices law, and is a 
partner of D. G. Furman of Swanton. LAMOILLE COUNTY 
LAMOILLE county was incorporated in 1835. It embraced twelve 
towns: Eden, Hyde Park, Morristown and Wolcott from Orleans 
county; Belvidere, Cambridge, Johnson, Sterling and Waterville 
from Franklin county; Elmore and Stowe from Washington county; 
and Mansfield from Chittenden county. In 1839 two square miles of 
Mansfield were set to Underhill in Chittenden county. In 1848 Mans- 
field was annexed to Stowe, and in 1855 Sterling was divided among 
Johnson, Morristown and Stowe. Petition was made to the Legislature 
in 1834 for the new county and the bill creating the same passed the 
House, but was laid over in the Council. The next year, however, 
the bill passed both branches of the Legislature and the county was 
incorporated October 26, 1835. The act of incorporation provided 
that when some town should erect a suitable court house and jail 
then the county should be deemed to be organized. The lower end 
of the county wanted the shire located at Johnson and the upper end 
at Morristown. The opposing interests were evenly divided, but 
finally it was left to a committee to settle, and Joshua Sawyer, a lawyer 
of great influence in the county, secured the county seat for Hyde Park, 
the geographical center of the county. The first county buildings were 
erected by the town in 1837 and the first session of the court was 
held that year. The business that was pending in the courts from 
the towns that were transferred from the old counties to the new 
was brought to the county of Lamoille for disposition. Thus the 
law business was at hand when the buildings were ready for the courts 
and the lawyers in the cases came to the new county to try their cases. 
This brought together a great array of eminent lawyers, who gave 
a picturesque appearance to the new bar. The list included Gov. 
Paul Dillingham, Senator Willian Upham, Judge Timothy P. Redfield, 
Judge David A. Smalley, James Bell, Judge John Mattocks and 
many others who are less known to fame. The men of this 
period were trial lawyers; they were large physically and men- 
tally and they had the manners and the dress of the old school. Clients 
came to court with the expectation that their cases would be tried and 
when these men were arrayed against each other a battle royal was 
sure to take place. Court proceedings were more stately in those 
days the lawyers were more given to pomp and elegance, and the 
Sheriffs and their deputies, who conducted the Judges to and from the 
court house with much dignity, added to the solemnity of a session 
of court. It would not do to say that these great lawyers of an earlier 
period were not entirely human when out of court. Some of them 
were, indeed, a convivial lot who spent much time in patronizing the 
open'bars in good fellowship with one another. 318 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
The original county buildings were continued in use with some 
repairs and alterations until April 17, 1910, when they were burned 
in the great fire of that year. By an act of the Legislature, passed 
October 10, 1910, a committee was appointed to erect new buildings 
at or near the site of the old ones and a tax was assessed to defray 
the expense thereof. The new buildings were constructed in 1911 at 
an expense of forty-two thousand dollars. These include the court 
house, jail and the residence of the jailor. They are constructed of 
red brick, are imposing in appearance, and their proportions are such 
that they might well accommodate the needs of the largest county 
of the State. On the first floor are the offices of the County Clerk, 
Judge of Probate, and the State’s Attorney, which connect with suit- 
able vaults for the safe keeping of the files and records of the county. 
On the same floor there are also offices for rental. On the second 
floor is the large court room, which connects with suitable rooms for 
the Judges, attorneys and jurors. The jail and dwelling house con- 
necting therewith stand just north of the court house and are in 
keeping with the latter. The jail is modern in all its appointments. 
It has steel cages for the accommodation of twelve prisoners, a hos- 
pital and a tramp room. The courts are held on the first Tuesday in 
June and December in each year. 
JOSHUA SAWYER 
1789-1869 
Joshua Sawyer, of Old,Haverhill, Mass., brought a letter of 
introduction to friends in Vermont, bearing high testimony to his 
integrity, scholarship and gentlemanly qualities. He was born at the 
place above named, July 23, 1789, and was educated in what was known 
as the old school of gentlemen, and great urbanity marked his rela- 
tions with his fellowmen throughout life. In June, 1809, he entered 
the office of Daniel Farrand at Burlington as a student in order to 
comply with the rules then in force in Chittenden county, that the 
last year’s study must be in Vermont. It was the intention of Mr. 
Sawyer to locate in Hyde Park, then a part of Orleans county. On 
August 27, 1810, he was admitted to the bar and at once commenced 
practice at that place, where he remained for more than forty years and 
until his practice had grown to be one of the largest in the State. It is 
said that he was engaged in more suits than any other lawyer in Ver- 
mont. In his early practice he was extensively employed in the courts 
of Chittenden and Franklin counties, but his best field was in Caledonia 
and his own county. At a time when many brilliant lawyers appeared 
as his opponents, by the fertility of his resources, the brilliancy of his THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
319 
wit and his remarkable self possession, he fairly held his own as a prac- 
titioner and commanded a large share of business and success. He 
was the peer of Mattocks, Bell and Baxter. He was remarkable 
for an exhaustless fund of anecdote, readiness of repartee, and court- 
liness of demeanor; he represented Hyde Park in the Legislature 
from 1811 to 1832, eleven terms. The last two or three years he was 
sent expressly as the most influential man to obtain an act for the 
incorporation of the new county of Lamoille. He may be said truly 
to have been the father of that county, as it was largely due to his 
skilful management in the Legislature that the county was organized, 
it formerly having been a part of Orleans. He was State’s Attorney 
for the county of Orleans from 1816 to 1823. He died at Hyde Park, 
March 16, 1869, at the age of eighty years. 
GEORGE WILKINS 
1817-1902 
George Wilkins was born in Stowe, Vt., December 6, 1817. He 
attended the district schools and during brief periods the academies 
at Johnson and Montpelier. He studied law with Butler and Brigham 
at Stowe, and was admitted to the bar in 1841. For five years he 
practiced in company with Mr. Butler, but in 1845 purchased his 
partner’s law library and formed a partnership with L. S. Small. This 
firm was soon dissolved and thereafter Mr. Wilkins practiced alone. 
In 1852-53 he was State’s Attorney of Lamoille county and in 1859 
represented the county in the State Senate. He was an ardent admirer 
of Lincoln and was a delegate to the national convention of 1864, 
which gave Lincoln his second nomination. In 1868 he was a Presi- 
dential Elector from the third congressional district of Vermont and 
cast his vote for General Grant. In 1872, as a delegate to the national 
convention, he aided in the nomination of Grant. He was interested 
in education and in 1870 gave to each school in towm a copy of Web- 
ster’s Dictionary and he subsequently provided the schools with globes 
and astronomical apparatus. He was for twenty-five years the largest 
real estate owner in Lamoille county. He owned as many as forty 
farms and paid taxes in twelve different towns. He was one of the 
founders of the Lamoille County National Bank; of this he was a 
director from the first and he rarely failed in attending the bank 
meetings. 
Mr. Wilkins married Maria N. Blanchard, a lady of fine intellect 
and many accomplishments. She exerted a strong influence, not only 
at home, but throughout the State. She was the first woman to occupy 
the position of superintendent of schools. She spoke entertainingly 320 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
on educational questions, and topics relating to the home, and wrote 
an excellent history of Stowe. 
Mr. Wilkins was one of the most striking figures of his day. 
When upwards of eighty his eye was not dimmed nor his natural force 
abated. He bore himself erect and his step was firm and elastic. His 
manners were courtly and dignified and he was conspicuously the 
gentleman of the old school. The nestor of the Lamoille county bar, 
he was a busy practitioner for sixty years. He maintained unimpaired 
to the last his splendid mental powers, sound judgment and intimate 
knowledge of men and affairs. He was unusually able as a trial 
lawyer, earnest, thorough and resolute. He was engaged in a large 
number of important cases, involving large sums and was usually 
successful. His legal abilities and business tact were exerted in all 
things affecting the welfare of the community. He aided in all worthy 
public enterprises. Plis counsel was much sought by the people about 
him in all manner of personal matters and his advice and aid were 
freely given. His death occurred at Stowe, March 22, 1902. 
THOMAS GLEED 
1826-1861 
Thomas deed, brother of Philip K. deed, was born at Lyme 
Regis, Dorset county, England, July 8, 1826. When he was a small 
boy his father landed in Quebec, bringing Thomas with him. The 
elder Gleed remained in Canada until the rebellion of 1837, when he 
removed to Berkshire, where he preached for two years and removed 
to Waterville. Thomas deed was educated in the public schools, 
and in 1844 was a teacher in Morristown. Two years later he began 
the study of the law in the office of Judge Luke P. Poland at Mor- 
risville and was admitted to the bar in 1849. He practiced at Water- 
ville until the fall of 1853, when, having been elected State’s Attorney 
of Lamoille county, he located at Morrisville, where he remained in 
practice until his death on August 30, 1861. He was elected State’s 
Attorney again in 1854 and the next year was made a member of 
the Council of Censors. In 1856 and 1857 he represented Lamoille 
county in the Senate and the two following years represented Mor- 
ristown in the General Assembly. He married Cornelia A. Fisk and 
there were born to them two sons, Charles S. Gleed, now of Topeka, 
Kan., and Willis Gleed of St. Louis. Thomas Gleed was a man of 
brilliant mind and he had exceptional gifts as a trial lawyer. He was 
cool, courageous and vigilant and he seized every advantage offered 
by his adversary and gave no signs of the weak points of his own 
case. He tried no cause without first consulting carefully with his FRANK D. ABERNETHY 
Born in New Haven, Vt., December 26, 1858. After 
his father’s death, in 1866, the family removed to Bris- 
tol. Mr. Abernethv received his educational training- 
in Bristol Academy and in 1875 became a clerk in a 
store in a neighboring town. In October, 1880, he en- 
tered the employ of the well-known Burlington dry 
goods firm of Lyman and Allen, the firm name re- 
maining unchanged until the death of Edward Lyman 
in 1890. Mr. Abernethy had acquired an inter- 
est, and the firm name became H. W. Allen & Company. 
The business continued without further change until 
1910, when he purchased the interest of Heman W. 
Allen and since that date he has conducted the busi- 
ness under his own name, that of wholesale and retail 
dry goods. He is a director and vice-president of the 
Merchants’ National Bank, a member of the Washington 
Lodge of Masons, the Episcopal Church, and many 
social clubs. He is president of the Vermont State 
Chamber of Commerce and a member of and director 
of the Burlington Chamber of Commerce. THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
321 
client and the witnesses and advising the former of the probable 
outcome of the case. He possessed remarkable power of concentra- 
tion, had an unfailing memory, and was a well-trained debater and 
an effective advocate. He was greatly beloved on account of his 
integrity and faithfulness to his clients. Men learned to trust him 
and he was always the poor man’s friend. He was possessed of a 
Christian spirit and on his death bed left this message to his brother, 
Philip: “Tell him to be a Christian lawyer, that legal studies and 
business sprinkled with Christianity give depth of thought and strength 
of mind and make easy the deep things of the law.” 
WALDO BRIGHAM 
1829-1900 
Waldo Brigham was born at Bakersfield, Vt., June 10, 1829, and 
died at Hyde Park, April 2, 1900. He was the youngest of the family 
of ten children of Asa and Sally Hardy Brigham, who were farmers. 
His early education was obtained in the district school and at Bakers- 
field Academy, after which preparation he entered the University of 
Vermont, from which he graduated with honor in the class of 1854. 
The following year he assumed the duties of principal of the St. 
Lawrence Academy at Potsdam, N. Y., after which he took up the 
study of the law, first in the office of W. C. Wilson in Bakers- 
field and afterward in the office of John A. Child and Whitman G. 
Ferrin at Hyde Park. He was admitted to the bar of Lamoille county 
at the May term, 1857, and shortly thereafter at East Berkshire en- 
tered the office of Judge Homer E. Royce, then a member of Congress 
from Vermont. After practicing his profession for four years in 
Franklin county he-returned to Hyde Park, where, in 1862, he en- 
tered the office of his preceptor, John A. Child, whose professional 
duties he expected to assume while Mr. Child was at the front with 
the northern army. But Mr. Child suddenly sickened and died and 
shortly thereafter Mr. Brigham formed a partnership with George 
L. Waterman, which continued until 1884, when the failing health 
of Mr. Waterman compelled a dissolution of the partnership. During 
the quarter of a century that the firm was in practice there was hardly 
a case of prominence on the Lamoille county docket in which did not 
appear Brigham and Waterman, while against them were arrayed 
the leaders of the Lamoille county bar. After Mr. Waterman’s re- 
tirement from practice a partnership was formed with his son-in-law, 
Henry M. McFarland, which continued for three years, when ill 
health compelled Mr. Brigham to retire from active practice. He was 
largely instrumental in the building of the St. Johnsbury and Lake HISTORY OF VERMONT 
322 
Champlain Railroad, was an earnest supporter of the public schools 
and a public spirited citizen. Being always a Democrat in politics, 
high office was not within his reach in Vermont; but he served Hyde 
Park with credit three times in the Vermont Legislature and was 
a candidate of his party for the leading offices in Vermont, both State 
and National. His talents were practical rather than brilliant. Strength, 
earnestness, honesty and good sense rather than genius were the at- 
tributes that won him success. 
PHILIP K. GLEED 
1834-1897 
Philip K. deed was born in Granby, Quebec, September 10, 
1834. He came in his youth to Morrisville, where his brother, Thomas, 
was a well-established lawyer, and there he became a student in the 
Peoples Academy. He afterwards attended Bakersfield Academy and 
Troy Conference Academy, from which he graduated in 1855, and 
Union College, New York, from which he graduated in 1859. Follow- 
ing his graduation he taught in Morrisville and in the meantime pursued 
his legal studies with his brother. He was admitted to the bar in 
Lamoille county. He was State’s Attorney for the county, 1867-68, 
and again, 1880-82. He represented Morristown in the Legislature 
in 1868-69; was trustee of the Reform School in 1869; assessor of 
internal revenue in 1870-74; State Senator and president pro tem of the 
Senate, 1880-81, and Commissioner of State Taxes, 1890-92. He was 
a member of the committee on revision of the laws in 1893-94. He was 
president of the Vermont Bar Association in 1888. He held almost 
all of the local offices; was director of the bank at Morrisville as 
well as the one at Hyde Park. In all the offices intrusted to him 
he displayed sound judgment and conscientious fidelity. 
It was the aim of Mr. deed’s father to make a preacher of him 
and once, while the elder deed was preaching in Waterville, he an- 
nounced that his son, Philip, would preach that evening. The address 
that followed was scholarly and delivered in the style of an 
enthusiastic, ambitious student. But the following day, while 
laying shingles to pay a past due board bill, he contemplated the 
struggles and hardships which his father had endured and decided 
he would try the law instead of the ministry as a livelihood. For a 
time after his admission he practiced at Richmond, Vt., but his brother, 
Thomas, soon dying, he removed to Morrisville which thereafter was 
his home. In 1862 he formed a partnership with Judge H. H. Powers 
which continued until 1874, when the latter was elected a Judge of 
the Supreme Court. The firm of Powers and Gleed was one of the THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
323 
strongest in northern Vermont. Their services were valuable and 
their success was remarkable. During the partnership Judge Powers 
did more of the trial work, while the office and preparatory labor 
fell on Mr. Gleed. They were admirably adapted to work together 
in this way. Following the election of Judge Powers to the bench, 
Mr. Gleed became proficient and successful as a trial lawyer, and as 
a jury advocate and court lawyer he had few equals. He was re- 
markably industrious, gave his cases the most careful preparation; 
he was a first-class lawyer. His mind was quick to comprehend, 
analyze and apply, and his love of justice was inflexible. As an advo- 
cate he was strong, clear, logical, witty and eloquent and sometimes 
sarcastic. He was apt to carry the jury with him and the audience 
delighted in his easy manner, choice language, fluent and graceful 
delivery. He had, too, the arts of the special pleader and could trip 
his adversary if he got on the wrong track. He died at Morrisville, 
June 29, 1897. 
GEORGE L. WATERMAN 
1838-1886 
George L. Waterman was a leader at the Lamoille comity bar 
for twenty years. He was the son of Vernon and Adaline Cady 
Waterman, a brother of Mrs. H. Henry Powers and uncle of Justice 
George M. Powers. He was born in Morristown, August 9, 1838, 
and died at Hyde Park, August 11, 1886. His education was received 
at Peoples Academy and at the University of Vermont. He grad- 
uated from college in 1860 and received an election to the Phi Beta 
Kappa Society. He pursued his legal studies in the office of Leander 
Small at Hyde Park and was admitted to the bar in 1862. During 
the year of his admission he formed a partnership with Waldo Brig- 
ham and practiced with him at Hyde Park for a period of twenty- 
two years. There was hardly a case of any prominence in the County 
Court in which the firm did not participate during this time. Being 
a lifelong Democrat the usual offices did not fall to Mr. Waterman. 
He represented Hyde Park in the General Assembly in 1872, was a 
candidate for Congress in 1880, often presided over State conven- 
tions of his party, and attended as a delegate the National Democratic 
Convention held at Cincinnati in 1880. He was an accomplished 
lawyer, who was well versed in the law as a profession and able to 
practice with success against the best men of his time. His personality 
and talents equipped him for efficient service as a trial lawyer, where 
he excelled alike in presenting the evidence and in marshaling it 
before the jury. He was eloquent whether engaged in the advocacy 324 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
of cases or in the discussion of party issues. He was, moreover, a 
gentleman of the old school. His manners were gracious and courtly 
and his kindliness and thoughtfulness were always manifest in his re- 
lations with others. 
PRESENT MEMBERS OF THE LAMOILLE COUNTY BAR 
Thomas C. Cheney, of Morrisville, was born at Morristown, 
October 10, 1868. He was educated at the Peoples Academy, where 
he graduated in 1886, and at the University of Vermont, where he 
graduated in 1891. He studied law in the office of George M. Powers 
at Morrisville, was admitted to the bar in 1895 and has since resided 
at Morrisville. He was State’s Attorney, 1900-1902; Assistant Clerk 
of the House; Clerk of the House from 1898 to 1906; member and 
Speaker in 1906 and 1908; and Legislative Draftsman since 1915. 
Henry C. Fisk, of Hyde Park, was born at Morrisville, July 22, 
1852. He was educated at Peoples Academy and at Peacham Acad- 
emy, studied law with Gov. George W. Hendee and with Philip K. 
Gleed at Morrisville and was admitted to the bar in 1875. He prac- 
ticed at Morrisville, but has not been in practice for some time. 
Frederick G. Fleetwood, of Morrisville, was born at St. Johns- 
bury, September 27, 1868. He was educated at St. Johnsbury Acad- 
emy, the University of Vermont, and Harvard University, where he 
graduated in 1891. He studied law in the office of Philip K. Gleed 
at Morrisville, was admitted to the bar in 1894 and has since practiced 
there. He was Town Clerk of Morristown, 1896-1900; member of 
the House, 1900; State’s Attorney, 1896-1898; secretary on the com- 
mission for the revision of the Vermont Statutes, 1893-1894; Pres- 
idential Elector, 1900; Secretary of State, 1902-1908, and from Sep- 
tember, 1917, to January, 1919, and elected Congressman from the 
First District in 1922. 
Roger W. Hulburd, of Hyde Park, was born at Waterville. 
October 22, 1856, and was educated at Montpelier Seminary, Peoples 
Academy, and the University of Vermont. He graduated at the Uni- 
versity in 1882 and studied law at the Albany Law School and with 
Brigham and McFarland at Hyde Park. He was admitted to the 
bar in 1887 and has always practiced at Hyde Park with the exception 
of one year, when he had his office in Burlington. He was State’s 
Attorney in 1894; County Senator in 1896; member of the House in 
1906; and Lieutenant-Governor in 1917-1918. Governor Hulburd adds 
to the usual attributes of an accomplished lawyer the graces of a THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
325 
polished orator. He stands at the head of the Vermont bar in this 
regard. His voice is often heard in conventions, on the stump, in 
legislative gatherings, at public banquets, and on patriotic occasions, 
and always to the delight of his listeners. His diction is choice, his 
sentiments exalted, his voice musical, and his manner dramatic and 
impressive. 
Dean A. Lafountain, of Morrisville, was born in Montgomery 
in 1884 and was educated at Brigham Academy, where he graduated 
in 1906, and at the Central Business College of Syracuse, where he 
graduated in 1908. He studied law in the office of Frederick G. Fleet- 
wood in Morrisville and with M. P. Maurice of the same place, and 
was admitted to the bar in 1912. He has practiced at Morrisville 
since his admission. 
Henry M. McFarland, of Hyde Park, was born at Waterville, 
August 5, 1852. He was educated at the Peoples Academy, where 
he graduated in 1878, and at the University of Vermont. He studied 
law at Hyde Park in the office of Brigham and Waterman and was 
admitted in 1881. He has always practiced at Hyde Park and has 
held the following offices: State’s Attorney, 1884-1886; Secretary of 
Civil and Military Affairs, 1890-1892; chairman of the board of 
trustees of village for several years; member of the House, 1919; 
and trustee of the University of Vermont. 
Albert A. Niles, of Morrisville, was born in Morristown, May 
28, 1842, and was educated in the district schools and at Peoples 
Academy. He studied law in the office of Powers and Gleed at Mor- 
risville and at the Ann Arbor Law School and was admitted in 1869. 
He practiced with M. O. Heath at Johnson in 1870, in 1872 opened 
an office in Morrisville, the same year was elected State’s Attorney 
and served for one year. He has held many town offices and from 
1900 to 1918 was town and village clerk and treasurer. 
Harry A. Noyes, of Hyde Park, was born at Hyde Park, June 
4, 1871. He graduated from the Lamoille Central Academy in 1889 
and from the University of Vermont in 1893. He studied law at the 
New York Law School, where he graduated in 1898. He was admitted 
to the bar of New York the year of his graduation and practiced at 
Elmira for three years. In 1903 he returned to Hyde Park, where he 
is employed as cashier of the Lamoille County National Bank. He 
has not been in active practice in Vermont. He has held the office of 
School Director for fifteen years. 326 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
Wallace H. Parker, of Cambridge, was born at Fairfax, December 
6, 1839, and was educated in the common schools, at New Hampton 
Institute at Fairfax, and Spaulding Academy at Barre. He studied 
law with FI. J. Stowell at Cambridge, was admitted in 1877 and has 
always resided at Cambridge. Every grandfather on each side of 
the family to which Mr. Parker belongs, including the period from 
the Revolution to the War of 1812, was a soldier, and he and his 
brother, Col. Myron M. Parker, were soldiers in the Civil War. 
He was commissioned First Lieutenant and was assigned to Co. I, 
122nd Regiment, U. S. C. T., and was discharged at Corpus Christi. 
He has held all the town offices; was State’s Attorney in 1884, and 
represented Cambridge in the House in 1886; was one of the judges 
at the World’s Columbian Exposition at Chicago; and was U. S. 
Immigrant Inspector at Quebec, 1897-1911. 
Carroll F. Randall, of Morrisville, was born in Eden, January 
25, 1856, and was educated at the Lamoille Central Academy at Hyde 
Park and the Peoples Academy at Morrisville. He studied law in 
the office of Brigham and Waterman at Hyde Park and was admitted 
to the bar in 1878. He has never practiced, but has been engaged 
as proprietor of the hotel at Morrisville. He has held many town 
offices. 
William E. Tracey, of Johnson, was born at Belvidere, November 
6, 1876. He was educated in the common schools and at Johnson 
State Normal School. He studied law with Bert A. Hunt at Johnson 
and was admitted to the bar in 1902. He has practiced at Johnson 
since his admission. He was Town Clerk and Treasurer, 1907-1911 ; 
State’s Attorney, 1906-1908, and since February 1, 1919; member 
of the House, 1919. 
Fred H. McFarland, of Hyde Park, was born at Waterville, 
March 9, 1854, and was educated in the Morrisville Graded School 
and at Peoples Academy. He studied law with Roger W. Hulburd 
at Hyde Park and was admitted to the bar in 1898, and has practiced 
at Hyde Park. He was Superintendent of Schools in Waterville, 
and for sixteen years Referee in Bankruptcy for Lamoille county. ORANGE COUNTY 
AT the first session of the Vermont Legislature held in March, 
1778, the State was organized with two counties, Cumberland 
being the name given to the part east of the Green Mountains 
and Bennington to the western division. In 1781 the Legislature 
divided Cumberland county into Windham, Windsor and Orange 
counties. The limits of the first two were substantially the same as 
now, while Orange extended from the northerly boundary of Windsor 
county to Canada. Caledonia, Essex and a part of Orleans counties 
were taken from Orange county in 1792. Five years later the Legis- 
lature divided the State into eleven counties, which division was sub- 
sequently increased to fourteen by the organization of Lamoille, Grand 
Isle and Washington counties. When the last named county was 
formed in 1810 the towns of Barre, Berlin and Roxbury were taken 
from Orange and added to the new county, leaving Orange with 
seventeen towns. 
When the provincial government of New York organized Glouces- 
ter county, about 1769, Kingsland, now Washington, was made the 
county seat. The old county of Gloucester corresponded to the new 
county of Orange, while the counties of Windham and Windsor were 
included in what was then Cumberland county. The town of Kings- 
land was wholly uninhabited at the time of the provincial organization 
and not a road was built nor a house, save a simple log hut which 
was hastily constructed for a court house and jail. The courts were 
to be holden quarterly, on the last Tuesdays of May, August, Novem- 
ber and February. No causes were entered in court until the No- 
vember term, 1770, when eight were docketed and continued until 
the February term, 1771. What was done at the February term 
appears from the original entry now in the County Clerk’s office at 
Chelsea, where all that remains of the records of Gloucester county 
is kept: 
“Feby. 25th, 1771. Set out from Moretown* for Kingsland 
traveled until Knight there Being No Road and the snow very Deep 
we traveled on snow shoes or Raccatts on the 26th we traveled some 
ways and held a council when it was concluded it was best to open 
the Court as we saw no Line it was not***whether in Kingsland or 
Not But we concluded we were far in the woods we did not expect 
to see any House unless we marched three miles within Kingsland and 
No one lived there when the Court was ordered to be opened on the 
spot. 
“Present John Taplin Judge 
“John Peters of the Quor’m 
“John Taplin, Jun. Sheriff. 
*Now Bradford. 
“All causes continued and adjourned to the next term. The 
Court, if one, adjourned over to the next Tuesday in May next.” 328 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
Courts were held here until August, 1772, after which they were 
held alternately at Kingsland and Newbury until February, 1774. 
This was the last term held in Gloucester county and no courts were 
held within that territory thereafter until June, 1781, when the first 
term of the Orange County Court was held at Thetford at the tavern 
of Captain William Heaton. The County Court was held here until 
December, 1785, after which it was held, until the December term, 
1796, at Newbury, in a court house built for the purpose. Chelsea then 
became the permanent county seat. Here the court was first held 
in the upper arched room used as the town hall, which stood on the 
main street. The same room served for the court, town and religious 
meetings and other public gatherings. In 1810 a commodious court 
house was built at the east end of the south common. This, too, 
served as a place for religious worship until the local societies erected 
churches in the village. By 1847 the building had become decayed 
and inadequate for the needs of the county. It was taken down, 
and the present modest, chaste and commodious structure was erected 
nearly upon the same site. 
In 1896, on the one hundredth anniversary of the establishment 
of the shire at Chelsea, the event Avas fittingly celebrated by appro- 
priate exercises held at that place. The address of welcome was 
delivered by Joseph K. Darling of Chelsea and the response was 
made by Chief Justice John H. Watson, then of Bradford. Matthew 
Hale of Albany, N. Y., a native of Chelsea and a prominent member 
of the bar of the State of his adoption, contributed to the occasion in 
a letter of “Personal Reminiscences of Half a Century Ago.” An 
historical address was delivered by Ex-Gov. Roswell Farnham of 
Bradford and Hiram A. Huse of Montpelier, a distinguished lawyer 
of Orange county birth, spoke on the early history of the county. 
Letters were read from the Judges of the Supreme Court, from some 
of the oldest lawyers then at the bar, and from several State officials. 
The proceedings of this meeting are preserved in the Chelsea Herald 
of October 8, 1896. 
The courts of Orange county are held on the first Tuesday of 
June and December. 
PETER BURBANK 
1781-1836 
Peter Burbank was the first lawyer to locate at Newbury, coming 
from Connecticut. He was a strong and well-read lawyer, of good 
common sense, great memory, and exceptional influence with courts GEORGE L. DUNHAM 
Born in North Paris Me., June 15, 1859. He was 
educated in the public schools, at Hebron Academy 
and Colby College. He removed to Brattleboro in 
1885 and has built up a large business as a wholesale 
dealer in boots and shoes. He was elected a member 
of the House of Representatives in 1917 and 1919 and 
was a State Senator from Windham county in 1921, 
being one of the leaders in legislative business. THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
329 
and juries. His energy was untiring and his success very marked. 
He was a member of the House in 1829 and in 1831, secured the 
charter of the bank of Newbury the latter year and was its first 
president. In politics he was a Democrat. He was a man of many 
eccentricities. He delighted in a long coat which came nearly to the 
ground, a ruffled shirt, stained with tobacco juice, and a broad-brimmed 
Quaker hat. Thus attired, with a boot on one foot and a shoe on 
the other, he would go to court, followed by a crowd of men and 
boys whom he entertained by stories, quirks and gibes. But he was 
capable of a sudden transformation of manner and could at once 
shake off the clown and become the gentleman. In society no man 
could be more brilliant and entertaining, and at the bar he was almost 
irresistible, defeating some of the most eminent men of his time 
with ease. He was of the Governor Mattocks school of oratory and 
ranked with Collamer, Marsh, Fletcher and Bell. He saved $30,000 
in his practice, a large sum for that period. He was seized with 
a fatal malady when fifty-five years of age and he hastened his 
taking off by sitting by an open window in the severe weather of 
winter. He was fond of farming, loved horses and owned the best 
saddle horse in the country. His epitaph in the old cemetery at 
Wells River, to which a long procession accompanied his remains, 
reads: 
Hon. Peter Burbank, 
Counsellor at Law, 
Obit. Jan. 16, 1836, 
Aged 55 years. 
LEVI B. VILAS 
1811-1879 
Levi B. Vilas was born in Sterling, Lamoille county, February 
25, 1811. He received an academic education and entered upon a 
collegiate course with such intense application that his health became 
undermined and he was obliged to forego its completion. After a 
thorough study of the law he was admitted to the bar at St. Albans 
in 1833 and practiced his profession at Morristown, Johnson and Chel- 
sea for eighteen years, after which he removed to Madison, Wis., 
where he remained in practice until 1856. He died at the latter place, 
February 6, 1879. 
From the first he was a leader at the bar. His professional rep- 
utation for ability and learning placed him in the front rank of the 
most eminent members of the profession. 330 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
Early in his career Judge Vilas took an active part in politics 
and he held many positions of honor and trust. In 1835 he was 
elected from Johnson to the Constitutional Convention. In 1836 and 
1837 he represented Johnson in the Legislature, and during the 
same time he was Judge of Probate. Removing to Chelsea in 
1838, he was again honored by being elected in 1840, 1841, 1842 and 
1843 to the Legislature, serving during all the time on the Judiciary 
Committee and in the last session as chairman. He was elected State 
Senator in 1845 and re-elected in 1846, when he served as president 
pro tempore of that body, although his party was in the minority. 
He was Judge of Probate for three years in Orange county, and in 
1850 represented Chelsea in the Constitutional Convention. He was 
a candidate for Congress in 1844, but failed of an election. 
On removing to Madison in 1851, Judge Vilas acquired in that 
State a high standing in his profession and as a citizen. Having 
accumulated a comfortable fortune he soon retired from practice, but 
afterwards held many important offices. He represented the Madison 
assembly district in the Legislature in 1855, 1863 and 1873, during 
which time he labored industriously for the advancement of the in- 
terests of his constituents. In 1861 he was elected Mayor of Madison, 
without opposition, serving one year. For twelve years he was Regent 
of the State University, which he ably and loyally supported and 
which he sought to establish and maintain on a firm basis. His five 
sons graduated here with honor. 
Robert McKinley ormsby 
1814-1881 
Robert McKinley Ormsby was born in Corinth, Vt., June 29, 
1814, and died at East Chester Hill, N. Y., February 22, 1881. He 
spent his childhood in Bath, N. H., where he received a common 
school education. In 1831 he was a student at Bradford Academy, 
where he first showed an aptitude for writing. In 1833 he removed 
to Massillon, Ohio, where he taught school for a while. In 1836 he 
went to Louisville, Ky., where he became a student in the university 
in that city and replenished his slender purse by writing for the daily 
papers. A series of articles that he wrote attracted the attention of 
Judge Marshall of that State, who called at the newspaper office to 
learn the name of the author, and on being advised he asked the 
young man to come into his office as a student and into his home 
as a boarder. He remained in the office of Judge Marshall until his 
admission to the bar. Humphrey Marshall and the celebrated Tom 
Marshall were sons of Judge Marshall and friends of Mr. Ormsby. THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
331 
Mr. Ormsby came to Vermont in 1842 and located in Bradford, where 
he remained until 1866, when he removed to New York City, where 
he was in practice until his death. In the early years of his practice 
his clients were not numerous and he had much time in which to 
study law and such literary works of high character as were 
available. He accumulated a large law and general library and his 
business increased until he had all he could do. He had excellent 
gifts as a lawyer, but is better remembered by his writings. While 
in Bradford he wrote a serial story entitled “Kritz Lemberg,” which 
was afterwards issued in book form. He also prepared a spelling 
book which later was adopted as a text book in Vermont and had 
an extensive sale. He was a pronounced Whig in politics and when 
Daniel Webster announced his candidacy for the presidency he threw 
himself into the campaign with great earnestness. He edited and 
published at Bradford at this time in the interest of Mr. Webster the 
Northern Enquirer, a weekly newspaper. He was a candidate for 
State Treasurer on the ticket of Old Line Whig Party, but was de- 
feated. In 1859 he published “A History of the Whig Party,” a 
book of three hundred and seventy pages. The sale of this book was 
not large, as the party had passed out of power. He also prepared a 
standard spelling book, printed by Asa Low of Bradford. In 1864, hav- 
ing joined the Democratic party he became their nominee for Congress, 
but again was defeated. In 1857 he formed a partnership with 
Roswell Farnham which lasted for two years. His introduction to the 
bar of New York was through its leader, Charles O’Conor, with 
whom he was associated in the defence of Jefiferson Davis. In New 
York he was a frequent contributor to the press and among other 
writings he published a poem entitled “Darwin.” This was a dialogue 
between Christian and Philosopher who engaged in dispute over the 
theories of Darwin and Huxley. The last two lines of the poem 
are these: 
It is the true sphere of philosophy 
To find out God and not ignore Him. 
Judge Peck used to tell an interesting story of Mr. Ormsby. 
Before the usual closing hour of court in the afternoon the case on 
trial was finished and the next case called. It was Mr. Ormsby’s 
case and his associate pleaded for time until morning, Mr. Ormsby 
not being in court. Judge Peck took a recess until 8.30 o’clock instead 
of 9 o’clock in order to save such time as had been lost in the after- 
noon. When court convened next morning the Judge directed the 
clerk to call a jury in Mr. Ormsby’s case, but he was still absent. 
When the court inquired about his whereabouts and found he was 
at the hotel he ordered the Sheriff to “produce him in court.” In a 
few moments the door to the court room opened , and in it appeared 332 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
the Sheriff with his hand on Mr. Ormsby, who was in the act of 
drawing one of his suspenders over his shoulder. He had been taken 
out of bed and brought to the court house post haste and hadn’t had 
time to fully dress. The Judge said sternly: “Why weren’t you 
here when court opened ?” To which Mr. Ormsby replied: “I didn’t 
know court opened before breakfast.” 
He was genial and obliging, was well versed in the intricacies 
of the law and successful as a practitioner. The New York Times 
said of him on the occasion of his death that he “was a man of de- 
cided mental power and an active philosophical political student.” 
ROSWELL FARNHAM 
1827-1903 
Roswell Farnham was born at Boston, July 23, 1827, and died 
at Bradford, January 5, 1903. On both sides lie came from good 
New England stock. His father, after financial reverses in Massa- 
chusetts, came to Bradford in 1840 and located on one of the beautiful 
Connecticut River farms. Roswell, as was the custom in those days, 
labored strenuously on his father’s farm, but having an inclination 
toward a higher education he began a course of study at the Bradford 
Academy. Here he not only fitted for college, but under the tutelage 
of William C. Belcher, pursued the studies of the freshman and 
sophomore years so that in 1847 he was able to enter the junior class 
of the University of Vermont, from which he graduated with honor 
in 1849, and three years later received the degree of Master of Arts. 
Among his college mates at that time were John Q. A. Fellows, a 
native of Topsham, who became a celebrated lawyer at New Orleans 
and who was associated with Ex-Justice Campbell in the famous 
“Slaughter House Cases,” and Matthew Hale, a Chelsea lad who was a 
distinguished lawyer in New York. After his graduation, young Farn- 
ham taught at Durham, Canada, and in 1850 took charge of the Frank- 
lin Academical Institution at Franklin, Vt., where he taught for three 
years, after which service he successfully conducted the Bradford Acad- 
emy for two years. During his spare moments as a teacher he had been 
studying law, largely under the direction of Robert McKinley Ormsby 
of Bradford. He was admitted to the Orange county bar at the January 
term, 1857. He began practice with Mr. Ormsby at Bradford, with 
whom he remained for two years, and then opened an office by 
himself in the same town and there remained throughout his life. 
He answered to the first call of President Lincoln for troops. He 
was a Lieutenant and the Captain of the Bradford Guards and after- 
wards Lieutenant-Colonel of the Twelfth Vermont Regiment. He THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
333 
was in command of the regiment in the night attack at Fairfax Court 
House in December, 1862. He took part in the battle of Gettysburg 
and was mustered out July 14, 1863. On returning home from the 
war he entered with zeal upon the practice of his profession and for 
many years his docket was one of the largest in Orange county. He 
was connected with much of the important litigation and took a lead- 
ing position at the bar. He was careful and methodical in prep- 
aration and acquired an intimate knowledge of the details of his cases. 
His papers were drawn with great care and accuracy. As an advo- 
cate he appealed to the reason rather than the passions and prejudice 
of the triers, and convinced by his firmness in speech and manner 
rather than in boisterous declamation. He adorned the profession 
with a culture which included history, ethics and general literature 
as well as the law. His talents eminently fitted him for the position 
of president of the Orange County Bar Association, a place which 
he filled from its organization to the time of his death. Here his 
taste for historical research and fine literary talents found valuable 
employment in the service of preserving the careers of his associates 
at the bar. He is the author of the sketch of the “Bench and Bar 
of Orange County,” published in “Childs’ Gazette of Orange County.” 
In 1859 he was State’s Attorney of his county; from 1865 to 
1868 was a member of the Republican State Committee; in 1868 and 
1869 a State Senator; in 1876 a delegate to the Republican National 
Convention and a Presidential Elector; served on the State Board of 
Education in 1873, 1874 and 1875, and for many years was a trustee 
of the University of Vermont, and in 1880 became Governor of Ver- 
mont, being the only Governor ever furnished by Orange county. 
In 1889, President Harrison appointed him National Bank Ex- 
aminer. This he resigned a few months later to become the pres- 
ident of a large business enterprise in New England City, Ga., at a 
salary of $10,000 per year. In July, 1898, he was appointed Referee 
in Bankruptcy, a place which he held until his death. All his official 
trusts were discharged with ability and fidelity. 
D. ALLEN ROGERS 
1828-1881 
D. Allen Rogers, of Wells River, was born in Columbia, Coos 
county, N. H., September 11, 1828, and died at Wells River, July 11, 
1881. His father, Daniel Rogers, was a clergyman who settled north 
of the White Mountains and combined the duties of the minister with 
the toils of the frontiersman. It was a wild country where he had 
settled, the woods abounded, and wild game and fish were in great 334 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
abundance. The amusements were mainly fishing and hunting and 
the teaching which he received in his early years was from his father 
and mother. But he did not neglect his books. After acquiring such 
advantages as the common school afforded he entered the academy at 
Farmington, Me., so long taught by the Abbotts, the authors. Here 
he made good use of his time and finished his academic education. 
Soon after leaving the academy he entered the office of Lyman T. 
Flint of Colebrook as a student, later was admitted to the bar of Coos 
county and opened an office for the practice of the law in Colebrook. 
Here he was made Postmaster. In 1859 he sold out his business at 
Colebrook with the expectation of locating in Washington, but was 
prevented from going and went instead to St. Johnsbury, where he 
remained for a year and then located in Wells River, where he formed 
a partnership with Charles B. Leslie. He remained here until his 
death. He held several town offices, represented Newbury in the 
Legislature in 1872 and was State’s Attorney of Orange county from 
1876 to 1878. Mr. Rogers was not what is known as a scholarly 
lawyer, but he had good attainments, more than usual mental ability 
an unusual skill and industry. His phrases and language were in the 
vernacular of the farm and thus adapted his speech to the understand- 
ing of the jury. He was, moreover, so well versed with all the many 
duties and experiences that make up the life of the farmer that he 
well knew how to appeal to a farmer jury, and his examination of wit- 
nesses and his arguments to the jury were very effective. He made 
the jury feel that he was one of their kind. He had a fund of curious 
knowledge on which he drew and illustrated every point by some 
anecdote in his own experience. If these illustrations were not always 
elegant, they were at least forcible and sure to bring the laugh on 
his opponent. I used to hear Judge H. Henry Powers, who presided 
at the trial, tell of his argument in the case of Melendy v. Bradford, 
a celebrated suit tried in Orange county at the June term, 1881, and 
reported in 56 Vermont Reports, 149. It was an action for an injury 
on the highway and it was claimed on the part of the town that two 
wagons passed each other at the point of the accident, one a light 
and one a double wagon, in a space claimed by the plaintiff to be only 
ten feet wide. He carried the jury with him in his reply, in which 
he said: “My friend, the counsel for the town seems to think you 
take stock in the idea that two wagons passed each other at the point 
where the accident happened and where we say the road is but ten 
feet wide. Gentlemen, you know how wide a ten-foot barn door is 
and you know how wide your hay wagon is. I leave it to you to say 
whether the learned counsel could drive his buggy wagon into your 
barn floor by the side of your hay wagon.” This was a fair sample 
of his many commonplace illustrations. GEORGE H. MORSE 
Born in Boston, January 3, 1839. He studied in the 
public schools and graduated from Northfield (Mass.) 
Academy. He secured a position with the lumber 
firm of Flint and Hull, but in 1862 removed to San 
Francisco, Cal., where he was employed by the large 
lumber firm of Pope and Talbot. In 1866 he returned 
to Boston and the following year went to Burlington, 
Vt., to reside. In 1868 he purchased the lumber busi- 
ness of Lawrence Barnes and with others organized 
the Shepard and Morse Lumber Company. He became 
a director of the Saginaw Lumber and Salt Company, 
the American Milk Sugar Company, the Vermont Life 
Insurance Company, and was interested in the Baldwin 
Refrigerator Company. Mr. Morse served several 
times as a Burlington Alderman and was Mayor of 
the city in 1883 and 1884. He went to New York in 
1893 and in 1895 became connected with the firm of 
William M. Crombie and Company. Mr. Morse mar- 
ried Kate Russell of New Bedford, Mass., in 1867. Two 
sons, Harold R. and Herbert W., were born to them. 
Mr. Morse died March 4, 1905. THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
335 
In his relations with his fellow attorneys, Mr. Rogers was warm 
and entertaining. Governor Farnham said of him that he was the 
most entertaining man he ever knew, that he had a great fund of 
anecdote and personal reminiscences that seemed inexhaustible, that 
these were quaint and peculiar and smacked of frontier life, the woods 
and mountains of New Hampshire, that he was courteous, kindly, 
honest and above all, a Christian gentleman. 
LYMAN G. HINCKLEY 
1832-1887 
The office of County Clerk has always been an important one in 
Orange county and it has been adorned by able men. In the later 
years the incumbent has been a member of the bar. Some of these 
men should be mentioned. To go back to 1855 it will be found that 
Burnam Martin held the office. He was a lawyer of respectable talents 
and a citizen of high standing. He was honored by election to the 
office of Lieutenant-Governor. Salmon B. Hebard succeeded Governor 
Martin in the office. He was a lawyer, the son of Judge William 
Hebard, and in his later years a man of influence and power in the 
community and State. Curtis S. Emery, now (1921) of Newport, 
held the office from 1894 to 1905. Mr. Emery is also a member of the 
bar, although he has not practiced his profession to any great extent. 
Prior to his service as clerk he was cashier of the bank at Chelsea 
and during his residence there was one of its foremost citizens. After 
leaving Chelsea he was the Collector of the Memphremagog District; 
he was the first Mayor of the city of Newport. His successor 
was Hale K. Darling. Mr. Darling is the leader of the Orange 
county bar, has served his town in the General Assembly, his county 
in the Senate, has been Lieutenant-Governor, and served again in the 
Legislature of 1921 as the member from Chelsea. 
Among this list of officials, Lyman G. Hinckley appears. He 
held the office from 1860 to 1887. He was unique, original, kindly, 
honest, efficient, gentle, attractive and withal the greatest wit in the 
county or State. He was born at Thetford, Vt., April 13, 1832, and 
died while on a visit to his brother and sisters in Boston, November 
26, 1887. He prepared for college at Thetford Academy in the days 
when Hiram Orcutt was its principal, and entering Dartmouth Col- 
lege in 1852, graduated in 1856. He paid his own way largely by 
teaching winters and canvassing for books and papers summers. In 
the sale of Benton’s “Thirty Years’ View” he met with great suc- 
cess. After leaving college he taught one or two terms in Chel- 
sea Academy as assistant and at the same time became a law stu- 336 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
dent in the office of Burnam Martin. The last year of his study 
was in the office of Judge William Hebard. He was Deputy 
Clerk of the County Court from the time he entered Governor Mar- 
tin’s office until 1860. He was admitted to the bar the year he 
was appointed Clerk, but never practiced law. Shortly after his 
admission he became the trial justice for Chelsea and for many 
years tried justice cases with satisfaction to the bar and to the 
litigants. He was five times elected to the Legislature from Chel- 
sea and once to the Senate from Orange county. The latter elec- 
tion was in 1872 and two years later he became Lieutenant-Governor. 
From 1856 to 1859 he was Assistant Clerk of the House of Representa- 
tives. He discharged his duties with strict fidelity and enjoyed the 
confidence and love of his acquaintances to an unusual degree. He 
was distinguished as a writ and his equal in this respect cannot be 
found among the public men of his time. His stories and bright 
sayings were strewn all along his life’s pathway to the great joy of 
those who met him from day to day, and on occasions of public 
gatherings he was quite sure to be the attractive figure and to leave 
with those who heard him some catchy speech that was never for- 
gotten. He lacked the strength for extended argument in debate, but 
carried his point by some sally of wit or ridicule that went straight 
to the mark and won by a shorter process. It was during the session 
of 1880, when he was the member of the House from Chelsea, that 
he had one of his first great public triumphs. It came about in con- 
nection with an attempt to elect a seventh Judge of the Supreme Court 
in the joint assembly. There were two candidates for the office, John 
W. Rowell of Randolph and William H. Walker of Ludlow. Mr. 
Hinckley favored the former and James L. Martin of Londonderry, 
the Speaker of the House, favored the latter. The elections in those 
days were in accordance with a joint resolution, and not as now. 
provided for by statute. It was apparent to the Rowell men that if 
the election could be forced at this time the result would favor the 
Ludlow candidate. It was the purpose of the Rowell supporters to 
put off the election until a future day. When the matter was under 
discussion on the floor where a fair majority could have been counted 
for Judge Walker, had the election taken place then, the Speaker 
left his place by the side of Lieutenant-Governor Barstow, who was 
presiding, took the floor and made an impassioned appeal in behalf 
of immediate action, in order that the Legislature having finished this 
part of its duties might settle down, perform the rest of the work 
before it and go home. The speech was too loud and too extravagant 
for the purpose for which it was intended and Mr. Hinckley was on 
his feet in an instant and opened his reply with words of praise for 
the member from Londonderry, but when the usual words of cour- 
tesy between disputants had been spoken he said the speech of the THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
337 
honorable speaker reminded him of two boys who visited a drugstore 
in Chelsea. One of them invested his only two-cent piece in a glass 
of pop beer which he promptly swallowed and started out, but as he 
was going down the steps the druggist called to him: “Don’t gullup, 
Johnnie, for if you do you will lose your two cents.” The members 
saw the application before the story was finished. (There had been 
too much gas in the last speech.) There was hand-clapping and laugh- 
ter, the seat covers were slammed and general pandemonium reigned. 
Mr. Martin sought to stem the tide, but all in vain. He afterwards 
confessed it was the worst punishment he ever had in a public assem- 
bly and he gave Mr. Hinckley the compliment of being the hardest 
man to meet that he had encountered in debate of this kind. The 
roll call followed and it was found that there were 112 for deferring 
action and 95 in opposition, and Mr. Hinckley had carried the day. 
When the question came up at a later time in the session neither of 
the aspirants for the seventh judgeship who were presented at this 
time was found to be the choice of the General Assembly and the 
election finally fell to Russell S. Taft of Burlington by a viva voce 
vote. 
An incident not unlike the above took place in the convention 
called to nominate State officers in 1886. Mr. Hinckley was a delegate 
from Chelsea and favored the nomination of Levi K. Fuller of Brat- 
tleboro for Lieutenant-Governor. Franklin Fairbanks of St. Johns- 
bury was his opponent. The name of the latter was presented by 
Henry C. Bates, an eloquent man whose speech usually carried con- 
viction, but on this occasion he talked too long. There was much to 
be said in favor of his candidate, for he had given generously to local 
institutions; he had given the Museum, and contributed to the acad- 
emy, the church and the cemetery; and he shared in the responsibility 
of establishing and maintaining the principal industry of his village, 
the Fairbanks scale works. But it did not occur to the eloquent Mr. 
Bates that these considerations were local and not State-wide, nor was 
he impressed as others were, with the narrowness of his appeal when 
he closed each round of praise with the words “for St. Johnsbury.” 
He was reminded of this a moment afterwards, however, for Mr. 
Hinckley was on his feet exclaiming: “We have heard what the 
honorable gentleman has done for St. Johnsbury, but what in h—1 has 
he ever done for Chelsea!” The result was electrical. The convention 
was in an uproar and in the spell of the merriment which had been 
created Fuller was nominated. 
Mr. Hinckley was the life and soul of everything he undertook. 
His talents were well illustrated at the legislative reunion in 1885. 
This was not such a reunion as we are accustomed to hold now, when 
each session has its gathering at Montpelier, but it was a reunion 
of all the sessions that had been held. To it had been invited the 338 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
officers of the State, local as well as national, and Senator Edmunds 
was one of the speakers. A good attendance of members and ex- 
members was there, but there was a lack of interest until Mr. Hinckley 
appeared and was made the presiding officer. He put his rare talents 
to play and at once put life and vigor into the meeting, and what at 
first seemed a dismal failure turned out to be a happy success. His 
introductions were full of anecdotes which sparkled with wit and 
humor, and his knowledge of and acquaintance with the leading men 
of the State enabled him to present them as no one else could and 
at the close of the reunion it was generally admitted that its success 
was almost wholly due to Mr. Hinckley. 
If “Lyme Hinckley,” as he was affectionately called, was too 
convivial at times—and these times were too often—it is a remarkable 
tribute to his personality that those who came to see him and had 
to wait for such time as he was able to attend to their business, were 
so charmed by his attentions that they did not miss the time so lost. 
He had the sense stolidly to refuse to do any work when he was not 
clear headed and so the records of his office and all his business affairs 
were at all times in perfect order. He enjoyed the respect of the 
community to a degree that is unusual and his death was lamented with 
a sorrow that was deep and lasting. He took high ground on public 
questions and stood for good things in the community. He was kind 
to the poor, believed in the Christian religion, and died reciting the 
child’s prayer, “Now I lay me down to sleep.” 
JOSEPH K. DARLING 
1833-1910 
Joseph K. Darling, of Chelsea, father of Hale K. Darling, was 
born at Corinth, Vt., March 8, 1833. He had the usual common school 
education and in 1851 went to California for the purpose of obtaining 
means with which to acquire a college course. He took up employ- 
ment with John C. Fremont, for whom he drove ox teams, worked 
in mines and did other branches of work. He spent about eight years 
in California and having returned to Vermont in 1861 he served in 
Company H of the Twelfth Vermont Volunteers for the full period 
of nine months’ enlistment. Until 1871 he was engaged in farming 
and in mercantile pursuits, and in the latter year entered the office of 
Governor Farnham at Bradford as a law student. He was admitted 
to the Orange county bar in June, 1874, and opened an office at East 
Corinth, where he remained until 1884, when he removed to Chelsea, 
where he spent the rest of his life. Here he died, October 25, 1910. 
He was State’s Attorney of Orange county from 1882 to 1884; repre- THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
339 
sented Chelsea in the General Assembly in 1890-1892; and was County 
Senator in 1894. He was a good lawyer in every department of the 
practice. He was a safe counsellor to those who called to find out 
what the law was for their guidance in business transactions; he 
brought his actions well, whether in the lower or the higher courts, 
and he tried them faithfully and earnestly and successfully. He was 
an ideal country lawyer and was of great service to his clients and 
his community. He was, moreover, a good citizen and his interests 
were wider than those of most men. He felt a public responsibility 
that prompted him to be generous to worthy public needs and he set 
aside religiously one-tenth of his income for charitable purposes and 
went so far as to keep a strict book account of the amount expended. 
This did not reach the limit of his gifts of this character. It was said 
of him by a long-time friend and brother lawyer that “he fought a 
good fight and kept the faith.” 
THE PRESENT MEMBERS OF THE ORANGE COUNTY BAR 
Lyle R. Beckwith, of Chelsea, was born in Danville, September 
11, 1890. He graduated from the Chelsea High School in the class 
of 1909 and from the Albany Business College in 1910. He studied 
law in the office of Judge Stanley C. Wilson at Chelsea, was admitted 
to the bar in 1918 and since that time has practiced at Chelsea. 
Nelson L. Boyden, of Randolph Center, was born at Barnard, 
July 19, 1836. He was educated in the district schools and at Royal- 
ton Academy. He studied law with Philander Perrin at Randolph 
Center and was admitted in 1865, and for fifty years practiced at 
Randolph Center. He was State’s Attorney, 1871-1873; 1875-1877; 
State Senator, 1882-1884; member of the House, 1888-1890; Town 
Clerk, 1868-1894; trustee of the State Normal School, 1867-1910. 
Hale K. Darling, of Chelsea, was born at Corinth, January 26, 
1869. He was educated in the public schools of Vermont and studied 
law in the Law Department of the University of North Carolina. He 
was admitted to the bar at Raleigh, N. C., in 1894, and at Montpelier 
in 1895. He has always practiced at Chelsea, but for several years 
was engaged in preparing briefs for the late Clarke C. Fitts, doing 
much of the work in the office of the latter at Brattleboro. He was 
a member of the House in 1904, 1906 and 1920; County Senator in 
1912 by election, and in 1917 by appointment; Lieutenant-Governor 
in 1915-17; Commissioner to revise statutes, 1905-07, and 1915-18; 
County Clerk from 1905 to 1921. 340 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
Governor Darling is a scholarly lawyer of large experience, 
especially in the preparation and argument of cases before the Su- 
preme Court. He assisted in the argument of the Clement National 
Bank case before the United States Supreme Court, sharing with 
Mr. Fitts the labors and honors of the case. No lawyer in Vermont 
is as familiar with the statutes as Governor Darling and no one as 
skilled in their compilation. He works with great rapidity and accu- 
racy, has a vast fund of information and an exceptionally good 
memory. 
Hugh W. Hastings, of Bradford, was born at Waterford, No- 
vember 8, 1882, and was educated in the common schools, St. Johns- 
bury Academy and Western Reserve University. He studied law in 
the offices of May and Hill and of Albro F. Nichols at St. Johnsbury, 
and was admitted to the bar in 1908. He practiced at Orleans and at 
North Troy before locating in Bradford. He was Deputy Collector 
of Customs at North Troy and Deputy County Clerk of Caledonia 
county. In 1922 he was elected to represent the town of Bradford 
with practically no opposition. 
John C. Sherburne, of Randolph, was born at Pomfret, August 
31, 1883, and was educated in the public school of Pomfret, at Wood- 
stock High School, and at the University of Vermont, where he grad- 
uated in 1904, and at Oxford University, England, where he studied, 
1904-1907. He studied law at Oxford as a “Rhodes Scholar” and in 
the office of Hunton and Stickney at Bethel, and was admitted to the 
bar in 1908. He has practiced at Randolph since his admission; was 
Referee in Bankruptcy, 1908-1916; and State’s Attorney, 1917-1921. 
He was elected to the State Senate in 1920. 
William H. Sprague, of Chelsea, was born at Chelsea, Jan- 
uary 1, 1867. He was educated in the common schools, at Goddard 
Seminary, and at Norwich University, from which he graduated in 
1891. He studied law in the office of Darling and Darling and in the 
office of Darling and Wilson at Chelsea, and was admitted in 1908. 
He has practiced at Chelsea since his admission. He was Postmaster 
of Brookfield, 1896-1904; Sheriff of Orange county, 1904-1908; Deputy 
County Clerk, 1908-1920; County Clerk since 1921; School Director. 
Town Grand Juror, Selectman; member and secretary of the local 
board of Orange county during the World War. 
George L. Stow, of Chelsea, was born in Grafton, Mass., October 
10, 1851. Fie prepared for college at the Burlington High School 
and graduated at the University of Vermont in the class of 1873. He 
studied law at Burlington in the office of Wales and Taft and was WILLIAM A. CROMBIE 
Born in New Boston, X. H., April 30, 1844. He was 
educated in the schools of Pinkerton and Derry, and 
also at the Nashua High School. At the age of six- 
teen he entered the freight department of the Boston, 
I.owell and Nashua Railroad and worked his way up 
to the position of cashier. After four years of rail- 
road work he removed to Burlington, Vt., and entered 
the employ of Lawrence Barnes, a prominent lumber 
dealer. Later this business passed into the hands of 
the Shepard and Morse Lumber Company. Mr. 
Crombie became a partner and local manager. He also 
became interested in the Porter Manufacturing Com- 
pany, the Burlington Shade Roller Company and the 
Baldwin Refrigerator Company. In 1893 he formed 
the Morse and Crombie Lumber Company, with head- 
quarters in New York. Two years later the new firm 
of William M. Crombie and Company was formed. 
He was active in the New York Lumber Trade Associa- 
tion and the National Wholesale Lumber Dealers’ As- 
sociation. At the time of his death he had been in 
the wholesale lumber business longer than any other 
man in New York. Mr. Crombie was a Republican in 
politics. He was twice elected Mayor of Burlington, 
Vt., was appointed a Colonel on the staff of Governor 
Ormsbee of Vermont, and was the Republican leader 
of the Nineteenth Assembly District of New York. He 
was a member of the Union League Club, the Sons of 
the American Revolution, the Vermont Society of New 
York and the Lake Champlain Association. Mr. 
Crombie married Sarah Elizabeth Murray of Nashua, 
N. H., in 18b8. Two sons, William M., and Arthur C., 
and a daughter, Maude E., were born to them. He 
died January 3, 1914. THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
341 
admitted in 1875. He practiced at Barre from 1875 to 1880, and 
since 1880 has practiced at Chelsea. He was State’s Attorney, 1892- 
1894, and has been Judge of Probate for the district of Randolph 
since December 1, 1906. 
Millward C. Taft, of Chelsea, was born at Waltham, March 13, 
1890. He was educated at the Vergennes High School and at the 
Ohio Northern University, from which he graduated in 1913. He 
studied law in the office of Judge Frank L. Fish at Vergennes, in the 
office of Stickney, Sargent and Skeels at Ludlow, and at the Ohio 
Northern University College of Law. He was admitted to the bar in 
Ohio in 1914 and in Vermont in 1915. He practiced at Columbus in 
1914; at Bristol, 1915-1917; since 1917 at Chelsea. He was Assistant 
Secretary of the Senate, 1915-1919; License Commissioner of Orange 
county; secretary-treasurer and attorney of the Chelsea National 
Farm Loan Association. He was elected State’s Attorney of Orange 
county in 1920, and Secretary of the Senate at the session of 1921. 
Frank S. Williams, of Bradford, was born at North Troy, Jan- 
uary 27, 1872. He graduated at Goddard Seminary in 1895 and 
studied law in the office of Richard A. Hoar at Barre. He was ad- 
mitted to the bar in 1899, and practiced at Barre, 1899-1905; after that 
he practiced at Bradford. He was State’s Attorney, 1912-1916. Mr. 
Williams has withdrawn from practice and is engaged in farming at 
Piermont, N. J. 
March M. Wilson, of Randolph, was born at Bethel, the son of 
James J. Wilson, a leading lawyer, August 29, 1870. He graduated 
at the Bethel Graded School in 1887 and at the University of Ver- 
mont in 1891, studied law in the office of his father at Bethel and was 
admitted in 1894. Since 1895 he has practiced at Randolph. He was 
State’s Attorney, 1904-1908; chairman of the State Board of Library 
Commissioners, 1912-1914. ORLEANS COUNTY 
SINCE the year 1800 a County Court has been held in Orleans coun- 
ty. In November, 1792, the Legislature in session at Rutland 
passed an act dividing the counties of Chittenden and Orange into 
six separate counties and created as one the county of Orleans. In 
1799 the Legislature established courts in Orleans county, but pro- 
vided that the Supreme Court should not meet in the county until 
so directed by future legislation, and that the causes proper to be 
heard by that court should be tried and determined at Danville, in 
the county of Caledonia. Brownington and Craftsbury were made 
half shires temporarily, the act providing that no permanent county 
seat should be established for five years from its passage. The first 
session of the court was held at Craftsbury, March 24, 1800. The 
building used for a court house stood on the ground now occupied 
by the Craftsbury Academy and was known for many years as the 
“Old Court House.” It was built either by the town or by citizens 
of Craftsbury, and it was used for the purpose of a court house, 
town house and church. The buttery of Col. Joseph Scott was used 
as a jail. At Brownington courts were held in a small school house 
hardly large enough to hold the Judges, jurors and court officers. 
The building stood on the old road to Derby, about one mile north 
of the present village of Brownington. Here Judge Strong’s cellar 
served as a jail. In 1812, Irasburg was established by the Legislature 
as the county seat, providing the inhabitants thereof within four years 
should build a court house and jail to the satisfaction of the Judges 
of the Supreme Court. In 1815 a court house and jail were built 
and accepted and the August term, 1816, was held in the new building. 
This court house was in use until 1847, when a new one was erected 
at an expense of four thousand dollars by the town of Irasburg and 
without expense to the county. This remained in use until the present 
court house was erected at Newport. Several different buildings were 
in use as jails up to 1862, when a strong granite building was erected 
for the purpose at an expense of three thousand dollars. In 1884, 
after a memorable struggle in the Legislature, an act was passed 
locating the shire of Orleans county in some town on the Connecticut 
and Passumpsic River Railroad, the place to be selected by a com- 
mittee of three to be appointed by the Governor. The committee 
designated Newport as the best location and here suitable brick court 
buildings were constructed at an expense of twenty-one thousand 
dollars. The first session of court at Newport was held in February, 
1886, and regular sessions have been held here since. The present 
terms are held on the second Tuesday of March and September in 
each year. THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
343 
WILLIAM BAXTER 
1778-1827 
One of the early leaders of the Orleans county bar was William 
Baxter, who was born at Norwich, Vt., August 3, 1778. He was 
educated at the schools in the vicinity and studied law with 
Daniel Buck of that town. He was admitted to the bar of Orleans 
county November 23, 1801, being the second lawyer to be admitted 
in the county, and commenced the practice of his profession at Brown- 
ington, where he resided until his death, October 1, 1827. Although 
rough in manner, he possessed great shrewdness and talent and rose 
to the leadership of the bar in northeastern Vermont. Beginning 
with nothing, he acquired a substantial property and at the time of 
his death, although residing all his life in a small town, and accumulat- 
ing for only twenty-five years, he possessed an estate which was ap- 
praised at $100,000. Besides being a leading lawyer, Mr. Baxter was 
also a good farmer and raised excellent crops. He was an active man 
in all town affairs and was liberal in aiding the benevolent objects of 
the day. He erected an academy in Brownington at his own expense 
and gave it to the county for the purpose of a grammar school, with 
a provision that the second story should be appropriated as a place 
of public worship until such time as it should be required for the in- 
terests of the school. He held every town office in the gift of his 
townsmen, from the lowest to the highest, and for a series of years 
held from twro to eight offices at the same time. Pie was State’s Attor- 
ney for the county of Orleans from 1802 to 1814 and Assistant Judge 
from 1825 to 1826. 
JESSE COOPER 
1803-1872 
Jesse Cooper was born in Eaton, Province of Quebec, January 
1, 1803. His parents removed to Canaan, Vt., when he was a small 
child and he remained here until he became of age. After attaining 
his majority he spent several terms at the academy at Guildhall, and 
having decided to study law he applied and was received into the 
office of Isaac Fletcher at Lyndon. Here he spent five years, was ad- 
mitted to the bar and established a reputation for clear judgment and 
sound reasoning. In 1830 he opened an office at Irasburg, where for 
thirty years he faithfully pursued the duties of his profession and 
achieved an enviable reputation, a wide practice and comparative 
affluence. In the same village at the time lived the other legal lights, 344 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
Timothy P. Redfield, afterwards one of the Judges of the Supreme 
Court, and Stoddard B. Colby, one of the great lawyers of northern 
Vermont. During these days Mr. Cooper was conspicuous in his 
practice both in Vermont and New Hampshire, and there was rarely 
a trial of great importance in the northern part of these States with 
which he was not connected. After thirty years he was led to seek 
a new home at Wyandotte, Kan., where he opened an office and prac- 
ticed successfully until 1870, when he retired. In Kansas he took 
much interest in church work and benevolent associations, and estab- 
lished in that State a reputation as an upright and able lawyer. He 
died July 13, 1872. 
JOHN H. PRENTISS 
1811-1876 
John H. Prentiss was born at Montpelier, February 10, 1811. 
His father was Judge Samuel Prentiss. He attended the public schools 
and the academy at Montpelier. While quite young he went to Boston 
and engaged in mercantile pursuits, where he remained for a few 
years. As this work was not to his liking, his inclination being toward 
a professional career, he returned to Montpelier, where he entered 
his father’s office as a student, and was admitted to the bar in Wash- 
ington county in November, 1835, and to the Supreme Court in March. 
1838. While in Boston he gave much study to political economy and 
received a diploma for the best essay on the tariff from the Society 
for the Diffusion of Useful Knowledge. This was delivered to him 
by Daniel Webster, the president of the society. Following his admis- 
sion to the bar he remained in his father’s office until about 1839, 
when he located in Irasburg, where his brother, Charles, was in prac- 
tice. Here he remained until 1869, when failing health compelled 
him to retire from the law. In the hope of restoring his health he 
removed to Minnesota, where he died at Winona, September 28, 1876. 
He was a good advocate and scholar, very tenacious and persistent. 
Although well equipped in legal learning he yet surpassed this in his 
knowledge of the Bible and Shakespeare. He had ready wit and was 
a rare story teller. One of his stories related to the speech of an 
old soldier—a Democrat in Arkansas—who had fought under General 
Jackson. This was made in a convention to alter the Constitution. 
A part of this speech is as follows: “When I was fighting the battles 
of my country under the patriot, Jackson, in mud, blood and dirt 
to the waist, where then was Daniel Webster? Down there in Boston 
town writing his d—d old Federal dictionary. Now alter the Con- 
stitution, will you, d—n you?” THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
345 
ELBRIDGE G. JOHNSON 
1814- 
Elbridge G. Johnson, the youngest but one of a family of twelve 
children, was born at Bath, N. H., December 14, 1814. His father 
owned a square mile of stony soil in Bath and looked to his family 
of boys to maintain it. Elbridge took more to books than to the land. 
While he worked on the farm until fourteen years of age he did this 
under protest. A Scotch Presbyterian clergyman brought him books 
and fostered his ambition for learning. His determination to prepare 
himself for a professional career met with so little encouragement 
at home that he was compelled to leave without aid or blessing and 
qualify himself as best he could. He took up his abode with Thomas 
Goodwillie, a preacher and scholar of the Scotch Presbyterian Cov- 
enanters in Caledonia county, who in consideration for his labor on the 
farm prepared the young man for college. He commenced to teach 
school at sixteen and returned to the farm to work during his vaca- 
tions while attending Newbury Seminary, where he was pursuing 
academic studies. When sent into the field to plough, it is said of 
him that he was frequently found under a tree absorbing his Latin. 
Later he located at Derby Line, where he studied law with Judge 
Timothy P. Redfield, and was admitted to the bar when he was twenty 
years of age. His early professional life was brilliant and promising. 
A close and early friendship was formed between him and his fellow 
student, Luke P. Poland—a friendship which endured as long as Mr. 
Johnson lived. Among his active personal friends were Senator 
Samuel S. Phelps, Judge Redfield, Judge Stephen Royce, Portus 
Baxter and others. Mr. Johnson and Judge Poland agreed that each 
should be present and hear the other’s first argument in court. This 
compact was carried out. Mr. Johnson was admitted a year later than 
the Judge, who in speaking of the former’s efforts, said: “I thought 
I made a good speech, but when I came to hear Johnson I concluded 
my place was on a back seat.” Mr. Johnson practiced at Derby Line 
until 1850, when he removed to Peoria, 111. In the latter State he 
held several offices, was State’s Attorney, member of the Legislature 
and Register in Bankruptcy, and gained a foothold in practice among 
lawyers of exceptional standing and talent. He died before 1886 at 
Peoria. 
STODDARD B. COLBY 
1816-1867 
Stoddard B. Colby was born in Derby, in January, 1816. He 
fitted for college in the law office of Judge Isaac F. Redfield, which 
stood near his father’s store at Derby Center. Fresh from his studies 346 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
at Dartmouth, Judge Redfield gave him a thorough training in Latin 
and Greek. He entered Dartmouth College in the fall of 1832 and 
graduated with high honor in 1836. He studied law in the office of 
Senator Upham in Montpelier, and was admitted to the bar in Orleans 
county at the December term, 1838, and commenced practice at Derby, 
where he remained until 1846, representing the town in the Legis- 
lature in 1841. In 1846 he removed to Montpelier and formed a 
partnership with Lucius B. Peck under the firm name of Peck and 
Colby, and so continued until 1863, when Mr. Colby was made Reg- 
ister of the Treasury and removed to Washington. This office he 
held until his death, which occurred at Haverhill, N. H., October 
21, 1867. Mr. Colby was a ripe scholar and a ready speaker. His 
manner was elegant and his language choice and beautiful. He pos- 
sessed a voice of peculiar compass and melody and he ranked as a 
brilliant and accomplished advocate. In the latter respect it is said 
of him at the time he left for Washington that he had no peer among 
the lawyers of Vermont. His first wife was a sister of the late Senator 
Redfield Proctor. She lost her life on the ill-fated steamer Henry 
Clay, which was burned on the Hudson on its passage from Albany 
to New York. The transfer of Mr. Colby to the duties of his office 
at Washington was never quite congenial to his tastes, but he was 
thus enabled to become acquainted with the great public men of his 
time, many of whom took part in the Civil War. 
JOHN L. EDWARDS 
1819-1895 
John L. Edwards was born at Walden, Vt., August 29, 1819. 
He attended the district schools, fitted for college at Newbury Sem- 
inary, and entered the University of Vermont in 1840. After re- 
maining in college for but one year his desire to study law prompted 
him to enter the office of Stoddard B. Colby of Derby, from which he 
was admitted to the bar in Orleans county at the June term, 1843. 
He opened an office at Brownington, where he remained until January, 
1844, when he removed to Barton. In 1845 he removed to Derby 
Center. At the latter place he formed a partnership with William 
M. Dickerman under the firm name of Edwards and Dickerman, which 
continued for two years, after which he practiced alone until 1859, 
when he was associated with Gen. G. W. Slade at St. Johnsbury, 
doing an extensive business in Orleans, Caledonia and Essex counties. 
He formed a partnership with Judge E. A. Stewart under the firm 
name of Edwards and Stewart, which continued at Derby until 1864, 
when he became associated at the same place with Jerry E. Dickerman THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
347 
under the firm name of Edwards and Dickerman. In 1881, John 
Young entered this firm, which became known as Edwards, Dicker- 
man and Young, and did business at Newport until 1886, when Mr. 
Edwards retired. After this time he practiced alone. 
Mr. Edwards was State’s Attorney of Orleans county by appoint- 
ment by the Legislature in 1850. He was a member of the Constitu- 
tional Convention in 1850 and 1857, and of the Council of Censors 
in 1862. He was a candidate for Governor on the Democratic ticket 
in 1867-68, and for Congress in 1874 and 1876. In these campaigns 
his local popularity was strikingly manifested. 
He was an able lawyer and he stood in the front rank of his 
profession for many years. He enjoyed the law as a science, was 
a skilled pleader, and always a devoted student. He had the con- 
fidence of clients and of his fellow attorneys to a marked degree and 
during his long career tried many important causes. He died at 
Walden, October 19, 1895. At the February term of the Orleans 
County Court following his decease fitting resolutions were adopted 
by the bar and eloquent eulogies paid the deceased by leading mem- 
bers of the profession from his own and adjoining counties. They 
are preserved in Vol. IV, beginning at page 282, of the Proceedings 
of the Vermont Bar Association and are worthy of perusal. 
ISAAC N. CUSHMAN 
1821-1881 
Isaac N. Cushman, father of the present County Clerk of Orleans 
county and his predecessor in the same office, was born at Woodstock, 
March 24, 1821. His father, too, was a lawyer who ranked among 
the distinguished advocates of the Vermont bar. The family soon 
after the birth of Isaac moved to Hartford, in Windsor county, where 
they owned and carried on a farm. 
In 1837, Isaac entered the military academy at Norwich, and 
in 1838 left this institution to enter the United States Military Acad- 
emy at West Point, where he remained until 1840. Here he met 
some of the men who afterwards became famous in the Civil War, 
among them Grant and Sherman, who were cadets at the same time. 
After teaching for a few years in Vermont he removed to Milwaukee, 
Wis., where he practiced land surveying. On his father’s death in 
1843 he returned to Vermont, and in 1845 studied law in the office 
of Judge Timothy P. Redfield at Irasburg. He was admitted to the 
bar in January, 1847, and opened an office in Glover. He represented 
Glover in the Legislature in 1849 and during the session was elected 
Judge of Probate for the district of Orleans. At the close of the 348 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
session he removed to Irasburg, where he resided until his death, 
September 29, 1881. From 1850 to 1854 he was Judge of Probate, 
having been elected to the office after the change in the Constitution 
in 1850, by which the office became elective. This place he relinquished 
in 1854 to become cashier of the Bank of Orleans, which was situated 
at Irasburg, a position which he held until his election as County Clerk 
in 1861. At the same time he was elected County Treasurer and he 
held both offices until his death. 
Irasburg honored Mr. Cushman by an election to the Legislature; 
he was County Senator and many other positions of honor and trust 
came to him. He enjoyed the full confidence of the people and every- 
one was his friend. He was a natural scholar and an extraordinary 
type of a man. He read with relish the old English classics. He 
possessed a genial and kindly wit, which was spontaneous and never 
used to wound. At the session of the court following his decease the 
bar passed resolutions of sorrow and regret at his loss, and praised 
his life as it had been exemplified as Clerk of the court and as a man 
and citizen. 
HENDERSON C. WILSON 
1826-1890 
Success in the law attended the efforts of Henderson C. Wilson 
in his long and useful life at North Troy. He was born in Champlain, 
N. Y., June 8, 1826, and in early life he went with his father to live 
in Colchester, Vt. His education was obtained in the common schools 
and in the academies at Bakersfield and Burlington. Later he taught 
in Colchester and Fairfield. His legal studies were pursued in the 
office of his cousin, Judge William C. Wilson, at Bakersfield, and he 
was admitted to practice at the September term of the Franklin County 
Court, 1847. He located at North Troy, where he resided there- 
after. His death occurred at North Troy, August 13, 1890. From 
early days, although North Troy was a small place at the time, busi- 
ness came to Mr. Wilson and he was actively engaged in his profession 
from that time forward. Although no sign ever hung from his office, 
he had a goodly number of clients and cases, and never failed in having 
his share of practice in County Court, or in being ready for trial when 
his cases were reached. He was almost invariably engaged in the 
important cases coming from his section of the county, and these were 
carefully prepared and well tried. 
His earnings were largely invested in real estate and he trafficked 
not a little in personal property as well. He acted as agent for others 
in real estate transactions, particularly for George Atkinson of Lon- EDWARD W. BAILEY 
Born in Elmore, Vt., August 31, 1843, being a son 
of George W. and Rebecca (Warren) Bailey, both of 
whom were native Vermonters, and the youngest of a 
family of ten children. His parents moved to Mont- 
pelier when he was ten years old and he received his 
education in the public schools there. He was actively 
interested with his father in the management of the 
home farm until he was twenty-six years of age, when 
he entered the grocery and milling business in Mont- 
pelier. In 1879 he went to Chicago and entered the 
firm of Bailey, Bullock and Company, in the grain and 
commission business. Later he bought out Mr. Bullock’s 
interest and continued under the firm name of E. W. 
Bailey and Company. He also continued the grain 
business in Montpelier. Mr. Bailey was involved in the 
widespread financial panic of 1893, but he later set- 
tled every financial obligation with accrued interest. 
His firm was regarded as one of the foremost grain 
and commission houses in Chicago. In 1869 Mr. Bailey 
married Mary Jane Carter of Montpelier. They had 
two children, George C. and Mary B., now Mrs. Fred 
Meyer of Evanston, 111. Mrs. Bailey died in 1908. He 
afterwards married Cora M. Haseltine of Chicago. 
Mr. Bailey died January 2, 1920. THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
349 
don, England, who owned large tracts of land in Orleans county. He 
took a large interest in public improvements in his town and county. 
He was one of the promoters of the South-Eastern Railway, and 
was actively engaged in the construction of the Missisquoi and Clyde 
River Railroad and for many years one of its directors. From 1855 
to 1860 he was State’s Attorney of Orleans county. In 1863 and 1864 
he represented his town in the Legislature, and in 1872 and 1874 was 
County Senator. In the Senate he was chairman of the Judiciary 
Committee. All these public trusts were performed with ability and 
fidelity. 
WALTER D. CRANE 
1827-1898 
Walter D. Crane was bom at Bridport, Addison county, Sep- 
tember 14, 1827. His father was a sturdy farmer of that town, who 
reared a family of twelve children, eleven boys and one girl. Of 
these, Walter was the third; his early life was spent on the farm. 
He attended the local common schools and later, largely through his 
own efforts, completed his education at the Bakersfield Academy. He 
was twenty-three years of age when he had finished at the academy 
and for this reason did not seek a collegiate course. He first turned 
his attention to the mercantile calling and in 1851 located at East 
Franklin, where he also served as Postmaster. After a few years, 
this calling not being congenial, he entered the office of Jasper Rand 
of Berkshire as a law student, and was admitted to the bar at the 
September term of the Franklin County Court in 1859. The same 
year he removed to North Troy, where he held the office of Deputy 
Collector of the port. In 1861 he was made assistant assessor of 
the internal revenue and continued to hold both offices until May, 
1864, when he removed to Newport, then the little village of “Lake 
Bridge,” associating himself with Lewis H. Bisbee under the firm 
name of Crane and Bisbee, and devoting himself exclusively to the 
practice of the law. After a successful practice of three years the 
firm was dissolved on account of the appointment of Mr. Bisbee as 
Deputy Collector of the port of Newport. He continued business for 
himself until 1878, when he became associated with Frank E. Alfred 
under the firm name of Crane and Alfred. This firm enjoyed a large 
and valuable clientage until its dissolution by the death of Mr. Crane 
in 1898. 
In 1867 and 1868, Mr. Crane represented Newport in the Legis- 
lature. He was appointed State’s Attorney to succeed Mr. Bisbee. 
who resigned the office to become Deputy Collector in 1867, and was 350 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
elected to the same office in 1872 and 1874. In 1882 he was elected 
Senator from Orleans county. From 1867 for many years he served 
as United States Commissioner for Vermont. 
Mr. Crane was a dangerous antagonist in the trial of a case. 
His special strength lay in his ability as an examiner of witnesses 
and in argument. He was not as strong on the law of his case as in 
these respects. He did not enjoy the drudgery of preparation, but 
a doubtful case was often made to appear a good one by his ingenious 
argument, and jurors were frequently captured by the power of his 
sarcasm. He was popular among his fellow lawyers and exceptionally 
kind to the younger members of the profession. 
JERRY E. DICKERMAN 
1830-1906 
Jerry E. Dickerman was born at St. Johnsbury, January 15, 1830. 
He was educated in the common schools and in the academies at New- 
bury, St. Johnsbury and Derby. In 1851 he commenced the study 
of the law with his brother, William M. Dickerman, at Coventry. 
Later he entered the office of Henry F. Prentiss at Derby Line as 
a student, where he applied himself with great tenacity of purpose 
to his studies. His admission to the bar occurred June 25, 1852. For 
two years he practiced at South Troy and from there removed to 
West Charleston, where his ability and skill were soon recognized and 
where he acquired a good practice. Besides being a painstaking and 
careful lawyer and a good advocate he came to be regarded justly as 
an exceptional accountant and was enabled to straighten out many 
complicated situations in figures. In 1858 and 1859 he performed 
the duties of State’s Attorney for his county and in 1859 and 1860 
represented his town in the Legislature. Llis skill as an accountant 
equipped him admirably for the office of Bank Commissioner, which 
he held in 1862, 1863 and 1864. In 1869 and 1870 he was Senator 
from Orleans county and became one of the leaders in the Senate. 
From 1872 to 1886 he was Deputy Collector of Customs at Newport, 
conducting the business with strict integrity and with the best busi- 
ness methods. 
Mr. Dickerman removed to Derby Line in 1864 and formed a 
partnership with John L. Edwards at that place, which continued 
until 1881, when John Young entered the firm, and the partnership 
became known as Edwards, Dickerman and Young. The following 
year the firm moved to Newport, where they carried on a large and 
lucrative practice. This continued until 1886, when Mr. Dickerman 
became associated with Mr. Young in the firm of Dickerman and THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
351 
Young at Newport, and Mr. Edwards retired from the business. The 
new firm continued until 1895. Mr. Dickerman died at Newport, 
February 2, 1906. 
WILLIAM W. GROUT 
1836-1902 
William W. Grout was born at Compton, Province of Quebec, 
May 24, 1836. He came of an old and distinguished family. The- 
ophilus, his grandfather, came to Vermont in 1792, settling in Kirby, 
where Josiah, his father, was born and spent most of his life. William 
W. was the second in a family of ten children. He acquired a com- 
mon school and academic education, and choosing the law he grad- 
uated in 1857 from the Poughkeepsie, N. Y., Law School. After 
graduation he entered the law office of Thomas Bartlett of Lyndon, 
where he continued his studies until December, 1857, when he was 
admitted to the bar in Caledonia county. The following year he 
located at Barton, where his good common sense, unfaltering courage 
and indomitable perseverance early gave him a good standing in 
his profession. In 1862 he declined a nomination as State’s Attorney, 
and recruiting a company in Barton, was elected its Captain. He 
later became Lieutenant-Colonel of the Fifteenth Vermont Regi- 
ment. The regiment was immediately sent to Virginia and did much 
picket and other duty, but did not take part in any battle. He was 
mustered out of service in August, 1863, and returned home to practice 
law. The following fall the Legislature created a State militia and 
he was chosen Brigadier-General. During the same year he was 
elected State’s Attorney, a position he held for two years. In 1868 
and for three successive terms he represented Barton in the Legisla- 
ture. He was a delegate to the National Convention which first nom- 
inated General Grant for the presidency. In 1874 he was again sent 
to the Legislature, and in 1876 to the State Senate, where he was 
made president pro tem of that body. In 1880 he was elected to the 
Forty-seventh Congress. He was again elected in 1884, and at each 
election thereafter until 1900, when he became a candidate for the 
United States Senate. Senator Morrill having died, Chief Judge 
Jonathan Ross of St. Johnsbury was appointed by Gov. E. C. Smith 
to fill the vacancy until the Legislature could elect. Judge Ross served 
with great credit to himself and honor to Vermont. When the elec- 
tion occurred in the Legislature of 1900, Judge Ross, Charles A. 
Prouty, Ex-Gov. William P. Dillingham and General Grout were can- 
didates for the vacant office and the choice fell to Governor Dilling- 
ham. After this contest General Grout retired from public life. HISTORY OF VERMONT 
352 
During much of the time that General Grout was holding public 
office he was engaged in his law practice, and he was connected with 
many important civil and criminal suits. In the trial of these cases 
he was singularly successful. He managed them with skill and wis- 
dom; his arguments were plain and vigorous, and he sought to obtain 
what was right regardless of technicalities. Had he devoted all his 
energies to the law, few would have surpassed him. He was much 
interested in agriculture; he purchased the old home at Kirby, where 
he made great improvements and demonstrated for a time the fact 
that intelligent farming can be made successful in Vermont. 
In his public career General Grout kept constantly in mind the 
good of Vermont and his efforts in the House of Representatives 
for all measures working to the betterment of his people were untiring. 
He was loyal to his friends and true to his work. He enjoyed in a 
remarkable degree the confidence of his constituents, as his eighteen 
years of tenure of office would indicate. It was at last his misfortune 
not alone to lose the goal of his ambition, the senatorship, but to have 
his large fortune entirely swept away. He did not long survive the 
latter calamity. He died October 7, 1902. 
LEWIS H. BISBEE 
1839-1898 
Lewis H. Bisbee, the son of a farmer, was born at Derby, Vt., 
March 28, 1839. His was the common experience of the ambitious 
country youth who found himself without means to acquire an educa- 
tion. He worked on a farm summers and taught school winters. He 
prepared for college at the academies at Glover, Derby, Morrisville 
and in Northfield. At nineteen he entered St. Hyacinthe College near 
Montreal, where he graduated two years later. Here he became a 
proficient French scholar. This accomplishment enabled him to pay 
his way by teaching French while a student in the office of John L. 
Edwards at Derby. In June, 1862, he was admitted to the bar. The 
same month he enlisted as a private in the army and later became 
Captain. He served with credit through many hardships. He was 
captured and released on parole, rejoining his regiment in 1864, when 
he resigned on account of sickness and returned to Newport, where 
he opened an office and acquired an extensive and lucrative practice. 
In 1865 he was elected State’s Attorney of Orleans county, and 
was re-elected in 1867, resigning shortly afterwards to become Deputy 
Collector of Customs, which place he held for two years, when he was 
elected to the Legislature. He was re-elected in 1870. Here he be- 
came the leader of his party and was acknowledged to be the most THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
353 
vigorous and effective speaker on the floor in extempore debates. 
From 1865 to 1870 he was United States Commissioner from New- 
port under the extradition treaty. In 1871 he moved to Chicago, 
where he became a successful jury and chancery lawyer in the north- 
west and enjoyed a large and lucrative practice. In 1878 his district 
honored him by an election to the Legislature, where he took rank 
as a ready and able debater and an influential and judicious legislator. 
Here he nominated John A. Logan for the United States Senate in 
a speech, the eloquence and force of which did much to secure the 
election. He was a natural orator, a logical thinker, a man of fine 
figure and commanding presence. He was an affable, genial and 
generous gentleman under all circumstances. He died in 1898. 
JOSIAH GROUT 
1841- 
Josiah Grout was born at Compton, Canada, May 28, 1841, and 
was reared on the family homestead at Kirby. His education 
was limited to the common school, with a partial academic course at 
the Glover and St. Johnsbury Academies. From the latter institution 
in October, 1861, he enlisted in Co. I, First Regiment, Vermont Cav- 
alry. In this company he rose from the rank of Second Lieutenant 
to that of Captain. He was severely wounded in a cavalry fight with 
Mosby at Broad Run, Virginia, on account of which and his impaired 
health he was honorably discharged in October, 1863. At the time of 
the St. Albans Raid he raised a company, was made its Captain and 
on the organization of the frontier regiment of cavalry he was ap- 
pointed one of its Majors. With this rank he was in command of 
the post at St. Albans until the close of the war in June, 1865. 
Upon retiring from the army he resumed the study of law in the 
office of his brother at Barton and was admitted at the December 
term, 1865, of the Orleans County Court. For about one year after 
admission he was in partnership with his brother, practicing law and 
publishing the Orleans Independent Standard. In December, 1866, he 
was appointed Deputy Collector of Customs, in charge at Island Pond. 
This office he continued to hold at Island Pond, St. Albans, and New- 
port until the spring of 1872. In 1869 he was in partnership with 
Lewis H. Bisbee in practice at Newport. This arrangement con- 
tinued until Mr. Bisbee removed to Chicago in 1871. His brother, 
Theophilus, then became his partner and continued as such until 1875, 
when Major Grout removed to Chicago, where he practiced success- 
fully for three years. He then removed to Moline, 111., where he 
engaged in business. In 1881 he returned to Vermont and purchased 354 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
the Hinman homestead at Derby Center. In 1872 and 1874 he rep- 
resented Newport in the Legislature. In the latter year, H. Henry 
Powers, who was Speaker, having been elected a Judge of the Supreme 
Court, Major Grout was chosen to fill the vacancy. In 1884 he was 
again elected Representative from Derby, and again in 1886, 1888 
and 1904. He again filled the Speaker’s chair in 1886 and 1888. In 
1892 he was elected Senator from Orleans county, and from 1896 
to 1898 was Governor of Vermont. In 1905 he resumed the practice 
of the law at Newport and continued therein until 1912, when he re- 
turned to the management of his farm at Derby. He is now retired 
and is living at Newport. 
As a lawyer, Major Grout was popular with his fellow attorneys 
and successful. He prepared his cases well and tried them with skill. 
His son, Aaron Hinman Grout, is an attorney in practice at Newport. 
JOHN YOUNG 
1839-1915 
One of the leaders of the bar of Vermont was John Young of 
Newport. He was born in Stanstead, in the Province of Quebec, 
March 31, 1839. He was educated in the district school, Stanstead 
Academy and Wesleyan University. He graduated from the latter 
institution with high honors in 1860. Having shaped his preparatory 
course for the law, he proposed at once to fit himself for his chosen 
profession. The state of his finances, however, did not permit him 
to devote all his time to study; consequently, he engaged as principal 
of the Derby Academy in the summer of 1860 and continued as such 
in that institution to the close of the fall. He commenced the study 
of the law in the office of John L. Edwards in Derby, where he spent 
such time as was not needed in connection with his duties as principal 
of Derby Academy. His work here was attended with marked suc- 
cess, as was his preparation for the law, and he was admirably fitted 
for his life work at the time of his admission, at the June term of 
the Orleans County Court, 1862. The same year he took up his resi- 
dence in South Troy, where he commenced practice. Clients were 
not numerous nor was his income large, but he found profit in the study 
of the few law books in his library and kept his eyes steadily fixed upon 
his chosen profession. He became familiar with the leading cases 
and the great principles of the common law and equipped himself for 
the large life that was before him. Being of foreign birth, in 1866 
he was naturalized. In 1867 he removed to Derby Line, where he 
continued the successful practice of his profession until 1881, when 
he removed to Newport, where he became a member of the firm, Ed- Born in Wilmington, Vt., April 14, 1824. He 
engaged in farming at Wilmington and in 1864 
removed to Jamaica, Vt., where he engaged in 
the tanning business. He removed to Geneseo, 111., 
in 1865, where he was engaged in farming until 1887, 
when he went to New York City, where, with his sons, 
he established the system of bakeries operated by Cush- 
man and Sons. He was a member of Calvary Baptist 
Church in New York City, under the pastorate of Rev. 
Dr. R. S. MacArthur. He married Emily Scott of 
Wilmington, Vt., in 1847. She died in 1854. Later he 
married Clarina A. Bills of Jamaica, Vt., who died in 
1906. Mr. Cushman died March 20, 1902, being sur- 
vived by seven sons and four daughters. 
SYLVESTER CUSHMAN THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
355 
wards, Dickerman and Young. That firm having dissolved in 1886, 
Mr. Young entered into a co-partnership with Jerry E. Dickerman 
under the firm name of Dickerman and Young, which continued until 
1895. From then until 1899 Mr. Young was in practice alone 
at Newport. At this time he formed a partnership with his son, George 
B. Young, which continued until 1895. From 1895 until 1899, 
Mr. Young was in practice alone at Newport. At this time 
he again formed a partnership with his son, which continued 
until the death of the senior partner. Mr. Young was a mem- 
ber of the Vermont House of Representatives from Newport, 1894- 
1896, and of the Vermont Senate, 1898-1900; was associate editor 
of the Vermont statutes of 1894, and president of the Vermont Bar 
Association, 1901-1902. He devoted himself with great energy and 
application to the practice of the law. His clientage was large and 
profitable and he had to do with the prosecution or defence of most 
of the important cases that were tried in northeastern Vermont during 
his years of practice. His knowledge of the law was broad and tech- 
nical, his power of analysis great, his memory of cases and capacity 
for labor remarkable. The most painstaking care was bestowed on 
the preparation as well as the trial of his cases. 
He was married to Augusta A. Young, June 3, 1866, by which 
union there was born one son, George B. Young, an accomplished 
lawyer and the general counsel of the National Life Insurance Com- 
pany of Montpelier. 
Some extracts from a tribute by John L. Edwards, his one-time 
partner, paid to Mr. Young a long time before his death, are inter- 
esting both as giving a picture of Mr. Young and as furnishing a 
specimen of Mr. Edwards’ writing: 
“Mr. Young had contemplated the legal profession as the great 
work of his life and so tenacious was he of this that he had no sooner 
graduated than he began to cast about to see how he could accom- 
plish his great purpose. To him it was everything. His limited 
means had already been exhausted in his college course, but he was 
in nowise disheartened, his eye was fixed upon the goal and every 
obstacle was brushed away as though it were but a feather in a giant’s 
hand. His great powers of endurance and ripe scholarship**enabled 
him to make rapid progress in preparation for the profession he had 
chosen. In a few months he had accomplished what is usually ac- 
quired by the law student in a much longer time. During all this 
time he had no side issues to distract his attention from the leading 
idea of his life and came to the bar admirably fitted for the discharge 
of its arduous duties.***Here a new era in life dawned on him 
which required all his energy. He had reached the crisis where more 
than half who set out in the great work fall behind, languish and 356 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
perish, and the merciless waves of oblivion sweep them from their 
comrades, while the rest remain with firm grasp but with varied suc- 
cess, struggling for the prize that is before them.***His scanty means 
supplied only a small but choice library. His library, however, had 
one advantage over the libraries of beginners generally; it was well 
read, and it soon became a formidable weapon in his hands.***Though 
life with him could hardly supply his daily wants, here, with a small 
beginning, was laid the foundation of his future success. Whether 
business came or not it was all the same, his work went manfully on, 
and he became familiar with the leading cases arid great principles of 
the common law, which in after years he turned to the very best 
account, enabling him to do double the business of the ordinary law- 
yer in the same time.***His vigilant foresight and careful prepara- 
tion of his case, both as regards the facts and the law, renders him 
a formidable competitor, but better far than this, it enables him to see 
that his client has the full benefit of all his legal rights. His cases 
are well in hand, and the emergencies are very few that have not been 
carefully considered in their preparation.” 
CHARLES A. PROUTY 
1853-1921 
If the lawyers of Vermont of a generation ago had been asked 
to name the leader of the bar the choice would have fallen to Charles 
A. Prouty of Newport. He was the most brilliant man to come to 
the bar of Vermont in the last fifty years. He was born at Newport. 
October 9, 1853. His father, John A. Prouty, was one of the prom- 
inent business men of Newport, being extensively engaged in farming 
and manufacturing lumber. The boyhood of Charles A. Prouty was 
spent on the farm of his father and at fourteen he had made such 
progress in the district school that he was sent to the high school at 
Upton, Mass. There and at Derby and St. Johnsbury Academies 
he fitted for college. In 1871 he entered Dartmouth College and 
graduated in 1875 at the head of his class. Mathematics and astron- 
omy were his favorite studies. Astronomy he decided to make his 
life work, and after college entered the astronomical observatory at 
Allegheny City, Pa. Here his health failed and he returned to Ver- 
mont at the end of one year. On the advice of his father he began 
the study of law, entering the office of Theophilus Grout at Newport, 
and was admitted to the bar at the February term of that county in 
1877. A partnership with his tutor followed for a year. He did 
not find the small business which usually comes to the beginner con- 
genial, and being offered the position of principal of the Newport THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
357 
Academy and graded school he accepted it. This work he followed 
for two years with delight to himself and to the satisfaction of all. 
Ill health again compelled him to make a change. This time he took 
a trip through the West. In July, 1882, he opened an office in New- 
port and began practice again. In the fall of this year he was elected 
State’s Attorney, an office to which he was re-elected in 1884. Civil 
business also came to him and he soon had an extensive practice 
which extended all over the State and brought him a good income. 
He was employed in important litigation, particularly in defence of 
suits against the Central Vermont Railway Company and the Rutland 
Railroad. He argued several cases before the United States Supreme 
Court at Washington. From 1888 to 1896 he reported the decisions 
of our Supreme Court. In December of the latter year he was ap- 
pointed by President McKinley a member of the Interstate Commerce 
Commission, which he held until February 3, 1913, when he was ap- 
pointed Director of Valuation in the Interstate Commerce Commission. 
In this position it was his duty to secure data regarding the valuation 
of the railroads of the United States. He was engaged in this work 
at the time of his death, which occurred at Newport, July 8, 1921. 
Federal regulation of the railroads had not progressed very far when 
Mr. Prouty began his career on the Interstate Commerce Commis- 
sion. It was largely through his influence by speeches, newspaper 
articles and otherwise that the powers of the commission were extended 
to their present force. During the latter part of his service he was 
president of the commission. 
In 1914 his friends urged him to become a candidate for the United 
States Senate, and after considerable reluctance he entered the can- 
vass as the candidate of the Progressive, Democratic and Prohibition 
parties. In doing this he opposed Senator William P. Dillingham, 
who was elected after one of the most exciting campaigns ever known 
in Vermont. After the re-election of Senator Dillingham, Mr. Prouty 
returned to his task of appraising the railroads. He had many flat- 
tering offers to leave Vermont, but clung to his native State with 
the affection of one born among the hills, and looked upon his beautiful 
home overlooking Lake Memphremagog as the place where he desired 
to spend the last years of his life. 
Intellectually, Charles A. Prouty was always a leader. It was 
found in college that if he was going to compete for a prize in scholar- 
ship it was useless for others to oppose him. In the law he saw a 
point quicker than others and stated a proposition with greater power 
and sharpness. Governor Grout called him to my assistance in the 
case of Hodgson, plaintiff in error v. Vermont, 168 U. S. 262. I had 
spent a long time in examining authorities and had taken notes that 
covered many pages in a note book. For more than an hour I read 
these notes to Mr. Prouty. Immediately when I had finished he said: 358 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
“There are four points in this case,” and at once stated them to me 
as the captions for the brief which I was to make. These points 
were not changed by as much as the addition or elimination of a word 
in the long brief from which we argued the case against Mr. Phelps 
at Washington. Mr. Prouty easily excelled in all departments of the 
law. He could run down the authorities more rapidly than others 
and discuss them with more readiness and interest. In the court 
room he was sure to receive first attention. In his conduct toward 
witnesses, his statements to the court and his arguments to the jury 
he was direct, unique, effective. His cross-examinations were not 
long, but if a witness escaped without a feeling that he wished he 
had not stated something in his direct that he did state or as he stated 
it he was the exception and not the rule. He had rare gifts as a 
public speaker; his diction was scholarly and his manner impressive, 
if not eloquent. In some poses which I used to observe in his days 
at the bar I was reminded of the pictures of Henry Clay. One of 
his best early efforts was his tribute to John L. Edwards, to which 
reference has been made. I heard him last at the American Bar Meet- 
ing in Boston in 1919. By this time he had developed a drawl in 
his speaking which detracted from the delight of listening to him. but 
his speech was one of the best that was heard on this memorable 
occasion. 
He took great delight in business and spent much time in in- 
stalling and managing electric plants at Newport and Bradford. He 
was a remarkable man and his life was crowned with notable success, 
but there will be those who will feel that his talents were essentially 
forensic and that these should have been employed in a forum where 
he could have become a disputant either over questions of law or of 
politics. 
JOHN W. REDMOND 
1861- 
John W. Redmond, the present leader at the Orleans county bar, 
was born at Charlotte. Vt., January 24, 1861, son of James and Mar- 
garet (Keating) Redmond. He was educated at St. Johnsbury Acad- 
emy, where he graduated in 1882, and at the University of Vermont, 
graduating there in 1886 with the degree of A. B. He studied law 
in the office of Brigham and McFarland at Hyde Park and was prin- 
cipal of the academy at that place during the three years he was 
preparing for admission to the bar, which occurred in October, 1889. 
At first he opened an office at North Troy, where he practiced for 
two years, and then removed to Newport, where he has been in prac- THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
359 
tice to the present time. This he has conducted without a partner 
except during 1896 and 1897, when he was associated with Edwin 
A. Cook, now of Orleans. He was Reporter of the Supreme 
Court decisions from July 15, 1904, until December 1, 1916, and 
chairman of the Public Service Commission from December, 1907, 
to March, 1914. Mr. Redmond is one of the leaders of the Vermont 
bar. He is thoroughly versed in the law, which he has studied de- 
votedly since he came to the bar. His work as Reporter during twelve 
years made him familiar with the decisions of the Supreme Court, 
and his retentive memory enables him to recall the principal points 
that have been decided. He is, likewise, well versed in literature, 
history and geography. His practice is extensive and lucrative and 
has grown during the past few years. He is ready and resourceful 
in jury trials, but is even stronger before the Supreme Court, where 
his analytical mind best comes in play in dissecting and elucidating 
obscure questions of law. He counts among his clients several large 
corporations, one of which is the Central Vermont Railway Company, 
and another the Grand Trunk Railway. He spends much of his time 
in doing the legal business of these roads and is the general counsel 
of the former. If there are any men in Vermont who are better 
equipped for the practice of the law than Mr. Redmond, they can be 
counted on less than half the fingers of one hand. In the rapid fire 
and cross fire, the hasty giving and taking that come in the court room, 
and in vehement, passionate, dramatic appeals to jurors, he stands 
alone. 
THE PRESENT MEMBERS OF THE ORLEANS COUNTY BAR 
Orien S. Annis, of North Troy, was born near the village of 
North Troy, November 15, 1866. He was educated at Westfield 
Academy, Johnson Normal School and by a private tutor. He studied 
law in the office of Henderson C. Wilson at North Troy, was ad- 
mitted to the bar in 1890 and has since practiced at North Troy. He 
was Postmaster and Superintendent of Schools in Westfield before 
his admission; State’s Attorney, 1894-1898; chairman of the county 
Republican committee six years; County Senator, 1902-1904; and 
member of the county legal advisory board. 
Frederick W. Baldwin, of Barton, was born in Lowell, September 
29, 1848. He was educated in the common schools, at Johnson Acad- 
emy and at the Vermont Conference Seminary at Montpelier. He 
studied law in the office of Powers and deed at Morrisville and was 
admitted to the bar in 1872. He has always practiced at Barton and 
has held the following offices: Assistant Secretary Vermont Senate, 360 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
1872; Secretary Vermont Senate, 1874-1878; State’s Attorney, 1880- 
1881; trustee Barton village twenty years; member Republican State 
Committee, 1884-1892 and chairman, 1888-1890; chairman Presiden- 
tial Electors in 1892 and messenger to carry the vote to Washington; 
member of the House in 1896; Senator and President pro tempore in 
1900. 
Mr. Baldwin has given many addresses on historical subjects 
relating to Vermont and is the author of several historical pamphlets. 
In 1887 he published a history of the bar of Orleans county. This 
contains a sketch of every person who ever practiced or was admitted 
to practice in the county. In all, one hundred and seventy-five per- 
sons are included and there are steel engravings of twenty-two of 
these. The book contains three hundred and three pages and is the 
only publication in Vermont that is devoted exclusively to the bench 
and bar of the State. Mr. Baldwin has one of the largest and best 
collections of books that were written and printed in Vermont, with 
printed catalogue of their titles and authors. In the latter regard he 
is unique in Vermont. Very few private persons have assembled so 
many Vermont books and fewer, if any, have caused them to be 
catalogued in printed form. 
Harry A. Black, of Newport, was born at Coventry, November 
22, 1879. He was educated in the common schools and at Derby 
Academy, where he graduated in 1899. He studied law at Newport 
in the office of John W. Redmond and was admitted to the bar in 1903. 
He practiced at Newport from his admission until 1919, when he 
assumed the duties of Secretary of State. He was Second Assistant 
Clerk of the House, 1906-1908; First Assistant, 1908-1912; Clerk, 
1912-1919; Secretary of State since 1919. 
Walter H. Cleary, of Newport, was born at Lyndonville, No- 
vember 17, 1887. He graduated at Lyndon Institute in 1906, at Mid- 
dlebury College in 1911, and at Boston University Law School in 
1915. He studied law in the office of Judge Harland B. Howe at St. 
Johnsbury and in the office of Young and Young at Newport, and 
was admitted to the bar in 1916. He has practiced at Newport since 
his admission and he holds the office of United States Commissioner 
for Vermont. 
Edwin A. Cook, of Orleans, was born at Glover, November 19, 
1856. He was educated at the Orleans Liberal Institute, Johnson 
Normal School, and St. Johnsbury Academy. He studied law in the 
office of Fred W. Baldwin at Barton and in the office of Judge Lafor- 
rest H. Thompson at Irasburgh, and was admitted to the bar in 1884. WILLIAM R. WARNER 
Born in Bridport, Vt., July 7, 1871. He was edu- 
cated in the Crown Point, N. Y., High School and the 
National Institute of Pharmacy at Chicago. He is a 
pharmacist and located in Vergennes in 1894. From 
1905 to 1910 he was a member of the State Board of 
Pharmacy, being chairman of the board during his 
last year of service. He was appointed a member of 
the Public Service Commission in 1910 and has served 
in that capacity since that time. He was a delegate to 
the Republican National Convention of 1912. THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
361 
He practiced at Glover, 1884-1891; at Newport, 1892-1909; at Lyn- 
donville, 1909-1919; and at Orleans since 1919. He was Superin- 
tendent of Schools in Glover; State’s Attorney of Orleans county, 
1904-1908; member of the House from Lyndon in 1912; and Referee 
in Bankruptcy, 1915. 
Henry B. Cushman, of Newport, was born at Irasburg, December 
29, 1855. He was educated in the common schools and at Derby Acad- 
emy. He studied law at Newport in the office of John W. Redmond 
and was admitted to the bar in 1906. He has never been in active 
practice. He has been County Clerk since 1881 ; County Treasurer 
since 1898; Municipal Judge from 1906 to 1910, and from May, 1915, 
to August, 1917, when he resigned to serve on the United States 
draft board. He ceased this work March 31, 1919. 
Curtis S. Emery, of Newport, was born in Brookfield, November 
6, 1861. He was educated in the common schools and at Chelsea 
Academy, and studied law at Chelsea with C. W. Clarke and A. S. 
Austin. He was admitted in 1883 and practiced at Chelsea until 
January 1, 1906, and has practiced at Newport since. He was a mem- 
ber of the House from Chelsea in 1888, 1898 and 1900; Senator from 
Orange county, 1902; County Clerk of Orange county, 1892-1905; 
Collector of Customs, district of Memphremagog, 1906-1914; trustee 
of the village of Newport, 1916-1917; first Mayor of Newport, March, 
1918, to March, 1919. 
Albert W. Farman, of Newport, was born at Troy, Vt., June 
21, 1875. He was educated in the common schools and at Lyndon 
Institute. He studied law in the office of Orien S. Annis at North 
Troy, and in the office of Cook and Redmond at Newport, and was 
admitted in 1897. He began practice in Newport in the fall of 1897, 
but closed his office and joined the Vermont Regiment the following 
spring to take part in the war with Spain. He resumed practice in 
1899 and continued until 1905, when he entered the lumber business 
in which he was engaged until 1918, when he again opened a law 
office in Newport. He was State’s Attorney, 1902-1904, and was 
again elected in 1920. 
John G. Foster, of Derby Line, was born at this place March 9. 
1859. He was educated at Goddard Seminary and studied law in 
the office of Edwards, Dickerman and Young at Newport, and was 
admitted to the bar in 1881. He was never in active practice. He 
represented Derby in the House in 1892-1894; was United States 
Consul General at Halifax, 1897-1903, and has been Consul General 
at Ottawa since 1903. 362 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
Horace F. Graham, of Craftsbury, was born in Brooklyn, N. Y., 
February 7, 1862. He was educated in the district schools of Crafts- 
bury, Craftsbury Academy, Grammar School No. 35, New York City, 
College of the City of New York, Columbia College, Schools of Po- 
litical Science and Law, from which he graduated cum laude in 1888. 
He was admitted to the bar in 1888 and has since practiced at Crafts- 
bury. He was a member of the House in 1892 and in 1900; State’s 
Attorney, 1898-1902; Presidential Elector, 1900; Auditor of Accounts 
from 1902 to 1917; Educational Commission, 1912; Governor, 1917- 
1919. 
Aaron H. Grout, of Newport, was born at Rock Island, 111., 
January 18, 1879. He graduated from Derby Academy in 1896 and 
from the University of Vermont in 1901. He studied law in the 
office of J. W. Erwin at Derby and with John W. Redmond at New- 
port, and was admitted in 1904. He has practiced at Newport since 
his admission. He was Executive Clerk, 1906-1908; Secretary Civil 
and Military Affairs, 1908, 1910; Judge Advocate, National Guard, 
1910-1915; State’s Attorney, 1912-1916; Major promoted to Lieu- 
tenant-Colonel, Volunteer Militia, 1917-1919. 
William C. Lindsay, of Newport, was born in New York City, 
September 21, 1867, and was educated in the common schools and 
in the New York City grammar schools. He studied law in the office 
of John W. Redmond at Newport and was admitted to the bar in 
1901. He has been Constable and Trustee of the village. 
Frank E. Miles, of Newport, was born at Albany, May 16, 1874. 
He was educated at Newport Academy and under a private tutor, 
studied law with Justice Willard W. Miles at Barton, with John Young 
and with John W. Redmond at Newport. He was admitted to the 
bar in 1897 and has since practiced at Newport. 
Hubert S. Pierce, of Newport, was born at Fairlee, December 
19, 1887. He graduated at Union Academy in 1906 and at Dartmouth 
College in 1911. He studied law by correspondence while teaching 
school and in the office of Francis Brady in Boston. He was ad- 
mitted to practice in Massachusetts in September, 1919, and in Ver- 
mont in October, 1920. After his graduation from college he taught 
in West Virginia, Massachusetts and in Vermont; the last year and 
a half of his teaching he was principal of the high school at New- 
port. He has located at Newport in practice. 
Ward Prouty, of Newport, was born at Newport, June 15, 1884, 
and was educated in the public schools of Newport and at the George THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
363 
Washington University, Washington, D. C. He graduated from the 
National Law School in the same city and for several years acted 
as attorney and examiner for the Interstate Commerce Commission, 
of which his father, Charles A. Prouty, was a member. He 
began working for the commission when he was sixteen years of age 
and continued in the employ until 1916, when he removed to Newport, 
where he has since practiced. 
William W. Reirden, of Barton, was born in Troy, August 31, 
1876. He was educated in the public schools and at North Troy Acad- 
emy, and studied law in the office of Orien S. Annis and in the office 
of Frank S. Rogers at North Troy, and was admitted in 1898. He 
practiced at Orleans, 1899-1901, at North Troy in 1901, and since 
1901 has practiced at Barton. He has been chairman of the Orleans 
County Republican Committee since 1914, and was member of the 
House in 1917. 
Frank S. Rogers, of North Troy, was born at Troy, December 
3, 1854. He was educated at St. Johnsbury Academy and at Dart- 
mouth College, where he graduated in 1878. He studied law with 
Homer E. Powell at Troy and with Philip K. Gleed at Morrisville, 
and was admitted in 1880. After admission he practiced at Troy until 
1894, when he removed to North Troy, where he has since practiced. 
He has held the office of Register of Probate in Orleans county and 
of Town Clerk of Troy. 
James G. Simpson, of Greensboro, was born at Craftsbury, Oc- 
tober 11, 1857, and was educated at Craftsbury, Williston and St. 
Johnsbury. He studied law at Columbia College and with Judge 
Laforrest H. Thompson at Irasburg, and was admitted to the bar in 
1878. He has practiced at Irasburg and at Minneapolis, Minn. 
Ephraim J. Smith, of Newport, was born at North Stratford, 
N. H., September 27, 1880. He graduated at the Newport High 
School in 1902, at Dartmouth College in 1906, and at the National 
Law School, Washington, D. C., 1912. He studied law in the office 
of Frank Plumley at Northfield, and was admitted to the bar in 1913. 
He has practiced at Newport since his admission and has held the 
office of Judge of Probate for the district of Orleans since April 1, 
1919. 
Frank D. Thompson, of Barton, was born at Irasburg, April 6, 
1876. He was educated in the schools of Irasburg, at the St. Johns- 
bury Academy, and at the University of Vermont. He studied law in 364 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
the office of Judge Wendell P. Stafford at St. Johnsbury and at the 
Boston University Law School, where he graduated in 1899, cum laude. 
He practiced at St. Johnsbury, 1899-1906; since January 1, 1906, he 
has practiced at Barton. He was State’s Attorney of Caledonia county, 
1904-1906; Judge of Orleans County Municipal Court, 1910-1915; 
member of the bar examining board, 1916-1919; State’s Attorney of 
Orleans county, 1918 to 1921; Supreme Court Reporter since April 
1, 1919. 
Frank C. Williams, of Newport, was born at Glover, May 12, 
1853. He was educated in the common schools, at Orleans Liberal 
Institute, and at Goddard Seminary. He studied law in the office 
of Cook and Redmond at Newport and was admitted in 1899. He 
has practiced at Newport since admission. He was Town Clerk and 
Treasurer of Coventry, 1881-1896; school director in Coventry and 
in Newport; Judge of Court of Claims, 1902-1906; trustee Hospital 
for the Insane, 1906-1908; member of the House from Coventry, 
1884, and Newport, 1908; Bank Commissioner, 1909-1919. 
Willard M. Wright, of Barton, was born at Albany, November 
26, 1867. He was educated in the common schools and at Craftsbury 
Academy, Barton Academy and St. Johnsbury Academy. He studied 
law in the office of Justice Willard W. Miles at Barton, and was 
admitted to the bar in 1895, locating and practicing at Barton. He 
has been village and town attorney; was State’s Attorney, 1908-1912; 
and has been Orleans County Municipal Judge since 1917. RUTLAND COUNTY 
ON February 27, 1787, the General Assembly passed an act de- 
fining the boundaries of the several counties of Bennington, 
Windham, Windsor and Orange, and constituting the county 
of Addison, leaving Rutland county substantially as it is today, except 
that Orwell has been set off to Addison and a small tract to Windsor 
county. 
Immediately after the organization of the county in 1781, Tin- 
mouth, being the center of population and the home of its leading 
men, was selected as the shire. The first court house was the inn 
of Solomon Bingham, which was located on Tinmouth Flats, one mile 
east of the present meeting house. It was built of logs, was one 
story in height and about forty feet long. The family occupied one 
room and the courts were held in the bar room. The jury retired 
for deliberation to a log barn which stood near. The jail, which was 
also build of logs, stood about a mile north of the court house at the 
intersection of the road from Tinmouth village with the east road. 
Tradition says that a blanket served as a door for the first jail. 
In 1784 Rutland was adopted as the shire town and the courts 
thereafter held their sessions until 1792 in the old gambrel-roofed 
building that stood until recently on West Street. It had two rooms, 
one with a floor and one without. The west room was for the court. 
This had a floor and elevated seats on the north side for the Judges, 
and benches for the jurors, witnesses and spectators. The east room 
served for the grand jury, the petit jury and the attorneys. A log 
jail stood a few rods to the west. 
It was here that the first session of the United States District 
Court for this State was held in May, 1791, with Nathaniel Chipman 
presiding. The State Legislature, too, held here the sessions of 1784 
and 1786, and it was here that the anti-court mob enjoyed a momentary 
triumph in November, 1786. 
In 1792 funds were raised by subscription and a more stately 
court house was erected on Main Street just above the site of the old 
Franklin House. It faced to the south. The Legislature during the 
first session held therein, on October 25, 1792, passed “an act for 
the purpose of raising by lottery the sum of one thousand and sixty 
pounds lawful money for the purpose of defraying the expense of 
building the new court house in Rutland.” In 1828 it became neces- 
sary to rebuild the then time-worn structure and again funds were 
raised by voluntary subscription by which the outside was bricked 
up and the interior refinished in wood. The building was extended 
forty-four feet in 1844 and with this change it served the needs 
of the county until April 3, 1868, when it was destroyed by fire. The 366 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
County Court was then in session and the remainder of the term was 
held in the office of Judge Prout, who was presiding at the time. One 
term was afterwards held in the rooms of the Christian Association, 
two in the old town hall and the remaining terms in the Federal Court 
room until the new court house was ready for occupancy in March, 
1871. The present building was begun in 1869 and it originally cost 
$72,000. In 1885 an additional sum of $5,500 was expended in im- 
provements. The rear entrance was opened, the Clerk’s office en- 
larged, the court room made more comfortable and attractive and a 
new heating plant installed. Since that time only minor changes 
have been made, costing, however, over $5,000. 
After the establishment of the House of Correction in Rutland 
in 1878 it served as the county jail until 1919, when it was consoli- 
dated with the State Prison at Windsor by the provisions of an act 
passed by the General Assembly and approved April 7, 1919. (No. 
200, Laws of 1919.) The House of Correction was originally built 
pursuant to an act passed in 1876, and Rutland was selected as the 
site on condition that the county should contribute $20,000 for its 
erection and should have the use of the same as the county jail. The 
buildings originally cost $60,000, and important improvements were 
made to them from time to time. They stand on the bank of East 
Creek in the western part of the city. During the year 1919 the 
inmates were removed to Windsor and the House of Correction at 
Rutland was abandoned. But by the provisions of No. 216 of the 
Laws of 1921 it became the State Prison and House of Correction 
for Women and here the women prisoners are confined. The county 
purchased a site for a jail a little to the west and on the same side 
of the street as the County Court House and here a new jail has been 
constructed. It is low in structure, is made of brick and has all modern 
facilities for safety and convenience. The County Courts are held 
on the second Tuesday of March and September. 
JOHN A. GRAHAM 
1764-1841 
John A. Graham was the first practicing attorney in Rutland 
county, and as claimed by some authorities, in Vermont. He was 
born in Southbury, Conn., June 10, 1764, and died in New York, 
August 8, 1841. After studying law in his native town he was ad- 
mitted to the bar of Connecticut in 1785 and removed to Rutland. 
He says, to use his own language in a book published by him in 1797 
on the early history of Vermont: “I moved forward as well as I 
could desire, in the different courts of common pleas, till the year HOSEA FAXON BALLOU 
A leading clergyman in the Universalist Church THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
367 
1790, when I was called to the bar of the Supreme Court of the State. 
I practiced in this court until June, 1792, when at the Circuit Court 
of the United States of America, for the district of Vermont, at Ben- 
nington, I was called to the bar of that court and admitted and sworn 
as an attorney and counselor.” In 1794, Mr. Graham was appointed 
on the staff of Governor Chittenden with the rank of Lieutenant- 
Colonel. In the same year he was sent to Europe by the Episcopal 
Church of Vermont in the interest of that organization. As this is 
the year of the passage of the acts appropriating the Church property 
to the use of the towns, it is fair to assume that this was the occasion 
of his mission. While in England on a second visit he was given the 
title of Doctor of Laws by the Royal College of Aberdeen and there 
he devoted some time to writing his book on Vermont. In 1800 he 
returned to Vermont, where he attained considerable success in the 
practice of the law. He is credited with having obtained a decision 
which resulted in legislation securing to persons charged with crime 
the right to an interview with counsel before being examined by a 
magistrate. For his argument in this case he received the congratula- 
tions of many eminent men both in and out of the legal profession. 
ROLLIN C. MALL ARY 
1784-1831 
Rollin C. Mallary was one of the most eminent of the early 
lawyers in Rutland county. He was born in Cheshire, Conn., May 
27, 1784, where he resided until 1795, when he came with his parents 
to Poultney. He graduated at Middlebury College in 1801 and was 
admitted to the Rutland county bar in 1807. The following October 
he was appointed by Governor Smith secretary of the Governor and 
Council. The same office was held by him in 1811, 1812, 1813 and 
1816. He soon took rank among the ablest lawyers in the county. 
He was State’s Attorney from 1811 to 1813 and again in 1816. He 
was elected to Congress in 1819 and received six successive re-elec- 
tions. Here his services were of the highest value. He lived in 
Castleton until about the time of his election to Congress. He died 
in Baltimore, April 15, 1831. Ahiman L. Miner of Manchester, a 
leading lawyer of the last generation, speaking of Mr. Mallary at 
the centennial celebration of the organization of Rutland county in 
1881, said of him: “Mallary had perhaps as much ability as any man 
ever raised in this State.” 368 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
ROBERT PIERPOINT 
1791-1864 
Robert Pierpoint was a distinguished member of the Rutland 
county bar. He was born at Litchfield, Conn., May 4, 1791, one of 
the seven sons of David Pierpoint. At seven years of age he was 
placed with his uncle, who lived at Manchester, Vt. He aided his 
uncle as best he could in keeping a country inn until he was sixteen 
years of age, when he entered the office of Richard Skinner and began 
the study of law, a pursuit which he followed with the utmost en- 
thusiasm until he became of age. In June, 1812, he was admitted to 
the bar of Bennington county and in the same year he came to Rut- 
land to live. He was shortly afterwards made Deputy Collector of 
the district tax, a place which he filled with tact, energy and ability. 
He represented Rutland in the General Assembly in 1819, 1823 and 
1857; was a member of the Constitutional Convention in 1822 and 
1828; member of the State Council from 1825 to 1830, and State 
Senator from 1836 to 1839; County Clerk from 1820 to 1839; Judge 
of Probate from 1831 to 1832; Clerk of the House of Representatives 
in 1832 and 1838 and Lieutenant-Governor in 1848 and 1849. He 
received the degree of M. A. from Middlebury College in 1826 and 
from the University of Vermont in 1838. He was a Judge of the 
Circuit Court from 1850 to 1856. He was an able and good man 
who ranked high in his profession and was a formidable opponent 
at the bar. 
SOLOMON FOOT 
1802-1866 
Solomon Foot was born at Cornwall, in Addison county, No- 
vember 19, 1802, and graduated at Middlebury College in 1826. Fol- 
lowing his graduation he tutored in the University of Vermont and 
was for a time principal of Castleton Seminary. He was professor 
of natural philosophy in the Vermont Academy of Medicine at Castle- 
ton from 1829 to 1831. He studied law in Rutland and was admitted 
to the bar of the county in 1831. He settled in Rutland and entered 
at once upon a successful practice and was especially noted as a jury 
advocate. He became prominent in political affairs and was a favorite 
as a platform orator. As president of the monster Whig Convention 
held at Burlington in 1840 he sprang into great prominence. His first 
words on this memorable occasion, uttered in his loud, melodious 
voice, “Men of Vermont, come to order,” thrilled and hushed the THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
369 
vast throng in a moment of time. This was the beginning of a brilliant 
and successful political career. He represented Rutland in the State 
Legislature in 1833, 1835, 1837, 1838 and 1847. He was Speaker in 
the last three sessions. He was a prominent member of the State 
Constitutional Convention of 1836 and State’s Attorney from 1837 
to 1842. Elected to Congress in 1843, he continued to serve until 
1847. In 1850 he was elected United States Senator, which place he 
held until his death. He was president of the Senate during a part 
of the Thirty-sixth Congress and during all of the Thirty-seventh 
Congress and was prominently mentioned as a candidate for Vice- 
President in 1860. He made many elaborate speeches in the Senate 
and was conspicuous in the Lecompton debate in 1850. He was 
one of the great war Senators and a friend and adviser of President 
Lincoln. 
In 1854-55 he was president of the Brunswick and Florida Rail- 
road and visited England, where he negotiated its bonds and purchased 
the iron for its construction. He died in Washington, March 28, 
1866. A memorial service was held in the Senate chamber after 
which the remains were conveyed to Rutland, accompanied by a sen- 
atorial committee and deposited in the Federal Court room where 
an impressive scene occurred on the delivery of the body to the people 
of Rutland in feeling discourses by Senator Poland, his colleague in 
the Senate, and Senator Doolittle of Wisconsin. These were followed 
by an address of acceptance by William T. Nichols on the part 
of the people. On the day of the obsequies people came from all parts 
of the State to pay homage to the dead Senator. The eulogy was 
pronounced by Rev. Norman Seaver, D. D., the long-time eloquent 
pastor of Rutland. The burial was at Evergreen Cemetery, where 
a monument of granite has been erected, taken from the same quarry 
from which the stones in the Vermont State House were obtained. 
He left his large library to the United States Court of Vermont. Sen- 
ator Foot was a man of commanding presence, a dignified and eloquent 
orator of the old school, a perfect presiding officer and a lawyer of 
marked ability. 
EDGAR L. ORMSBEE 
1805-1861 
For twenty years or more Edgar L. Ormsbee was a leading mem- 
ber of the Rutland county bar. Born in Shoreham in 1805, he gradu- 
ated at Middlebury College in 1823 in a brilliant class, in which he dis- 
tinguished himself for classical scholarship and natural talent. He 
studied law with Rodney C. Royce in Rutland, graduated at the Litch- 370 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
field Law School, and was admitted to the bar in 1826. He rose 
quickly to a high position in his profession, which he retained until his 
retirement from practice. While his manner was not adapted to the 
trial of jury cases, his argumentativeness and fondness for metaphysi- 
cal distinctions adapted him to the practice before the Supreme Court. 
He did not appear at his best in the smaller cases, but when the case 
was one of sufficient importance to call forth his best powers of mind, 
he would rise in dignity and grace and pour forth his thoughts in chaste 
and manly diction in unsurpassed eloquence. No one could give a 
clearer analysis of a question than he. His wit was keen, his humor 
unbounded, his repartee always ready, and his satire irresistible. His 
perceptions were far reaching and prophetic. He was one of the first 
to conceive the feasibility of intercommunication through western Ver- 
mont with Canada and other localities, and his ardent advocacy with 
tongue and pen did much to assure the railway system which Rutland 
enjoys. The only public office he held was that of State’s Attorney, 
from 1845 to 1847. He died November 24, 1861. 
CHARLES H. JOYCE 
1830-1916 
Charles H. Joyce was born near Andover, England, January 30, 
1830. He came to this country with his parents when six years old. 
They settled in Waitsfield, Vt., where he attended the public 
schools. He afterwards was a student at Waitsfield and Northfield 
Academies and Newbury Seminary. He began his law studies in 1850 
in the office of John L. Buck and Francis V. Randall at Northfield 
and completed them in the office of Ferrand F. Merrill at Montpelier. 
He served for a time as Assistant State Librarian. In 1852 he was 
admitted to the bar in Washington county and settled at Northfield. 
In 1856 he was elected State’s Attorney of Washington county and was 
re-elected the following year. In this office he greatly distinguished 
himself by his able prosecution of several cases of felony. Early 
in the war he was Major of the Second Regiment, Vermont Volun- 
teers, which did service under Gen. O. O. Howard. While holding 
this command he participated in the first battle of Bull Run and in the 
battle of Lee’s Mills. He was promoted to the Lieutenant Colonelcy 
of the regiment in June, 1862, and while holding this office took part 
in several engagements, including the second battle of Bull Run and 
the struggle around Fredericksburg, but on account of ill health he 
was obliged to resign his commission in January, 1863. The following 
summer he located in Rutland and soon held a position of leadership 
at the bar, and from that time he was engaged in much of the most THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
371 
important litigation in that part of the State. His services were par- 
ticularly in demand as an advocate, especially in criminal causes. He 
was equally successful in the prosecution and in the defense of this 
kind of cases. He took part in several murder trials. He prose- 
cuted John P. Phair, who was afterwards executed for the murder of 
Anne Frieze, and he defended successfully Colvin B. Inman of Poult- 
ney, who was tried at the September term of the Rutland County 
Court, 1889, for shooting Patrick Sennett. In the latter case he held 
the great audience of spectators spell-bound. He painted a picture so 
touching that there was scarcely a dry eye in the audience. 
In 1869 he represented Rutland in the Legislature and was re- 
turned the following year, when he was made Speaker. His first elec- 
tion to Congress came in 1874 and he was re-elected in 1876, 1878 and 
1880. In his Congressional relations he served on important commit- 
tees and rendered efficient service. He frequently spoke on important 
subjects and when he did so he commanded the attention of the House. 
He was a popular and forcible platform speaker and from the time 
of the Fremont campaign, in 1856, to the time of his retirement from 
public life he was in demand as a campaign orator, both in Vermont 
and in other States. His place in the forefront of the legal fraternity 
was not questioned; he was conscientious and industrious as a member 
of Congress; brave as a soldier and useful as a citizen. He enjoyed a 
peaceful repose from his active life in retirement in the town of Pitts- 
field, in Rutland county, and here he died, November 22, 1916. 
EBENEZER J. ORMSBEE 
1834- 
Ebenezer J. Ormsbee, the first citizen of Brandon and a leading 
lawyer of Rutland county, was born at Shoreham, Vt., June 8, 1834, 
the son of John Mason and Polly (Wilson) Ormsbee. His education 
was obtained in the common schools and in the academies at Brandon 
and South Woodstock. He studied law in the office of Briggs and 
Nickolson at Brandon and was admitted to the bar in Rutland county 
at the March term, 1861. Instead of entering practice he enlisted in 
the “Allen Grays,” a military company organized at Brandon. This 
company was subsequently known as Company G, First Regiment, 
Vermont Volunteers. In this he served as Second Lieutenant during 
the term of the company’s enlistment. After the four months’ service 
in this company had expired he returned to Brandon and enlisted in 
Company G, Twelfth Regiment, Vermont Volunteers, in which he was 
commissioned Captain. This Regiment was attached to the Second 372 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
Vermont Brigade, commanded by General Stannard, which afterwards 
became the T hird Brigade in the Third Division of the First Army 
Corps, Army of the Potomac, which took a prominent part in the 
Gettysburg campaign. On his return to Brandon in July, 1863, on 
being mustered out of service, Captain Ormsbee associated himself 
with Anson A. Nickolson, in practice at Brandon. Afterwards he 
formed a partnership with Ebenezer N. Briggs, at the same place, and 
this was followed by a partnership with George E. Briggs, a son of the 
former partner. This continued for many years under the name of 
Ormsbee and Briggs. It was the leading law firm in Rutland county, 
outside of Rutland City. From 1868 to 1872 he was Assistant United 
States Internal Revenue Assessor; State’s Attorney for Rutland 
county from 1870 to 1874, Representative from Brandon to the Legis- 
lature in 1872 and State Senator in 1878; trustee of the Vermont Re- 
form School from 1880 to 1884, resigning in the latter year to become 
Lieutenant Governor. Two years later he was elected Governor. In 
1891 he was appointed by President Harrison to treat with the Piute 
Indians at Pyramid Lake, Nevada, a task which he performed with 
such fidelity and tact that President Harrison named him as a Com- 
missioner of the United States to Samoa. Here, in company with 
similar appointees from Germany and Great Britain, he adjusted cer- 
tain private claims of citizens of the three governments amounting to 
many millions of dollars. The service consumed two years, from 
November, 1891, to November, 1893. On the completion of this 
service he resumed practice at Brandon. On the failure of Hammond. 
Bush & Company and the Vermont Investment and Guarantee Com- 
pany of Orwell he was appointed receiver by the Court of Chancery 
of the latter company and in this work was engaged for about ten 
years. This was a task of large magnitude and it was performed in 
an able and conscientious manner. It was the most important service, 
from a business point of view, rendered by Governor Ormsbee during 
his long career. He kept up his practice until he was nearly eighty 
years of age, and was in daily attendance at his office. At this time a 
partial stroke of paralysis incapacitated him from active service. He 
is still able, however, to perform his duties as President of the Brandon 
National Bank; his advice is still sought by his close personal friends 
and he retains an active interest in his town, county and State. 
Every trust reposed in Governor Ormsbee has been carefully 
administered. He performed his public duties with dignity and 
diplomatic skill, and in his private practice he enjoyed the confidence 
of a large circle of clients, whose interest he cared for with judgment, 
tact and ability. THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
373 
JOEL C. BAKER 
1838-1904 
Joel C. Baker was born at Danby, Vt., April 16, 1838 
and died at Rutland June 6, 1904. His ancestors came from 
Rhode Island. He began the preparation for college under a 
private tutor, but was unable to take a college course. In 
1859 he entered the office of Spencer Green, in Danby, as a law stu- 
dent. It was necessary for him to earn some money during the time 
he was studying law here, and for that purpose he learned the black- 
smith trade. This he followed during the day, devoting his attention 
to study in the evening. He left the office of Mr. Green to enter that 
of David E. Nicholson of Wallingford, with whom he continued until 
his admission to the Rutland county bar, April 4, 1862. The same year 
he enlisted in Company B, Ninth Regiment, Vermont Volunteers, and 
served until the end of the war. He was captured and paroled. When 
Richmond was taken he was the first to enter the city and personally 
hauled down the flag that was flying over the residence of Jefferson 
Davis. He was promoted from the office of Second Sergeant of his 
company to that of Captain. 
For a short time he remained in North Carolina, where he had an 
extensive practice in the Provost Courts, which' were organized under 
an act of Congress. Removing to Vermont he located at Wallingford, 
but soon removed to Rutland, which was his home during the re- 
mainder of his life. 
In the early days of his career his practice was slow of growth 
and in order to support his family he turned to outside work. From 
1869 to 1873 he was editor of the Rutland Herald, daily and weekly, 
a position which he filled with distinguished success. During the same 
time he was Register of Probate for the District of Rutland. By pay- 
ing careful attention to all law business entrusted to him during the 
years he was discharging his other duties by 1873 his practice had so 
increased that he gave up his editorial work and devoted his entire at- 
tention to his profession. He spent much time in general study of the 
law and devoted much attention to the subject of procedure. Hours of 
research among the records of the County and Supreme Courts were 
spent, to the end that he might become a master in the art of pleading. 
This made him an authority on the subject and he became the guide, 
counsellor and friend of young and old attorneys alike who were in 
doubt as to how to bring their cases. Business came in great abundance. 
At one time he was connected with no less than two hundred pending 
cases. In addition to this he wras master and referee in many other 
cases and during the last years of his life was Referee in Bankruptcy. 
Yet his work was so ordered that it did not seem to the outside world 374 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
that he was over-busy. His practice extended to the counties that 
border Rutland and took him into the Federal Courts and to the United 
States Supreme Court. He tried his cases fairly, honestly and earn- 
estly on their merits, without using any of the tricks of the pettifogger. 
He always spoke fluently, logically and to the point, but was without 
magnetism. It is natural that such a lawyer should have been more 
successful with the courts than with juries; yet for a quarter of a cen- 
tury he was engaged in most of the important jury trials in his county. 
His temperament was well adapted to the large work which he dis- 
patched for so long a time. He had an even temper and was slow to 
wrath. 
He had little political ambition. He held but one public office, 
that of County-Senator. It came suddenly and unsought in 1886, and 
he filled it with ability. In 1900 he reluctantly became a candidate for 
Congress, but could be induced to do nothing to further his canvass; 
not a letter even would he write in his own behalf. It was natural that 
in a heated canvass on the part of other aspirants he should have failed 
of the nomination. One position he did aspire to, and that a place on 
the Supreme Court, and twice in his career his ambition seemed about 
to be gratified, but each time the honor fell to another. 
ALDACE F. WALKER 
1842-1901 
Aldace F. Walker of Rutland was an exceptionally able lawyer 
and administrator. He was born in West Rutland May 11, 1842, the 
son of a Congregational minister. He spent his youth in West Rut- 
land, where he attended school. He prepared for college at Kimball 
Union Academy at Meriden, N. H., and graduated from Middlebury 
College in 1862, standing at the head of his class. The last months of 
his course were spent in enlisting and drilling recruits for the Eleventh 
Vermont Infantry, of which he was commissioned First Lieutenant. 
He delivered his valedictory address amid great enthusiasm, in the 
uniform of his rank. He was promoted to the position of Captain and 
later commissioned as Lieutenant Colonel. His war record was a 
splendid one for bravery and discipline. When the war was over he 
returned to Vermont and took up the study of law, first in Walling- 
ford and Manchester and then in the office of George F. Ed- 
munds in Burlington. He completed his studies in Columbia College 
and for seven years practiced in the office of Strong and Shepard in 
New York City. On the death of the head of the firm he could have 
became a partner of the surviving member, Elliot F. Shepard, but pre- 
ferred to return to Vermont. In 1873 he removed to Rutland, where JOHN MARTIN THOMAS 
Born in Fort Covington, N. Y., December 27, 1869, 
being the son of Rev. and Mrs. C. N. Thomas. He 
graduated from Middlebury College in 1890, from Union 
Theological Seminary in 1903 and studied in Germany. 
He was ordained a Presbyterian minister in 1893 and 
was pastor of the Arlington Avenue Church at East 
Orange, N. J., from 1893 to 1908. In 1908 he was 
elected president of Middlebury College and served 
that institution very efficiently until 1920, when he re- 
signed to accept the presidency of Pennsylvania State 
College. He was a member of the Lake Champlain 
Tercentenary Commission. He served as Chaplain of 
the Vermont regiment ordered to the Mexican border 
in 1916 and in a similar capacity on an army transport 
plying between the United States and Europe during 
the World War. He was the first commander of the 
Vermont division of the American Legion. In 1920 
he was elected one of the Vermont delegates to the 
Republican National Convention. He is author of 
“The Christian Faith and the Old Testament” (1908), 
and a contributor to various magazines. In 1893 he 
married Sarah G. Seeley of Middlebury, Vt. Five 
children have been born to them, Marion S., Huldah M., 
Henry S., John M. and Sarah G. Thomas. THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
375 
he formed a partnership with Judge Prout. As the active member of 
the firm of Prout and Walker, Prout, Simons and Walker, and Walker 
and Livingston, he was engaged in most of the important litigation of 
the time in Rutland county. Toward the end of his career in Vermont 
he gave most of his time to equity cases. 
Upon the creation of the Interstate Commerce Commission he 
was appointed by President Cleveland one of the five commissioners. 
This place he resigned in 1889 to become Chairman of the Interstate 
Commerce Railway Association, a rate-maintaining organization com- 
posed of most of the railroads operating westerly and southerly of 
Chicago. He was also at the head of the Western Traffic Association, 
which was a successor to the former association. During the time he 
held these trusts he resided in Chicago. He was one of Vermont’s 
Commissioners to the World’s Columbian Exposition. On the disso- 
lution of the Western Traffic Association, he became one of the Com- 
missioners of the Joint Committee of the Central Traffic and Trunk 
Line Association, comprising railroads east of Chicago. In 1894 he 
practiced law in Chicago and New York in interstate commerce mat- 
ters. In the same year he was appointed one of the receivers of the 
Atchison road, of which he soon became the active head. His bril- 
liant service here made him the chairman of the board of directors 
and of its executive committee when the road was re-organized in 
1895. He continued in the service of this corporation until his death, 
April 12, 1901. 
Colonel Walker was a truly great man, strong, able and fair in the 
practice of his chosen profession and skilful in the administration of 
the great trusts that came to him in his mature years. He held high 
rank as a citizen, was a forceful and accomplished orator, an interest- 
ing writer, a lover of good things in literature and a companionable 
and attractive man. 
GEORGE E. LAWRENCE 
1844-1921 
George E. Lawrence, for many years a leader at the Rutland 
county bar, had the unique and unusual experience of having occu- 
pied the same rooms at 25 1-2 Merchants Row, in the city of Rutland, 
during his practice of fifty-one years. 
He came of good New England stock, which numbered among 
its members those who were conspicuous in both civil and military life. 
His father was Edwin Lawrence of Weybridge, a man of high char- 
acter, who married Harriet Yale of Middlebury. 
George E. Lawrence was born at Weybridge, June 10, 1844. 
After the proper preparation therefor he entered Middlebury College, 376 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
where he graduated in 1867. At the Albany Law School he graduated 
in 1868, and the same year pursued his studies further in the office of 
John W. Stewart, at Middlebury, and was admitted to the bar. He be- 
gan practice at Rutland in 1870. Four years later he formed a part- 
nership with Charles H. Joyce, later a member of Congress, which 
continued for four years, and subsequently he was associated in prac- 
tice for many years with P. M. Meldon. He was alone in practice for 
some time, but as soon as his son, Robert A., was fitted for the bar he 
took him as a partner and later his son, Edwin W., and Bert L. Staf- 
ford became his partners. 
He held the office of State’s Attorney from 1878 to 1880, and 
again from 1900 to 1902. He was Municipal Judge from 1874 to 1878, 
and declined re-election. He represented Rutland in the General As- 
sembly in 1894, and was President of the Rutland County Bar Asso- 
ciation for several years. He married Catherine E. Phalen. The two 
sons, Robert A. and Edwin W., and a daughter, who died in 1888, 
were the only children. Sketches of both sons appear in this chapter. 
George E. Lawrence died at Rutland, April 9, 1921. 
George E. Lawrence was an able lawyer, a wise and safe counsel- 
lor, industrious and painstaking, of sound judgment, and courteous in 
demeanor. He stood among the leaders of the bar with Joel C. Baker 
and Thomas W. Moloney, and was a successful j'ury advocate. He 
enjoyed the confidence of the Judges and of his associates at the bar, 
and had the esteem of all with whom he had professional or social 
intercourse. He presented his cases before the Supreme Court with 
such candor and ability that one of its distinguished members said of 
him: “We always pay attention when Judge Lawrence argues a case 
before us. He is always helpful, and we can always rely upon him 
because he never attempts to mislead the court.” 
WILLIAM B. C. STICKNEY 
1845- 
William B. C. Stickney, the leader of the Vermont bar, was born 
at Marblehead, Mass., January 16, 1845, in a house built by Capt. 
Nicholas Trivett, who commanded an artillery company at the Battle 
of Bunker Hill. He was educated at home and in the Cambridge and 
Boston public schools and at Harvard College, where he was a mem- 
ber of the class of 1865, but did not receive the degree of A. B. until 
1905. He received the honorary degree of A. M. from Dartmouth 
College in 1896, and of LL. D. from Middlebury College in 1918. 
In 1857, after graduating at the Mayhew Grammar School, Hawkins 
Street, Boston, he headed a procession of Franklin Medal Scholars at THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
377 
the dedication of the Franklin Statue in the City Hall Yard of Boston. 
The rear guard of the procession was a barouche in which were two 
medal scholars, residents of the North End, Mr. Lash and Mr. Harris, 
the recipients of their medals at the first distribution in 1793. In 1868 
Mr. Stickney was at Washington, having employment in the legal 
bureau of the Secretary of the Treasury, also in the Patent Office. At 
the same time he was the secretary of Senator Fessenden of Maine, 
and later acted in a similar capacity for Gen. Benjamin F. Butler of 
Massachusetts. After admission to the bar in the Supreme Judicial 
Court of Massachusetts and the Circuit Court of the United States 
for the first circuit, he came to Vermont, and was admitted to the bar 
of Windsor county at the December term in 1874. 
In August, 1875, he entered into a partnership with the late 
Augustus P. Hunton, at Bethel, a grand opening for a young and am- 
bitious lawyer. Judge Poland, Edward J. Phelps, and George F. Ed- 
munds were frequent callers at the office of Hunton and Stickney to 
confer with Mr. Hunton upon legal questions of importance arising 
in their practice, and the young junior partner had rare opportunities 
of observing the shrewd practical application of the principles of law 
to matter of business. It was several years before he felt qualified to 
assume independent responsibility, although thoroughly convinced that 
the only course for a practitioner in advising clients and conducting 
their business of a legal nature is to rely upon his own judgment, the 
fruit of his own study, deliberation and consideration, fortified, per- 
haps, but not engendered by the opinion of others. 
In Bethel, his home, he met as opponents Hon. John W. Rowell, 
for many years Chief Judge of the Supreme Court, James J. Wilson, 
a sharp, ready and resourceful advocate; Dudley C. Denison of Roy- 
alton, a successful jury lawyer; Warren C. French of Woodstock, a 
skilful attorney, learned in the law; William E. Johnson, also of 
Woodstock, a grandson of the late Senator Collamer, a man of remark- 
able judgment and intuitive perception of what the law ought to be 
and a great force before a jury. Such a practice was stimulating and 
a continuous incitement to efforts and study of principles, as well as 
cases. 
Mr. Stickney’s early study of the law, before his admission to the 
bar, was in the office of the late Chief Judge Isaac F. Redfield in Bos- 
ton, where in connection with a regular course of study of text books 
upon the various branches of law and equity, he was employed to col- 
lect authorities for text books written or edited by Judge Redfield. 
This involved research in the Social Law Library of Boston, then kept 
in the old Suffolk County Court House, about which lingers 
the memories of Webster, Choate, Dexter, Judge Wild, Judge Shaw 
and the great masters of the logic and eloquence of the common law 
of England. An ever present recollection of these delightful days is 378 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
the vision of the late Horace Gray, then at the bar, afterwards Chief 
Justice of the Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts, and later Jus- 
tice of the Supreme Court of the United States, and the late Theron 
Metcalf, formerly a Justice of the Supreme Judicial Court of Massa- 
chusetts. Judge Gray was very tall, about six feet, and of massive 
stature and extreme dignity. Judge Metcalf, equally dignified, was 
very diminutive, about five feet one, and thin. Both were profound 
students and daily visitors at the Library, Judge Gray to study the law 
applicable to his cases, Judge Metcalf preparing work for publication. 
However absorbed Judge Gray might be, he never failed to be at hand 
to reach a book on the high shelf as Judge Metcalf might require it. 
Mr. Stickney’s later practice, after 1891, was largely for clients 
out of Vermont. His first considerable employment was by the New 
York Life Insurance Company, and later his time and services were 
almost entirely engrossed by public service corporations and a few in- 
dustrial associations at the sacrifice of the more exciing conduct of 
suits arising in the ordinary course of human events, and disputes re- 
sulting from pride, passion, prejudice, spite, or the root of all evil, 
love of money. The consequence has been that for the latter years of 
his practice he has not appeared in Court as often as formerly, but he 
has tried several important cases in recent years and is pretty sure to 
be offered a retainer on one side or the other, and sometimes on both, 
in cases involving large interests that are for trial. 
Among his most important clients are the Boston and Maine, and 
New York, New Haven and Hartford Railroads, the American Express 
Company, the New England Telephone and Telegraph Company and 
the Western Union Telegraph Company. 
In 1884 Mr. Stickney was a member of the General Assembly, 
representing the town of Bethel, where he had been married in Febru- 
ary, 1877, to Mary Hunton, his partner’s daughter, and where his 
children were born. In the Legislature his great effort was to relieve 
the towns of the State from excessive burdens in the maintenance of 
highways by transferring such excess to the State, in which he was 
not particularly successful. 
After 1884 he attended the several sessions of the General Assem- 
bly at Montpelier in the interests of clients, and took occasion to ex- 
ert his influence in general legislation affecting. taxation, highways, 
transportation and banking, and the administration of justice. His 
advice was frequently sought and freely rendered according to his 
light. His attendance at Montpelier was continuous through the ses- 
sions after 1884 until 1915. Since that year it has been only occa- 
sional. He has never sought public office, nor engaged in politics, 
other than as he felt that his duty to the community and his State de- 
manded his activities and exertion as a private citizen intensely con- 
cerned for the public welfare. THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
379 
Mr. Stickney has enjoyed the undisputed leadership of the bar 
for more than twenty years, has tried important cases in most of the 
counties in Vermont, and has argued many cases in the Supreme Court 
and in the Federal Courts. His is the best trained mind in the pro- 
fession and his long and wide experience, sound judgment and pro- 
found learning have given him preeminence over the other members of 
the bar. His charming personality and warm interest in the work of 
his fellow lawyers have made him a general favorite with them and 
his erudition and masterly presentation of cases to the courts, as well 
as his courteous conduct on all occasions, have endeared him to the 
Judges. His life is an illustration of what can be accomplished by a 
country lawyer of equipment and talents that are adapted to and ap- 
plied in the discharge of intricate and important legal duties. 
JAMES C. BARRETT 
1851-1887 
James C. Barrett, of Rutland, was the victim of a fatal accident 
which occurred on February 14, 1887. He was a leader of the Rut- 
land county bar and a man of great promise. This was at a time when 
tobogganing was a popular pastime in Rutland. In the chute down 
which Mr. Barrett slid was a splintered board which had been dis- 
placed by some one passing over it so that it projected into the slide, 
pointing upward. Without any knowledge of this condition on the 
part of Mr. Barrett, he and two others, including Mrs. Barrett, dashed 
down the chute. Mrs. Barrett was uninjured, the other passenger re- 
ceived an ugly wound from the splintered board, which passed from 
her body into that of Mr. Barrett, which it entered on the inner side of 
the thigh. It went through the abdomen, and came out at the back. 
Thus transfixed, he was caught up from the toboggan, which passed 
on down the chute. Assistance was soon at hand and he was carried 
to a near-by building, where medical help was hastily summoned. The 
board, which was still in his body, was sawed off and removed and the 
fearful wounds dressed as best they could be. Mr. Barrett was fully 
conscious and realized his great danger. His first call was for his wife 
and when she arrived he kissed her and asked her to pray for him. 
They both prayed and when the doctors were about to etherize him he 
asked them, one after the other, about the chances for his recovery 
and when told that they were about one in a thousand he said he would 
try and take that chance. He remained conscious and comparatively 
comfortable during most of the next day, was able to converse with 
the members of his family, but died before midnight. 380 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
James C. Barrett was the son of Judge James Barrett of the Ver- 
mont Supreme Court. His birth was at Woodstock, December 26, 
1851. He prepared for college in the village schools of Woodstock 
and under a private tutor, entered Dartmouth in 1870 and graduated 
four years later. In his junior year he was recognized as the fore- 
most writer and debater in his class. Following graduation he began 
the study of law under the direction of his father in the office of Wil- 
liam E. Johnson, at Wodstock. Ill health prompted an ocean voyage 
and he visited Europe, spending some time with George P. Marsh, 
then Minister to Italy, and with Henry Stevens, trustee and acting 
librarian of the British Museum, both distinguished Vermonters. He 
returned home in May, 1877, and that year was admitted to the bar 
in Windsor county. In July he located in Rutland, where he remained 
in practice until his tragic death. In 1882 his father removed to the 
same place and the two formed a partnership under the name of Bar- 
rett and Barrett. Mr. Barrett was one of the most promising members 
of the bar of his county at the time of his decease. He was connected 
with the important litigation in Rutland county. In the celebrated 
case of Langdon against Vermont & Canada Railroad Company he 
had a leading part, as he did in the case of Chaffee against the Rutland 
Railroad Company, the Rutland Railroad Company against Clement 
& Sons, and Tillotson against Pritchard; but the case in which his 
abilities were best displayed was that of the Rutland Railroad Com- 
pany against Page. This was heard at the March term, 1885, in Rut- 
land County Court, and was one of the most remarkable cases ever 
tried in Vermont. The damages claimed were two million dollars and 
the trial lasted eight weeks and two days. Mr. Barrett was the lead- 
ing attorney and examined and cross examined most of the witnesses 
and argued many of the questions of law raised during the trial. He 
displayed great mental and physical vigor and proved a match for the 
older and more experienced lawyers who opposed him. And yet his 
forte was not as a jury advocate, where he was perhaps too refined to 
be effective at all times. But he was a brilliant legal scholar who knew 
the law not merely as a system of rules and decisions but as a body of 
harmonious principles. In style he was perspicuous, energetic and con- 
cise. He never attempted the pathetic and rarely the humorous; he 
seldom resorted to sarcasm or invective, but he had great facility of 
expression and could effectually meet an argument of an hour by a 
statement of a few minutes. His fine legal attainments were coupled 
with severe integrity and great moral courage and independence. JULIA C. R. DORR 
The daughter of Mr. and Mrs. William Y. Ripley, 
was born in Charleston, S. C., February 13, 1825. Her 
parents removed to Vermont when she was young. 
In 1845 she married Seneca M. Dorr, a Rutland lawyer 
and banker. She began to write at the age of twelve, 
but published nothing until 1849, when her first poem 
appeared in the Union Magazine. For more than sixty 
years she was active in literary work. Several editions 
of her poems were published. In her later years 
“Afterglow” and “Beyond the Sunset” were published. 
Her prose work included four novels, “Farmingdale,” 
“Lanmere,” “Sybil Huntington” and “Expiation”; also 
“Bermuda,” “The Flower of England’s Face,” “A 
Cathedral Pilgrimage” and “In Kings’ Houses.” Emer- 
son gave her a place in his “Parnassus” and Stoddard 
included ten of her poems in his “Female Poets of 
America.” She was a woman of charming personality 
and her beautiful home was a center of gracious hospi- 
tality. She died January 18, 1912, aged eighty-seven 
years. Mrs. Julia C. R. Dorr THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
381 
THOMAS W. MOLONEY 
1862-1917 
Thomas W. Moloney, for more than twenty-five years a leading 
member of the Rutland county bar, was born in West Rutland, January 
10, 1862, the son of Michael and Mary Ryan Moloney. He concluded a 
preparatory course in Montreal College and graduated from Holy 
Cross in 1882. After graduation he entered the law office of Reding- 
ton and Butler in Rutland as a student, and when Mr. Redington sev- 
ered his connection with the business in 1885 he became a partner of 
Judge Fred M. Butler, remaining as such until the latter’s election to 
the bench as Superior Judge in 1909. The firm of Butler and Moloney 
was one of the best known in Vermont and its business extended 
throughout the southern counties of the State. After the elevation of 
Judge Butler to the bench Mr. Moloney continued the business alone 
until his decease. 
As a trial lawyer, and particularly as a criminal lawyer, Mr. 
Moloney stood in a class almost by himself. He had no superior, if 
an equal, in his State. His capacity of acquisition of the facts of a 
case was remarkable and his knowledge of men and wide range of 
general information exceptional. A winning presence and an elo- 
quence that was sure to touch the jury made him a formidable oppo- 
nent. He was without a peer as a cross examiner and rarely lost a 
case when the chances were equal. He had, moreover, the kindliest 
qualities of heart—an attribute that helped him not only in the acqui- 
sition and retention of business, but gave him a large circle of personal 
friends. 
He was a Democrat in politics. In 1890 he represented the City 
of Rutland in the Legislature, in 1896 was a candidate for Congress, 
and the same year was chairman of the Vermont delegation to the 
Democratic National Convention. Two years later he was the nom- 
inee of his party for Governor and in 1889 its candidate for the United 
States Senate. He received at a later time strong endorsement for the 
Federal Judgeship in this district. He was eminently qualified to have 
filled any of these offices. He died at Rutland June 30, 1917. 
MARVELLE C. WEBBER 
1868- 
Marvelle C. Webber was born at Rochester, Vt., January 14, 
1868. His father, Christopher Allen Webber, died at the early age 
of forty-one, but not until he had acquired the reputation of being an 382 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
accomplished lawyer. Edward J. Phelps, who was once associated 
with him in a suit, was so impressed with his ability that he urged him 
to leave Rochester and locate in a larger place. On his decease Judge 
Barrett said of him that he was one of the most promising young 
lawyers in Vermont. His father, Sumner Allen Webber, born in Rut- 
land, admitted to the Rutland county bar in 1824, after studying law 
with Judge Charles K. Williams, was likewise a lawyer at Rochester; 
he was a leader in his profession, a wise, able and prudent counsellor, 
and an eloquent advocate. Christopher Webber (great grandfather 
of Marvelle), moved to Rutland from Walpole, N. H. before 1800, 
when a young man, but afterwards located at Cavendish, where he 
became a man of great influence in the community, holding various 
town offices and twice representing the town in the General Assembly. 
Marvelle C. Webber received his preparatory education in the 
public schools of Rochester and at Montpelier Seminary, where he 
graduated in 1886. The same year he entered Williams College but 
remained only one term, when he entered Boston University, where 
he graduated from the College of Liberal Arts in 1889, with the de- 
gree of Bachelor of Philosophy. This was followed by a course in the 
law school of the same institution, from which he graduated in 1891, 
with the degree of Bachelor of Laws. Through the influence of his 
uncle, Marvelle W. Cooper of New York, in 1891 he entered the law 
office of Evarts, Choate and Beaman, while Mr. Evarts and Mr. Choate 
were senior members of the firm. After serving a clerkship for one 
year in this, the leading law office in New York, he was admitted to 
the New York City bar in December, 1892, and continued from that 
time in the employment of the firm until March, 1898, acting as man- 
aging clerk for a period of two years. In the latter year he left New 
York on account of ill health and returned to Vermont. In 1901 he 
located in Rutland, where he has since resided. Here he has con- 
ducted important litigation, and taken high rank as a lawyer. One of 
the first leading cases in which he was associated was that of Patch 
Manufacturing Company v. Protective Lodge No. 215, Inter- 
national Association of Machinists, which was brought to recover dam- 
ages on account of a strike and in which he was one of counsel for 
plaintiff. This resulted in a verdict for the plaintiff, which was later 
sustained by our Supreme Court. He argued, with the late Maxwell 
Evarts, Esq., of New York, the case of the State of Vermont v. 
the Clement National Bank before the United States Supreme Court. 
In this case the constitutionality of the tax legislation affecting savings 
deposits in national banks was involved. Mr. Webber was of coun- 
sel for the bank. In 1909 he was appointed by Governor Prouty one 
of a committee of three to arrange and provide for the compilation 
and issue of a digest of the reported decisions of the Supreme Court 
of Vermont. This digest was afterwards published by the West Pub- THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
383 
lishing Company, in 1911. In 1912 and 1913 he was made a commis- 
sioner from Vermont by appointment of Governor Mead to attend 
the annual conference of commissioners from the various States on 
uniform legislation. He served nearly two years as City Attorney for 
the City of Rutland. He has served as a School Commissioner for 
the City of Rutland since 1912 and as President of the Board for two 
years. He was appointed a member of the State Board of Education 
by Governor Gates in 1915 and was reappointed by Governor Clement 
in 1919, and by Governor Hartness in 1921. He was elected President 
of the Vermont Bar Association in 1920 and is a member of the 
American Bar Association. There is not in Vermont a more accom- 
plished lawyer nor a more polished gentleman. 
He married April 16, 1902, Mary Rex of Philadelphia, daughter 
of Dr. Oliver P. Rex, one of the most prominent physicians of that 
city and medical director of the Penn Mutual Life Insurance Co. 
There are three children: Payson Rex, Christopher Allen, and 
Marvelle Cooper. 
ROBERT A. LAWRENCE 
1878-1912 
Robert A. Lawrence of Rutland was a young man of attractive 
personality, wide sympathies, and good lawyership. He was the son of 
George E. Lawrence and a brother of Edwin W. Lawrence. Robert A. 
Lawrence was born at Rutland, October 15, 1878, and died at the same 
place, March 10, 1912. He was educated in the public schools of Rut- 
land, graduated at the Rutland High School in 1894, spent a year in ad- 
ditional studies at this school and in his father’s law office, then entered 
the University of Vermont, from which he graduated in 1899. After 
his college course was ended he entered the office of his father, where 
he prepared for his profession and was admitted to the bar in 1901. He 
formed a partnership with his father, which continued until his death. 
At the age of twenty-five he was elected State’s Attorney and held the 
office from 1904 to 1908. He discharged his duties with conspicuous 
ability and procured several notable convictions. He was counsel for 
important interests, including the Rutland Railroad Company and the 
Vermont Marble Company, was a director of the Rutland County 
National Bank and president of the Rutland Garment Company, a suc- 
cessful manufacturing corporation. 
On April 25, 1911, he married Mary Stickney, daughter of Wil- 
liam B. C. Stickney, the leader of the Vermont bar, from whom he 
was parted ten months later by death. The fatal tragedy was the 
last of a series of accidents that befell Mr. Lawrence. The first came 384 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
to him while in college. He fell while trying a rope fire escape in a 
fourth-story room of the Converse dormitory and was this time saved 
by falling into a snow bank. While campaigning in northern Vermont 
in 1906 in the Proctor-Clement contest for the governorship he in- 
jured a limb so badly that he was compelled to cancel his engagements. 
In 1909, while descending a mountain road in Chittenden, he was 
thrown from a carriage by runaway horses and his skull was fractured. 
The fatal accident was due to a defect in the electric system which 
lighted his home. He arose, apparently, from the bath tub, filled with 
water, and while standing in it turned the light off, receiving a shock 
which caused instant death. 
From young manhood Mr. Lawrence was a leader among his fel- 
lows. In college he was first and foremost in all college activities. 
He was equally prominent in athletics and in scholarship. He organ- 
ized a debating society and was a ready and efficient disputant. He 
was captain of a military company, winner of the prize in declamation, 
toastmaster at his class banquets, and a member of the Phi Beta Kappa 
Society. In later life he kept up his qualities of leadership. He spoke 
during campaigns, took an active part in local politics, attended the 
conventions of his party and nominated his friends for office. Twice 
he nominated Dr. John A. Mead for Lieutenant Governor—once in 
1904 and again in 1908, when he was elected. He nominated him for 
the Governorship in 1910 and was his trusted and influential adviser 
throughout the session of the Legislature following his election. In 
the practice of his profession Mr. Lawrence was active, studious and 
successful. He had the necessary qualities for eminent success in 
trial work and the scholarship essential to the argument of questions 
of law before the Supreme Court. But it is probable that his tastes 
and abilities would have dictated a political career had his life been 
spared and already his friends were looking forward to the time, not 
far distant, when he would be called to represent his district in 
Congress. 
EDWIN W. LAWRENCE 
1881- 
Edwin W. Lawrence, son of George E. and Kate C. Lawrence, 
was born at Rutland, Vt., March 27, 1881. He graduated at the Rut- 
land High School in 1897 and from the University of Vermont in 1901. 
In college he took high rank and occupied many positions of honor, 
graduating with the degree of A. B. cum laude and becoming a mem- 
ber of the Phi Beta Kappa Society. He studied law in the office of 
his father and was admitted to the Vermont bar in October, 1902. In THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
385 
November following he became Assistant Clerk of the Committee on 
Agriculture in the United States Senate, by appointment of Senator 
Proctor, who was chairman of the committee. In May following he 
was appointed Assistant Attorney in the Post-Office Department and 
discharged the duties of that office until September, 1905, when he 
was advanced to the position of Assistant Attorney in the Department 
of Justice, which he held until June, 1906. At that time he severed his 
connection with the Government and entered the office of Simpson, 
Bleacher and Bartlett in New York City, continuing therein until Sep- 
tember, 1908, when he became special assistant to the Attorney-Gen- 
eral of the United States, which place he resigned three months later 
to become attorney of the Rutland Railroad Company to succeed 
Judge H. Henry Powers. This place he still occupies and is engaged 
in general practice with Bert L. Stafford and Asa S. Bloomer in 
the firm of Lawrence, Stafford and Bloomer. He was admitted to 
practice before the United States Supreme Court in April, 1906, and 
while employed as special assistant to the Attorney-General in 1908, 
made the brief in the celebrated case for contempt, before that court, 
of the United States v. Joseph F. Shipp, et al. In deciding the case 
the court followed the claims made by Mr. Lawrence in his able and 
scholarly brief and imposed sentence on six defendants for their 
connection with the lynching of a negro at Chattanooga, Tenn., while 
his case was pending on habeas corpus proceedings before the United 
States Supreme Court. One of the defendants was the Sheriff of the 
county. The case attracted the attention of the whole country and 
was unique in the history of our highest court. 
In his connection with the Rutland Railroad and its litigation, 
Mr. Lawrence has met with a large measure of success. A wise, con- 
servative policy has been pursued which has resulted in a decrease in 
litigation and the promotion of a friendly spirit toward the road on 
the part of the public. Mr. Lawrence takes an active part in the 
business of the firm to which he belongs and assists in the trial of 
important cases outside of his railroad employment. He was elected 
in 1922 a Senator from Rutland county. 
He married October 10, 1904, Florence H. Roby, daughter of 
Rodney and Harriette Roby of Burlington. There are two children. 
PRESENT MEMBERS OF THE RUTLAND COUNTY BAR 
William A. Atwell, of Brandon, was born at Johnson, February 
8, 1867. He was educated at the Peoples Academy and Johnson Nor- 
mal School, where he graduated in 1889. He graduated at the Ann 
Arbor Law School in 1892, studied law with Philip K. Gleed at Mor- 
risville, Otis Kelton at Montgomery, George A. Ballard at Fairfax, 386 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
and was admitted to the bar in 1893. He practiced at Bristol, 1893- 
1894, and has since practiced at Brandon. He has been Grand Juror 
for fifteen years; has held the offices of Town Agent, Moderator and 
Selectman; was a member of the House, 1915-1917. 
Thomas H. Browne, of Rutland, was born at Rutland, May 26. 
1859. He was educated in the public schools of Rutland and studied 
law in the office of Bradley B. Smalley at Burlington and with Patrick 
M. Meldon at Rutland. He was admitted in 1899 and has practiced 
at Rutland. He has been an Alderman for several years and in 1896- 
1897 was Mayor of Rutland. He was the Vermont member of the 
Democratic National Committee from 1908 to 1916; has attended 
all the national conventions of his party since 1906 and spoken in 
every national campaign since 1896. He was appointed Chinese In- 
spector by Secretary Carlisle in 1893 and was ordered to New York 
by Secretary Shaw in 1897, where he remained in the service until 
the Chinese immigration to this country ended. He has been Referee 
in Bankruptcy since 1916. 
Asa S. Bloomer, of Rutland, was born at Proctor, August 15, 
1891. He attended the public schools in West Rutland, graduated at 
the University of Vermont in 1913 and from the Yale Law School 
in 1917. He studied law in the office of Lawrence, Lawrence and 
Stafford in Rutland and was admitted to the bar in 1917. He prac- 
ticed at Rutland from November 20 to December 18, 1917, when he 
entered the military service in the war with Germany, in which he 
remained until January 14, 1919, since which time he has been in 
practice in Rutland. 
William H. Botsford, of Rutland, was born at Vergennes, July 
12, 1872. He graduated at the Vergennes High School in 1890 and 
at Middlebury College in 1898. He studied law with A. G. Stone 
at Wallingford, with George L. Hasseltine at Bristol, and with Taft 
and Stobbs at Worcester, Mass. He was admitted to the bar of 
Massachusetts in 1906 and to the bar of Vermont in 1907. He prac- 
ticed in Worcester in 1906 and has since practiced at Rutland. 
John S. Buttles, of Brandon, was born January 20, 1877, at Troy, 
N. Y. He graduated at the Brandon High School in the class of 1893, 
and the University of Vermont in 1897, and at the New York Law 
School in 1900. He also studied law in the office of Governor Orms- 
bee at Brandon and was admitted to the New York bar in 1900 and 
to the bar of this State in 1906. He practiced at Rutland from 1906 
to 1915 in company with William H. Botsford and since then has 
practiced in Brandon. For four years following his admission to the JOHN G. SAXE 
Born in Highgate, Vt., a border town, June 2, 181(5. 
He studied in the St. Albans schools, entered Wesleyan 
University and at the end of the first year transferred 
to Middlebury College, from which he graduated in 
1839. He studied law in Lewiston, N. Y., and St. 
Albans and was admitted to the bar in 1843. He prac- 
ticed law in Highgate, St. Albans and Burlington and 
was elected State’s Attorney of Chittenden County in 
1851. He purchased the Vermont Sentinel in 1851 and 
was its editor for several years. He also held the office 
of Deputy Collector of Customs. In 1859 and in 1860 
he was the Democratic candidate for Governor of Ver- 
mont. In the forties, Mr. Saxe began to contribute 
to the Knickerbocker Magazine, and in 1849 his first 
volume of poems was published. He was noted for his 
humor and was one of the most popular poets of his 
time. More than forty editions of his poems were pub- 
lished in America and Europe. He was also one of 
the well-known lecturers of the period. In 1860 Mr. 
Saxe removed to Albany, N. Y., and later he lived in 
Brooklyn. In 1841 he married Sophia Sollace of Brid- 
port, Vt., and five children were born to them. Mr. 
Saxe died in 1887. The State of Vermont has erected 
a monument at Mr. Saxe’s birthplace in Highgate. THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
387 
New York bar he was engaged in insurance work in the West and 
never practiced in New York. He represented Brandon in the House 
in 1919, and has been Commissioner of Industries since July, 1919. 
Oscar H. Bump, of Benson, was born at Wallingford, June 17, 
1845, and educated at the public schools of Wallingford and Rutland. 
He studied law in the office of David E. Nicholson at Wallingford 
and was admitted in 1866. He has not been in practice before the 
courts to any great extent, but had an office in Wallingford until 1877 
and since then has had an office in Benson. He was Assistant Judge 
of the Rutland County Court from 1888 to 1905 and was Justice of 
the Peace for twenty years from 1879. 
George A. Brigham, of Rutland, was born at Pittsfield, Novem- 
ber 27, 1868. He was educated in the district schools, Montpelier 
Seminary, and St. Johnsbury Academy. He studied law at the Albany 
Law School and in the office of F. G. Swinnerton, in the office of 
George E. Lawrence, and in the office of Edward Dana, at Rutland. 
He was admitted in 1893. He practiced at Rutland, Pittsfield and 
Barre, and in 1904 took up the real estate business which he has 
since followed. 
Charles R. Burgess, of Proctor, was born at Proctor, November 
21, 1889. He was educated in the Proctor High School and at the 
Albany Business College, and studied law at the National University, 
Washington, D. C., where he received the degree of LL. B. He was 
admitted to the bar of the District of Columbia in 1916 and of Ver- 
mont in 1917. He practiced in Washington for a year and since 
1917 has practiced at Rutland. From 1911 until his admission to the 
bar he was an accountant in the Bureau of Chemistry, United States 
Department of Agriculture. He holds the office of Justice of the Peace. 
James A. Clark, of Rutland, was born at Rutland, July 11, 1890; 
he graduated at the Rutland High School in 1908 and at the Albany 
Law School in 1911. He studied law in the office of William T. 
Foley at Rutland and was admitted to the bar in 1912. He practiced 
at Rutland from 1912 until 1918 and has since been engaged in the 
War Risk Insurance Bureau at Washington. He was a Justice of 
the Peace and Assistant City Judge while living in Rutland. 
Henry L. Clark, of Castleton, was born at Mount Holly, February 
5, 1847. He was educated in the Rutland High School and at Bran- 
don Seminary. He studied law in the office of Edgerton and Nicholson 
at Rutland and in the office of Cyrenius M. Willard at Castleton and 
was admitted to the bar in 1870. He practiced at Castleton in com- 388 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
pany with Judge J. B. Bromley from his admission until 1899 and 
since that time has been in practice alone. He was a member of the 
House in 1884, 1896 and 1906; of the Senate in 1886 and 1910; Rail- 
road Commissioner from 1886 to 1888; Assistant Judge of the Rutland 
County Court from 1891 to 1896; Register of Probate for the district 
of Fair Haven from 1868 to 1899 and Judge of the same court from 
1899 to date; Town Clerk for thirty-six years. 
Ashbel G. Cooledge, of Rutland, was born at Andover, April 29, 
1860. He was educated at the Black River Academy at Ludlow, where 
he graduated in 1881. He studied law with Gilbert A. Davis at Wind- 
sor and with Joel C. Baker at Rutland, and was admitted to the bar 
in 1884. He has practiced only at Rutland. He was Executive Clerk 
to Governor Ormsbee in 1886-1888; Engrossing Clerk in the Secretary 
of State’s office in 1888-1890; Assistant Secretary of the Senate, 1892- 
1894; Register of Probate, Rutland district, 1906-1908; Judge of the 
same court since 1908. 
Omeron H. Cooledge, of Rutland, was born in Andover, August 
27, 1862. He studied law with Howe and Coolidge at Rutland and 
was admitted in 1891. He practiced law for three years thereafter 
at Rutland in the firm of Cooledge and Cooledge, the other partner 
being his brother, Judge Cooledge, of the Rutland Probate Court. 
Edward Dana, of Rutland, was born at Woodstock, May 6, 1852. 
He was graduated from Middlebury College in 1876, and studied law 
with Dunton and Veazey at Rutland. He was admitted in 1880 and 
has always practiced at Rutland. He was special prosecutor by ap- 
pointment of Governor Pingree and was State’s Attorney, 1888-1890. 
John S. Dorsey, of Rutland, was born at Plymouth, October 4. 
1881. He was educated in the common schools of Plymouth and of 
Ludlow and graduated at the Black River Academy in 1900; studied 
two years in Boston University; and graduated at the Boston Univer- 
sity Law School in 1914. He studied law in the office of Judge Frank 
A. Walker at Ludlow and in the office of Thomas W. Moloney of 
Rutland; admitted to the bar of Massachusetts in 1914 and to the 
bar of Vermont in 1915; was in practice with Mr. Moloney until his 
death and since has occupied the offices formerly occupied by him and 
Judge Butler. He has been City Attorney and Grand Juror. 
William H. Dunn, of Rutland, was born at Rutland, May 25, 
1877, and was educated at the Rutland High School, Andover Acad- 
emy, where he graduated in 1896, and Lawrenceville School, where 
he graduated in 1897. He graduated from the New York Law School THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
389 
in 1905 and was admitted to the New York bar the same year. He 
practiced in New York from 1905 to 1910. He was admitted to 
the bar of Vermont in 1915. 
William E. Dever, of Rutland, was born at Brandon, June 20, 
1894. He was educated in the Brandon Graded and High Schools 
and at Holy Cross College, where he graduated in 1915. He studied 
law in the office of Walter S. Fenton at Rutland and was admitted 
to the bar in 1919. He has practiced since his admission in the office 
of Mr. Fenton. 
Walter K. Farnsworth, of Rutland, was born at Windsor, No- 
vember 17, 1870. He was educated in the schools of Chester and 
Woodstock and studied law in the office of George E. Lawrence in 
Rutland. He was admitted to the bar in 1898 and has since resided 
in Rutland. He was Assistant Secretary of the Senate, 1898-1900; 
Secretary, 1902-1906; Judge of the Municipal Court, 1907-1909. 
Walter S. Fenton, of Rutland, was born at Pittsford, July 12, 
1886. He was educated in the Pittsford High School and in the Rut- 
land Business College. He studied law in the Law College of Syracuse 
University and with Shanahan, Costello and Walters of Syracuse and 
with Charles L. Howe of Rutland. He was admitted to the bar of 
Vermont and to the United States Circuit Court in 1909. He was 
a Justice of the Peace, 1908-1914; City Attorney, 1915-1917; member 
of the House, 1917-1919; Executive Clerk to Governor Clement, 1919- 
1921. 
George M. Goddard, of Rutland, was born at St. Albans, October 
24, 1877, and was educated in the grammar schools of Rutland and at 
the Richardson private school at the same place. He studied law in 
the office of Lawrence, Lawrence and Stafford and was admitted to 
the bar in 1914. He has practiced at Rutland since admission and 
from February 1, 1919, to February 1, 1921, was Judge of the Rut- 
land City Court. 
George N. Harman, of Rutland, was born at Rutland, March 18, 
1891. He was educated in the public schools of Rutland, the Rutland 
High School, Phillips Exeter Academy, and the University of Ver- 
mont. He studied law with his father, Henry A. Harman, and was 
admitted in 1917. He has not been in active practice. He has been 
Rutland County Clerk since August 1, 1916. 
Charles P. Harris, of Rutland, was born in Springfield, Mass., 
July 2, 1852. He was educated in the schools of Rutland and at the 390 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute at Troy, where he graduated as a civil 
engineer. He studied law in the office of Joel C. Baker in Rutland 
after retiring from the manufacturing business and was admitted to 
the bar in 1897. He practiced at Rutland for a brief period when 
ill health compelled him to retire from the work of his profession. 
He has held many offices in business concerns and in societies of a 
public and benevolent nature. 
Charles L. Howe, of Rutland, was born at Mount Tabor, Feb- 
ruary 10, 1855. He was educated in the public schools of Mount 
Tabor and Rutland, and graduated from the New York School of 
Pharmacy in 1877. He studied law in the office of Joel C. Baker 
at Rutland and was admitted to the County Court in 1882, to the 
Supreme Court in 1884, and later to the Federal Court. He was 
City Attorney, 1895-1898 and in 1903; Judge, Rutland County Court, 
1899-1902; Mayor, 1912. 
Joseph C. Jones, of Rutland, was born at Granville, N. Y., June 
19, 1864. He was educated in the common schools and studied law 
in the office of William H. Preston at Fair Haven and in the office 
of George E. Lawrence at Rutland. He was admitted to the bar 
in 1889 and has always practiced at Rutland. He was State’s Attor- 
ney in 1892-1896 and in 1908-1910. 
Lawrence C. Jones, of Rutland, was born at Rutland, August 
10, 1893. He graduated at the Rutland High School in 1912 and 
entered the Worcester Polytechnic Institute in the fall of 1912 for 
the study of Mechanical Engineering, but gave this up to study law 
in 1915. He studied in the office of his father, Joseph C. Jones, was 
admitted to the bar in 1918 and has since practiced with his father 
in the firm of Jones and Jones. 
Harvey R. Kingsley, of Rutland, was born at Rutland, January 
8, 1872. He was educated in the public schools of Rutland, at Morse’s 
Private School, New York City, at Columbia College, where he grad- 
uated in 1893, and at Columbia Law School, where he graduated in 
1896. He studied in the law office of King and Jessup in New York 
City, in the office of J. A. Merrill and George L. Rice in Rutland, 
and was admitted to the bar in 1898. He practiced in New York 
from 1896 to 1900, and since 1900 has practiced at Rutland. He 
has been City Grand Juror and School Commissioner; he was Sec- 
retary of Civil and Military Affairs to Governor Mead; County Sen- 
ator, 1919-1920, 1921-1922. 
Clayton H. Kinney, of Rutland, was born at Rutland, October 
19, 1893. He was educated in the graded and high schools of Rut- THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
391 
land and studied law at that place in the office of Edwin W. Lawrence. 
He was admitted to the bar in 1918 and has practiced at Rutland 
since his admission. He is in practice with John H. Dorsey in the 
firm of Dorsey and Kinney. 
James P. Leamy, of Rutland, was born at West Rutland, January 
16, 1892. He was educated at the West Rutland graded and high 
schools, at Holy Cross College, where he graduated in 1912, and at 
the Boston College, where he graduated in 1913. He graduated at 
the Harvard Law School in 1915 and thereafter entered the law office 
of Marvelle C. Webber at Rutland. He was admitted to the bar in 
1916 and has held the office of School Commissioner of West Rutland, 
and is United States Commissioner for Vermont. 
Edward S. Marsh, of Brandon, was born at Brandon, October 
13, 1857, and was educated at the Brandon High School, and at Nor- 
wich University and Brown University, graduating from the latter 
in 1879. He studied law in the office of Ormsbee and Briggs in 
Brandon and with Arnoux, Ritch and Woodford in New York, at 
the Columbia Law School and at the Boston University Law School, 
graduating from the latter in 1882. He was admitted to the bar of 
New York in 1882 and to the bar of Vermont in 1884. He has prac- 
ticed at Brandon, where he has held only local offices. 
Patrick M. Meldon, of Rutland, was born at Rutland, April 20, 
1859. He was educated in the public schools of Rutland and at Mid- 
dlebury College, where he graduated in 1880. He studied law at 
Rutland with James C. Barrett and with Prout and Walker and was 
admitted in 1882. He has practiced at Rutland. He has held the 
following offices: Secretary of the Board of Education of Rutland; 
City Attorney for five years; Postmaster from 1914 to 1921. 
James A. Merrill, of Rutland, was born at St. Johnsbury, Feb- 
ruary 21, 1863, and was educated in the public schools of Rutland, 
at Phillips Exeter Academy, where he graduated in 1882, and at 
Yale University, where he graduated in 1885. He studied law in the 
office of Lyman W. Redington and James Barrett at Rutland and 
was admitted to the bar in 1888. He has always practiced at Rutland. 
He was Rutland City Judge, 1895-1899; he has held the office of 
United States Commissioner; Superintendent of Schools, Grand Juror 
and Lister. 
George E. Morse, of Rutland, was born at Rutland, April 19, 
1888. He was educated at the Lawrenceville School, at Lawrence- 
ville, N. J., where he graduated in 1902, and at Cornell University, 392 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
where he graduated in 1912. He studied law in the office of Lawrence, 
Lawrence and Stafford at Rutland and was admitted to the bar in 
1919. Since his admission he has been engaged in practice at Rutland 
in the firm of Wing and Morse. 
Edmund R. Morse, of Rutland, was born in Rutland, May 4, 1858, 
and was educated in the Rutland schools and at Cornell University, 
where he graduated in 1879. He studied law in Rutland in the office 
of James Barrett, Jr., and that of Prout, Simons and Walker, and 
was admitted in 1882. He has never practiced, but has spent his life 
in the employment of the Vermont Marble Company, in which he has 
been treasurer and director for many years. He represented Proctor 
in the House in 1896, was delegate to the Republican National Con- 
vention in 1916, and since the organization of the Federal Reserve 
Bank has been a director therein. He is also a director of the Rutland 
Railroad Company. 
Charles E. Novak, of Rutland, was born at Rutland, November 
7, 1890. He was educated at the Rutland High School, studied law 
in the office of Ernest H. O’Brien at Rutland and was admitted to the 
bar in 1914. Since his admission he has practiced at Rutland, where 
he held the office of City Grand Juror, 1915-1918. He was elected 
State’s Attorney of Rutland county in 1920. 
Learned R. Noble, of West Rutland, was born at Tinmouth, July 
9, 1871. He was educated in the public schools, at the State Normal 
School at Castleton, where he graduated in 1892, at the Rutland 
English and Classical Institution, where he graduated in 1897, and 
at Middlebury College, from which he graduated in 1903. He studied 
law in the office of Lawrence and Lawrence at Rutland and was 
admitted to the bar in 1909. He has practiced at West Rutland. He 
was a member of the General Assembly from West Rutland in 1921. 
Philip M. M. Phelps, of Fair Haven, was born in that town, 
June 12, 1886. He graduated at Cushing Academy, Massachusetts, 
in 1907, attended the Chicago Law School for one year and graduated 
at the Albany Law School in 1910. He studied in the office of William 
H. Preston at Fair Haven and was admitted to the bar in 1910. He 
has practiced in Fair Haven since 1912 and is a partner of Judge 
Pratt in the firm of Phelps and Pratt. He was a member of the 
House in 1915, and from 1919 to 1921, State’s Attorney of Rutland 
county. 
Leo E. Pratt, of Fair Haven, was born in Moriah, N. Y., May 
16, 1887, graduated from the Vergennes High School in 1907, from HORACE WARD BAILEY 
Born in Newbury, Vt., January l(j, 1852. He studied 
at Newbury Seminary and in his early years worked 
on his father’s farm. For several years he was em- 
ployed as a hotel clerk. He entered business for him- 
self in 1880, operating a grist mill and later a grocery 
and feed business. He spent much time as an admin- 
istrator of estates, in which he was successful. He 
was a director of the Citizens’ Savings Bank and Trust 
Company of St. Johnsbury and a trustee of Bradford 
Savings Bank and Trust Company. In 1894 he was 
elected a Senator from Orange county and in 1902 
was elected a member of the House of Representatives 
and he became one of the leaders of the House. He 
served as State Fish and Game Commissioner from 
1894 to 1900 and State Railroad Commissioner in 1902- 
03. In 1903 he was appointed United States Marshal, 
which position he held until his death, January 6, 1914. 
He w as a member of the Lake Champlain Tercentenary 
Commission. He contributed frequently to Vermont 
newspapers and Mas the author of many historical 
articles. He was a man of genial personality, a force- 
ful public speaker, a ready writer and an authority on 
Vermont historical matters. THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
393 
the Portland Business College in 1908, and from the Albany Law 
School in 1910. He studied law in the office of Pyrke and Dudley 
at Port Henry and was admitted to the bar of New York in 1912, 
practicing in the above office until 1913, when he removed to Fair 
Haven and formed a partnership with Philip M. M. Phelps. He was 
admitted to the bar of this State in 1914. He has been Judge of 
the Fair Haven Municipal Court since July, 1915. 
Frank C. Partridge, of Proctor, was born at East Middlebury, 
May 7, 1861, and graduated at the Middlebury High School in 1877 
and at Amherst College in 1882. He studied law at Columbia Law 
School, where he graduated in the class of 1884. He was admitted 
to the bar in 1885, and practiced at Rutland, 1894-1897. He has not 
been in active practice since 1897, but has been employed at Proctor 
by the Vermont Marble Company. He was first vice-president and 
after the death of Governor Proctor, president. He was Solicitor for 
the Department of State at Washington, 1890-1893; Envoy Ex- 
traordinary and Minister Plenipotentiary to Venezuela, 1893-1894; 
Consul General to Tangier, Morocco, 1897-1898; member of the State 
Senate, 1898-1900; chairman of the committee to propose amend- 
ments to the State Constitution, 1909. 
Camille V. Poulin, of Rutland, was born at Rutland, July 5, 
1888. He was educated in the high school of Rutland City. He 
studied law at the Albany Law School and was admitted to the bar 
in 1911. He has practiced at Rutland since his admission. He was 
Official Reporter of the Vermont Senate in 1908, and State’s Attorney, 
1914-1918. 
William H. Preston, of Fair Haven, was born at Fair Haven, 
March 29, 1859. He was educated at the Fair Haven High School 
and at Pine Grove Academy, studied law in the office of George M. 
Fuller at Fair Haven and was admitted to practice in the County 
Court in 1883 and to the Supreme Court in 1886. He has practiced 
at Fair Haven and Rutland. He has been Town Clerk of Fair Haven 
for thirty years; State’s Attorney, 1890-1892, 1902-1904; member 
of House, 1894; Senator, 1912. 
Edward D. Raymond, of Fair Haven, was born in Bridgewater, 
June 8, 1868, and was educated in the common schools, at St. Johns- 
bury Academy, where he graduated in 1886, and at Amherst College, 
where he graduated in 1890. He studied law in the office of Enright 
and Blanchard at Windsor and was admitted in 1897. He located 
at Fair Plaven in 1898 and has practiced there since. He has been 394 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
school director and has held several town offices. He is a member of 
the Amherst alumni council, and is director of several corporations. 
Martin P. Riordan, of Rutland, was born at East Albany, Oc- 
tober 9, 1869, and was educated in the public schools of Albany, at 
Goddard Seminary, and at St. Joseph’s College, where he graduated 
in 1889. He studied law in the office of Justice Willard W. Miles 
at Barton and was admitted in 1892. He practiced from admission 
until 1898 in Barton and from 1898 until 1908 in Rutland, where 
he held the office of City Grand Juror. Since 1908 he has been engaged 
in insurance work as a special traveling representative. 
Willis M. Ross, of Rutland, was born at Poultney, May 8, 1863, 
and was educated at Troy Conference Academy and at Middlebury 
College, where he graduated in 1886. He studied law in the office of 
Edward Dana in Rutland and at the Columbia Law School, was ad- 
mitted to the bar in 1890 and has since resided in Rutland. He was 
Judge of the Rutland City Court, 1903-1907. 
William IT. Rowland, of Poultney, was born at Fair Haven, 
December 5, 1852. He was educated in the common schools and at 
the Castleton Seminary. He studied law in the office of George M. 
Fuller at Fair Haven and with Beeman and Platt at Poultney; was 
admitted to practice in 1879 and has remained at Poultney. He has 
been Town Clerk since 1884, with the exception of two years; Rep- 
resentative to the House in 1884, 1886, 1900 and 1910; Senator, 
1904-1906; State’s Attorney, 1896-1898. 
Lindley S. Squires, of Rutland, was born at Rutland, April 22, 
1890. He was educated in the district schools of Pittsford, at the 
Rutland High School, where he graduated in 1910, and at Middlebury 
College. He studied law in the office of Charles L. Howe at Rutland 
and was admitted to the bar in 1917. He has practiced at Rutland 
since his admission. He was doorkeeper of the Vermont Senate at 
the session of 1917. 
Bert L. Stafford, of Rutland, was born at Tinmouth and was 
educated at the high school of Wallingford, the Rutland Institute, 
and Middlebury College, from which he graduated in 1901. He 
studied law in the office of Lawrence and Lawrence at Rutland and 
was admitted to the bar in 1906. He has practiced at Rutland since 
admission and is a member of the firm of Lawrence, Lawrence and 
Stafford. He represented Tinmouth in the House in 1906. and was 
Mayor of Rutland in 1915-1917. He is a trustee of Middlebury 
College. THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
395 
Bert H. Stickney, of Rutland, was born at Plymouth, December 
21, 1876. He was educated at the Rutland High School and at 
Phillips Exeter Academy, and studied law in the office of James A. 
Merrill in Rutland and in the office of Edward Dana in the same place. 
He was admitted to the bar in 1900 and has since been in practice at 
Rutland. He was Captain of Co. A, First Vermont, 1900-1903; 
City Grand Juror; Justice of the Peace; Fish and Game Warden. 
1905-1908. 
James E. Sennett, of Poultney, was born at Dorset, May 13, 
1878, and was educated in the common schools of Wells, Troy Con- 
ference Academy, Westbrook Seminary, Maine, and Tufts College. 
He studied law with John Gilroy, at Granville, N. Y., and with King 
and Angell at Glens Falls. He was admitted to the bar of New York 
in 1906 and to the bar of Vermont in 1909. He practiced at Glens 
Falls from 1906 to 1909 and since has practiced at Poultney. 
Frederic G. Swinnerton, of Rutland, was born at Leicester, 
December 14, 1849. He was educated in the public schools and at 
Middlebury College, where he graduated in 1875. He studied law 
with Prout and Walker at Rutland and at the Harvard Law School, 
where he graduated in 1878. He was admitted in 1878 and practiced 
at Rutland until 1918. In 1886-1887 he was a partner of Aldace F. 
Walker in the firm of Walker and Swinnerton. He was City Attor- 
ney, 1885-1886; Judge of the Rutland City Court, 1909-1919; chair- 
man of the Republican District Committee since 1898. 
Frank D. White, of Rutland, was born in Londonderry, April 
6, 1863. He was educated at the Rutland Graded School, Vermont 
Academy, and Brown University, graduating from the latter in 1887. 
He studied law in the office of Butler and Moloney at Rutland and 
at the Albany Law School, graduating from the latter in 1890. He 
was admitted in 1890 and has since resided at Rutland. He was 
clerk of the City Court in 1890; Reporter of the House in 1890 and 
1892; Senator, 1894; Presidential Elector, 1896; member of House, 
1900. 
Frank W. Williams, of Brandon, was born at Brandon, Sep- 
tember 13, 1873. He was educated in the public schools of Brandon 
and studied law with Governor E. J. Ormsbee and at the Catholic 
University of America at Washington, D. C. He was admitted to 
the bar in 1899 and has since practiced at Brandon. 
Leonard F. Wing, of Rutland, was born at Ira, November 12, 
1894. He was educated in the public schools of Ira and Rutland HISTORY OF VERMONT 
396 
and graduated at the Rutland High School in 1914. He studied law 
in Rutland in the office of Lawrence, Lawrence and Stafford and 
was admitted to the bar in 1917. He has practiced in Rutland since 
January 1, 1919, when he formed a partnership with George E. Morse 
under the name and style of Wing and Morse. He is City Attorney 
and corporation counsel for the city of Rutland. He enlisted in the 
late war in 1917 and graduated from Fort Oglethorpe and received 
a commission as First Lieutenant in the infantry. From August, 1918, 
until December of the same year he was stationed at Camp Wheeler, 
Georgia, where he served as the Trial Judge Advocate of all the gen- 
eral and special courts-martial in that camp. He was appointed Judge 
of the Rutland City Court, February 1, 1921. WASHINGTON COUNTY 
WASHINGTON county of the present day is not the first Ver- 
mont county of that name. When the new State was annex- 
ing parts of New Hampshire and New York in 1781 the Ver- 
mont Legislature established a county to which the name of Washing- 
ton was given from the towns it had annexed east of the Connecticut 
River. That county had for its northerly towns Claremont, Newport, 
Unity and Wendall; but when the forty-five New Hampshire towns 
were restored, February 21, 1782, to their own State, this Washington 
county ceased to exist. 
From the organization of Chittenden county in 1787 to December 
1, 1796, Washington county towns were divided among three counties, 
and from December 1, 1796, to December 1, 1811, the present territory 
was in four counties; the towns of Barre, Berlin, Northfield and Rox- 
bury being in Orange county; Cabot, Calais, Marshfield, Montpelier, 
Plainfield and Woodbury, in Caledonia; Duxbury, Fayston, Middlesex, 
Moretown and Waitsfield being in Chittenden ; and Warren in Addison. 
On November 1, 1810, Jefferson county was incorporated and a 
committee appointed to designate the place of building a jail and court 
house. The new county was established by the acts of the session of 
1811. One of these acts fixed the place for holding courts at Mont- 
pelier. The territory embraced in Jefferson county was nearly that 
of the present county of Washington. In 1814 an act was passed 
changing the name of Jefferson to Washington. 
The courts were held first in the hall of the State House. In 1817 
a committee was appointed to build a court house near the northwest 
corner of the State House Common. This court house was thirty-four 
feet wide and and forty-eight feet long. The court room was thirty- 
three by thirty-four feet, arched above, and twenty-one feet between 
joints. The court house was completed in 1818 and occupied that 
year. This building was removed in 1837 to the place it now occupies, 
east of the Pavilion Hotel. It continued to be used as a court house 
until the fall of 1843, after which it was used for a time as a Catholic 
church, and of late years has been the residence of the priest in charge 
of St. Augustine’s Church. 
In 1843 a new brick court house was erected on Elm Street and 
partly on the site of the present court house. It was burned the same 
year. Court was then held in the Masonic Hall. The property on the 
corner of State and Elm Streets, where the present county buildings 
stand, was procured by subscription, and when a new court house was 
erected it was made to front on State Street. In 1879 an addition to 
this court house was built and the old part of the house remodelled. 398 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
May 25, 1880, the court house was burned, but the walls were left stand- 
ing. The same year it was rebuilt in its present form. A large, mod- 
ern jail to the east of this takes care of the county’s needs in this re- 
gard. 
Courts are held on the second Tuesday in March and September. 
WILLIAM UPHAM 
1792-1853 
William Upham, for ten years United States Senator, was born 
at Leicester, Mass., August 5, 1792, the son of Capt. Samuel Upham. 
who moved to Vermont in 1802, and settled on a farm in Montpelier. 
The loss of a hand unfitted William for farm labor. He spent a few 
terms at the old academy at Montpelier, was privately tutored for a 
time and was for a brief period a student at the University of Ver- 
mont. Then he studied law with Judge Samuel Prentiss at Montpelier 
and was admitted to the bar in 1811. For a few years he practiced in 
partnership with others, but mainly was alone during thirty years of 
active professional work following his admission. He shunned politics 
for a long time, but in 1827-28 and 1830 represented Montpelier in the 
Legislature. He became an ardent sympathizer with the Canadian re- 
bellion of 1838, and two years later he plunged actively into politics 
and stumped nearly the whole State for Harrison. The fruit of this 
experience was an enthusiastic personal following, which in 1842 made 
him United States Senator to succeed Senator Crafts. He was once 
re-elected and died during his second term. 
He was an ardent Whig; he voted for the Wilmot Proviso, the 
bill to establish territorial governments in Oregon, California and New 
Mexico, and was an earnest advocate of a protective tariff. He op- 
posed the compromise measures of 1850 and on this subject, the Mexi- 
can War and the tariff delivered able speeches in the Senate. 
At a bar of great lawyers Senator Upham was a foeman worthy 
of the best of them. As a jury advocate he was one of the best Ver- 
'mont has produced. He has been compared to Choate in the fiery im- 
petuousness of his eloquence, though lacking the latter’s poetic fancy. 
He was masterful in statement, biting in sarcasm, and full of nervous 
energy. He kept carefully out of politics until his reputation was made 
at the bar, holding to the doctrine that “the law is a jealous mistress.” 
In the Senate he studied his subject exhaustively and then in an effect- 
ive manner marshalled his facts and arguments. His speeches were 
marked by research, earnestness, ability and patriotic devotion. THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
399 
PAUL DILLINGHAM 
1799-1891 
Paul Dillingham, father of William P. Dillingham, United States 
Senator from Vermont, was born at Shutesbury, Mass., August 10, 
1799. He died at Waterbury, Vt., July 26, 1891. For sixty-eight 
years he practiced law. His father was a soldier in the Revolution 
and his grandfather was a soldier in the French War and fought under 
General Wolfe. In 1805 the parents of Paul Dillingham brought him 
to Waterbury, this State, and here he attended the district school. 
Later he attended the Washington County Grammar School at Mont- 
pelier and in 1820 began studying law with Dan Carpenter at Water- 
bury. He was admitted to the bar in Washington county at the March 
term, 1823. He represented this town in the Legislature in 1833-34- 
37-38-39; was State Senator in 1841, 1842 and 1861; State’s Attorney 
in 1835, 1836 and 1837; a member of Congress from March 4, 1843, 
March 4, 1847; was Lieutenant-Governor, 1862-64, and Governor in 
1865-66, and as his biographer says of him, “for more than fifty years 
drew tears and verdicts from juries.” 
He was a member of the Washington county bar in the days of 
Lucius B. Peck, Timothy P. Redfield, Stoddard B. Colby and other 
lawyers who were possessed of superior ability but he crowned them 
all in his capacity as a jury advocate. After a good deal of study of 
the lawyers of Vermont it seems to me that he was our greatest advo- 
cate. It is interesting to note the characteristics that made him fa- 
mous. He possessed, in the first place, an exceedingly fine presence. 
He had a commanding figure; he was fully six feet tall and weighed 
over two hundred pounds. His figure was well rounded but not cor- 
pulent ; his step elastic and his bearing kindly; he was warm-hearted, 
frank and manly; he had that fascinating address which invited re- 
spectful familiarity and cordial friendship. There was a dignified 
simplicity, too, about him that attracted attention. His eyes beamed 
with sympathy and kindness, and his gestures, movements and address 
were natural, easy and unaffected; his voice was musical and sweet as 
a flute in its lower cadences, but rang like a bugle in passion or excite- 
ment. Added to these qualities was an endowment of excellent health 
and happy, genial temperament. Not a plodder in the books but a 
genius in brilliant conceptions, glittering generalities, happy conceits, 
apt illustrations and appropriate anecdotes, he would compel an audi- 
ence to stand upon its feet by the hour to listen to his eloquence. He 
was a good lawyer out of court as well as in it, and knew how to ad- 
vise his clients and what remedy to recommend. He was not a special 
pleader but he reached results in a practical and sensible manner. In 
his old age his biographical sketch was read to him by Senator Dilling- 400 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
ham. It was from the pen of Mr. Fifield and was an attempt to an- 
alyze his wonderful power over juries. After it was finished he turned 
to his son and said: “Well, they all overlooked one thing, and that is 
that I had some common sense, and used some judgment.” 
As a citizen, legislator and Chief Executive he was likewise dis- 
tinguished. He was a devoted member of the Methodist Church and 
a great Bible student. He was accustomed to discuss the Scriptures in 
the weekly meetings and these discussions were gems of religious 
thought and expression. 
LUCIUS B. PECK 
1802-1866 
Lucius B. Peck was born at Waterbury, Vt., in October, 1802. 
He lived there until he was nineteen years of age, when, having fin- 
ished a preparatory course, he was admitted as a cadet to the Military 
Academy at West Point, July 1, 1822. At the end of one year he was 
compelled to resign on account of ill health, and the following year, 
being restored to health, he entered the law office of Judge Samuel 
Prentiss as a student. After one year he left this office and resumed 
study in the office of Denison Smith, at Barre. He was admitted to 
the bar in 1825 at the September term of the Washington County 
Court. He formed a partnership at once with Mr. Smith, who was 
then late in life, and the work of a large clientage fell upon Mr. Peck. 
In this he was eminently successful and soon was in the full tide of 
practice in Washington and Orange counties. At this early time he 
represented Barre in the Legislature. In 1827 Mr. Smith died and 
soon after Mr. Peck removed to Montpelier, where he continued to 
practice until his death. Governor Paul Dillingham, Senator Upham 
and Andrew Tracy practiced there, all men of exceptional ability. 
These men found their match in the cool, deliberate, mental power of 
Mr. Peck. He was slow, deliberate and argumentative but his dis- 
course was intended to instruct the understanding and convince the 
mind. His statement was candid and fair and sure to eliminate truth 
from falsehood. From 1830 to 1845 he did not mingle with politics. 
These were the happiest years of his life. In the latter year he took 
an active interest in politics and from 1847 to 1851 represented his 
district.in Congress, where he formed the acquaintance of such men 
as Daniel S. Dickenson and Governor Marcy, with whom he was on 
intimate terms. While he was reasonably successful in his congres- 
sional career, the law was his delight and it was a happy time for him 
in 1852 when he returned to the practice in Montpelier. There were 
few large suits in Vermont after this time in which he was not en- LARKIN G. MEAD 
Born in Chesterfield, N. H., January 3, 1835. His 
parents removed to Brattleboro while he was young. 
After studying in the village schools, at the age of 
fifteen he became a clerk in a hardware store. He de- 
veloped a love for art and on the last night of the 
year 1856, aided by his sister, Eleanor (afterward Mrs. 
W. D. Howells), he modeled a colossal statue of The 
Recording Angel in snow. This statue was photo- 
graphed and the newspapers of the country gave wide 
publicity to the achievement. He studied drawing and 
sculpture in Brooklyn and later went to Italy, where 
he was attached to the United States Consulate at 
Venice. He made his home in Florence. He executed 
many notable statues, two of Ethan Allen, one of 
Abraham Lincoln, numerous groups, and the pediment 
over the main entrance to the Agricultural Building at 
the World’s Columbian Exposition at Chicago. He 
died October 15, 1910. THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
401 
gaged. He was United States District Attorney under President 
Pierce; was twice nominated for Governor. He declined being candi- 
date for Judge of the Supreme Court on account of ill health. From 
1859 to his death he was President of the Vermont and Canada Rail- 
road. 
Mr. Peck was about five feet ten inches in height and weighed 
one hundred and forty pounds. His carriage was erect and his move- 
ment slow and dignified; he had an intellectual face. He was fastidi- 
ous in dress and his manner showed good breeding. He was careful, 
painstaking, thorough and very able in his work in County Court, but 
it was in the Supreme Court that he excelled. Here he was regarded 
by the court as the model lawyer of the State and no one helped the 
court as much as he. He died at Lowell, December 28, 1866. 
HEMAN CARPENTER 
1811-1884 
Heman Carpenter was born at Middlesex, Vt., July 10, 1811, and 
died at Northfield, January 16, 1884. His father was Nathaniel Car- 
penter, who came of Connecticut ancestry. He settled on the Win- 
ooski River between Montpelier and Middlesex, where he became the 
arbiter of local disputes and was the trial justice of that vicinity for 
thirty years. Heman was educated in the district schools and in the 
Washington County Grammar School of Montpelier. His father de- 
clined to aid him in procuring an education and to raise funds to at- 
tend the grammar school he taught in the district schools, where he be- 
came known as a skilful and valuable teacher. In 1832 he was ap- 
pointed State Librarian, which position he held until 1837. During 
his occupancy of this office the books were removed from the old to 
the new State House and were catalogued and numbered. He studied 
law with William Upham and was admitted to the bar in Washington 
county in 1836. In the same year he located at Northfield, where he 
practiced his profession until his decease. He was widely known as a 
jury lawyer, had a large docket in Washington, Orange and Windsor 
counties and was not a stranger in the courts of Caledonia, Lamoille 
and Chittenden counties. In 1847 he was elected a Representative 
from Northfield to the Legislature and was returned in 1848. At the 
latter session he was instrumental in procuring the passage of the first 
homestead law. From 1848 to 1850 he was Judge of Probate for the 
District of Washington. He was State’s Attorney for the years 1865- 
66 and State Senator in 1870-72. He was one of the delegates to the 
first Republican National Convention and usually a delegate at the 
State conventions of his party. When in 1870 he was made permanent 402 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
chairman of the State convention he announced on taking the chair 
that this was the fourteenth State convention of his party that he had 
attended. Mr. Carpenter was devoted to the cause of education, was 
one of the founders of Goddard Seminary at Barre and for several 
years its president; a benefactor of the University of Vermont, which 
conferred a degree upon him in 1860; a trustee and earnest supporter 
of Norwich University and the founder of the Northfield institution 
which was later merged in the Northfield Graded School. With Gov- 
ernor Paine he was largely instrumental in building the Vermont 
Central Railroad. 
As a lawyer Mr. Carpenter excelled as an examiner and cross ex- 
aminer of witnesses. He was also more than an ordinary advocate. 
He gave legal advice, even to strangers, without retainer and usually 
urged terms of settlement between litigants. He was industrious, 
earnest and faithful in his client’s cause, never tiring, never despairing, 
aggressive, bold and persistent. 
BENJAMIN FRANKLIN FIFIELD 
1832-1918 
Benjamin Franklin Fifield was born in Orange, Vt., November 
18, 1832, being the son of Col. Orange Fifield, who was the son of 
Col. Samuel Fifield, one of the early settlers in that town and an ex- 
tensive property holder therein. The family is of Scottish descent, 
and the family name is understood to have been originally a union of 
the name of County of Fife in Scotland, with the name of Field. Mr. 
Fifield’s ancestors emigrated to the Massachusetts Colony in 1634. 
His lineage in America is a notable one. On the maternal side he was 
descended from the Adamses of Massachusetts, his grandmother’s 
maiden name being Lucy Adams, she being in direct line of descent 
from Henry Adams, who came to this country about 1629, and who 
was the common ancestor of the Adams family. On the other hand, 
Samuel Adams, the Revolutionary patriot, was the son of Samuel and 
Mary (Fifield) Adams, the latter being in direct line of descent from 
William Fifield, the common ancestor of the Fifield family. His great- 
grandfather Fifield was an officer in the Revolutionary War and was 
the second man over the British entrenchments at the battle of Ben- 
nington. His grandfather’s brother, Colonel Edward Fifield, com- 
manded a regiment in active service in the War of 1812. Mr. Fifield’s 
father having moved to Montpelier, Benjamin F. fitted for college 
there, and at the Plattsburg (New York) Academy. He graduated 
with credit from the University of Vermont in the class of 1855. Se- 
lecting the law as a profession he pursued his legal studies in the office THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
403 
of Peck and Colby, in Montpelier, the members of which were Lucius 
B. Peck and Stoddard B. Colby. In 1858 he was admitted to the bar in 
Washington county, and commenced practice in Montpelier where he 
resided thereafter. Following his admission to the bar he became as- 
sociated with the firm of Peck and Colby, and when Mr. Colby re- 
moved to Washington in 1864 to become Register of the United States 
Treasury, Mr. Fifield formed a partnership with Mr. Peck. This con- 
tinued until the death of the latter in 1866, when Mr. Fifield succeeded 
to the business of the firm. From his admission to his retirement from 
active practice in 1900, he devoted himself assiduously to his profes- 
sion. In 1869 he was appointed by President Grant United States 
Attorney for the District of Vermont and received consecutive re- 
appointments until 1880 when he resigned the office on account of his 
election as representative to the Legislature from Montpelier. During 
his term of office he prosecuted General O’Neill and other leaders of 
the Fenian raid in 1870 and they were convicted of violation of the 
neutrality laws. He was a staunch Republican in politics. In August, 
1880, he delivered a speech on the political issues of the day, the vig- 
orous and effective character of which was at once recognized, and 
two editions of five thousand copies each were printed by direction of 
the Republican State Committee and circulated throughout the State. 
The speech attracted no little attention outside of Vermont on account 
of the publication and circulation of one million copies by the Republi- 
can National Committee throughout the North. It was an exceedingly 
trenchant description of the then political conditions and national per- 
ils, attractive in presentation as a romance, and convincing as naked 
truth itself. Throughout the campaign the Democratic orators pecked 
at the arguments contained in the speech, but were not able to dis- 
lodge them. 
In the Legislature Mr. Fifield was Chairman of the Judiciary 
Committee and was an influential member in a body of many strong 
men. 
In 1884 he was a delegate to the Republican National Convention 
and in the same year delivered a powerful address as President of the 
Vermont Bar Association, in which he urged that the tenure of the 
Judges should be during good behavior. In 1898 he was elected a trus- 
tee of the University of Vermont, in which capacity he served with 
keen interest until 1909, when he declined to hold the place longer. 
In 1904 he was elected Governor of the Society of Colonial Wars for 
one year, and in 1906 the University of Vermont conferred on him the 
degree of LL. D. 
As a railroad and corporation lawyer he stood for years at the 
head of his profession in Vermont. In 1869 he became counsel and 
confidential adviser of the Vermont Central Railroad Company, and 
of the receivers of that company and its successor, the Central Ver- 404 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
mont Railroad Company, and continued to March, 1899. The Vermont 
Central and Vermont & Canada roads were placed in the hands of re- 
ceivers in 1856, and the receivership was continued until 1883, a period 
of twenty-seven years, a thing unprecedented in judicial annals. A 
large receivers’ debt, amounting in bonds to $5,000,000 and a floating 
debt amounting to about $3,000,000, had been incurred, and when the 
floating debt went to protest in 1872, the validity of all this debt and 
its priority of lien over the Central Vermont first and second mort- 
gages and the stock of the Vermont & Canada Railroad, which was a 
leasehold estate, as well as the legal relations of the receivers to the 
road, were contested, and out of it grew the most extraordinary liti- 
gation ever known in this country. The principal case was commenced 
in 1873 for the enforcement of the receivers’ debts. It was brought 
in the State Court, and went to the Supreme Court three times before 
a final decision was reached in 1882. This litigation resulted in mani- 
fold entanglements, which called for the skill of the wisest counsel. 
Mr. Fifield was the responsible counsel and made the principal argu- 
ments. Opposed to him were Edward J. Phelps, Aldace F. Walker. 
F. A. Brooks of Boston and a large number of other counsel. Mr. 
Fifield was finally sustained on all the substantial questions involved 
when the litigation came to an end in 1883, and a re-organization of 
the road took place, leaving his clients in control. During his entire 
connection with the Central Vermont Railroad for thirty years, no im- 
portant action was ever taken without his advice, and during that period 
he established the most important of the rules governing the practice 
in receivership cases which have been followed in this country since 
that time. 
Mr. Fifield ranked as a lawyer in the same class with Lucius B. 
Peck, and Andrew Tracy of the last generation of Vermont lawyers, 
and with Edward J. Phelps and George F. Edmunds of the later gen- 
eration. 
In 1899 he was appointed by Gov. Edward C. Smith United States 
Senator to fill the vacancy caused by the death of Senator Morrill. 
It is an office very rarely declined, and no one doubts Mr. Fifield would 
have filled it with high ability had he accepted it, but Mrs. Fifield was 
at the time approaching the fatal end of a protracted illness, and on 
account of her critical condition he declined it. Had he gone to Wash- 
ington at the time he would have taken rank with Ed- 
munds and Morrill in the Senate. Upon the death of Mrs. Fifield 
in March, 1899, he severed his connection with the railroad and re- 
linquished all professional and public engagements. He was not in 
active practice afterward, although he was frequently called on for 
opinions in important and complicated cases. For thirty years Mr. and 
Mrs. Fifield resided in their handsome home on State Street, and dis- 
pensed a graceful and generous hospitality. Their home was a model THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
405 
of domestic felicity and elegance. Mrs. Fifield was refined and ac- 
complished and a favorite wherever she was known. Mr. Fifield 
was scholarly and fastidious in his tastes and habits, and was much 
devoted to his family. 
After his retirement from practice he spent his leisure with the 
books, for which he had an elegant taste, and with friends who had 
become endeared to him. He kept in touch with the affairs of the day 
and exercised a quiet influence in the community and profession. 
On January 4, 1865, he married Lucy, daughter of Erastus Hub- 
bard of Montpelier. Three daughters were born to them. The eldest, 
Fanny F., was born November 27, 1865. On the 26th of October, 1889, 
she was married to Burnside B. Bailey. The second daughter, Ara- 
bella B. was born February 14, 1870. October 17, 1895, she married 
Julius F. Workum. They reside in New York City. Ellen Lamb, the 
youngest daughter, was born October 20, 1875. She married Carlisle 
J. Gleason, October 18, 1902, and they reside in New York City. 
Mr. Fifield died at Montpelier July 23, 1918. 
HIRAM A. HUSE 
1843-1902 
Hiram A. Huse, son of Hiram Sylvester and Emily Morgan (Blod- 
gett) Huse, was born at Randolph, Vt., January 17, 1843. From 1845 to 
1868 the family lived in Wisconsin; here Hiram pursued his studies 
in the public schools and seminaries. Previous to 1860 he taught dis- 
trict school for several years and that year returned to Randolph, 
where he completed his college preparatory studies. In 1861 he en- 
tered Dartmouth College, from which he graduated in 1865, having in 
the meantime served in the army. After his graduation he attended 
the Albany Law School, where President McKinley was a classmate, 
and was admitted to the bar in 1867. He practiced his profession for 
a few months in Wisconsin but returned in 1868 to Randolph. Prior 
to 1872 he was for a time assistant under Principal Edward Conant 
in the State Normal School at Randolph. In 1872 he removed to 
Montpelier and entering the law office of Heaton and Reed began to 
practice his profession. During the next few years his time was 
divided between his practice, service in the State Library, of which 
Mr. Reed was custodian, and editorial writing on the Green Mountain 
Freeman. In 1873 he was appointed State Librarian, a position which 
he held until his death. From 1876 for two years he was a law partner 
of William A. Lord. In 1878 he was the representative from Mont- 
pelier in the Legislature, and in 1882-4 State’s Attorney for Washing- 
ton county. In 1883 he formed a partnership with Clarence H. Pitkin, 406 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
which lasted seven years. In October, 1890, the law firm of Dilling- 
ham and Huse was formed, which was later enlarged by the admis- 
sion of Fred A. Howland, the firm then being known as Dillingham, 
Huse and Howland, and continuing until the death of Mr. Huse. The 
senior member of this firm was Senator William P. Dillingham. 
Mr. Huse had a much broader life than is given to most lawyers, 
having been a teacher, newspaper writer, historian and librarian; but 
the law was his ambition and his destiny. His preparation in this was 
painstaking and comprehensive. He was fortunate in his association 
in early practice with Mr. Heaton and Mr. Reed. Mr. Reed was a 
fine lawyer and a great book lover. He and Mr. Huse came to have 
a warm attachment for each other and a common ambition to build 
up a State Library worthy of Vermont. Mr. Huse had the satisfac- 
tion of seeing his service of thirty years rewarded in the growth of 
the library from thirteen thousand to forty-two thousand bound vol- 
umes, and he left it rich in American and English reports, in digests, 
encyclopaedias, elementary treatises, statutes and public documents, 
and particularly in Vermont historical matter. 
Mr. Huse had a great fund of information on Vermont history. 
He was a walking depository of knowledge, covering different fields 
and many subjects. Facts and dates once lodged in his mind abided 
there and he was in constant demand by searchers for information 
both in Vermont and from outside, and no one ever sought him in vain. 
He patiently listened to those who came and never sent any away 
empty-handed. 
In the law Mr. Huse was an able counsellor. He searched thor- 
oughly for the truth and thought out well all questions before advising 
clients or putting his points on paper for the Supreme Court. Per- 
haps in this court he was the most successful, for he stated his propo- 
sitions tersely, and argued his case convincingly. He was very sure of 
his position and not quite convinced he was wrong when the court 
sometimes decided against him. In jury trials he was an excellent gen- 
eral, as he was in politics, and he could examine witnesses brilliantly 
and argue a case ably. His place, however, in a trial when associated 
with other counsel, was to advise as to the admission or rejection of 
evidence, as to the law of the case, and as to its general conduct. He 
was delightful as a companion, his integrity was unsurpassed, his help- 
fulness never ceasing. 
WILLIAM P. DILLINGHAM 
1843- 
William P. Dillingham, son of Gov. Paul and Julia (Carpenter) 
Dillingham, was born at Waterbury, Vt., December 12, 1843. He be- 
gan his education in the common schools of his native village and com- WILLIAM R. MEAD 
Born in Brattleboro, Vt., August 20, 1846, and gradu- 
ated from Amherst College in 1867. He studied architec- 
ture in New York and in Europe. He became a member 
of the architectural firm of McKim, Mead and White, in 
recent years one of the most famous firms in America. 
Among the structures designed by the firm are Madi- 
son Square Garden, the Rhode Island Capitol, the 
buildings of the New York Herald and the New York 
Life Insurance Company, and the Agricultural and 
New York State buildings at the Columbian Exposition. 
The firm are architects for Columbia University, the 
University of the City of New York, the University of 
Virginia and the Boston Public Library. He has been 
president of the American Academy at Rome. He is 
a brother of the late Larkin G. Mead, the sculptor. THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
407 
pleted it in Newbury Seminary and Kimball Union Academy. He 
read law in the office of his brother-in-law, Matt H. Carpenter, in Mil- 
waukee, Wis., and his father, Paul Dillingham, at Waterbury. He 
was admitted to the bar of Washington county in September, 1867, 
and at once formed a partnership with his father, under the name of 
Dillingham and Son, which continued until the retirement of the senior 
member. For several years after this time the junior member of the 
firm practiced alone. From 1890 to 1902 he practiced at Montpelier 
in the firm of Dillingham and Huse, and Dillingham, Huse and How- 
land. He began his public career in 1866 as Secretary of Civil and 
Military Affairs during the administration of his father and he per- 
formed a similar service in 1874-76 for Gov. Asahel Peck. From 1872 
to 1876 he was State’s Attorney of Washington county. He repre- 
sented Waterbury in the Legislature in 1876 and again in 1884, and was 
Senator from Washington county in 1878 and again in 1880. For six 
years following 1882, when the new State tax law was passed, he 
served as Commissioner of State Taxes. In 1888 he was elected Gov- 
ernor by the largest majority ever given in the State for that office. 
In October, 1900, he was elected United States Senator to fill the 
vacancy caused by the death of Senator Justin S. Morrill. Two years 
later he was elected for a full term of six years and again in 1908, 
1914 and 1920 was similarly honored. In 1914, Charles A. Prouty 
contested the election with Senator Dillingham but was defeated. 
At the bar Mr. Dillingham commanded the confidence and admira- 
tion of his colleagues and of the bench. To his fine literary abilities 
and deep knowledge of law, he added a commanding presence and con- 
summate strength as a speaker. He was at his best as an advocate be- 
fore the jury. In the discharge of his duties as State’s Attorney he was 
remarkably successful. His two most celebrated cases were those of 
Magoon for murder and Miles for bank robbery. As a legislator at 
Montpelier he was a leader in the Republican ranks, and much im- 
portant legislation of the period was of his authorship. As a campaign 
speaker, it is doubtful if Vermont has produced his equal. During 
several presidential campaigns he had stumped the State and rendered 
most effective service, but had not been called on for such service for 
some time prior to 1914 as his many arduous cares at Washington had 
kept him closely confined to the National Capital. His attractive per- 
sonality and charms as a speaker were not known to the younger men 
in Vermont in 1914, when he returned to try titles to the Senatorship 
with Mr. Prouty. The State had, moreover, got a feeling that he was 
too much of a reactionary and that a more progressive man should rep- 
resent it in the Senate. The brilliant campaign on his part which fol- 
lowed completely set at rest any question of his leadership, and his 
eloquent and powerful speeches throughout the State gave him the 
first place among the people, which he still holds. 408 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
He had such a triumph at Orleans, the stronghold of the Prouty 
supporters, during the campaign of 1914, as rarely falls to the lot of 
an orator. It had been arranged that he should speak here and he 
could not honorably avoid the engagement. It was a difficult task to 
face an audience that was in full sympathy with his opponent, but he 
gradually won his hearers by his frankness and boldness in strongly 
maintaining that his position on the public questions in which he had 
been criticized were correct and in his more emphatic declaration that 
he should stand by such positions for the future. Opposition changed 
into friendship as he went on; his hearers began a mild applause which 
grew into an enthusiastic one and before he had closed the whole 
audience was applauding him. He had won his cause and established 
himself in the affections of his listeners, and he carried the town at 
the election that followed. 
In the Senate he has served on some of the most important com- 
mittees, those of Transportation Routes to the Seaboard, of the Dis- 
trict of Columbia, of Indian Depredations, of Post Offices and Post 
Roads, of Privileges and Elections, of Territories and Immigration. 
On the latter committee he has rendered his most important service. 
FRANK PLUM LEY 
1844- 
Frank Plumley, an eloquent jury advocate, was born at Eden, Vt., 
December 17, 1844. His education was obtained in the common 
schools and at the People’s Academy at Morrisville. He began his 
legal studies in the office of Powers and deed at Morrisville and 
completed them in the law department of the University of Michigan. 
He was admitted to the bar in Lamoille county in 1869. The same 
3'ear he located at Northfield and formed a partnership with Hernan 
Carpenter, which continued until 1876. He was afterwards a partner 
of C. M. Johnson for two years and with Frank L. Bates for one 
year. In 1903 he formed a partnership with his son, Charles A. Plum- 
ley, now the President of Norwich University. In 1876 he was elected 
State’s Attorney of Washington county, an office which he held for 
four years. In 1882 he represented Northfield in the Legislature. In 
1889 he was appointed by President Harrison United States’ Attorney 
for the District of Vermont. In 1894 he was a Senator from Wash- 
ington county and president pro tem of that body. He was Judge of 
the Court of Claims from 1902 to 1908. He was elected to Con- 
gress in 1908 and re-elected in 1910 and 1912, but declined to be 
again a candidate. In 1884 he was appointed a lecturer on constitu- 
tional law at Norwich University and made trustee in 1888. The hon- THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
409 
orary degree of A. M. was conferred on him by this institution in 
1892. Mr. Plumley has rendered distinguished service on the stump, 
but his greatest triumphs have been in the law. Both as a prosecutor 
and as attorney for the defense he has shown exceptional ability in the 
trial of criminal cases. While State’s Attorney he prosecuted the Carr 
and Meaker murder cases with success and afterwards the Marsh 
and Buzzell murder case. He successfully defended Mildred Brew- 
ster, charged with murder, and in the celebrated Spotter case secured 
the acquittal of the respondent, Wilson, after a hard-fought trial in 
Windsor county, and he secured from the Legislature of 1902 the com- 
mutation of Doherty’s sentence of death. 
Mr. Plumley rendered distinguished service in the Venezuela 
awards, in which he acted as umpire. This was in 1903 and 1904. 
The unpaid claims of Great Britain, Germany and Italy resulted in a 
pacific blockade which led to arbitration. Eleven nations were repre- 
sented and as many tribunals were established at Caracas, each made 
up of commissioners, one of whom was named by the creditor country 
and one by the debtor country, and over these an umpire presided 
who was named by a neutral country, whose duty it was to decide 
questions that the representatives of the country in dispute could not 
agree upon. On the recommendation of Senator Proctor, Mr. Plumley 
was appointed by President Roosevelt as umpire of the British-Ven- 
ezuela claims, and later, on the request of Netherlands and Venezuela, 
he became umpire in their cases. Many important decisions were made 
by the umpire during the six months spent by the commission in Cara- 
cas, including an interpretation of the terms of the protocol providing 
for the commission, and there were eight cases which by permission 
of the litigant nations he brought home for decision and on which he 
spent three months in making his award. Soon after this service was 
performed, in December, 1904, the State Department called on Mr. 
Plumley at the request of France and Venezuela to act as umpire in 
their differences. This service was accepted and Mr. Plumley 
took up for decision at Northfield with the representatives of the 
nations named seven cases in dispute in which the total claims 
amounted to about $9,000,000. He reported his findings and opinions 
to the two commissioners after a labor of six months and these were 
subsequently edited and published by act of Congress and are valuable 
practical expositions of international law as applied to actual cases 
and are in use in some of the law schools in courses of instruction in 
international law. His decisions at Caracas, with the decisions of the 
umpires in the other cases tried there, were also published by act of 
Congress in a volume which may be found in the Library of Congress. 410 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
JOHN H. SENTER 
1848-1916 
John H. Senter of Montpelier was a lawyer of striking and orig- 
inal personality. In the rough and tumble of debate, wdiether at the 
bar or in the legislative or political field he had few equals. His mind 
worked with remarkable rapidity and his fund of information on a 
great variety of subjects equipped him for the duties of the disputant. 
He was, moreover, a well-read lawyer and in the department of evi- 
dence especially skilled. He was frank, open and honest with the 
court and took pleasure in assisting in the right decision of questions, 
as well as in the progress of the trial. Mr. Senter was born at Cabot, 
November 11, 1848, the son of Dearborn Bean and Susan (Lyford) 
Senter. He received his education in the public schools of his native 
town and in the high school at Concord, N. H. For many years he 
was a school teacher, having taught in all forty-three terms. He studied 
law with Clarence H. Pitkin in Montpelier and was admitted to the 
bar in Washington county in 1879. Subsequently he practiced his 
profession in Warren, but moved to Montpelier in 1885 and formed a 
partnership with Harlan W. Kemp, which lasted until 1891. For 
many years he was a director and officer in the Union Mutual Fire In- 
surance Company of Montpelier. In 1896 he was secretary of the 
Montpelier Board of Trade and in 1898 and 1899 the Mayor of Mont- 
pelier. In 1906 he represented his city in the Legislature, where he 
was a leader. In politics he was a Democrat. For nearly thirty years 
he was secretary or assistant secretary of the Democratic State Com- 
mittee and he frequently represented his party in National Conven- 
tions. In 1900 he was the Democratic candidate for Governor. He 
was State’s Attorney of Washington county in 1903-1904 and member 
of the State Tax Commission in 1906. President Cleveland, during 
his first term, appointed Mr. Senter National Bank Examiner and in 
1886 he was named by Judge Wheeler Commissioner of the United 
Sfates Circuit Court for the District of Vermont. In 1894 he was ap- 
pointed United States District Attorney for Vermont. Mr. Senter 
died very suddenly in his room at Montpelier, January 20, 1916. 
FRED A. HOWLAND 
1864- 
Fred A. Howland, son of Moses Nathan and Sylvia Ann (Ship- 
man) Howland, was born at Franconia, N. H., November 10, 1864. 
He was educated at Phillips Andover Academy and Dartmouth Col- 
lege. He graduated from the latter institution in 1887. He studied THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
411 
law with Senator Dillingham at Waterbury from 1887 to 1890, and 
was admitted to the bar of Vermont in the latter year. In January, 
1891, he commenced practice in Minneapolis, Minn., but in November 
of the same year he returned East and entered the office of Ossian 
Ray at Lancaster, N. H. In 1892 he went to Montpelier and became 
a member of the firm of Dillingham, Huse and Howland, continuing 
until the death of Mr. Huse in September, 1902, when the firm was 
dissolved. In the early part of 1903 he gave up the general practice 
of law to become counsel of the National Life Insurance Company, 
and in 1909 he was made vice-president of the company, and on the 
death of Joseph De Boer in 1915, its president, a position which he 
now holds. He was Secretary of Civil and Military Affairs under 
Gov. William P. Dillingham, in 1888-90; Clerk of the House of Rep- 
resentatives, 1896-8, and State’s Attorney of 'Washington county 
during the same period. He was Secretary of State from 1898 to 1902, 
and member of the Board of Library Commissioners from 1894 to 
1902. In 1910 he was made chairman of a commission appointed to 
submit a revision of the banking laws of the State. Mr. Llowland was 
an able and successful practitioner when engaged in general practice, 
and assuming his duties as a specialist in the law of insurance and 
securities, rendered invaluable service to his client. 
PRESENT MEMBERS OF THE WASHINGTON COUNTY BAR 
Charles B. Adams, of Waterbury, was born at Randolph 
September 2, 1887. He was educated in the common schools, at Ran- 
dolph State Normal School, and Montpelier Seminary. He studied law 
at the University of Maine College of Law and graduated in 1913. 
He studied in the office of March M. Wilson at Randolph, and was ad- 
mitted to the bar of Maine in 1912 and to the bar of Vermont in 1914. 
He practiced at Bangor, Me., 1912-1914; he has practiced at Water- 
bury since 1914. He has been Town Clerk since 1919. In 1921 he 
was appointed State’s Attorney for Washington county, and was 
elected to the same office in 1922. 
John M. Avery, of Montpelier, was born at Wallingford 
April 4, 1880. He was educated in the Middlebury High School and 
at Middlebury College, graduating from the latter institution in 1911. 
He studied law with Judge Charles I. Button at Middlebury and was 
admitted to the bar in 1919. He has done no general practice. He 
was Legislative Reference Librarian from 1913 to July, 1919, when 
he was appointed Commissioner of Taxes. He held this office until 
May 1, 1920, when he exchanged positions with Mr. Morse and again 
took up the duties of Legislative Reference Librarian. He resigned HISTORY OF VERMONT 
412 
these duties June 1, 1922, and became a clerk in the legal department of 
the National Life Insurance Company. 
Burton E. Bailey, of Montpelier, was born in Williams- 
town, July 5, 1866. He was educated in the district schools and at 
Montpelier Seminary, where he graduated in the class of 1890. For 
ten years he was a traveling salesman and in 1900 he began to study 
law in the office of his brother, Frank A. Bailey, at Montpelier, where 
he remained until his admission to the bar in 1902. From the time of 
his admission until 1914 he was in active practice at Montpelier. 
Since that time he has been Postmaster of Montpelier. He was Grand 
Juror of Montpelier, 1904-1905, and City Attorney, 1911-1914. 
Edward W. Bisbee, of Barre, was born at Waitsfield, February 
27, 1856. He was educated in the district schools and at Barre Acad- 
emy, where he graduated in 1875. He studied law in the office of 
Heath and Carleton and in that of Joseph A. Wing, in Montpelier, 
and was admitted to the bar in 1879. He practiced in Barre for 
twenty years. He was State’s Attorney from 1886 to 1890 and Post- 
master at Barre from 1899 to 1915. 
George Briggs, of Montpelier, was born at Brandon, April 
26, 1844. He was educated in the schools of Brandon, at the Vermont 
Episcopal Institute at Burlington, and at Hobart College, Geneva, 
N. Y., where he graduated in 1866. He studied law in the office of 
Senator George F. Edmunds at Burlington, with Briggs and Ormsbee 
at Brandon, and at the Albany Law School. He was admitted to the 
bar in 1868 and practiced in Brandon in company with Gov. E. J. 
Ormsbee. He was Town Clerk from 1868 to 1894, and Director of 
the National Life Insurance Company from 1889 to 1920. He retired 
from practice and removed to Montpelier, where he was employed in 
the loans department of the insurance company. 
J. Ward Carver, of Barre, was born at Calais, February 19, 
1881, and was educated in the public schools, at Montpelier High 
School and at Goddard Seminary, where he graduated in 1900. He 
studied law in Barre in the office of John W. Gordon and was ad- 
mitted to the bar in 1905. He has always practiced at Barre, where 
he has held the following offices: Grand Juror, City Attorney, 1906- 
1910; State’s Attorney, 1910-1915; State Senator, 1914. 
Osman D. Clark, of Montpelier, was born at Montpelier, 
November 26, 1855, and was educated in the public schools of Mont- 
pelier and at Amherst College, where he graduated in 1876. He 
studied law at Montpelier with Charles H. Heath, with Huse and CHARLES PLIMPTON SMITH 
Has for many years been a dominating figure in the 
banking life of Vermont. He became President of the 
Burlington Savings Bank in 1889 and under his admin- 
istration its assets have increased from less than 
$2,000,000 to $20,000,000. There is perhaps no man in 
Vermont whose advice on financial matters for many 
years past, has been more generally sought and relied 
upon, both by individuals and by State officials. In 1894 
and 1890 he represented the City of Burlington in the 
General Assembly, and in 1898 was a member of the 
State Senate. 
Mr. Smith was born in St. Johns, P. Q., in 1847, 
while his parents were temporarily living in that city, 
although they were residents of Burlington at the time. 
He has lived in Burlington all his life, having been edu- 
cated in the schools of the city. At the age of nineteen 
he was in business for himself, and did a growing busi- 
ness in flour, grain and hay until he became president of 
the Burlington Savings Bank. In 1884 Mr. Smith was 
elected a trustee of the Burlington Savings Bank and 
from that time until the present has been actively asso- 
ciated with its growth. 
The first achievement which brought him notably 
before the State as a banking force, was the vigorous 
and courageous manner in which he brought his institu- 
tion through the panic of 1893 not only with credit to 
itself but with a record of helpfulness to all neighboring 
banks. From that time to the present he has had much 
to do with the strength and public spirit of Vermont 
banking institutions. 
Mr. Smith married Anna A. Pease of Oswego, N. Y. 
They have one daughter, Mrs. John M. Wheeler of 
New York City, and three sons, Levi P. and Charles P., 
Jr., of Burlington, and Frederick F. of Opheim, Mont. 
Mr. Smith has been connected with many benevolent 
institutions. He was for many years treasurer of the 
Mary Fletcher Hospital and is now the president of its 
board of trustees. He is one of the permanent trus- 
tees of the Burlington Y. M. C. A. and of the Home for 
Destitute Children, and a member of the board of the 
Home for Aged Women. He is a director of the Na- 
tional Life Insurance Company, the Central Vermont 
Railroad and New England Telephone and Telegraph 
Company. THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
413 
Lord and with Clarence H. Pitkin, and was admitted to the bar in 
1879. He has resided at Montpelier since 1885. He has long been 
secretary of the National Life Insurance Company. 
Harrison J. Conant, of North Montpelier, was born at 
Southbridge, Mass., June 8, 1882. He was educated in the schools of 
Worcester, graduated at Amherst College in 1904, and at Columbia 
Law School in 1907. He was admitted to the bar in New York in 
1907 and to that of Vermont in 1910. He practiced in New York 
from 1907 to 1910; at Montpelier from 1910 to 1917, and at North 
Montpelier since 1917. He was Executive Clerk to Governor Mead. 
He is Assistant State Librarian and Legislative Reference Librarian. 
Murdock A. Campbell, of Northfield, was born at Gran- 
iteville, January 16, 1889. He studied law at the University of Maine 
Law School and with Plumley and Plumley at Northfield, and was 
admitted to the bar in 1917. He was in service in the late war from 
May, 1917, to July, 1919, entering as a private and retiring as First 
Lieutenant. Since August, 1919, he has practiced at Northfield in the 
firm of Plumley, Plumley and Campbell. 
George H. Dale, of Waterbury, was born at Moretown, 
April 18, 1858. He was educated in the common schools, studied law 
in the office of Columbus Clough at Waterbury, and was admitted to 
the bar jn 1896. He has practiced at Waterbury since his admission. 
He has held the office of Assistant Judge of Washington County Court 
since 1910 and has been a Justice of the Peace since 1898. He has 
held many other local offices, including that of President of the Vil- 
lage, Treasurer of the Village, Tax Collector, Trustee, School Direc- 
tor, Auditor and Grand Juror. 
Earl R. Davis, of Barre, was born at Corinth, October 14, 
1868, and was educated at the Montpelier Seminary, where he gradu- 
ated in 1891, and at the University of Vermont, where he graduated in 
1895. He studied law at Island Pond, in the office of George N. Dale 
and Porter H. Dale, from 1895 to 1898 and taught in the Island Pond 
High School during the same period. He was admitted to the bar in 
1898 and practiced at East Barre 1899-1901, and since 1901 at Barre. 
He was State’s Attorney from July, 1917, to February 1, 1921. He 
was elected Judge of Probate in 1922. 
Charles M. Davis, of Northfield, was born at Northfield, 
June 13, 1860. He was educated at the Northfield High School, Dart- 
mouth College, Norwich University, and Boston University Law 
School. He studied law in the office of Frank Plumley at Northfield, 414 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
with Stephen C. Shurtleff at Montpelier, and at the Boston University 
Law School, graduating in 1889. He was admitted to the bar of Ver- 
mont the latter year and from 1890 to 1900 practiced at Northfield. 
He has retired from practice and is engaged in business. 
Edward H. Deavitt, of Montpelier, was born at More- 
town, December 1, 1871. He graduated from the Montpelier High 
School in the class of 1889, and from the University of Vermont in 
the class of 1893. He studied law in the office of his father, Thomas 
J. Deavitt, of Montpelier, and at the Harvard Law School and was 
admitted to the bar of Vermont and of Massachusetts in 1896. He 
practiced at Boston, 1896-1897; he has practiced at Montpelier since 
1897. He was Referee in Bankruptcy, 1898-1905, and State Treas- 
urer, October, 1906, to Janaury, 1915. 
Edward C. Dufficy, of Barre, was born at Brattleboro, April 
10, 1892. He was educated at the high school at Gorham, Me. He 
studied law at the University of Maine, where he graduated in 1917. 
He was admitted that year to the bar of Maine and practiced in 
Rumford. He was a member of the United States Army in 1918 
and the year following studied in the office of Stickney, Sargent 
and Skeels at Ludlow and was admitted to the bar of Vermont in 
1919. He practiced for a year at Springfield and is now in practice 
at Barre. 
Alland G. Fay, of Barre, was born at Brookfield, December 4, 
1856, and was educated in the common schools and at Goddard Sem- 
inary. He studied law with Heath and Carleton at Montpelier and 
with Charles H. Heath, and was admitted to the bar in 1884. He 
practiced at Montpelier, 1887-1892; at Plainfield, 1884-1892; at Lan- 
caster, N. H., 1892-1895; at Barre since 1895, except from 1908 to 
1915, when he was engaged in the granite business. He was Assistant 
Secretary of the Senate, 1886-1888; and Tudge of Barre City Court, 
1900-1906. 
Joseph J. Frattini, of Montpelier, was the first Italian 
born in Barre, the date of his birth being May 7. 1889. He was edu- 
cated in the public schools of Barre and graduated at the Spaulding 
High School. He studied law with John H. Senter at Montpelier 
and with Lewis C. Moody at the same place; he was admitted to the 
bar in 1917 and was the first person of Italian nationality who has been 
admitted to the bar of Vermont. He has practiced at Montpelier since 
his admission, and is Deputy Clerk of the Washington County Court, 
Benjamin Gates, of Montpelier, was born at Pittsford, 
August 6, 1873. He was educated at the public schools of Brandon THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
415 
and at Montpelier Seminary. He studied law at the University of 
Michigan Law School and with Melville E. Smilie at Montpelier and 
was admitted to the bar in 1903. He practiced at Montpelier from 
his admission until January 7, 1917, when he became Auditor of Ac- 
counts. For one year he was in partnership with Judge Stanley C. 
Wilson in practice at Montpelier. He was Deputy Clerk of the Wash- 
ington County Court; Assistant in the State Library; Grand Juror; 
State’s Attorney, 1906-1910; Secretary of Civil and Military Affairs 
to Governor Gates, 1915-1917; Auditor of Accounts since 1917. 
Lena Giudici, of Barre, was born at Barre, November 7, 1898. 
She pursued her studies in the public schools of Barre and graduated 
at the Spaulding High School in 1917. She studied law at the Boston 
University Law School and received her degree in 1920. She studied 
law in the office of J. Ward Carver at Barre, and was admitted to the 
bar in Massachusetts in 1920 and to the bar of Vermont in 1921. She 
is not in practice. 
Fred E. Gleason, of Montpelier, was born March 17, 1883 
at Montpelier, and was educated in the schools of Montpelier, at Wil- 
liston Seminary, where he graduated in 1901, and at Yale University, 
where he graduated in 1905. He studied law at the Harvard Law 
School and in the office of Edward H. Deavitt at Montpelier and was 
admitted to the bar in 1909. He has since practiced at Montpelier. 
He has been City Grand Juror; Clerk of the Revision Committee; 
State’s Attorney, 1914-1917; Secretary Republican State Convention, 
1912, 1914; Secretary Washington County Bar Association; member 
General Council American Bar Association. 
John W. Gordon, of Barre, was born in Vershire, September 
16, 1857. He was educated at the Burlington Eligh School, Barre 
Academy, and at Dartmouth College. He studied law with Truman 
R. Gordon in Montpelier and with Barney and Hoar in Barre and was 
admitted to the bar in 1890. He has practiced at Barre since his ad- 
mission, where he has held the office of Lister, School Commissioner, 
Mayor, County Senator, and was elected City Representative in 1922 
by a practically unanimous vote. 
Erwin M. Harvey, of Montpelier, was born at Topsham, 
October 12, 1871. He was educated in the public schools, at Mont- 
pelier Seminary, where he graduated in 1892, and at the University 
of Vermont, where he graduated in 1896. He studied law in the office 
of Melville E. Smilie and in the office of his father, Roney M. Elarvey. 
at Montpelier, and was admitted to the bar in 1899. He has practiced 
at Montpelier since his admission. He was Clerk of the Board of 416 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
Railroad Commissioners, 1900-1902; and was Judge of Montpelier 
City Court from 1904 to 1921. 
Roney M. Harvey, of Montpelier, was born at Topsham, 
May 20, 1843. He was educated in the public schools, at Newbury 
Seminary, and at Peacham Academy. He studied law at Topsham 
with Josiah O. Livingston and was admitted to the bar in 1869. He 
practiced at Topsham until 1896 and afterwards practiced at Mont- 
pelier. He was a member of the House in 1880 and 1886; Senator from 
Orange county in 1890; State’s Attorney of Orange county, 1878; 
State Supervisor of Insane, 1880-1882. 
Clifton M. Heaton, of Montpelier, was born at Mont- 
pelier, October 18, 1877, and was educated at the Vermont Episcopal 
Institute and at the University of Vermont. He sudied law at the 
Boston University Law School and was admitted to the bar of this 
State in 1901 and to the bar of Kansas in 1908. He has practiced at 
Montpelier and at Topeka, Kan. He is at present located at Mont- 
pelier and is in the employ of the National Life Insurance Company. 
Helen M. M. Hoar, of Barre, was born at Barre, November 
28, 1887. She was educated in the public schools of Barre and 
graduated at the Spaulding High School in 1909. She studied law in 
the office of her father, Richard A. Hoar, at Barre, and at the Uni- 
versity of Maine, where she received the degree of LL. B. from the 
law department in 1915. She was admitted to the bar in 1914, and has 
since practiced at Barre. Miss Hoar was the third woman to receive 
the LL. B. degree from the University of Maine, and is the second 
woman to be admitted to the bar of Vermont. While at the Univer- 
sity she was associate editor of the Maine Law Review, and at present 
is Vice-President of the Women Lawyers’ Association and a con- 
tributor to its journal. In 1918 and 1919 she was State Chairman of 
the Civil Service Reform Committee of the Vermont Federation of 
Women’s Clubs. She is not engaged in practice. 
Guy B. Horton, of Montpelier, was born at North Clarendon, 
December 1, 1875, and was educated at Middlebury College, where he 
received his degree in 1901. He studied law in the office of Robert 
Roberts at Burlington and in the University of Michigan. He was 
admitted to the bar in 1906. He practiced at Burlington from his ad- 
mission until 1918 and is now Attorney with the National Life Insur- 
ance Company, at Montpelier. He was Associate Editor of the Ver- 
mont Digest, compiled by Robert Roberts, and Editor of a continua- 
tion of the Digest and of Vermont Citations. THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
417 
George L. Hunt, of Montpelier, was born at Moosup, Conn., July 
23, 1878. He graduated at the Brockton High School in 1896 and at 
Brown University in 1900. He studied law in the office of Albro F. 
Nichols at St. Johnsbury and was admitted to the bar in 1903. He 
practiced at Enosburg Falls, 1903-1904; Island Pond, 1905-1912; 
Montpelier, 1912 to the present time. He is a partner in the firm of 
Theriault and Hunt. He was Deputy Clerk in Caledonia County 
Court, 1900-1903; Deputy Secretary of State, 1904-1905; State’s At- 
torney of Essex county, 1908-1910; City Attorney of Montpelier, 
1912 to date; Clerk Educational Commission, 1912-1914. 
S. Hollister Jackson, of Barre, was born in Toronto, 
Canada, December 7, 1875. He was educated in the public schools 
of Kingston, Ont., and Collegiate Institute, Queens University, To- 
ronto University, where he graduated as Bachelor of Music in 1896; 
University of Vermont, where he graduated in 1898. He studied law 
in the office of John W. Gordon, at Barre, and was admitted to the bar 
of Vermont in 1900 and to the bar of California in 1902. He has 
practiced at Barre since his admission. He was State’s Attorney of 
Washington county, 1904-1906; member of the House, 1906; member 
of the Railroad Commission and Public Service Commission, 1906- 
1913. 
Fred L. Laird, of Montpelier, was born at Plainfield, Sep- 
tember 26, 1860. He graduated from Montpelier Seminary in 1880 
and from Dartmouth College in 1884. He studied law with John G. 
Wing, M. E. Smilie and Stephen C. Shurtleff at Montpelier and was 
admitted to the bar in 1887. He has practiced at Montpelier since ad- 
mission and in 1912-1914 was County Senator. He was appointed 
Judge of the Montpelier Municipal Court in 1922. 
William A. Lord, of Montpelier, was born at Montpelier, 
August 28, 1849. He was educated at the Montpelier High School, 
and graduated from Dartmouth College in the class of 1869. He 
studied law in the office of Alexander Ferguson in Cincinnati, Ohio, and 
in the office of Charles H. Heath at Montpelier, and was admitted to 
the bar in 1876. He has practiced at Montpelier since his admission. 
He was the first City Attorney of Montpelier; member of the House 
in 1894; member of the House and Speaker in 1896; National Bank 
Examiner, 1898-1900 ; County Senator, 1904; Chairman of the Com- 
mission to Revise the Statutes, 1904-1906; Chairman of the Board of 
Editors of the Revision of Public Statutes, 1906-1908. He was ap- 
pointed Judge of the Montpelier Municipal Court in 1921 and served 
until 1922. 418 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
Frank J. Martin, of Barre, was educated at Barre Academy, 
Worcester Academy, Worcester, Mass., and in a business college at 
St. Louis, Missouri. He studied law at Montpelier in the offices of 
Melville E. Smilie and Hiram A. Huse, and was admitted to the bar 
in 1890, and has since resided at Barre. He has held some town 
offices, was Second Assistant State Librarian, and is Judge of Probate 
for Washington county. 
Webster E. Miller, of Montpelier, was born at Pittsfield, 
Mass., March 20, 1892. He was educated in the public schools and 
in the high school at Pittsfield and at Middlebury College, where he 
graduated in 1917 with the degree of A. B. He studied law in the 
office of Stickney, Sargent and Skeels at Ludlow and was admitted to 
the bar in 1920. He at first located at Windsor and was associated 
with Fred C. Bicknell in practice, and later moved to Montpelier. 
Lewis C. Moody, of Montpelier, was born at Stowe, Novem- 
ber 10, 1855, and was educated at the Stowe High School and at 
Waterbury Center Seminary. He studied law with L. S. Thompson 
and George Wilkins at Stowe, and was admitted to the bar in 1884. 
He practiced at Stowe, 1884-1899; at Waterbury, 1899-1912. He was 
State’s Attorney of Lamoille county, 1892-1894; he has been Clerk 
of Washington County Court since March, 1912. 
Claude L. Morse, of Northfield, was born at Northfield, 
February 9, 1877. He was educated at the Northfield High School 
and studied law with Judge Frank Plumley. He was admitted to the 
bar in 1903 and has since practiced at Northfield. He has been Town 
Clerk and Treasurer, Treasurer of the Village and Treasurer of the 
Graded School District since 1908. He was Sergeant of the First 
Vermont Volunteer Infantry in the Spanish-American War. 
Charles A. Plumley, of Northfield, was born at North- 
field, April 14, 1875. He was educated in the graded and high schools 
of Northfield, graduating from the latter in 1892, and at Norwich 
University, where he graduated in 1896. He studied law in the office 
of his father, Frank Plumley, at Northfield, and was admitted 
to the bar in 1903. He has practiced at Northfield. In 1894 he was 
Assistant Secretary of.the Senate; from 1900 to 1906, Assistant Clerk 
of the House; from 1908 to 1910, Clerk of the House; Speaker of 
the House in 1912; Commissioner of State Taxes from 1913 to 1919. 
He resigned the latter office in 1919 and in June accepted a position 
in the legal department of the Firestone Tire and Rubber Company 
of Akron, Ohio. In 1920 he was elected President of Norwich Uni- 
versity and returned to Vermont. JOHN J. FLYNN 
Born in Dorset, Vt., June 22, 1857, the son of James 
and Catherine (Shea) Flynn. He was educated in the 
public schools. He was a tenant farmer in South 
Burlington from 1876 to 1880, a retail grocer in Bur- 
lington from 1880 to 1890 and a real estate dealer from 
1890 to the present time. At various times he has been 
a large owner of Vermont forest lands. He organized 
and financed the building of the Military Post Street 
Railway connecting Winooski and Essex Junction and is 
its treasurer; the Barre and Montpelier Street Railway 
system; the St. Albans and Swanton electric line; the 
Bellows Falls and Saxtons River electric road. He 
was also interested in street railway lines in New 
Jersey and in building the Barre gas plant. He was 
one of the organizers and principal owners of the Ver- 
gennes Water Power Company. He was one of the 
organizers of the Chittenden County Trust Company 
and is its vice-president and a director. He is largely 
interested in the Burlington Traction Company and 
for the last twenty-five years has been an officer and 
director. He is a director of the Elias Lyman Coal 
Company and of the Burlington Building and Loan 
Association. He is the owner of Starr Farm Beach 
on Lake Champlain, a suburban community of summer 
dwellers. He is a member of various clubs and is 
a Democrat in politics. He married Nellie F. Waite of 
Dorset in 1880, who died in December, 1922. THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
419 
Albert A. Sargent, of Barre, was born at Ludlow, Novem- 
ber 16, 1871. He was educated at Black River Academy and at Mid- 
dlebury College. He studied law at the Boston University Law School 
and with Stickney and Sargent at Ludlow and was admitted to the bar 
in 1898. He has practiced at Barre. He was City Attorney in 1919, 
and is Vice-President of the Granite Mutual Insurance Company. 
H. William Scott, of Barre, was born at Barre, August 10, 
1870. He was educated in the common schools and at Goddard Sem- 
inary, studied law with Barney and Hoar at Barre and was admitted 
to the bar in 1895. He has always practiced at Barre, where he has 
held the offices of City Grand Juror, and City Assessor, and Alderman. 
He was Judge of the City Court from 1906 to 1919. 
Elwin L. Scott, of Barre, was born at Braintree, June 1, 
1877, and was educated at the Rochester High School and at the Ran- 
dolph State Normal School. He studied law with Frank Plumley at 
Northfield and with Richard A. Hoar at Barre, and was admitted to 
the bar in 1903. He has practiced at Barre since his admission and 
was City Attorney, 1910-1915, and has been Judge of Barre City 
Court since February 1, 1919. 
Harry C. Shurtleff, of Montpelier, was born in Plain- 
field, December 28, 1871. He was educated at the Montpelier High 
School and the University of Vermont, where he graduated in 1895. 
He studied law in the office of his father, Stephen C. Shurtleff, at 
Montpelier, was admitted to the bar in 1897 and has practiced at 
Montpelier since. He was School Director, 1899-1902; Alderman, 
1916-1919, and Mayor 1919 to 1921. 
John H. Stone, of Montpelier, was born at Chelsea, July 13, 
1888, and was educated in the district schools of Chelsea and at Chel- 
sea Academy, where he graduated in 1909, and at Montpelier Semi- 
nary, where he graduated in 1910. He studied law with John H Sen- 
ter of Montpelier and was admitted to the bar in 1915. 
Robert E. Susena, of Montpelier, was born at Baveno, 
Italy, September 28, 1894. As a child he studied in the schools of 
Italy and Switzerland. When ten years of age he entered the graded 
school of Barre and later graduated from the same. His higher 
studies were pursued with private tutors. He studied law in the office 
of Theriault and Hunt at Montpelier and was admitted to the bar in 
1920. In the World War he was a Sergeant of Engineers. He has 
located at Montpelier. 420 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
Arthur C. Theriault, of Montpelier, was born at Mont- 
pelier, June 11, 1888. He attended the St. Michael’s Graded School, 
graduated at the Montpelier High School in 1907; was at Dartmouth, 
1907-1908; took a special course at the University of Maine Law 
School; studied law in the office of Theriault and Hunt at Montpelier 
and was admitted to the bar in 1913. He has practiced at Montpelier 
since admission, with exception of thirteen months that he spent in 
the service during the late war with Germany. He was City Grand 
Juror from 1914 to 1917. 
William N. Theriault, of Montpelier, was born at Mont- 
pelier, November 2, 1877, and was educated at St. Michael’s Parochial 
School and at Montpelier High School, where he graduated in 1895. 
He studied law with Dillingham, Huse and Howland, and was ad- 
mitted to the bar in 1899. He has always practiced at Montpelier. 
From 1899 to 1902 he practiced in the office of the firm with which he 
studied, and was afterwards alone until 1912, when he formed a part- 
nership with George L. Hunt under the style of Theriault and Hunt, 
which continues. He has been Messenger and Assistant Librarian in 
the State Library, was Corporal in the Spanish-American War, and 
has been Referee in Bankruptcy since 1906. 
Fred B. Thomas, of Montpelier, was born at Stowe, June 
17, 1869. He was educated in the district schools of Stowe, at the 
People’s Academy, and at Norwich University, where he graduated 
in 1895. He studied law with George W. Wing at Montpelier, and 
with Melville E. Smilie, and was admitted to the bar in 1899. He has 
practiced at Montpelier except during the time he was in war service. 
He served in the Spanish-American War from July 18, to Oct. 27, 
1898, as Private in Co. H, First Vermont Infantry Volunteers. He 
was in the Mexican Border Service (National Guard called into the 
Federal Service by the President), June 19 to October 11, 1916, as 
Lieutenant-Colonel, First Infantry, Vermont National Guard. The 
time actually at the Border (Eagle Pass, Texas), was from July 2, to 
September 20. He was called into Federal Service with the First 
Vermont Infantry, National Guard, April 2, 1917, and mustered into 
United States Service April 6, 1917. He was drafted into the United 
States Army with the entire National Guard of the country, August 5, 
1917 and discharged May 9, 1919. His grade was Colonel during this 
entire service. He commanded the First Vermont Infantry, National 
Guard, from April 2, 1917, when called into Federal service by the 
President until February 9, 1918, when the designation of the regiment 
was changed to the Fifty-Seventh Pioneer Infantry. He commanded 
the Fifty-Seventh Pioneer Infantry from February 9, 1918, to October 
30, 1918, when this regiment was broken up at Le Mans, France, to THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
421 
be used as replacement troops. He was attached to the Eight Hundred 
and Sixth Pioneer Infantry, November 14, to November 18, 1918, 
assigned to command of the Three Hundred and Tenth Trains (Trains 
of the Eighty-Fifth Division), November 18, 1918, transferred to the 
Three Hundred and Thirty-Seventh Infantry (of the Eighty-Fifth 
Division), January 18, 1919. He commanded the Three Hundred and 
Thirty-Seventh Infantry until it was demobilized at Camp Custer, 
Mich., which was completed April 25, 1919. He sailed from Hoboken 
September 29, 1918, landed at Brest, France, October 7, 1918, returned 
to the United States March 30, 1919. He was elected State’s Attor- 
ney of Washington county in 1920. This office he resigned to become 
Commissioner of State Taxes in 1921. 
Timothy R. Phillips, of Montpelier, was born at Mont- 
pelier, August 12, 1879. He was educated at the St. Albans Military 
Academy at Knoxville, 111., and studied law at the Boston University 
Law School and with Edward H. Deavitt at Montpelier. He was ad- 
mitted to the bar in 1903 and practiced at Montpelier for about two 
years, when he was obliged to change his occupation on account of 
ill health. 
William C. White, of Northfield, was born at Middlesex, August 
27, 1873, and was educated at Montpelier Seminary. He studied law 
in the offices of William A. Lord, Melville E. Smilie, and Fred L. 
Laird, at Montpelier, and was admitted to the bar in 1900. He prac- 
ticed at Williamstown, 1901-1906; at Middlesex, 1906-1912; and at 
Northfield since 1912. He was Postmaster at Middlesex, 1906-1912, 
and Referee in Bankruptcy, Orange county, 1904-1906. He was ap- 
pointed Postmaster at Northfield and took office October 1, 1922. 
George W. Wing, of Montpelier, was born at Plainfield, October 
22, 1843. He was educated in the district schools, at Barre Academy, 
and the Washington County Grammar School, from the latter of which 
he graduated in 1862 and entered Dartmouth College the same year. 
Graduating from Dartmouth College four years later he entered the 
office of his father, Joseph A. Wing, as a law student and was ad- 
mitted to the bar in 1868. He practiced at Montpelier from 1873 
until 1902, when he withdrew from the law on the death of Hiram A. 
Huse, whom he succeeded as State Librarian. Mr. Wing held nearly 
all the local offices when Montpelier was under town government, and 
he was Trustee and President of the Village of Montpelier and the 
first Mayor of the city. He represented Montpelier in the House in 
1882; from 1866 to 1870 was Assistant State Librarian and Deputy 
Secretary of State; from 1868 to 1873 was clerk of the State Treas- 422 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
urer’s Office; from 1893 to 1906, Trustee of the State Hospital for 
the Insane; from 1884 to 1888 Postmaster at Montpelier. 
William Wishart, of Barre, was born at Vinal Haven, Fox Island, 
Me., February 10, 1876. He was educated at Goddard Seminary, 
and studied law at the Boston University Law School and with John 
W. Gordon at Barre. He was admitted to the bar in 1899, and has 
since practiced in Barre. He has often held the offices of City Grand 
Juror and City Attorney. He was elected to the General Assembly 
from Barre City in 1920. 
George B. Young, of Montpelier, was born at Troy, Vt., April 
20, 1867. He was educated in the district schools of Derby Line, at 
Stanstead, Wesleyan College, Wesleyan Academy, and Dartmouth Col- 
lege. He studied law at Newport in the office of Edwards, Dicker- 
man and Young and in the office of Dickerman and Young, in which 
firm his father, John Young, was a partner. He was admitted to the 
bar of Vermont in 1891, to the bar of Minnesota in 1892 and to the 
bar of the United States Supreme Court in 1907. He practiced at 
Minneapolis from 1892 to 1899 and at Newport from 1899 to 1916. 
In the latter year he became general counsel of the National Life In- 
surance Company and has since resided at Montpelier. He was a mem- 
ber of the school board in Newport, was elected a trustee of the Ver- 
mont State Library in 1919, and since 1911 has been a Commissioner 
on Uniform State Laws and from 1915 to 1918 was Secretary of the 
National Conference of Commissioners on Uniform State Laws. WINDHAM COUNTY 
BY the provisions of an act passed in February. 1779. all of eastern 
Vermont to the south line of the Province of Quebec was em- 
braced within the county of Cumberland. At a session of the 
General Assembly, held at Windsor in February, 1781, the entire eastern 
part of the State was incorporated into the three counties of Windham, 
Windsor and Orange. Windham county embraced all that part of 
Cumberland county lying south of a line commencing at the southeast 
corner of Springfield and running westerly to the east line of Ben- 
nington county. In February, 1787, the boundaries of Windham 
county were further defined in an act passed by the General Assem- 
bly which provided for holding one more session of court at West- 
minster, after which the sessions were to be held at Newfane, if the 
inhabitants thereof should build a court house. Provision was made 
for holding the courts at Westminster and Marlboro as half shires 
until 1790, when one shire was constituted at Newfane. They were 
held in the two places alternately and in the latter in the house of 
Colonel Granger. In the early settlement of the town a village had 
grown up on Newfane Hill. This was on the summit of the eleva- 
tion, which rises like a cone in the center of the town and is about 
two miles west of the present village of Newfane. Thither the courts 
were removed from Westminster, a court house and jail having been 
erected here for the use of the county. From 1790 to 1820 the village 
consisted of a meeting house, academy, three stores, two hotels, a 
variety of shops such as weie found in New England villages at an 
early day and about twenty private residences. The village was a 
farming center and there were many large and fertile farms round 
about it. Standing upon the summit of the hill the village afforded an 
extensive and picturesque prospect. Here could be seen no less than 
fifty townships in Vermont, New Hampshire and Massachusetts. From 
the same eminence appeared Haystack Mountain, in Wilmington, Strat- 
ton Mountain in Stratton, Ascutney in Windsor, Monadnock in New 
Hampshire, and Wachusett in Massachusetts. The county buildings 
occupied this unique spot, which is the geographical center of the 
county, until 1825 when they were moved to the village below, then 
called Fayetteville, now Newfane. Following the removal of the pub- 
lic buildings the other structures on the hill were taken down or aban- 
doned and the inhabitants moved into the valley below, either to New- 
fane or Williamsville. Several of the buildings were taken to pieces 
and removed to the new village of Fayetteville and reconstructed 
there. This was the fate of the old court house. Its timbers and 
boarding, now more than a century old, can be detected on an ex- 
amination of the present court house in Newfane village. The last 424 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
building to remain was the old school house, but this crumbled to decay 
a third of a century ago; many of the farms, too, were abandoned. 
The hill is not without interest or life, however, for the summer visitor 
has come to admire and enjoy its beauties and more than one sum- 
mer camp, erected near the summit, commands the grand panorama 
of mountain and valley that stretches distant in all directions. James 
L. Martin, Judge of the United States District Court, was the owner 
of one of these camps, and spent several summers here during the last 
years of his life. 
On the moving of the county seat into the village, the court house 
and jail were put up there at a cost of $10,000. These, with many 
additions and improvements, constitute the present county buildings. 
In 1853 the buildings first erected were altered and improved at an 
expense of $13,000 and since that date, from time to time, further 
improvements have been made. The most extensive change in the 
court house was made a few years ago, when the building was en- 
larged by the addition of twenty-four feet to the west end to make 
rooms for the Judges, Lawyers, and Grand Jury. This was done 
without changing the style of construction or marring the symmetry 
of the building, which is one of the most attractive court houses in 
New England and by far the most attractive in Vermont. 
The picture of the building on page 360 of volume 2 of the 
History is of the court house as it appeared before the addition; 
and the load of logs should be replaced by a line of automobiles 
parked in the same spot to represent present surroundings when court 
is in session. Its architecture is impressive, but this is greatly en- 
hanced by the location. It is of stately proportions, being ninety- 
three feet long, forty-four wide, two stories high and surmounted by a 
handsome tower and belfry with four massive pillars supporting the 
portico of the eastern front. The house is built of wood, is painted 
white, with green blinds. It stands on a slight elevation, is surrounded 
by maples and in summer almost hidden by their dense foliage. The 
court room is large and well lighted and the acoustic proprieties are 
perfect. It is sure to attract the attention of the visitor by the large 
number of portraits that are hung on the walls. These vary in size from 
a life-size painting of William C. Bradley to enlarged photographs of 
lawyers and Judges. There are nearly forty in all in the court room 
and rooms adjoining, representing the great lawyers of the county and 
the Judges of the State, and each one is accompanied by a sketch which 
gives an outline of the life of the individual. The court house is admi- 
rably adapted to the work of the court, having an abundance of room 
for all purposes and being equipped with a better library than can be 
found in most of the other court houses. Extensive changes have 
been made in the jail at a large expense, in order to secure its safety 
and its sanitation. THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
425 
More than one legislative battle has been fought over the question 
of the removal of the shire from Newfane to Brattleboro, the largest 
and most prosperous town in the county, the home of the leading 
lawyers and the center of the legal business of southeastern Vermont; 
but the geographical argument and the influence of the small towns 
have prevented the change. The coming of the railroad in 1880, the 
telephone and the automobile have all made conditions more favorable 
for holding the county courts in Newfane, and the many improve- 
ments, including plumbing and electric lights, together with important 
changes in the county jail by which it has been completely modern- 
ized, will have a tendency to quiet discussion on this question. The 
county courts are held here on the second Tuesday of April and 
September. 
JEREMIAH MASON 
1768-1848 
Jeremiah Mason, the greatest of New England lawyers, and a law 
student at Westminster, was admitted to the bar on Newfane Hill in 
1791. He was born at Lebanon, Conn., April 27, 1768, and graduated 
from Yale College in 1788. After spending a period of six months in 
the office of Simeon Baldwin in Connecticut, Mr. Mason entered the 
office of Stephen R. Bradley in Westminster, where he fitted for the 
bar. Following his admission he purchased the practice of Col. 
Alpheus Moore in Westmoreland, N. H. Here he remained for three 
years when he removed to Walpole, in the same State, in 1794. In 
1797 he located at Portsmouth. In 1802 he became the Attorney Gen- 
eral of New Hampshire. Five years later he met Daniel Webster. 
He and Webster were often pitted against each other and each found 
the other a powerful and dangerous opponent. In the trial of the Dart- 
mouth College case in the State Court, Mr. Mason made the brief 
and argued the case for the college. In it he made the same points 
which Mr. Webster afterward made before the United States Su- 
preme Court, and it is said that Webster added nothing to the case, 
except by way of embellishment, that is not contained in the brief of 
Mr. Mason in the State Court. Mr. Mason’s biographer says of the 
two men, that “Mr. Mason was a great lawyer and Mr. Webster a 
great man practicing law.” They were fast friends. Mr. Webster said 
in a eulogy of his friend, after Mr. Mason’s death, that he “could 
pour out his tears like water.” For years they were the leaders of the 
New Hampshire bar. In 1813 Mr. Mason was elected to the United 
States Senate, serving until 1817, when he resigned to resume the 
practice of law. In 1816 he declined the office of Chief Justice of New 
Hampshire. Removing to Boston in 1832, he became one of the fore- 426 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
most lawyers in Massachusetts. He was a giant physically as well as 
mentally, being six feet six inches tall. His greatness is emphasized 
by Rufus Choate, who said of him: “As a jurist he would have filled 
the seat of Marshall as Marshall filled it”; and by Webster, who de- 
clared: “If you were to ask me who was the greatest lawyer in the 
country, I should answer John Marshall; but if you took me by the 
throat and pinned me to the wall and demanded my real opinion, I 
should be compelled to say it was Jeremiah Mason.” He died in Bos- 
ton, October 14, 1848. 
GEN. MARTIN FIELD 
1773-1833 
Martin Field was one of the earliest lawyers to locate in Wind- 
ham county. He was born at Leverett, Mass., February 12, 1773, 
and graduated at Williams College in 1798. He studied law in the 
office of his uncle, Lucius Hubbard, of Chester, Vt., and upon the de- 
cease of Calvin Knowlton, son of Judge Knowlton, in 1800, at the 
special request of Judge Knowlton he came to Newfane and located 
in practice on Newfane Hill. He married Esther Smith Kellogg, 
daughter of Daniel Kellogg of Amherst, Mass., and sister of Judge 
Daniel Kellogg of the Vermont Supreme Court, February 21, 1902. 
To this marriage there was born two sons, Charles K., April 24, 1803, 
and Roswell M., February 22, 1807. Mrs. Field was an accomplished 
lady of fine personal appearance, great goodness and exemplary piety, 
to whose industry, prudence and discretion General Field was in- 
debted in great measure for his success in life. She died June 6, 1867, 
aged 88 years, surviving her husband thirty-four years. 
Mr. Field was for ten years State’s Attorney for Windham 
county and repeatedly represented Newfane in the General Assembly 
and Constitutional conventions. In 1819 he was elected Major Gen- 
eral of the First Division of the Vermont Militia and was one of the 
leading men of the State in his day. 
His forensic efforts abounded in flashes of wit, and bursts of sar- 
casm and ridicule, which he could use with great skill and effect. He 
was on this account a popular jury advocate. He was eminently 
successful in his profession and for thirty years enjoyed a large 
and lucrative practice which he had to abandon on ' account of 
deafness. On relinquishing the duties of his profession he turned 
his attention to the study of geology and mineralogy and by 
great perseverance and industry collected what at that time was re- 
garded as the rarest and most extensive cabinet of minerals in the 
State. These were afterwards given to Middlebury College bv his 
widow. Born on a farm in Alstead, N. H., December 
13, 1786. Ten years later the family removed 
to Reading, Yt. At the age of fifteen Allen 
Wardner became the apprentice of Dr. Isaac Green of 
Windsor in the drug and mercantile business. Hoping 
to secure an appointment as cadet in the United States 
Military Academy, he went to Washington. Failing 
in this effort, he went to West Point, where Capt. Alden 
Partridge secured for him permission to take some 
subjects in the academy upon the payment of tuition 
fees. An offer of partnership from Doctor Green in- 
duced him to return to Windsor late in 1809. He be- 
came a prosperous merchant and a public-spirited 
citizen. The building of the great mill dam south of 
Windsor village was his undertaking. He aided in 
organizing the Ascutney bank of Windsor and was its 
first president. Mr. Wardner represented Windsor in 
the Legislatures of 1831, 1832, 1833 and 1842, and was 
a member of the Governor’s Council in 1834 and 1835. 
To him, more than any other person was due the 
building of the second State House, and he served on 
various committees and commissions having the work 
in charge. During the financial depression of 1837, 
Governor Jenison sought the most reliable and capable 
man in the State for the position of State Treasurer 
and Mr. Wardner was his choice. During the days of 
“wildcat” currency he stabilized and protected the 
credit of the State. He married Minerva Bingham of 
Lempster, N. H., January 24, 1841. Twelve children 
were born to them, one daughter becoming the wife of 
William M. Evarts, a well-known American statesman. 
For years Mr. Wardner was recognized as Windsor’s 
leading citizen. He died August 29, 1877. 
ALLEN WARDNER THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
427 
General Field left Newfane Hill about 1825, the county buildings 
having been removed to Newfane village, and erected in the latter the 
beautiful Colonial residence south of the court house which was de- 
stroyed by fire a few years ago. Here he spent the remainder of his 
life. To the west of the Field mansion between it and Union Hall 
stood the law office of General Field. Here after his days of practice 
were over were collected his mineralogical specimens. Several years 
ago this building was removed. 
Mr. Field died in Newfane October 3, 1833, and was buried in 
the family vault in the village cemetery. 
WILLIAM C. BRADLEY 
1782-1867 
William C. Bradley of Westminster is regarded by many as the 
greatest lawyer Windham county has produced. He was born at 
Westminster, March 23, 1782. He was a precocious child and began 
to write poetry at six; at nine he had read the Bible through seven 
times; was fitted for college at eleven; at twelve published his first 
prose works, and at thirteen entered Yale. He was expelled from 
college during the early part of his course, on account of some mis- 
chief for which he was not responsible, but in spite of this treatment 
and the coldness shown him by his father on account of his expulsion, 
he resolved to become a learned man notwithstanding the lack of a col- 
lege education. So he entered the law office of Judge Simeon Strong 
at Amherst where he studied until his tutor was appointed Judge of 
the Supreme Court of Massachusetts when he returned to his father’s 
office in Westminster and concluded his legal studies there. At the 
age of seventeen he was appointed to deliver the Fourth of July ora- 
tion at Westminster which included an original ode. He was admitted 
to the bar at the age of twenty, but was refused permission to prac- 
tice in the Supreme Court on account of his youth but an appointment 
by the Legislature as attorney for Windham county secured him ac- 
cess to the Supreme Court. This office he held for seven years. At 
twenty-four he represented Westminster in the Legislature (1806 and 
1807) ; at thirty he was a member of the Council, and at thirty-two a 
representative in Congress. At the expiration of this term in Con- 
gress he was appointed Agent of the United States under the treaty 
of Ghent for fixing the Northeastern Boundary. This was the great- 
est service of his life and it consumed five years. He was afterward 
elected to Congress for two terms (1823-1827). He was a member of 
the Legislature in 1852 and a Presidential Elector in 1856, casting the 
vote of his State for John C. Fremont, and was a member of the 
State Constitutional Convention in 1857. 428 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
He took a prominent place in Congress, and enjoyed the confi- 
dence and respect of Daniel Webster who entered Congress with him 
in 1812. He performed all his public duties with fidelity and ability. 
He was a great scholar, the master of several languages and a great 
wit but was essentially a lawyer, devoted to the law for the sake of 
its philosophy, its principles and its justice. In the examination of 
witnesses he was fair and took no more of the court’s time than was 
necessary. His arguments to the jury were earnest and effective, 
abounding in eloquence and wit, but were never abusive. Once an 
admiring clergyman complimented him on the earnestness of his ap- 
peal to the jury, and asked him why the clergy were not as eloquent as 
the lawyers. To this Mr. Bradley replied: “It is because we are so 
much nearer the judgment than you are.” 
He was in practice for fifty-five years. His last case was argued 
at the February term, 1857. He said that judging by the length of 
the lives of his ancestors he should live ten years longer and these he 
proposed to devote to reflection and repose. Accordingly he informed 
the bar that he should cease practice and should not go to Newfane 
again. The lawyers and officers of the court gave him a farewell sup- 
per at Newfane on this occasion, at which were present Judges Isaac 
F. Redfield, Pierpoint, Barrett and Aldis, the leading members of the 
bar from Windham county, and other distinguished citizens. Of this 
party, made up of forty men, none survive. Col. Kittridge Haskins 
of Brattleboro and Gen. Lewis A. Grant of Minneapolis were the last 
of the party to pass from among the living. 
Whoever visits the court room at Newfane is at once impressed 
by the full-length portrait of Father Bradley hanging on the north 
wall. This was the gift of the bar and the officers of the court. At 
the April term, 1854, Mr. Bradley had made an exhaustive and pow- 
erful argument before the jury and as he stepped along to resume his 
chair he staggered and trembled violently, whereupon Oscar L. Shat- 
ter, then of Wilmington, sitting at the table, wrote a subscription 
paper providing for the raising of money to secure the portrait of Mr. 
Bradley for the court house, all feeling that he would not be with 
them long. Enough was raised to secure the portrait. It was painted 
in 1855 by Tenney of Boston, who came to Westminster to do the 
work. 
Mr. Bradley had so calculated his forces that the ten years which 
he had allotted to himself for reflection and repose were shortened by 
only nineteen days. He died at Westminster March 4, 1867, in his 
eighty-fifth year. THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
429 
JONATHAN DORR BRADLEY 
1803-1862 
Jonathan Dorr Bradley, son of William C. Bradley and grandson 
of Stephen R. Bradley, was born at Westminster, Vt., in 1803. He 
graduated at Yale College and fitted for the legal profession. He be- 
gan practice at Bellows Falls but later moved to Brattleboro where 
he spent most of his professional life. He died here in September, 
1862. In some specialties Mr. Bradley had no equal at the bar. His 
knowledge of mechanics rendered him an almost inexhaustible source 
of information upon matters often imperfectly understood even by 
the learned. It was a great delight to him to discover and bring to 
light a hidden or obscure truth. But his mental exercises in the 
sciences did not render him a less formidable antagonist in debate. 
In his earlier days he acted with the Democracy but before the Civil 
War he left the old party and in 1856 and 1857 represented Brattle- 
boro in the Legislature. Here he took a leading part and became 
noted for his action on the State House question. He was on the 
first board of directors of the Vermont and Massachusetts Railroad 
Company and he was conspicuous in forwarding the construction of 
the road into Brattleboro. Mr. Bradley was successful as a public 
speaker and seemed to be a perfect master of the science of adaption 
to all grades of intellects. He was a great wit. Once Roswell M. 
Field reproved him for not giving the Yankee proof of success in life. 
“Roswell,” said he, “I have laid up my treasures in Heaven where 
moth and rust doth not corrupt nor thieves break through and steal.” 
Coming hastily into the office of Mr. Field on another occasion 
he inquired for Chitty on Contracts. “What do you wish to know ? ” 
replied Mr. Field, placing one finger on his forehead, “I carry my 
book here.” “I see,” said Mr. Bradley, “bound in calf.” 
He once received from a friend a noble mastiff, to which he be- 
came much attached. About the same time a bill was introduced in 
the Legislature to tax dogs, which called forth the following poem 
from Mr. Bradley. It had the effect at two sessions to defeat the 
bill, which did not pass until after Mr. Bradley’s decease: 
To My Dog Jowler 
Jowler! they have taxed you honest friend! 
Assessed you, put you in the roll, 
To exile every dog they’ll send, 
Unless some friend will pay his poll. 430 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
By all that’s good, the rascals meant 
Betwixt us two to breed a strife, 
And drive you into banishment, 
Or bribe your friend to take your life. 
But Jowler! Don’t you be alarmed! 
If politicians do neglect you, 
Confound their tax! You shan’t be harmed. 
I know your worth and I’ll protect you! 
But taxes by the Constitution 
Convey the right to represent, 
So dogs, by this same resolution, 
Might just as well as men be sent. 
Now, dogs and men and voters hear! 
That Jowler’s put in nomination 
To go upon the coming year, 
And aid in public legislation. 
On Mr. Bradley’s death resolutions were passed at the meeting 
of the bar at the United States Circuit Court for the District of Ver- 
mont, in which reference is made to his distinguished abilities as an 
advocate, his varied and elegant acquirements as a scholar, his genial 
and attractive qualities as a man. A leading Vermont newspaper in 
seeking with his nearer associates to lay a small tribute of worth upon 
his fresh-made grave, referred to his death as a “public calamity.” 
CHARLES K. FIELD 
1803-1880 
Charles K. Field, eldest son of General Martin and Esther Smith 
(Kellogg) Field, was born on Newfane Hill April 24, 1803. He fitted 
for college at Amherst, Mass., the home of his mother’s parents, and 
entered Middlebury College at the age of fifteen, graduating in 1822. 
After studying law in the office of his father for three years he was 
admitted to the bar in Windham county and commenced practice in 
Newfane. In 1828 he removed to Wilmington, where he resided for 
ten years representing that town in the Legislature in 1835, 1836, 
1837 and 1838. He was a delegate from Wilmington in the Constitu- 
tional Convention in 1836. In 1838 he returned to Newfane where he 
resided until 1861 representing the town in the Legislature in 1853, 
1854, 1855 and 1860 ; he also represented it in the Constitutional Con- THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
431 
ventions of 1843, 1850 and 1857. In 1861 he removed to Brattleboro, 
where he resided during the remainder of his life. He was elected a 
member of the Council of Censors in 1869, was Chosen president 
thereof at its first session, and in 1870 represented Brattleboro in the 
Constitutional Convention. In 1864 he formed a partnership with 
Judge James M. Tyler, under the name of Field and Tyler, which 
lasted until his death. Mr. Field inherited many of his father’s char- 
acteristics, especially his faculty for story telling. It was said of him 
that he usually kept his worst side out and his best side in. Byron’s 
description of Sheridan is applied to him by one of his biographers: 
“God never made but one such man, 
And broke the die in moulding Sheridan.” 
He was a great reader and student; was familiar with ancient and 
modern authors; possessed a wonderful memory; was a brilliant pub- 
lic speaker; had rare judgment of men; was a skilled lawyer, who 
commanded a large clientage but did not try cases himself in court; 
was widely known and respected throughout the State for his bril- 
liant abilities; possessed a kind, loyal disposition toward his friends, 
and was an honest man. He was the last survivor of a brilliant galaxy 
of lawyers who made the bar of Windham county famous during the 
early and middle part of the last century. In this list the Bradleys, 
Kelloggs, Shafters and Fields were the most distinguished. Mr. Field 
died at Brattleboro, September 16, 1880. 
ROSWELL M. FIELD 
1807-1869 
The most brilliant man who has graced the bar of Windham 
county was Roswell M. Field, who was born on Newfane Hill, Feb- 
ruary 22, 1807, and died at St. Louis, Mo., July 12, 1869. He fitted 
for college with Rev. Luke Whitcomb of Townshend and entered Mid- 
dlebury College in 1818 at eleven years of age. Graduating four years 
later he studied law with Daniel Kellogg of Rockingham, and was ad- 
mitted to the bar in September, 1825, at eighteen. He practiced in 
Windham county from 1825 until 1839 when he removed to St. Louis 
where he resided until his death. He represented Newfane in the Gen- 
eral Assembly in 1835 and 1836; was State’s Attorney for Windham 
county in 1832, 1833. 1834 and 1835. While a member of the Legis- 
lature he wrote an able report in favor of abrogating the rule of the 
common law excluding atheists from giving testimony in courts of 
justice. This measure failed for the time being, but was revived in 432 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
1851 and passed. The special pleas which Mr. Field drew in Torrey 
v. Field, 10 Vermont Supreme Court Reports, 353, were declared by 
Judge Story to be masterpieces of special pleading. These contribu- 
tions, with the exception of a multitude of briefs in cases reported in 
the Vermont and Missouri reports, are all the memorials of his 
learning. 
Mr. Field was an accomplished scholar. He read Greek, Latin, 
French, German and Spanish, and had an extensive acquaintance 
with English literature and general science, but it was as a lawyer that 
he won his greatest distinction. While having to contend with men 
like Benton, Gamble and Bates in Missouri, to none of these was he 
second in legal attainments, sound judgment and keen foresight. His 
opinions always had great weight with the Supreme Court, and at the 
time of his decease he was esteemed as the ablest lawyer at the Mis- 
souri bar. He gained a national reputation in the famous Dred Scott 
case which was brought in the State Court of Missouri by another 
lawyer of the same name and later transferred by Mr. Field to the Uni- 
ted States District Court of Missouri where he tried the case for 
the negro. When the appeal was entered in the United States Supreme 
Court he turned the case over to Montgomery Blair, who was residing 
in Washington at the time, who appeared with numerous other coun- 
sel for the defendant in error. During the dark days of the Civil War 
Mr. Field was one of the strong men to save his city and State from 
Confederate control. In social relations he was genial and entertain- 
ing, possessed great conversational powers, abounding in witty and 
sarcastic observation and epigrammatic sentences; he was elegant in 
manner and refined in deportment, an accomplished musician and a 
lover of children. He was confiding and generous until his last years, 
when he became reserved and distrustful. He was utterly devoid of 
all ambition for power or place and uniformly declined all offers of 
advancement to the highest judicial honors in his State. Had this 
element supplemented his other remarkable gifts his fame might well 
have become national. His recreation was in study, perusal of the 
Greek and Latin classics being his most delightful pastime. He was 
averse to physical exercise, and for years before his death lived a life 
of studious seclusion, and at an age when many men are at their best 
died of physical exhaustion. At a session of the Supreme Court of 
Missouri, held shortly after his death, he was eulogized as “one of 
the brightest ornaments” of the Missouri bar. Eugene Field, the 
humorous writer and poet, was his son. HENRY CLAY COPELAND 
Born in Middletown Springs, Vt., May 23, 1844, 
being the son of Lucius and Minerva (Skinner) Cope- 
land. He secured a position in a bank in Poultney in 
1867. From 1888 to 1870 lie was employed in a New 
York bank, and from 1870 to 1883 was cashier of the 
First National Bank at Brandon, Vt. He assisted in 
organizing the Sprague National Bank of Brooklyn, 
N. Y., and was its cashier for two years. In 1885, 
he founded the Minnehaha National Bank of Sioux 
Falls, S. Dak., and in 1887 he was the founder of the 
Riverside Bank of New York City. He was the cashier 
of this institution from 1887 to 1894 and its president 
from 1894 to 1903. He is a director and secretary of 
the Steel Ores Mining Company, and secretary, treas- 
urer and director of the Acetylene Samples Company. 
Since 1903 he has been actively interested in real estate 
in New York City and Haworth, N. J. He is a mem- 
ber of the West Side Republican Club, the Union Col- 
lege Alumni Association, the Broadway Association of 
New York City and the West End Association. Mr. 
Copeland was married October 10, 1866, to Julia A. 
North of Chazv, N. Y. Three children were born to 
them, Lucy M. (now Mrs. Adams), Henry F. and 
Frances L. Mrs. Copeland died in 1890 and on Sep- 
tember 1, 1892, Mr. Copeland married Marie K. Hinds 
of New York City. In 1922 Mr. Copeland established 
at his birthplace two memorial funds of five thousand 
dollars each, in honor of his father and mother, one 
for the benefit of the Congregational Church and one 
as a cemetery fund. THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
433 
JOHN E. BUTLER 
1809-1867 
John E. Butler, son of Aaron and Lucinda (Howard) Butler 
and uncle of Superior Judge Fred M. Butler, was born at Jamaica, 
December 14, 1809, and died at Beaufort, S. C. May 9, 1867. He 
attended the district schools in Jamaica and Leland and Gray Semi- 
nary at Townshend; studied law in Townshend and Whitingham and 
was admitted to the bar in Windham county at the April term, 1837. 
For a year he practiced with his preceptor, Horace Roberts, at Whit- 
ingham and on the death of the latter in 1838, and after that time and 
until 1843, practiced alone at Whitingham. He was Postmaster 
from 1838 to 1843 in the latter place. While residing here, mainly 
through his efforts, an academy was built. In July, 1843, he removed 
to Jamaica and began practice. He represented the town in the Legis- 
lature in 1848, 1849, 1851 and 1853. In the last-named year the West 
River Bank was incorporated. It was organized in 1854 and located 
at Jamaica. Of this he was elected cashier and remained as such un- 
til his decease. He formed a law partnership with, Benjamin L. 
Knowlton, which was dissolved by the latter’s death in 1855. He 
afterwards formed a partnership with Judge Hoyt H. Wheeler, which 
lasted until his death. He was a member of the Constitutional Con- 
vention in 1859 and was a State Senator from Windham county. In 
1861 he was a prominent candidate for Governor, but the nomination 
went to Frederick Holbrook of Brattleboro. 
As a lawyer, Mr. Butler stood in the front rank. For the prepara- 
tion of causes for trial, the arrangement and putting in of testimony, 
and the cross examination of witnesses, he had no equal in Windham 
county. I vividly recall what my father told me when I was a small 
boy about his exceptional talent as a cross examiner and have ever since 
had a pity for the unfortunate victims of his art, who tried to keep the 
truth from his far-seeing eye. He was wise as a legislator, public 
spirited as a citizen, kind and accommodating as a friend and neighbor. 
ALPHONSO TAFT 
1810-1891 
Alphonso Taft, father of President William H. Taft, was 
one of the great lawyers reared in Windham county. He was born at 
Townshend, November 5, 1810, and died at San Diego, California, 
May 21, 1891. He attended the district schools and afterwards taught 
and tutored for a time in his native town. When he had earned 
enough money to pay his tuition he entered the academy. When 434 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
nineteen years of age he entered Yale College where he graduated with 
high honors, studied law and started out to make his way in the world. 
He removed to Cincinnati, Ohio, in 1840, and began the practice of 
his profession. He was a pioneer in the organization of the Republican 
party and a delegate to the National Convention that nominated John 
C. Fremont in 1856. He was Judge of the Supreme Court of Cin- 
cinnati from 1865 to 1871; Secretary of War under President Grant 
from March 8 to May 22, 1876, when he was transferred to the office 
of Attorney General where he served nearly two years. He was ap- 
pointed, April 26, 1882, Minister to Austria and two years later Min- 
ister to Russia. He resigned in August, 1885, and returned to the 
United States. At different periods he was a member of the Cincin- 
nati Council, a trustee of Yale, and a trustee of the University of Cin- 
cinnati. He was a man of high principle, rugged honesty, sterling 
integrity, and withal a strong and able man. It was his custom after 
moving to Cincinnati to visit his old home once in two years. His tall 
form and gracious manner I pleasantly remember as I saw the aged 
lawyer with paper and pencil in hand, in the Probate office at Bellows 
Falls in 1889, noting down the friends of long ago from among the 
records as he was about to make his last visit to West Townshend 
with a son and daughter. He was twice married; first, to Fanny 
Phelps of Townshend, daughter of Charles Phelps, a prominent law- 
yer, and after her death to Louise Maria Torrey of Millbury, Mass. 
The first child by the second marriage was President Taft. 
OSCAR L. SHAFTER 
1812-1873 
Windham county never produced an abler lawyer than Oscar L. 
Shafter, who was born at Athens, Vt., October 19, 1812. He fitted 
for college at Wilbraham Academy, graduated at Wesleyan Univer- 
sity in 1834 and studied law at Harvard University. He began the 
practice of his profession at Wilmington in 1837, where he re- 
mained until 1854. In that year he removed to San Francisco, 
whither he was called by Halleck, Park, Peachey and Billings, leading 
lawyers of that city, to take charge of their important cases. This 
employment was at first on a salary of $10,(XX) a year but when Mr. 
Shafter found that his firm received more than that amount for the 
first case he argued he proposed at the end of the first year that he 
be admitted to the firm as a partner. He was admitted to the firm 
and remained until 1864, when he became a Judge of the Supreme Court. 
The firm to which he belonged was a notable one. At its head was 
Gen. Henry W. Halleck, one of the brainiest men on the Pacific Coast; THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
435 
the second member was Trenor W. Park, father of Mrs. John G. 
McCullough, who later resided in Bennington. He was a great finan- 
cier and a wise man of affairs. Frederick Billings was the last mem- 
ber of the firm. He afterwards removed to Woodstock where he was 
honored and respected as one of Vermont’s greatest men. In 1867 
Judge Shafter resigned as a member of the Supreme Court on ac- 
count of failing health and later he sought to regain this by a resi- 
dence in Italy, where he died January 23, 1873. 
He was a man of profound legal learning. He early took a posi- 
tion of leadership in Windham county and was employed in the im- 
portant cases here when he left for California. In the new field of 
his labors he was called upon to take charge of cases of great im- 
portance. In many of the cases which he tried in California the old 
Spanish titles were involved. These called for special skill and scholar- 
ship, which Mr. Shafter bestowed to the great advantage of his firm. 
His high standing at the bar is attested by his elevation to the bench 
at a time when the bar of California was rich with the best lawyership 
that the East could send to the new State. 
Judge Shafter made occasional addresses of a high order. One 
of these was delivered at Putney in 1835 on “Temperance,” and 
another before the Alumni of the Pacific Slope at Oakland, Calif., 
in 1866, on “Human Progress; Its Relations to the Reason, Acting in 
Right Method.” 
Hon. James McM. Shafter, brother of Judge Shafter, was Sec- 
retary of State for Vermont, 1842-1849. He, too, removed to Cal- 
ifornia and was a distinguished lawyer. 
ALBERT M. ALLBE 
1821-1916 
For many years one of the oldest Vermont lawyers was Albert 
M. Allbe, who was born at Westminster, November 13, 1821, and died 
at Bellows Falls, February 18, 1916. He attended school in Bellows 
Falls and at Walpole Academy. After graduating at the latter school 
he entered the law office of William C. Bradley, then the leading- 
lawyer in Windham county, at Westminster. He was admitted to 
the bar May 7, 1843, and to practice in the Supreme Court in 1846. 
In 1845 he located at Londonderry, but his health failing he left for 
California in 1852, where he prospected for gold but not with great 
success. Later he tried grain raising on a ranch south of San Fran- 
cisco. In 1855 he returned to Londonderry. His father died that 
year and he returned to Westminster, where he remained until 1861. 
From 1861 to 1865 he was located in Fitchburg, Mass., and from 436 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
1865 to 1874 in Londonderry. In the latter year he removed to Spring- 
field, Vt., where he practiced law until 1906, when he retired because 
of his advancing years, and removed to Bellows Falls, where he re- 
mained until his decease. 
Mr. Allbe was a grandson of the Revolution, his grandfather, 
Thomas Messen, having fought in that war. He was a charter 
member of the Vermont Bar Association, a member of the Sons of 
the American Revolution, a Mason, and a communicant of Immanuel 
Church at Bellows Falls. 
He married Mary C. Waite of Londonderry, who died on Friday 
afternoon, January, 1916, three days preceding the death of Mr. 
Allbe. They had been married upwards of seventy years and were 
the oldest married couple in Vermont, if not in New England. Mrs. 
Allbe was born in Andover, this State, July 3, 1825. Her grand- 
father was Major Waite of the Continental Army, whose funeral was 
long remembered as one of the largest ever held in Westminster. Her 
father died in his ninety-ninth year and her mother when she was 
eighty-eight. It was the proud boast of Mrs. Allbe that for sixty- 
eight years of her married life she kept house without hiring help of 
any kind. Three children survived their parents, Mrs. Fred A. Pierce 
of Fitchburg, Mass., Clara A. Allbe, widow of Dr. E. S. Allbe of 
Bellows Falls, and Mrs. A. C. Spear of Beverly, Mass. 
On the invitation of the late Clarke C. Fitts, who was then pres- 
ident, Mr. Allbe was a guest of the Vermont Bar Association at the 
annual meeting held at Montpelier in 1913, and spoke at length at 
the banquet. He was then in his ninety-second year. He stood erect 
without apparent fatigue and spoke without notes for nearly half an 
hour, never halting for a word as he discussed the men and customs 
of the early days in Vermont. He seemed like the real Nestor, “from 
whose lips,” said Homer, “words flowed sweeter than honey. In 
his time two generations of speaking mortals had passed away and 
he was living among the third.” 
For twenty-five years Mr. Allbe was an invalid and unable to 
follow his profession. He became so poor that he feared he must 
call for aid from the town, but health came again and he returned 
to his professional work and outlived all of his generation. 
CHARLES B. EDDY 
1829-1893 
After the passing of Charles N. Davenport in 1882, Charles B. 
Eddy, of Bellows Falls, became the leader of the Windham county 
bar and he retained the position until an illness in the winter of 1890- 
1891 incapacitated him from further service at the bar. He was THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
437 
born at Rockingham, Vt., July 27, 1829, the son of Charles Eddy 
and Lucy (Rollins) Eddy. His father was a farmer; his mother 
a school teacher and a woman of remarkable mental qualities and 
acquirements. Charles B. Eddy’s education was acquired in the com- 
mon schools and in the academies at Chester and Springfield. At the 
age of sixteen he was teaching the district school during the winter, 
preparing for a fall term of academy instruction, and thus alternating 
until for some years he pursued almost uninterruptedly the vocation 
of a teacher. Among his fellow students at Chester Academy were 
the late Gilbert A. Davis of the Windsor county bar, Gen. Lewis A. 
Grant of Minneapolis, Edwin H. Stoughton and Charles B. Stoughton, 
afterward leading lawyers. In 1849 he was married to Sarah M. 
Spaulding of Cavendish, and immediately removed to New Jersey, 
where both he and his wife were engaged as teachers in the public 
schools until 1857. During this time he was registered as a law 
student in the office of Stoughton and Grant at Bellows Falls and 
was diligently pursuing his legal studies. Leaving New Jersey in 
1857, he came to Bellows Falls and continued his studies in the office 
named and was admitted to the bar in Windham county at the April 
term, 1858. He was twenty-nine years old. The first year he re- 
mained in the employment of his preceptors at a dollar a day or less, 
but said afterward that he never lived so well or happily as during 
that first year. The following year he opened an office for himself 
in Bellows Falls, where he resided during the remainder of his life. 
Mr. Eddy was pre-eminently the lawyer, and his reputation was not 
confined to his own county or State. Much of his practice was in the 
adjoining State of New Hampshire. While he excelled as a coun- 
sellor and an examiner of witnesses, he surpassed in his method and 
power as a jury advocate. When the sympathies of his enfolding 
nature were aroused his eloquence was irresistible. Invective was 
swiftly and unsparingly employed, he would feelingly picture the 
sufferings of humanity and make the minds and hearts of the men 
in the jury box the receptacles of his own thoughts and emotions. 
He was an orator by nature and his speech flowed on fluently and 
dramatically rising at times to heights of eloquence. His strong, 
gracious face and attractive personality added much to his discourse. 
Once a brother attorney told him he could overcome his argument 
better than his face. During his leadership at the bar he was the 
senior counsel in most of the trials in his own county and tried many 
important cases in Windsor and Bennington counties in Vermont, 
and in Cheshire county in New Hampshire. Mr. Eddy held the office 
of State’s Attorney for Windham county in 1866-1867 and was State 
Senator in 1870-1871. He did not aspire to other offices, but con- 
tented himself with the law. He was, notwithstanding, an ardent 438 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
partisan and this element in his nature arrayed him strongly on his 
client’s side when engaged in a case. Mr. Eddy was a companionable 
man, was fond of children, a devoted husband and kind father. An 
illness in the winter of 1890-1891 was followed by paresis, from 
which he died at Bellows Falls, June 5, 1893. One of his sons, Charles 
F. Eddy, an able lawyer, located in Boston. 
CHARLES N. DAVENPORT 
1830-1882 
Charles N. Davenport was born at Leyden, Mass., October 20, 
1830. He received his education in the common schools and at the 
Shelburne Falls Academy and Melrose Seminary, West Brattleboro. 
He entered the office of Oscar L. Shafter of Wilmington as a student 
March 10, 1851, and was admitted as an attorney at the April 
term, 1854, of the Windham County Court. On his admission 
he formed a partnership with Mr. Shafter which continued until 
November 10, 1855, when Mr. Shafter removed from the State. On 
the admission to the bar of Col. Kittredge Haskins in April, 1858, he 
became a partner of Mr. Davenport and remained as such until April, 
1861. Mr. Davenport remained at Wilmington in active practice until 
his removal to Brattleboro in March, 1868, where he ever after resided. 
Here he found a large field for his unusual talents, and correspondingly 
larger responsibilities. Desiring to be relieved of a portion of his in- 
creased business which was overtaxing both his mental and physical 
powers, in 1875 he took into partnership Jonathan G. Eddy under the 
firm name of Davenport and Eddy. This co-partnership continued 
until January 1, 1882, when, with a view of regaining his health, 
which had become seriously impaired, he disposed of his business to 
Judge James L. Martin, the firm becoming Martin and Eddy. After 
relinquishing his law practice Mr. Davenport devoted himself to the 
lumber business and became interested in a steam saw mill in New- 
fane which he installed in my father’s wheelwright shop. He was 
much out-of-doors and had partially regained his health when he 
caught a severe cold from which, with other complications, he died 
April 12, 1882. 
He was the leader of the Windham county bar for many years 
preceding his retirement from practice and was a man of unusual force 
and ability. He was of commanding figure, being six feet three inches 
tall and weighing two hundred and thirty pounds, and his mental pow- 
ers corresponded with his physical ones. He was compelled to meas- 
ure swords with some of the best men in the profession, and in the 
combat was not found wanting. His practice became a large one and ALBERT G. FARR 
Born in Brandon, Vt., December 3, 1851. His 
father, Flavius Josephus Farr, and his mother, Chas- 
tina Eliza (Buck) Parkhurst, were likewise born in 
Vermont, as were three of his grandparents. Mr. Farr 
received his early education at the Brandon Seminary. 
On January 20, 1868, the family moved to Columbus, 
Ohio, where he graduated from the Central High School 
with first honors in 1870. His father's ill health made 
it impossible for him to go East to a technical school, 
as he had intended, so he began teaching mathematics 
and physics in the High School at Columbus during 
the next school year and continued there until June, 
1881. He was principal of the school for the last two 
years of this period. On July 23, 1873, he married 
Alice Parkhurst of Berlin, Wis., who died in 1888. They 
had one daughter, Shirley. He married (2d) Lottie 
Louise Snow, of Chicago, in 1890, who died in 1911. 
In 1881 Mr. Farr went to Chicago and became clerk 
for the law firm of Willard and Driggs; He was ad- 
mitted to the Illinois bar in 1882. His law practice 
early brought him into contact with N. W. Harris, and 
in 1891 he became a partner in X. W. Harris and Com- 
pany, bankers and bond dealers, Chicago, New York, 
and Boston. In 1907 he became a director of the Har- 
ris Trust and Savings Bank, Chicago, and later first 
vice-president and chairman of the board of directors. 
He was also a director of Harris, Forbes and Com- 
pany of New York and Boston. Mr. Farr was a very 
loyal Vermonter and for many years the family spent 
the summer months in Brandon. Mr. Farr was gen- 
erous in contributions of time and money to the interests 
of his native town and was largely instrumental in 
securing the erection of the Stephen A. Douglas memorial 
at Brandon. He died of pneumonia on December 22, 
1913. THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
439 
he counted his clients not alone in his own county and State but in 
other States. His manner of stating legal propositions was clean cut, 
comprehensive and epigrammatic. His briefs and arguments were the 
fruit of careful study and wise reflection but he was most celebrated 
in the skill and force of his presentation. The bar did not regard him 
as great as a lawyer as it did as an advocate and this opinion was shared 
by Senator Edmunds, who had met him in practice. When the Senator 
was told that he had gone into the lumber business he replied, dryly: 
“I hope he gets out his lumber straighter than he did his law.” He 
tried his case to win and would contend as though life itself were at 
stake. He possessed a logical mind, had an easy flow of plain and 
simple language to which all listened with pleasure and profit. When 
thoroughly aroused his imagination would glow with poetic fire and 
his voice quiver with intensity of feeling. At such time his magnet- 
ism would hold spell-bound those who were within the reach of his 
eloquence. 
I could imitate his way of speaking as a boy and once in the trial 
of a mock case at Townshend I made use of it and drew from my 
teacher in elocution the flattering compliment that she had not before 
realized what the voice of Daniel Webster was like. 
He was kind of heart and good to the poor and gave his services 
to poor clients that he thought were being wronged, but he was very 
rough in manner and when in a rage would swear like a trooper. He 
used oaths, too, in his daily intercourse with men, all unconsciously no 
doubt, and was accustomed to employ them in introducing some epi- 
grammatic speech which was characteristic of him. Once a traveling 
man called to get advice about some legal question and turned to go, 
after thanking Mr. Davenport for his pains, but was brought up with 
the admonition: “By G—, young man, that kind of coin isn’t current 
in this office,” whereupon he was handed a dollar by his visitor and 
replied: “That is more like it.” My father was a very shy man, 
polite and courteous and anxious always to do the genteel thing. He 
wanted to consult a lawyer and went to the office of Mr. Davenport, 
but not being unfamiliar with business conventions, knocked at his 
door. Mr. Davenport roared at him from within: “Come in.” When 
he walked into the presence of the great lawyer he received this repri- 
mand : “G— d— you Fish, don’t you know any better than to knock 
at a lawyer’s office?” 
Mr. Davenport was a Democrat and so did not hold public office. 
He was not successful as a politician although eminently so in his pro- 
fession. His attachment for his home and family was deep and abid- 
ing. His friendship was warm and permanent. He was twice married. 
By his first marriage were born Charles H. Davenport, for a long 
time the editor of the Windham County Reformer, and Herbert J. 440 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
Davenport, who studied for the law but never practiced. Both have 
recently died. 
KITTREDGE EIASKINS 
1836-1916 
Kittredge Haskins of Brattleboro was for a long time prominent 
as an attorney in Windham county. He was born at Dover April 
8, 1836, and died at Brattleboro, August 6, 1916. He was educated in 
the common schools and by a private tutor, and studied law in the 
office of Charles N. Davenport at Wilmington. He was admitted to 
the bar in Windham county April 14, 1858, and remained in practice 
until his decease. He was State’s Attorney in 1871 and 1872; United 
State’s Attorney for the District of Vermont from October, 1880, to 
July, 1887. He enlisted in 1862 in Company I, Sixteenth Regiment, 
Vermont Infantry, was commissioned First Lieutenant the same 
year, and resigned on account of disabilities the year following. He 
was Post Adjutant to Lieutenant Colonel Stoughton, the Brigade 
Commander; he also acted as Adjutant and Quartermaster. He was 
appointed Colonel by Governor Washburn in 1869. He represented 
Brattleboro in the Legislature in 1872, 1896 and 1898 and was Speaker 
at the war session and regular session the last year. He was State 
Senator in 1892. He was elected to Congress in 1900 and served until 
March 4, 1909. He was a thirty-third degree Mason and prominent 
in the Episcopal Church. 
Colonel Haskins was a brilliant man and a fine jury advocate. 
He was an eloquent speaker and his services were in demand during 
presidential campaigns and on patriotic occasions. He had a good 
standing at the bar and his career in Congress was more than usually 
successful. 
LAVANT M. READ 
1842-1902 
After the death of Charles B. Eddy, Judge Lavant M. Read be- 
came the leading lawyer in the north half of Windham county. He 
was born at Wardsboro, December 26, 1842. He was educated in the 
common schools of his native town and at Leland and Gray Seminary 
at Townshend. studied law with Judge H. H. Wheeler at Jamaica 
and was admitted to the bar in Windham county in 1869. He formed 
a partnership with his tutor which continued until 1872, when he re- THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
441 
moved to Bellows Falls where he resided until his death, which oc- 
curred June 17, 1902. He was elected to the Legislature from Jamaica 
in 1870 and from Rockingham in 1892. In 1876 he was elected Judge 
of Probate for the Westminster district and continued to hold this office 
until his death. 
He enlisted in Company H, Second Vermont Volunteers, in 1863, 
was in the battles of Rappahannock Station and Mine Run and of the 
Wilderness. He was wounded in the last named engagement and was 
discharged August 20, 1865. 
He was conspicuous in the Masonic order, where he held the office 
of Master in the Mount Lebanon Lodge at Jamaica and of Grand 
Master, Grand Secretary and Grand Dictator in the Grand Lodge. 
He was the first Commander of the E. H. Stoughton Post, No. 34, 
G. A. R., at Bellows Falls. In 1892 he was elected president of the 
Vermont Bar Association. 
Judge Read was an excellent lawyer, an accomplished surveyor 
and a public-spirited and useful citizen. His capacity for work was 
unusual and his executive ability exceptional. In common with the 
other men who practiced at Jamaica in his time, Judge Wheeler and 
Judge Waterman in particular, he was an excellent penman. This 
gave a finish to the papers that left his office in the days before the 
typewriter came into use. He kept his own records as Judge of Pro- 
bate before I entered his office in 1888 and after I left the office, and 
in a single day would fill forty pages with copies of the files of the 
office. He had such confidence in the correctness of his work that he 
never stopped to correct it and instructed me to follow the same 
plan when I did the recording. It is needless to say that the office 
work of such a man was well kept up. 
He was nervous in court and ill at ease in trying cases but he 
tried them well in County Court, always on their merits, and usually 
with good success. In the Supreme Court he was regarded highly 
and listened to with great respect. 
He was the soul of honor, loyal and steadfast as a friend, and had 
a high regard for the ethics of the profession. He burned with indig- 
nation when a client called at his office and told him that he had come 
to hire a “liar” to take care of his case. 
CHARLES H. ROBB 
1867- 
Charles H. Robb of Bellows Falls is one of the men of the bar 
in Windham county who has achieved brilliant success. He was born 
at Guilford, November 14, 1867, the son of Isaac and Clara Slater 
(Matthews) Robb. He obtained a preparatory school education, 442 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
mainly at Brattleboro, studied law in the office of Kittredge Haskins 
at Brattleboro and was admitted to the bar in 1889. He located at 
Bellows Falls, where he practiced from 1894 to 1902. He held several 
minor offices and was State’s Attorney of Windham county from 1896 
to 1898. He was Assistant Attorney General for the Post Office De- 
partment during the investigations of 1904-5; Assistant Attorney Gen- 
eral of the United States in 1905-6, and has been Associate Justice of 
the Court of Appeals of the District of Columbia since 1906. In 
connection with his duties at Washington before he came to the bench 
Tudge Robb conducted the prosecution of Senator Burton of Kansas 
for frauds against the Government and procured his conviction. His 
appointment as Judge was made by President Roosevelt, who dis- 
covered in the efficient prosecuting officer the right material for the 
Court of Appeals. 
CLARKE C. FITTS 
1870-1916 
Clarke C. Fitts was born in Wardsboro, October 17, 1870. He 
was educated in the public schools, at Leland and Gray Seminary at 
Townshend, and at the Brattleboro High School where he graduated 
in 1886. This was the extent of his preparation for the law. He en- 
tered the office of Waterman, Martin and Hitt as a student and was 
admitted to the bar October 22, 1891. He opened an office at once 
at Brattleboro where he ever after resided and practiced his profes- 
sion. He was State’s Attorney of Windham county from 1894 to 
1896; represented Brattleboro in the Legislature in 1904, and was At- 
torney General from 1904 to 1908. 
From the first he attracted attention as an aggressive and prom- 
ising lawyer. He soon had a large docket and his early trials marked 
him as a man of talent. He became by general consent the leader 
of the House in 1904 and at its close commenced his career as 
the first Attorney General of the State, a place to which he had 
been elected by the Legislature. In the one important office which 
he held he displayed great constructive ability and filled it to the 
general satisfaction of the State. This brought him into prom- 
inence especially as a trial lawyer and at the end of his second term 
he declined to be a further candidate for the office, preferring to 
devote all his time to private practice. A large and profitable 
business awaited him. This, in large part, came from important busi- 
ness and corporate interests. His clientage soon extended over his 
own State and to New Hampshire, Massachusetts and New York. He 
was frequently called on to try cases in these States and he argued THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
443 
several cases before the United States Supreme Court at Washington, 
the last one being that of the State of Vermont v. the Clement Na- 
tional Bank. 
This case was brought to recover a tax assessed under the State 
law on the savings deposits of the defendant. The bank opposed the 
collection of the tax on the ground that being a Federal institution 
the assessment was in contravention of the United States Constitution. 
Maxwell Evarts of New York and Marvelle C. Webber of Rutland 
appeared for the bank. The decision was in favor of the State. 
He fitted up over the Vermont National Bank the finest law 
offices in Vermont. On the second floor a large office room richly 
furnished and equipped was used by Mr. Fitts, while opening from it 
were rooms for his associates, Hermon E. Eddy and Harold E. Whit- 
ney, together with rooms for several stenographers. On the third floor 
and over the main office he located his library, one of the largest and 
best private law libraries in Vermont. Here for much of the time he 
employed an expert lawyer in examining the law and making briefs. 
His was the best equipped office in Vermont for the discharge of a 
large, special business throughout a wide area. 
Mr. Fitts possessed a remarkable mentality. As a small boy in 
his father’s country store he was accustomed to out-argue the old men 
who exchanged views there. His first years in the profession were 
marked by great courage and boldness and it was not long before his 
talent was recognized and his services were sought in important liti- 
gation. His capacity for the acquisition of facts and details was 
phenomenal and his memory was no less remarkable. He carried in 
his head a chain of titles of sixty or more transfers covering a period 
of a hundred years in the Marlboro Pond case and could give the de- 
tails of each deed. He could follow a question of law with the same 
facility and cite from memory a long list of authorities. These quali- 
ties and a native persistency made him an exceptionally good jury 
lawyer before whom he tried cases with great force, earnestness and 
ability, and they made him likewise one of the strongest advocates 
before the courts of review. 
He took a keen interest in developing the natural resources of 
Vermont, and the great dam at South Vernon and the large enter- 
prises of the Deerfield River are monuments to his initiative. He took 
a leading part in all public enterprises in Brattleboro and lent his 
powerful aid to the movements that looked to the betterment of his 
State. 
While engaged as a speaker in the national campaign in behalf 
of the Republican cause in the fall of 1916 Mr. Fitts was warned by 
his suffering of a serious physical infirmity and on examination a dis- 
eased condition of the pancreas, liver and gall bladder was discovered. 444 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
Although the early results of an operation seemed favorable a cancer- 
ous condition developed causing his death on December 20, 1916. 
ORA E. BUTTERFIELD 
1870-1916 
Ora E. Butterfield, the brilliant classmate of Clarke C. Fitts at 
the Brattleboro High School, was born in Brattleboro in 1870, the 
only son of Oscar H. and Roselia (Elmer) Butterfield. He died in 
New York December 23, 1916. After his graduation at the high 
school he took a post-graduate course for a year and later graduated 
from the Childs Business School in Springfield, Mass., completing the 
full course there in a time never equalled up to that period. After 
working for a year in a loan and trust company office in Greeley, Colo., 
he entered the law department of the University of Michigan, from 
which he graduated a month before he was twenty-one years old. He 
was admitted to the bar the day he was twenty-one. 
He soon attracted the attention of the Michigan Central Railroad 
officials and was engaged by them in legal work. His advancement was 
rapid and within a few years he was made general counsel of the Mich- 
igan Central which is controlled by the New York Central system. For 
several years he lived in Detroit but the New York Central wanted 
him for important service and he was called to New York and placed 
in charge of the rate work of that system and in other matters in 
which appearance before the Interstate Commerce Commission was 
necessary. His title was that of General Solicitor, his position being 
one of the highest from a legal standpoint in the offices of the company. 
It is a strange coincidence that the two ablest men to enter the 
legal profession from Windham county during their generation should 
have had so many things in common. They were born in the same 
year and in the same county. They graduated together at the Brattle- 
boro High School when they were sixteen years of age. They were 
admitted to the bar the same year as soon as they arrived at the age 
of twenty-one. Each achieved brilliant success in his chosen profes- 
sion. Each had deep religious convictions. Mr. Butterfield was an 
enthusiastic supporter of the Universalist Church, once serving as 
vice-president of the Universalist General Convention, the most im- 
portant lay position in the denomination. Mr. Fitts was a mem- 
ber of the Congregational Church, an earnest and efficient helper and 
a teacher in the Sunday School. The two men were stricken at about 
the same time with the same fatal malady. Mr. Butterfield died from 
an infection of the gall duct and pancreas. Each was operated upon 
in the same month for the same cause; and while the friends of Mr. THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
445 
Fitts were assembling to attend his last sad rites Mr. Butterfield passed 
away. His funeral occurred at Brattleboro two days later and the mor- 
tal dust of each was placed at rest in Prospect Hill Cemetery. 
PRESENT MEMBERS OF THE WINDHAM COUNTY BAR 
Frank E. Barber, of Brattleboro, was born in Wardsboro, April 
28, 1878. He was educated in the public schools of Brattleboro, 
studied law in the office of his brother, Herbert G. Barber, at the same 
place and was admitted to the bar in 1903. He has practiced in Brattle- 
boro since his admission, first in company with his brother Herbert 
and now is practicing in the firm of Barber, Barber and Miller. He 
was State’s Attorney 1910-1912, and Judge of Brattleboro Municipal 
Court, 1913-1917. He represented Brattleboro in the General Assem- 
bly in 1921. 
Herbert G. Barber, of Brattleboro, was born in Wardsboro 
August 14, 1870. He was educated in the public schools of Tovvn- 
shend and Brattleboro and under a private instructor. He studied law 
in the office of Waterman, Martin and Hitt at Brattleboro and was 
admitted to the bar in 1893. He practiced at Wilmington from 1894 
to 18% and since 1896 has practiced at Brattleboro. He is a member of 
the firm of Barber, Barber and Miller. He was State’s Attorney from 
1898 to 1900; member of the House in 1908; Senator in 1912, and 
Attorney General, 1914-1919. 
Oscar M. Baker, of Bellows Falls, was born at Wallingford, Sep- 
tember 9, 1847. He was educated in the common schools of Walling- 
ford and Danby and at the Wallingford High School. He studied law 
in the office of Henry Hawkins at East Wallingford and was admitted 
to the bar in 1886. He practiced at Cuttingsville from 1886 to 1892 
and since 1892 has practiced at Bellows Falls. 
Almon I. Bolles, of Bellows Falls, was born at Bellows Falls, 
March 15, 1871. He was educated in the schools of Bellows Falls and 
studied law at the University of Virginia and in the office of his father. 
Francis A. Bolles, at Bellows Falls. He was admitted to the bar of 
Vermont in 1898 and to the bar of New Hampshire in 1904. He has 
practiced at Bellows Falls since his admission. He has held several 
local offices, including that of Town Clerk. 
Albert W. Butler, of Jamaica, was born at Jamaica, January 3, 
1879. He was educated in the public schools of Orange, Mass., at 
Leland and Gray Seminary, and at the University of Vermont, where 
he graduated in 1901. He studied law in the office of Butler and 446 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
Moloney at Rutland and was admitted to the bar in 1904. He has 
always practiced in Jamaica, where he has been Town Clerk and 
Treasurer since 1905. He represented Jamaica in the General As- 
sembly in 1921. 
Don O. Butterfield, of Wilmington, was born at Wilmington, 
March 19, 1875. He was educated in the public schools of Vermont 
and Nebraska, studied law in the office of Oscar E. Butterfield at 
Wilmington, and was admitted to the bar in 1906. He has never 
practiced but has devoted his attention to banking and is treasurer of 
the Wilmington Savings Bank. He was a member of the House in 
1910. 
Oscar E. Butterfield, of Wilmington, was born at Wilmington, 
September 17, 1839. He was educated in the common schools of 
Wilmington, and studied law in the office of Flagg and Tyler, 
Flagg and Son, and Flagg and Waterman at Wilmington. He 
was admitted to the bar in 1867 and has practiced at Wilmington, ex- 
cept from 1886 to 1897, when he was in Nebraska. He was a member 
of the House, 1869-1870-1872 and 1884; State’s Attorney, 1874-1875; 
State Senator, 1876-1877. 
Arthur P. Carpenter, of Brattleboro, was born at Readsboro, 
March 31, 1867, and was educated in the common schools, Castleton 
State Normal School, Rochester Business University, and Boston 
University Law School. He studied law with Stephen T. Davenport 
at Brattleboro, and was admitted to the bar of Vermont in 1896, that 
of Massachusetts in 1897, and to the Supreme Court of the United 
States in 1919. He practiced at North Adams, Mass., from 1897 to 
1905, and has since practiced at Brattleboro. He has been Town 
Agent since 1908 and was United States Marshal from 1914 to 1921. 
Charles S. Chase, of Brattleboro, was born at Whitingham, May 
13, 1855, and received his education at the public schools and from 
private tutors. Fie studied law at Whitingham with H. N. Hix and 
Hosea W. Brigham and was admitted to the bar in 1880. He prac- 
ticed at Whitingham until 1887 and since then has practiced at Brat- 
tleboro. He was official court reporter for Bennington county for 
thirty years, of Windham county for twenty-five years, and of Rut- 
land county for five years. He has been Justice of the Peace for thirty 
years; has held many town offices and was a Senator from Windham 
county in 1906. 
Neil B. Clawson, of Brattleboro, was born at Clyde, Minn., May 
22, 1880. He was educated in the high school at Chatfield and Brown Born in Albany, Vt., October 12, 1848. After study- 
ing in Peacham Academy he went to Omaha, Neb., and 
for two years was employed by the Union Pacific Rail- 
road. Returning to Vermont he engaged, in 1872, in 
the manufacture of hardware specialties at Windsor. 
He was manager and one of the owners of the Windsor 
Gas Company. He served as trustee and president of 
the Windsor Savings Bank and as manager of the 
Windsor County Trust Company. He was three times 
a member of the Vermont Legislature. He married 
Sarah F. Bishop in 1878 and seven children were born 
to them. He died August 29, 1921. 
HORACE P. McCLARY TLIE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
447 
Preparatory School at Faribault, both in Minnesota, and at the Zane- 
rian College of Art at Columbus, Ohio. He studied law with Robert 
C. Bacon at Brattleboro, was admitted to the bar in 1917, and since 
his admission has practiced at Brattleboro. He has been Clerk of the 
Public Service Commission since 1913. Mr. Clawson is an efficient 
stenographer, has taught stenography, and reports the proceedings of 
the Public Service Commission in shorthand. 
Addison E. Cudworth, of South Londonderry, was born at Savoy, 
Mass., July 3, 1852. He was educated at Chester Academy, Perkins 
Academy, and Dartmouth College. Pie studied law at South London- 
derry in the office of Judge James L. Martin and was admitted to the 
bar in 1879. He has practiced at South Londonderry since his admis- 
sion. He was a member of the House in 1884, 1917 and 1919; Sen- 
ator, 1898-1900; State’s Attorney; Referee in Bankruptcy; Mu- 
nicipal Judge Brattleboro Municipal Court from 1917 to 1921. Mr. 
Cudworth has administered several important trusts in Vermont and 
New York under appointments of the Federal Court. 
William R. Daley, of Brattleboro, was born at Bennington, May 
5, 1877. He was educated in the Bennington Graded School and 
studied law in the office of Barber and Darling at Bennington. He 
was admitted to the bar in 1900 and practiced at Bennington until 
1907, when he removed to Brattleboro, where he has since practiced. 
He was Special Prosecutor in Bennington under a commission from 
Governor Stickney in 1902; State’s Attorney of Bennington county, 
1904-1906; Municipal Judge of Brattleboro, 1910-1912; State’s Attor- 
ney for Windham county, 1917-1919, and County Clerk since 1920. 
Edgar H. Davenport, of West Brattleboro, was born in Leyden, 
Mass., November 22, 1845. He was educated in the public schools, 
at Powers Institute, Bernardston, Mass., and Green Mountain Insti- 
tute, South Woodstock. He studied law with Stephen T. Davenport, 
Charles N. Davenport, and Judge Hoyt H. Wheeler, and was admitted 
to the bar in 1871. He practiced at Wilmington in 1872 and 1873, and 
has held the office of Justice of the Peace. 
John E. Gale, of Guilford, was born at Guilford, May 12, 1866, 
and was educated in the district schools of Guilford. He studied law 
at his home but was registered with Haskins and Stoddard at Brattle- 
boro. He was admitted to the bar in 1897 and has since practiced at 
Guilford. He has held many town offices, including Town Clerk and 
Treasurer. He has been Referee in Bankruptcy since 1915, and is 
United States Commissioner. He is trust officer of the Brattleboro 
Trust Co. 448 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
Ernest W. Gibson, of Brattleboro, was born in Londonderry, De- 
cember 29, 1871. He was educated at the Black River Academy at Lud- 
low, Norwich University and the University of Michigan; studied law 
with Hon. E. L. Waterman and Hon. J. L. Martin at Brattleboro and 
was admitted to the bar of Vermont in 1899 and to the United States 
Supreme Court in 1905. From his admission until 1916 he practiced in 
Brattleboro, and again from March, 1919, to the present time. He 
was Register of Probate for the District of Windsor in 1896; Deputy 
Clerk United States Courts, 1899 to 1906; member of the House of 
Representatives, 1906-1908; member of the Senate, 1908-1910, and 
president pro tem; Judge of Brattleboro Municipal Court, 1906 to 
1910; delegate to the Republican National Convention, 1912; Captain 
First Vermont Infantry, Mexican service, June 19, 1916, to October 
8, 1916; Captain United States Army, World War, from 1916 to 
1919; State’s Attorney of Windham county from 1919 to 1921; Colo- 
nel of Vermont National Guard from 1921 to 1922. He is Secretary 
of Civil and Military Affairs to Governor Hartness. 
Warner A. Graham, of Bellows Falls, was born at Greensboro, 
January 9, 1884. He graduated from Hardwick Academy in 1903 
and from the Albany Law School in 1907. He studied law in the 
office of Melvin G. Morse at Hardwick and was admitted to the bar 
in 1907. He has practiced at Bellows Falls since admission and has 
held the following offices: Secretary of Civil and Military Affairs, 
1912-1914; member of the House, 1915; Judge of Probate, West- 
minster District, since March, 1916. 
Robert L. Fitts, of Brattleboro, was born at Brattleboro, August 
16, 1894. He was educated at the Brattleboro High School, at Phillips 
Exeter Academy, where he graduated in 1911, and at Dartmouth Col- 
lege, where he graduated in 1915. He studied law at Harvard Law 
School and in the office of Harvey, Maurice and Whitney at Brattle- 
boro, was admitted to the bar in 1919 and became a member of 
the firm of Harvey, Maurice, Whitney and Fitts, with whom he has 
since practiced in the office of his late father, Clarke C. Fitts. The 
firm is now Harvey, Maurice and Fitts, Mr. Whitney having with- 
drawn on becoming State’s Attorney of Windham county in Februarv, 
1921. 
Frederick L. Houghton, of Putney, was born at Brookline, Mass., 
August 24, 1859. He was educated in the public schools of Boston 
and studied law at the Boston University Law School, where he gradu- 
ated in 1884. He also studied in the office of Charles Houghton in 
Boston. He was admitted in 1884, and from that time until 1894 
practiced in Boston. He has held several town offices in Putney and THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
449 
was a member of the House from that town from 1900 to 1904. He 
is employed by the Holstein-Friesian Register Company of Brattle- 
boro. 
John N. Harvey, of Brattleboro, was born at West Topsham, 
August 23, 1879. He was educated at the Montpelier Seminary and 
at the University of Vermont, studied law in the office of his father, 
R. M. Harvey, and his brother, E. M. Harvey, at Montpelier, and 
was admitted to the bar in 1904. He practiced at Montpelier, 1904- 
1908; Montreal, 1908-1915; Barre, 1915-1917, and Brattleboro since 
1917. He is a member of the firm of Harvey, Maurice and Fitts. He 
was a clerk of the Revision of Bills Committee, 1904; assistant to the 
Committee to Revise the Vermont Statutes, 1904-1906; assistant to 
the Committee to edit the Statutes in 1906; Executive Clerk, 1908, and 
1917; assistant to the commission to revise Public Statutes, 1915- 
1917. 
Fred S. Hartley, of Saxtons River, was born in Brookline, Mass., 
August 6, 1890. He was educated at Hackley School, Tarrytown, 
N. Y., and graduated at Cornell University Law School in 1913. He 
studied law in the office of Clarke C. Fitts at Brattleboro and was ad- 
mitted to the bar in 1914. He has never practiced. 
Orrin B. Hughes, of Brattleboro, was born in Winhall, July 21, 
1882. He was educated at Leland and Gray Seminary, Burr and Bur- 
ton Seminary, where he graduated in the class of 1905, and at the 
University of Vermont, where he graduated in the class of 1909. He 
studied law in the office of Gibson and Waterman at Brattleboro and 
was admitted to the bar in 1912. He has practiced in Brattleboro since 
admission. He was Town Grand Juror, 1913-1915; Village Attorney, 
1913-1917, and State’s Attorney, 1915-1917. 
Edward S. Jones, of Wilmington, was born at Rutland, September 
19, 1890. He was educated in the Rutland Graded School and at the 
Rutland High School, studied law in the office of Joseph C. Jones at 
Rutland and at Albany Law School. He was admitted to the bar in 
1915 and practiced at Rutland, 1915-1916; at Barton, 1916-1917; and 
at Wilmington since September, 1919. He was with the Fifty-seventh 
Pioneer Infantry in the World War, was commissioned First Lieu- 
tenant, held the office of trial Judge Advocate for the Third Brigade, 
and was appointed to the Third Battalion Staff, Ninth Infantry, and 
later to the regimental staff of the same regiment, where he acted as 
trial Judge Advocate for four different courts. 
Joseph G. Martin, of Newfane, studied law with his brother, 
James L. Martin, and with Jonathan G. Eddy, and was admitted to the 450 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
bar in 1874. He attended the common schools, and select schools in 
Landgrove, Londonderry and Peru. He practiced at Londonderry 
from 1874 to 1881 and at Manchester from 1881 to 1896. While here 
he was for a time a partner of Frank T. Spring and later a partner of 
Frank C. Archibald. In 1896 he retired from active practice on ac- 
count of ill health and organized the Vermont Spring Company in 
Brookline. His legal residence is here and in 1908 he represented 
Brookline in the House. 
Melville P. Maurice, of Brattleboro, was born at Cambridge, 
August 11, 1871, and was educated in the common schools and at the 
State Normal School at Johnson. He studied law in the office of 
Philip K. deed at Morrisville, and in the office of L. F. Wilbur at 
Jericho, and was admitted to the bar in 1898. He practiced at Mont- 
gomery, 1898-1907; Morrisville, 1907-1919; Brattleboro, 1919 to date. 
He is a member of the law firm of Harvey, Maurice and Fitts. He 
was president of the village of Morrisville; State’s Attorney of La- 
moille county, 1908-1919; Senator from Lamoille county, 1919. 
Frank H. Laughton, of Dummerston, was born at that place Feb- 
ruary 26, 1876. He was educated in the public schools of Dummers- 
ton, at Miss Sawyer’s private school and at Brattleboro Academy. 
He studied law in the office of Haskins and Schwenk at Brattleboro, 
and was admitted to the bar in 1904. What practice he has done has 
been at Brattleboro. He has been Moderator, Auditor, and Town 
Agent of Dummerston. 
C. Menzies Miller, of Brattleboro, was born in New York, Novem- 
ber 11, 1873, and was educated at Mount Pleasant Academy, Brattle- 
boro High School, and Phillips Andover Academy, where he gradu- 
ated in 1893. He studied law at Brattleboro with Gibson and Water- 
man and was admitted to the bar in 1910. He has practiced at Brat- 
tleboro since admission, at first being associated with H. G. and F. E. 
Barber as Clerk, and now being a member of the firm of Barber, 
Barber and Miller. He was Probation Officer from 1912 to 1916; is 
a Justice of the Peace, and has been United States Commissioner since 
1917. 
Thomas E. O’Brien, of Bellows Falls, was born at Bellows Falls, 
August 5, 1867. He graduated at the Bellows Falls High School in 
1884 and for several years was engaged in newspaper correspond- 
ence. In 1894 he entered Boston University Law School and gradu- 
ated in 1917, magna cum laude. He was a student in the office of 
Herbert D. Ryder at Bellows Falls from 1891 to 1897 and was ad- 
mitted to the bar in 1897. He has practiced since 1904 at Bellows THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
451 
Falls. He was Municipal Judge in 1909-1910, and has held that office 
since 1913; President of the Bellows Falls Village Corporation, 1907- 
1911, and Register of Probate of Westminster District. He was Con- 
tributing Editor and Editor-in-Chief of the “Encyclopedia of Forms 
and Precedents,” 1897 to 1904, and Contributing Editor to “Annotated 
Statutes of the United States” in 1904. 
Fred B. Pingree, of Bellows Falls, was born at Chicago, August 
16, 1869, and was educated in the schools of Los Angeles, San Fran- 
cisco and Chicago. He studied law at Harvard and with Gov. Samuel 
E. Pingree, and was admitted to the bar in 1897. He practiced at Wood- 
stock, 1897-1899; Chester, 1899-1901, and from 1901 to the present 
time at Bellows Falls. 
A. V. D. Piper, of Brattleboro, was born at Brattleboro, March 
22, 1876. He graduated at the Brattleboro High School in 1893, 
studied law in the office of Haskins and Stoddard at Brattleboro, and 
was admitted to the bar in 1899. He practiced at Jamaica from 1903 
to 1912 and since then has practiced at Brattleboro. He was State’s 
Attorney of Windham county, 1913-1914. 
Herbert D. Ryder, of Bellows Falls, was born at Acworth, N. H., 
November 12, 1850. He was educated in the common schools, Colby 
Academy, Oberlin College, and Dartmouth College, where he gradu- 
ated in 1876. He studied law in the office of J. W. Pierce at Spring- 
field, with Judge David Cross at Manchester, N. H., and with Senator 
Henry E. Burnham at the same place. He was admitted to the bar in 
1880, and practiced at Springfield from 1880 to 1881, and since 1900 
has practiced in Bellows Falls. He is a member of the law firm of 
Ryder and Graham. He has held many local offices; was County Ex- 
aminer of Teachers for many years; State’s Attorney, 1904-1906; 
Department Collector of Internal Revenue, 1897-1904; member of the 
House, 1912; member of State Board of Education, 1913-1914. 
Anthony F. Schwenk, of Brattleboro, was born at Brooklyn, 
N. Y., September 9, 1873, and was educated in the district school 
and the High School of Brattleboro. He studied law in the office of 
Haskins and Stoddard and in the office of Kittredge Haskins at Brat- 
tleboro, and was admitted to the bar in 1897. He has practiced at 
Brattleboro since his admission. He was Register of Probate, 1896- 
1906; Referee in Bankruptcy, 1898-1900; State’s Attorney, 1900-1902; 
Judge of Probate, Marlboro District, since 1906. 
Frank D. E. Stowe, of Brattleboro, was born at Wilmington, De- 
cember 31, 1864, and graduated at Glenwood Classical Seminary in 452 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
1885. He studied law at Brattleboro with Judge E. L. Waterman, 
with Waterman and Martin, with Haskins and Stoddard and at the 
Albany Law School. He was admitted to the bar in 1889. He com- 
menced practice at Brattleboro. In 1890 he located in Hastings, Minn., 
where he remained for five years. From 1895 to 1898 he practiced 
in Keene, N. H., and since that time has been at Brattleboro. He was 
Referee in Bankruptcy in 1900-1907 and County Clerk of Windham 
county from 1907 to 1920. He was appointed Judge of the Brattleboro 
Municipal Court February 1, 1921. 
George H. Thompson, of Bellows Falls, was born at Ludlow, 
April 28, 1880. He graduated at the Vermont Academy in 1897 and 
studied law in the office of Waterman and Martin at Brattleboro. 
He was admitted to the bar in 1905 and has practiced at Bellows 
Falls since January, 1906, with the exception of one year, when he 
was in practice at Bethel. He was Judge of the Bellows Falls Mu- 
nicipal Court, 1910-1913. He was company commander, Quarter- 
master and Adjutant, First Infantry, Vermont National Guard, be- 
tween 1903 and 1913; Aide to the Governor, 1910-1912. He was 
Captain in the National Guard in the Federal service from August, 
1917, to March, 1918, when he was promoted to the rank of Major. 
He served until October, 1919, when he was honorably discharged 
and appointed to the Reserve Corps, with rank of Major. He is a 
member of the law firm of Bolles, Thompson and Twitched. 
Robert R. Twitched, of Bellows Fads, was born at Stockbridge, 
August 14, 1886. He graduated at the Whitcomb High School at 
Bethel in 1905, at Middlebury College in 1911, and at the Boston 
University Law School in 1915. He studied law in the office of 
Stickney, Sargent and Skeels at Ludlow and was admitted to the bar 
in 1915. He practiced at Ludlow, 1915-1916; and has practiced at 
Bellows Fads since 1916. He has held the office of Grand Juror and 
of Justice of the Peace. 
George A. Weston, of Bellows Fads, was born in Rockingham, 
February 27, 1849. He was educated at the Bellows Fads High 
School, Chester Academy, Kimball Union Academy, at Meriden, N. H., 
and at Powers Institute, at Bernardston, Mass. He studied law in 
the office of J. D. Bridgman at Bellows Fads and in the office of Judge 
Hugh Henry at Chester, and was admitted to the bar in 1876. He 
began practice at Chester, but soon removed to Bellows Fads, where 
he is in practice. He has long been the local attorney for the Boston 
and Maine Railroad. He was State’s Attorney from 1900 to 1902. Born in New Bedford, Mass., May 11, 1862. He was 
graduated from Harvard College in 1885 and a little 
later became a partner in an exporting and importing 
business in New York City, in which he was engaged 
for about seventeen years. He removed to Woodstock, 
Yt., in 1903. He was Chief of Staff for Governor Bell, 
1904-06, and was an influential member of the Legis- 
lature in 1910 and 1912, being chairman of the Appro- 
priations Committee in the last-named year. Governor 
Mead made him a member of the Conservation Com- 
mission and Governor Fletcher appointed him on the 
Board of Education. He was elected to the Legisla- 
ture again in 1920 and was chosen Speaker of the 
House. In 1922 he was elected Lieutenant-Governor. 
He is a member of several Woodstock corporations. 
FRANKLIN S. BILLINGS THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
453 
Harold E. Whitney, of Brattleboro, was born at Brattleboro, 
February 29, 1884. He was educated in the public schools of Brattle- 
boro and at Amherst College. He studied law in the office of 
Clarke C. Fitts at Brattleboro and was admitted to the bar in 1907. 
He has always practiced at Brattleboro and was until he became State’s 
Attorney a member of the firm of Harvey, Maurice and Whitney. 
He was elected State’s Attorney of Windham county in 1920. WINDSOR COUNTY 
AT a session of the General Assembly held at Windsor, February 
8, 1781, an act was passed subdividing the county of Cumber- 
land, which at the time embraced the whole of eastern Ver- 
mont, and establishing in its stead the counties of Windham, Windsor 
and Orange. The two former counties were laid out with nearly the 
same boundaries which they now have, while Orange county included 
all the territory north of Windsor county on the east side of the 
mountains. At this time a large number of towns on the east bank 
of Connecticut River were seeking admission to the new State of 
Vermont and on April 5, 1781, the union, eagerly desired by some 
and as strongly opposed by others, was consummated. On the follow- 
ing day the representatives from thirty-five towns on the east side of 
the river took their place in the General Assembly of Vermont. In 
order that the seceding towns might have the protection of the laws 
of this State the limits of Windsor county were extended so as to 
include all the towns within the State opposite Windsor county and 
northward of the towns of Claremont, Newport, Unity and Wendell. 
The county thus enlarged in area about one-half took in for a con- 
siderable distance the entire basin of the Connecticut on both sides of 
the stream. Besides the increase in wealth and population the east- 
side towns brought into Windsor county Dartmouth College, the seat 
of literature and arts, an institution which had recently been taken 
under the patronage of New Hampshire. 
The first session of the Court of Common Pleas for the new 
county was held at Windsor the last Tuesday in May, 1781. Elisha 
Payne was Chief Judge, and Joseph Marsh and Bezaleel Woodward, 
Assistant Judges. After a brief session the court adjourned until 
October. In the meantime, on July 17 of the same year, a special 
session was held at Lebanon. An effort was made in 1782 to fix a 
place for the establishment of a court house and jail and to provide 
means for building the same, but did not meet with success. At this 
time the union was dissolved and the New Hampshire towns returned 
to their original jurisdiction. The regular sessions of the court were 
held at Windsor until 1786, when the Legislature established Wood- 
stock as the shire town of Windsor county. Capt. Israel Richardson 
donated the land on which the first court house and jail were erected 
in Woodstock village in 1787. The first session of the court was held 
here on the last Tuesday in May, 1788. The court house was located 
on the site now occupied by the Woodstock Inn. It was a two-story 
structure with court room on the upper floor, which was warmed 
by a fireplace. The jail stood nearly in front of the Methodist Church THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
455 
and faced the northeast. In 1791 the court house was burned. Through 
the efforts of Charles Marsh, Captain Richardson was induced to ex- 
tend the common to its present limits and to lease a piece of land on 
the north side of the common on which to locate the court house. On 
this land the building was erected in 1793. A belfry was constructed 
upon the center of the house in which was hung the first bell to be 
placed in the tower of a court house in the State. The edifice was 
put to manifold uses, both secular and religious, by the inhabitants 
of Woodstock. In 1836 it was thoroughly repaired and a town hall 
constructed in the basement. On July 4, 1854, it took fire and was 
burned. A careless boy threw a lighted fire cracker on the roof at 
a time when most of the inhabitants were celebrating the nation’s 
liberty in the south village. A new and more elegant court house 
(the present one) was built the same year. It was erected on land 
purchased by subscription. The expense of the structure was $14,000. 
The first jail was a superficial and inferior one, but it was used 
until 1797. In that year it was ordered by the General Assembly that 
a new jail should be erected on such site as should be deemed most 
advisable. This jail was built where the present structure now stands, 
the land being given to the county by Charles Marsh. The expense 
of the building was in part defrayed by subscriptions and in part by 
a county tax. The flooring of this prison was laid with eight stones 
twelve feet long and three feet wide and from four to seven inches 
thick, carefully hewn so as to make good joints and bedded in lime 
mortar. In 1816 the jail was found to be insufficient and a stone jail 
was constructed at a cost to the county of $15,OCX). In 1867 the wood 
part of the jail was burned and the following year a substantial brick 
building was erected in the place of the old wooden one. In the new 
building a room was fitted up for the County Clerk and a vault con- 
structed for the county records. In the season of 1881 a fireproof 
building was erected at the east end of the jail close to the brook for 
the safe keeping of the county and probate records. The jail has 
recently undergone important repairs in accordance with the sugges- 
tions of the State Board of Health. 
The bar of Windsor county has been one of the most brilliant in 
the State. For many years its members were men of exceptional cul- 
ture, who were thoroughly versed in the best literature as well as 
learned in the law. This is particularly true of Woodstock during 
the early and middle part of the last century. Several of the best 
legal minds in Vermont were centered here, Tracy, Barrett, Washburn, 
Converse and others. The efficiency of the bar may have been due in 
no small measure to a code of regulations and rules adopted in 1806, 
which provided for the qualification and study of students in the law 
offices in the county, and imposed strict duties on both the students and 
their tutors. 456 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
CHARLES MARSH 
1765-1849 
Charles Marsh, son of Joseph Marsh, was horn in Lebanon, Conn., 
July 10, 1765. He removed with his father to Hartford, Vt., in 1773. 
He graduated at Dartmouth College in 1786 and at the Litchfield 
Law School in 1788. He began practice at Woodstock immediately 
following his graduation from the law school and was so engaged 
until near the time of his death, which occurred at Woodstock, Jan- 
uary 11, 1849. In 1797 he was appointed by President Washington 
District Attorney for Vermont. From 1809 to the time of his death 
he was a member of the board of trustees of Dartmouth College. He 
was elected to Congress in 1814, but served only one term. He made 
in Congress three notable speeches, however, one on the tariff, one 
on the Mexican War and one on the Smithsonian Institution. He ac- 
quired great popularity as a patron of benevolent societies and was 
an influential and useful citizen. He was the father of George P. 
Marsh, the most distinguished member of the family and considered 
by many persons the greatest scholar Vermont has produced. The 
latter practiced law for a time in Burlington, but was chiefly known as 
a man of letters. Charles Marsh was the leader of the Vermont bar. 
He was a cousin of Jeremiah Mason and in many respects the two 
men were of like mental gifts. They were born at about the same 
time and Mr. Marsh survived Mr. Mason by only a year. Between 
the two there were the most intimate relations and they kept up a 
correspondence until the death of Mr. Mason. Mr. Marsh was the 
early owner of the handsome estate at Woodstock which was later 
purchased, improved and occupied by Frederick Billings. 
ANDREW TRACY 
1797-1868 
Andrew Tracy was born at Hartford, Vt., December 15, 1797, 
being the second son of James Tracy, a farmer who came to Vermont 
from Connecticut. The family traced their lineage to Puritan ances- 
tors. Andrew Tracy was frail in health as a boy, and not being strong 
enough to work on the farm it was decided that he should have an 
education. Accordingly he attended the academies at Rovalton and 
Randolph and prepared for college. He entered Dartmouth College, 
where he remained for two years, after which he taught school for two 
or three years at Troy, N. Y., and then entered the law office of George 
E. Wales at Hartford, with whom he fitted for the bar. His admis- 
sion was at the December term of the Windsor County Court, 1826. THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
457 
He commenced practice at Quechee village, where he remained until 
the fall of 1837, when he took up his residence at Woodstock, where 
he spent the remainder of his life. On January 1, 1838, he formed 
a partnership with Norman Williams which lasted for one year, when 
Mr. Williams was appointed clerk of the courts. In 1840 he formed 
a partnership with Julius Converse which continued until Mr. Tracy’s 
election to Congress in 1853. In 1849 the firm of Tracy and Converse 
received James Barrett as a partner and after Mr. Tracy left the 
firm it was continued as Converse and Barrett until the election of 
the latter to the Supreme bench in 1857. On the retirement of Mr. 
Tracy from Congress he resumed practice at Woodstock but did not 
afterwards form another partnership. He represented the town of 
Hartford in the Legislature for five years in succession, from 1833 
to 1837, and Woodstock in the years 1842, 1843 and 1844. During 
the latter years he was Speaker of the House, a position which he 
filled with great dignity, courtesy and impartiality. He remained in 
Congress but one term and then declined a re-election, being glad 
to get back to his native mountains. 
In appearance Mr. Tracy was tall, slim and cadaverous. To a 
stranger he seemed as one who was in the last stage of consumption. 
But his step was quick and elastic and he performed a vast amount 
of work through his energy and indomitable will. He promptly dis- 
charged his attending physician who advised him that he could not 
live many months, and did live for more than a quarter of a century 
after this warning. 
From the days when he was a law student Mr. Tracy was a 
genius in the trial of cases; he baffled the skill of more than one able 
lawyer in his efforts during this early period. In his early practice he 
was engaged in most of the trials in Windsor county and after his 
return from Congress was employed in both his own county and 
throughout the State. His power consisted in his wonderful quickness 
of perception, the rapidity with which he could adapt principles to 
cases, his keen and discriminating analysis of facts, the nervous power 
and eloquence with which he presented these to a jury, and his mas- 
terful power of sarcasm and invective. He was not as great a 
lawyer as he was an advocate, was not a student of books and 
cases, but was remarkably skilful and adroit, and as an adviser and 
helper in desperate situations was without a peer in Vermont. 
He died at Woodstock, October 28, 1868, and was buried in the 
cemetery in Woodstock where sleep so many of the illustrious dead 
of that town. 458 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
JULIUS CONVERSE 
1798-1885 
Julius Converse, Governor and lawyer, was born at Safford, 
Conn., December 17, 1798. The family was of French origin. Joseph 
Converse, his father, was a farmer who came to Randolph in 1801. 
Julius was educated in the common schools and in Randolph Academy, 
studied law in the office of William Nutting at Randolph and was 
admitted to the bar in Orange county in 1826. He settled first at 
Bethel and later moved to Woodstock in 1840. At Bethel he was 
for several years a partner of Augustus P. Hunton. At Woodstock 
he formed a partnership with Andrew Tracy and later with James 
Barrett, the firms of Tracy and Converse, Tracy, Converse and Bar- 
rett, and after Mr. Tracy’s election to Congress, Converse and Bar- 
rett being among the strongest in the State. After Mr. Barrett’s 
election to the bench Mr. Converse formed a partnership with Warren 
C. French which continued until 1865, after which Mr. Converse 
practiced alone. He represented Bethel several times in the Legislature 
and in 1836, 1837, 1838 and 1839 represented Windsor county in the 
State Senate. He represented Woodstock several times in the Legisla- 
ture and was State’s Attorney from 1844 to 1847. In 1850 and 1851 he 
was Lieutenant-Governor. For the next twenty years he was out of 
public life. In 1872, when nearly seventy-four years of age, he was sud- 
denly and unexpectedly nominated for Governor, having been taken up 
to defeat Frederick Billings, a purpose that was accomplished by a nar- 
row majority of one after a hard fight in the convention. Mr. Con- 
verse was not in Vermont at the time. The first he knew of his can- 
didacy was when he read of his nomination in the morning papers. 
He died at Dixville Notch, N. H., August 16, 1885. 
As a lawyer Governor Converse was particularly strong in the 
careful preparation of his cases and as a cross-examiner of witnesses. 
He likewise excelled in chancery practice. 
OLIVER P. CHANDLER 
1807-1895 
Oliver P. Chandler was born at Peacham, May 29, 1807. He 
fitted for college at Peacham Academy and entered Dartmouth Col- 
lege in 1824. After his graduation in 1828 he studied law in the office 
of Governor Mattocks at Peacham and afterwards in the office of 
Shaw and Chandler at Danville. He opened an office in Woodstock 
village in 1832. He acquired an honorable position at a bar made 
up of distinguished and successful lawyers. In politics he was a Whig JOHN E. WEEKS 
Born in Salisbury, Vt., June 14, 1854. He was edu- 
cated in the Middlebury High School and for many 
years he was a farmer. Later he removed to Middle- 
bury and engaged in the hay and grain business. He 
served as Assistant Judge of Addison County Court, 
1884-86; represented Salisbury in the Legislature in 
1888; was a member of the Senate from Addison county 
in 1896; represented Middlebury in the General As- 
sembly in 1912 and 1915, being elected Speaker in 1915. 
He has been chairman of the Board of Penal Institu- 
tion and Director of the State Institutions since 1906. 
He is a trustee of Middlebury College. He married 
Hattie J. Dyer of Salisbury in 1879. THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
459 
and afterwards a Republican. He represented Woodstock in the 
General Assembly and was a member of the State Senate for three 
years. He retired from active practice many years before his decease, 
which occurred September 19, 1895. 
PETER T. WASHBURN 
1814-1870 
Peter T. Washburn belonged to the brilliant group of lawyers 
that made Woodstock famous fifty years ago. He was born at Lynn, 
Mass., September 7, 1814, the eldest son of Reuben and Hannah B. 
(Thatcher) Washburn. In 1817 his father moved to Chelsea, Vt., 
later to Cavendish, and finally to Ludlow. Peter T. Washburn grad- 
uated at Dartmouth College in 1835 and studied law under the direc- 
tion of his father for a time, then in the office of Senator Upham at 
Montpelier. He was admitted to the bar in 1838 and began practice 
at Ludlow. In 1844 he moved to Woodstock, where he formed a 
partnership with Charles P. Marsh which lasted until the latter’s 
death in 1870. Mr. Washburn was made reporter of the decisions 
of the Supreme Court in 1844, a position which he held with high 
credit for eight years. He represented Woodstock in the Legislature 
in 1853 and 1854; was chairman of the Vermont delegation to the 
Republican Convention that nominated Lincoln and Hamlin in 1860. 
He commanded the Woodstock Light Infantry on the breaking out 
of the Civil War. He was later commissioned as Lieutenant-Colonel 
of the First Vermont Regiment, but acted as Colonel during its entire 
period of service. In October, 1861, he was elected Adjutant and 
Inspector General of Vermont and continued as such to the close of the 
war. He was elected Governor in 1869 and died in office, February 
7, 1870. 
Until the outbreak of the war his chief energies were devoted to 
his professional work with ever-growing reputation. His practice took 
him into other counties than his own and especially into Windham, 
where he was a regular attendant of the County Courts. The facility 
with which he made himself the ready master of facts and his thorough 
knowledge of men equipped him for the trial of cases before the jury. 
He could conduct a case after a very short preparation, could call 
all the witnesses by name when once they had appeared in the case, 
and was admirably adapted to the work of assisting younger and 
less able counsel in the trial of causes. In his labors during the war 
he brought order out of chaos in the Adjutant General’s office, making 
it the model office of the kind in the whole country. At the time of 
his decease he was engaged in the preparation of a digest of the Su- 
preme Court reports of Vermont. He had worked his way through 460 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
thirty-eight of the forty-two volumes when his labors were inter- 
rupted by death. These labors were embodied in “Washburn’s Di- 
gest,” which was in general use before “Roberts’ Digest” was pub- 
lished. He simply wore himself into the grave in his excess of faith- 
fulness to duty. No trace of disease could be found about him. It 
was a case of nervous exhaustion. Thorough, studious, accurate, 
absolutely incorruptible, inflexibly just, judicious and kindly, he was 
a man whom the people could not fail to admire. 
AUGUSTUS P. HUNTON 
1816-1911 
Augustus P. Hunton, of Bethel, lived to a greater age than any 
other attorney who has been sketched in this work. He was past 
ninety-five at the time of his decease and thus older than Albert M. 
Allbe, who died at Bellows Falls, but practiced during a large part 
of his life in Windsor county. Mr. Hunton was born at Groton, N. H., 
February 23, 1816, and died at Bethel, June 19, 1911. He was a 
gentleman and lawyer of the old school. His father was Ariel Hunton, 
a physician who for thirty-nine years practiced his profession at Hyde 
Park, Vt., and his mother was Polly Pingree of Salisbury, N. H. His 
father’s ancestors were early settlers in New Hampshire and one of 
them was a soldier in the French and Indian War. Augustus Hunton 
was reared at Hyde Park, to quote from his genealogist, “free from 
the use of intoxicating liquors and the more common vice, the use 
of tobacco.” After receiving the common school and academical edu- 
cation of the times he commenced the study of law with Judge Wil- 
liam C. Wilson at Bakersfield, and continued the same with his uncle, 
Judge William M. Pingree, at Waitsfield, and was admitted to prac- 
tice in Washington county at the April term, 1837. He commenced 
practice at Stockbridge Common and soon removed to Bethel, where 
he formed a partnership with Governor Converse. This continued 
for but a short time, when he removed to Chelsea and became asso- 
ciated with Perley C. Jones in practice, but he soon returned to Bethel, 
where he remained for the rest of his life, a period of seventy-three 
years, and he continued to practice his profession until within a short 
time of his death. Following the partnership of Converse and Hunton, 
which terminated in 1840 when the senior member located in Wood- 
stock, there were the law firms of Hunton and Dudley, Hunton and 
Walker, Hunton and Blodgett, Hunton and Weymouth, Hunton and 
Gilman, and lastly Hunton and Stickney, which firm continued from 
August, 1875, to the death of Mr. Hunton, a period of thirtv-six 
years. William B. C. Stickney, the junior member of this firm, 'mar- 
ried Mary, the only child of his law partner. THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
461 
During the time that Mr. Hunton was in practice at Bethel he 
trained many young men in his office for careers at the bar and he 
numbered among his clients many corporations and individuals who 
had matters of great interest that required the attention of a skilled 
lawyer. In the fundamental principles of the law he was a profound 
scholar, and he was so much of an authority on matters of special 
pleading that the bar and bench alike came to his office for advice. 
Among the men who sought his advice were Senator Edmunds, Judge 
Barrett, Mr. Phelps, Governor Washburn and Governor Converse. 
Whenever Mr. Hunton filed a demurrer or other pleading it behooved 
the opposite attorney to take notice that there was something in the 
case that needed attention. 
In social life Mr. Hunton was charming. His speech was simple, 
his manner gracious, and his thoughts and language refined. His 
quaint humor, fund of anecdote and story, and large historical knowl- 
edge of State and Nation furnished a source of peculiar enjoyment 
to those who had the advantage of his companionship. 
He was given honorary degrees by the University of Vermont 
and Dartmouth College; was the representative of Bethel many times 
in the Legislature, and in 1861 and 1862 the Speaker, and was a 
member of the State Senate in 1856 and 1857. 
JOHN F. DEANE 
1817-1884 
The leading lawyer of southern Windsor county a little over a 
generation ago was John F. Deane of Cavendish. He was born in 
Weathersfield, June 29, 1817, and died at Cavendish, April 20, 1884. 
He graduated at the University of Vermont in the class of 1838. Ed- 
ward A. Cahoon, who later became a lawyer in Caledonia county, 
John Gregory Smith of St. Albans, president of the Central Vermont 
Railroad system, and George W. Reed, a member of the Montpelier 
bar, were among his classmates. He was admitted to the bar in 1841 
and spent his professional career at Cavendish. He was a member 
of the House of Representatives in 1847, 1848, 1849, 1852, 1854, 1857, 
1858, 1863 and 1864. He represented Windsor county in the Senate 
in 1878. He was a member of the Constitutional Convention in 1850; 
Reporter of the Supreme Court from 1852 to 1855 and the editor of 
the 24th, 25th and 26th volumes of the Vermont Reports. He was a 
man of commanding presence with a rich, melodious voice, and on 
occasion was very eloquent. He was well versed in the law and was 
not afraid to meet in legal tilt such a man as Charles N. Davenport 
of Brattleboro, who was a great lawyer and a dangerous adversary. 462 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
Mr. Deane had an intimate knowledge of the Scriptures as well as 
the law and could quote freely from the Bible. In the trial of a case 
in which Mr. Davenport appeared on the other side he indulged freely 
in references to the Holy Writ and quoted passages to illustrate and 
sustain his side of the case. Mr. Davenport usually tried to meet his 
adversary with the same kind of an argument that was employed 
against him, and in this case, like the Devil, quoted Scripture to his 
purpose, but his early education was limited and his instruction in the 
Word of God and his accustomed references to the Deity were not such 
as to prompt the belief that he was a true student of the Bible. After 
failing in several passages in which Mr. Deane had helped him out, 
he exclaimed: “Well, I shall have to admit that my brother Deane 
knows more Scripture than I do.” Whereupon the latter drawled 
out, to the laughter of the listeners: “Yes, and more lazv, too.” 
GILBERT A. DAVIS 
1835-1919 
Gilbert A. Davis, of Windsor, was a conspicuous example of what 
can be accomplished in a financial way by a Vermont lawyer. He 
was born at Chester, Vt., December 18, 1835, and died at Windsor, 
November 29, 1919. He was educated in the common schools and 
at Chester Academy and began to teach when he was fifteen years of 
age. He removed to New Jersey in 1852 and taught there for four 
years, during a part of which time he was engaged in the study of 
the law. He returned to Vermont and studied in the office of William 
Rounds in Chester and later in the office of Washburn and Marsh in 
Woodstock. He was admitted to the bar in 1859 and practiced at 
Felchville from 1860 to 1879, when he removed to Windsor, where 
he was in practice until his death. He was Register of Probate for 
the District of Windsor for five years and represented Reading in the 
Legislature in 1872 and 1874, was State’s Attorney for Windsor 
county from 1878 to 1880 and County Senator in 1876. After the 
enactment of the bankruptcy act in 1898 he became Referee and held 
the position until shortly before his death. He was elected Assistant 
Judge of the Windsor County Court in 1918, and held this position 
at the time of his death. He held many local offices and was a member 
of many corporations. In 1899 he donated a library building to the 
town of Reading. He had no law partner during the greater part 
of his career, but during his latter years was associated with his son, 
Gilbert F. Davis, in the firm of Davis and Davis. 
Mr. Davis was a man of untiring industry and given to watchful 
care of details. These were of great concern to him and he mastered THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
463 
them easily and carried them readily. If his cases were not of the 
greatest magnitude they made up in number what they lacked in size 
and each one received careful attention. This applied not alone to 
the preparation and trial but to his charges. Each item of service 
and expense was given an appropriate charge and when the client 
got the bill it was fully itemized. He kept books with the faith- 
fulness of a country merchant and while his charges were not 
large in any given case, they were comprehensive and omitted noth- 
ing that should have been stated. This attention to details en- 
abled him to advance financially and he acquired the habit of sav- 
ing money early in his practice while it was still small and in 
his later life became known as one of the wealthiest men at the bar. 
It is needless to say that he was a wise investor and a wise counselor 
to those who had financial interests at stake. As a lawyer he was 
trained in the old school that regarded pleading as an important branch 
of the law and relied on technicalities if they could be employed in 
his client’s behalf to trip the other side. He took great interest in 
historical matters, wrote much for the newspapers, published a history 
of Reading, delivered the centenary address at the celebration of that 
town, and was also the orator at the centennial celebration of the 
adoption of the Constitution and name of Vermont held at Windsor, 
August 9, 1877. 
WILLIAM E. JOHNSON 
1841-1917 
William E. Johnson was a native of Woodstock, where he was 
born, June 26, 1841. He was the son of Eliakim and Harriet A. (Col- 
lamer) Johnson. His mother was a daughter of Jacob Collamer, who 
was Chief Judge of the Supreme Court of Vermont, United States 
Senator and Postmaster General in the Cabinet of President Taylor. 
The statue of this distinguished and beloved ancestor, as one of the 
two most representative Vermonters, stands with that of Ethan Allen 
in the Capitol at Washington. 
After receiving his preparatory education at Kimball Union 
Academy, Mr. Johnson entered Dartmouth College, where he grad- 
uated in 1862. He studied law in the office of Washburn and Marsh 
at Woodstock and was admitted to the bar in Windsor county in May, 
1865. From that time he was actively engaged in his profession until 
about 1902, when failing health compelled him to retire from the prac- 
tice of the law. 
He was eminently successful as a lawyer. His clear, rapid and 
logical mental processes and his excellent judgment, accompanied with 464 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
a commanding and pleasing personality made him the ideal jury advo- 
cate. He was, moreover, well versed in the law and was an analyst 
of the first order. These talents gave him high standing with the 
Supreme Court. A noticeable feature of his legal work was the large 
number of important cases that were referred to him by the courts 
as referee and special master. 
He did not seek political preferment and chose to remain at home 
rather than take a place on the bench which was tendered to him. 
He did, however, accept the office of State’s Attorney of Windsor 
county in 1872, in which he served for one term. He also represented 
Windsor county in the State Senate of 1888. 
Mr. Johnson possessed unusual business capacity. This quality 
was displayed in his long relation to the Woodstock National Bank 
with which he was connected as a director for forty-three years and 
as president for twenty-two years, and in the settlement of large 
estates, particularly that of the late Frederick Billings. He died at 
Woodstock, September 20, 1917. 
WILLIAM W. STICKNEY 
1853- 
William W. Stickney, of Ludlow, was born at Plymouth, March 
21, 1853. He was educated in the common schools of Plymouth, at 
Ludlow Academy and at Phillips Exeter Academy, where he grad- 
uated in 1877. He studied law in the office of Sewall Fullam and 
with William H. Walker and Martin H. Goddard at Ludlow, was 
admitted to the bar in 1878, and has practiced at Ludlow since then. 
He was Assistant Clerk of the House in 1872, 1874, 1878, 1880, 1882; 
Clerk from 1882 to 1892; Speaker, 1892 to 1896; State’s Attorney, 
1882-1884, 1890-1892; Governor, 1900-1902. 
Governor Stickney as the head of the leading law firm of Stick- 
ney, Sargent and Skeels has had the practical business control of the 
office and been the executive head of its large share in the legal affairs 
of the State. He began his legal career as an office holder and ad- 
vanced at Montpelier through the channels of Clerk and Speaker 
to the office of Governor. In political management and especially 
as that relates to work before the Legislature, he has great influence 
and his wise business sagacity has resulted in his being called to many 
public and private trusts. He is an able lawyer and a sound counsel- 
lor and is accorded the leadership in a firm that includes Mr. Sargent. 
He could have had a place on the bench had he desired it, but the large 
business of his office appeals more strongly to him. JOSEPH A. DE BOER 
Born in Warfum, Province of Groningen, Holland, 
June 17, 1861. His father died when he was very young 
and when he was seven years old his mother brought 
her family to Albany, N. Y. At an early age the lad 
began to earn money as a newsboy. He attended the 
public schools of Albany, graduating with honor from 
the High School. He worked his way through Dart- 
mouth College, where he made a brilliant record, 
graduating in 1884. He was master of the Holderness 
School for Boys, 1884-85, and principal of the Mont- 
pelier High School, 1885-89. He was actuary of 
the National life Insurance Company of Montpelier, 
1889-1902, and was advanced successively to the posi- 
tions of secretary, second vice-president, first vice- 
president and president, being elected to the last-named 
office in 1902. He was a Senator from Washington 
county in 1900 and represented Montpelier in the Leg- 
islature in 1908. He was an eloquent orator, a man 
of scholarly tastes, and one of the foremost citizens 
of Vermont. He married Augusta C. Featherly of 
Albany, N. Y., in 1885. Five children were born to 
them, Ethel A., Minnie A., Bertha A. (deceased), Paul 
K., and Elizabeth A. Mr. De Boer died on Christmas 
day, 1915. THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
465 
JOHN GARABALDI SARGENT 
1860- 
John Garabaldi Sargent was born in Ludlow, Vt., October 13, 
1860. His father was John Henmon Sargent and his mother Ann 
Eliza (Hanley) Sargent. The latter was Irish and the former half 
Irish. This accounts for Mr. Sargent’s fighting qualities. The par- 
ents, who were farmers, lived on several different farms in Ludlow 
and Plymouth while Mr. Sargent was quite young before locating 
permanently on a farm on what is known as Sargent Hill. The family 
was not so located that it was possible for Mr. Sargent to attend school 
until after he was ten years of age, but after this time and until he 
was sixteen he attended the district schools, and in the fall of his 
sixteenth year he entered the Vermont Liberal Institute at Plymouth 
Union. At this school Mr. Sargent boarded himself. He had a plain 
room furnished with bed, table and chair. His father bought a barrel 
of crackers at the opening of the term and with these and a large 
pail of milk which he brought weekly from his home he sustained 
himself through the week. He took no regular course at this school. 
After the fall term he taught in a district school and afterwards re- 
turned to the Institute for two or three terms. He regularly taught 
school winters at this period and went to school as he could in the 
spring and fall. He later entered Black River Academy at Ludlow, 
where he spent four terms and graduated in 1883. In the fall of this 
year he entered Tufts College and graduated four years later at 
twenty-seven. When he entered Tufts he was conditioned in about 
every subject except possibly English grammar and arithmetic, but 
by the middle of the following June he had removed all conditions, 
and the last year and a half at college he was an instructor in French 
and in this way earned a part of his living. He graduated among the 
first four of a class of fifty. 
From the time he entered the academy at Plymouth Union he 
spent his vacations at work in the woods getting out scythe snaths. 
This was his trade as a young man and in following it he was enabled 
to earn large wages with which he paid his way at school. He in- 
herited from his father’s side of the family a giant frame. He is 
six feet three inches tall and weighed in his younger years three 
hundred pounds. His great strength enabled him to do more than 
a man’s work in the woods and this gave him prestige in his days in 
college in the athletic sports. It may be said, too, that his brain and 
heart are in harmony with his body. 
When he had returned from college Governor Stickney met him 
on the street one day in Ludlow and asked him if he wouldn’t like 
to enter his office as a law student. He was intending to teach, but 
he told his future partner he would think the matter over and after 466 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
doing so told him he would accept his invitation. This was in Sep- 
tember, 1887. He has remained with Governor Stickney since he 
first entered his office. He took his bar examination and was ad- 
mitted to the bar in 1890. He assisted in the office until 1890, when 
he formed a partnership with Governor Stickney under the name and 
style of Stickney and Sargent the same year. This continued until 
1900, when the co-partnership was enlarged to admit Homer L. Skeels, 
since which time the firm has been known as Stickney, Sargent and 
Skeels. Mr. Sargent was State's Attorney of Windsor county from 
1898 to 1900; Secretary of Civil and Military Affairs under Governor 
Stickney from 1900 to 1902; Attorney General from 1908 to 1912; 
member of the commission on uniform legislation for several years; 
and president of the Vermont Bar Association in 1919. 
Mr. Sargent came into prominent notice during the time he was 
State’s Attorney on account of his persistent efforts in the capture 
of the two Shaws who had shot and killed Sheriff Hoffman of Windsor 
county. While he was attempting to arrest them after they had broken 
out of the county jail at Woodstock, Mr. Sargent went out with the 
officers who were sent to arrest the Shaws and directed the search for 
them until their arrest near Middlebury. He later prosecuted them 
successfully in the Windsor County Court and he assisted in two 
other homicide trials before he became Attorney General. After he 
became Attorney General he tried in the four years he held that office 
thirty-three homicide cases—an average of more than eight a year— 
and in these cases met with remarkable success. He also rendered 
many opinions to the State officers and coordinated the work of the 
State by holding frequent meetings with the State’s Attorneys, advising 
with them as to the conduct of cases and business, assisting and re- 
ceiving assistance in the interpretation of new statutes, making pro- 
posals and plans for the enactment of statutes to further the success- 
ful prosecution of the laws, and helping them in the trial of important 
causes in court. His work as Attorney General gave him a large and 
intimate acquaintance with the bar and introduced him to many men 
who later brought him civil business of a valuable nature. He has 
been called on from nearly every county in the State to try large and 
important cases since his retirement from office. 
The firm of which he is a member does perhaps the largest law 
business in Vermont. This has grown from the ordinary country 
practice to employment in behalf of large corporations and other 
clients who have much at stake and are seeking the best counsel ob- 
tainable. About 1914, Mr. Sargent became counsel for the Boston 
& Maine Railroad, the Travellers’ Insurance Company and the Amer- 
ican Express Company, and since that time he has devoted much of 
his attention to the business of these clients. He was made a director THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
467 
of the Vermont Valley Railroad in 1915, and of the Boston & Maine 
in 1917, when that road was reorganized. 
The success of Mr. Sargent is due to natural talent, hard 
work, good judgment and patient, faithful attention to all details. His 
capacity for labor is marvelous. When engaged in a trial or in search 
of the law in an important case, or inquiring into a state of com- 
plicated facts he is tireless in his industry, often extending his labor 
after a full day’s work in office or court throughout much of the night. 
In presenting the evidence in court he gives the jury the benefit of 
all the facts as he feels they are entitled to know the whole story of 
the case. He is careful and wise in cross-examination and not prolix, 
is gentlemanly in his conduct of witnesses and sure not to turn the 
case against his client by anything bordering on abuse or browbeating. 
He argues his points logically and convincingly and at times eloquently; 
but he relies on reason rather than oratory in presenting his cases. 
He never indulges in sophistry or bluff. His papers are concise and 
to the point—not long and involved—and he presents his arguments 
to the Supreme Court with convincing power. No man at the Ver- 
mont bar can do more for a client and it is doubtful if there is anyone 
who can do as much. 
PRESENT MEMBERS OF THE WINDSOR COUNTY BAR 
Fred G. Bicknell, of Windsor, was born at Johnson, December 
22, 1872, and was educated in the common schools and in the State 
Normal School at Johnson. He studied law in the office of Bert A. 
Hunt at Johnson and was admitted to the bar in 1900. He practiced 
at Johnson from 1900 to 1912; at Chester from 1912 to 1916; at 
Windsor from 1916 to date. He was Town Clerk and Treasurer of 
Johnson; State’s Attorney of Lamoille county, 1902-1906; and mem- 
ber of House, 1906. 
Herbert H. Blanchard, of Springfield, was born at Berlin, Vt., 
January 22, 1868. He was educated at the Windsor High School and 
at the University of Vermont, studied law in the office of Joseph C. 
Enright at Windsor and was admitted to the bar in 1895. He practiced 
at Windsor from 1895 to 1898 and since 1898 has practiced at Spring- 
field. He was State’s Attorney, 1904-1906; Senator, 1912-1914; Mu- 
nicipal Judge of Springfield, 1908-1910; Municipal Judge Windsor 
Probate District since 1912. 
Frank H. Clark, of Windsor, was born at Reading, August 13, 
1860. He was educated at the Green Mountain Perkins Academy 
and studied law at the University of Michigan and with Gilbert A. 468 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
Davis at Windsor. He was admitted to the bar in 1884 and has prac- 
ticed at Felchville, Newport, New England City, N. D., and Windsor. 
Albert G. Cox, of White River Junction, was born at Woodstock, 
December 4, 1851. He was educated in the common schools of Wood- 
stock, at the Green Mountain Perkins Academy, where he graduated 
in 1873, and at Dartmouth College, where he graduated in 1877. He 
studied law with Governor Converse at Woodstock, with Judge Thomas 
O. Seaver at the same place, with George A. Ballard at Fairfax, and 
with Judge M. A. Bingham at Essex Junction. He was admitted to 
the bar in 1890, practiced at Fairfax from 1892 to 1894, and since 
1895 has practiced at White River Junction. He was Superintendent 
of Schools in Fairfax. 
Fred C. Davis, of Springfield, was born in Reading, May 29, 
1862, and was educated at Green Mountain Perkins Academy and at 
New Hampshire State College, where he graduated in 1884. He 
studied law in the office of Gilbert A. Davis at Windsor and in the 
office of A. M. Allbe at Springfield, was admitted to the bar in 1891 
and has practiced at Springfield. He represented Springfield in the 
House in 1908. 
Gilbert F. Davis, of Windsor, was born at Felchville, June 19, 
1877. He was educated in the schools of Windsor, graduated at 
Phillips Andover Academy in 1897, at Lawrence Scientific School, 
Harvard University, 1901, and at Harvard Law School, 1904. He 
was admitted to the bar in 1904 and has since practiced at Windsor. 
He was Judge of Probate for the District of Windsor for a short 
time in 1920. 
Hermon G. Davis, of Bridgewater, was born at Bridgewater in 
1847 and was educated in the district schools and at Tufts College. 
He studied law in the office of Converse and French at Woodstock 
and afterward taught school, then entered the office of French and 
Southgate and was admitted to the bar in 1881. He has resided at 
Bridgewater, but has not been actively engaged in the law. He has 
held the office of Selectman and has represented Bridgewater in the 
General Assembly. 
R. Ward Dent, of Springfield, was born at Greene, Chenango 
County, N. Y., January 6, 1864. He was educated in the schools of 
Schenectady, N. Y., in New York City and at Union College. He 
studied law in the office of Samuel W. Jackson at Schenectady, was 
admitted to the bar of New York in 1887 and to the bar of this State 
in 1915. He practiced in the city of New York, 1889-1909, and has 
practiced at Springfield since 1915. THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
469 
Edward H. Edgerton, of Rochester, was born at Warren, August 
31, 1863. He graduated at Barre Academy in 1885 and studied law 
in the office of Stephen C. Shurtleff and in the office of Senator 
William P. Dillingham at Montpelier. He was admitted to the bar 
in 1889 and practiced for a brief period in Barre. Since 1890 he 
has practiced at Rochester. He has held many town offices, is Town 
Clerk and Town Agent; was a member of the House in 1906 and 
1908; Senator, 1910; member of Board of Visitors, Norwich Univer- 
sity, 1910-1912; Assistant Judge Windsor County Court from 1913 
to December, 1921. 
Lawrence F. Edgerton, of Springfield, was born at Rochester, 
May 3,. 1894, and was educated at Phillips Exeter Academy, at Dart- 
mouth College, and at the University of Lyons, Lyons, France. He 
studied law in the office of his father, Judge Edward H. Edgerton, at 
Rochester, and at the University of Lyons, where he received the 
Faculti de Droit in 1919. He was admitted to the bar of Vermont 
in 1919 and began practice at Rochester. He is now associated with 
Fred C. Davis and Wade Keyes in practice at Springfield. He has 
held no public offices, but is a member of the executive committee 
of the American Legion. 
Philip Griffin, of White River Junction, was born at Rutland, 
December 11, 1888. He was educated at St. Laurent’s College, Mon- 
treal, the University of Vermont, and at Yale. He studied law at 
Georgetown University, with Stickney, Sargent and Skeels at Ludlow, 
and with Raymond Trainor at White River Junction. He was an 
aviator in the World War, but did not go over sea. He is located 
at White River Junction and is associated with Raymond Trainor, 
having been admitted to practice in 1920. 
Hugh H. Henry, of Chester, was born at Chester, June 13, 1883, 
and was educated in the schools of Chester, the Concord High School 
and at Yale College, where he graduated in 1905. He studied law 
at the Yale Law School, with Palmer and Foster, with Judson E. 
Cushman at Burlington and with his father, Hugh Henry, at Chester. 
He was admitted to the bar in 1907 and practiced at Chester in 1907 
and 1908, from 1908 to 1910 with Powers and Hall in Boston, and 
since 1910 has practiced in Chester. He was Executive Clerk to 
Governor Mead in 1910 and from 1911 to 1915 was Commissioner 
of Weights and Measures. 
Glenn C. Howland, of Windsor, was born at Jericho, April 15, 
1890. He graduated at the Windsor High School in 1908, studied law 
with Bert E. Cole at Windsor, was admitted to the bar in 1914 and 470 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
has since practiced at Windsor. He is Justice of the Peace, Lister 
and Water Commissioner, and was Village Clerk in 1916. He was 
elected State’s Attorney in 1921. 
Wade Keyes, of Felchville, was born at Reading, January 1, 1865, 
and was educated at Green Mountain Perkins Academy, Goddard 
Seminary, from which he graduated in 1885, and Tufts College, from 
which he graduated in 1889. He studied law in the office of William 
E. Johnson at Woodstock and was admitted to the bar of Vermont 
in 1892, to the bar of New York in 1895, and to the bar of Massachu- 
setts in 1896. He was admitted to practice in the United States Su- 
preme Court in 1904. He practiced at Woodstock in 1892-1894; in 
New York City, 1894-1896; in Boston in 1896-1916. He was a 
member of the firm of Montague and Keyes at 73 Tremont St., Tre- 
mont Building, Boston. He is associated in practice with Fred C. 
Davis and Lawrence F. Edgerton at Springfield. He was elected 
to the General Assembly from Reading in 1920 and again in 1922. 
Harlow G. Evans, of Ludlow, was born at Enosburg Falls, Au- 
gust 26, 1886. He was educated in the common schools of Cambridge, 
at the Peoples Academy, and at the University of Michigan. He 
studied law at the University of Michigan and was admitted to the bar 
in Michigan in 1910 and in Vermont in 1917. He practiced at Cass 
City, Mich., 1915-1916, and has practiced at Ludlow since 1917. He 
was Superintendent of Schools at Dakota, Neb., 1913-1914; at Cass 
City, Mich., 1914-1916; State Supervisor of Schools, Lyndonville, 
1916-1917; School Director, Ludlow, 1919. 
Ernest E. Moore, of Ludlow, was born at Plymouth, February 
10, 1881. He was educated at the Black River Academy, at Brown 
University, where he graduated in 1906, and at the Plattsburgh Law 
School, where he graduated in 1908. He studied law in the office 
of Stickney, Sargent and Skeels at Ludlow, was admitted to the bar 
in 1909 and since admission has practiced at Ludlow. He was a 
member of the House in 1915 and State’s Attorney from 1919 to 
1921. He is Judge of Probate for the District of Windsor. 
Hugh Moore, of Hartford, was born at West Canaan, N. H., 
May 20, 1869, and was educated in the public schools and at Pinkerton 
Academy and the Kansas Normal College. He studied law in New 
Hampshire in the office of E. B. Hayes at Manchester and in the 
office of Mathews and Sawyer and in the office of J. H. Albin at 
Concord. He was admitted to the bar of New Hampshire in 1906 
and to that of Vermont in 1917. He practiced at Lebanon from ad- 
mission until 1916 and since 1917 has practiced at White River 
Junction. THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
471 
Loren R. Pierce, of Woodstock, was born at South Londonderry, 
December 26, 1878. He was educated in the schools of Londonderry 
and graduated from the Southern Normal University College of Law 
in 1901. He studied in the office of Addison E. Cudworth at South 
Londonderry; he was admitted to the bar of Tennessee in 1901 and 
to the bar of Vermont in 1903. He practiced at South Londonderry 
from 1903 to 1915, and has practiced at Woodstock since with the 
exception of two years spent in the United States Army. He was 
County Examiner of Teachers in Windham county in 1904; Postmaster 
at South Londonderry, 1904-1914; First Lieutenant, Infantry, United 
States Army, November, 1917, to August, 1919; served with the Fifty- 
second Pioneer Infantry as Adjutant of the first battalion during the 
Meuse-Argonne operations and south and west of Verdun. 
William S. Pingree, of Hartford, was born at Hartford, No- 
vember 15, 1879, and educated in the grammar and high school of 
Hartford and at Norwich University. He studied law in the Boston 
University Law School and in the office of Governor Samuel E. 
Pingree at White River Junction. He has practiced at the latter 
place since admission. He was State’s Attorney from October, 1916, 
to 1919. 
David A. Pingree, of Hartford, was born in Georgetown, Mass., 
June 6, 1866, and was educated in the common schools, Phillips Acad- 
emy, Bridgewater State Normal School, and Boston University Law 
School. He studied law with Samuel E. Pingree at Hartford and 
was admitted to the bar of Vermont and of Massachusetts in 1896. 
He has practiced at White River Junction since admission. 
Homer L. Skeels, of Ludlow, was born at Swanton, November 
19, 1875. He graduated at Burr and Burton Seminary in the class 
of 1894, and at Middlebury College in the class of 1898. He studied 
law in the office of Daniel G. Furman at Swanton and in the office 
of Stickney and Sargent at Ludlow, and was admitted to the bar in 
1902. He has practiced at Ludlow since his admission and is a mem- 
ber of the firm of Stickney, Sargent and Skeels. He was Executive 
Clerk to Governor Stickney, 1900-1902; Assistant Secretary of the 
Senate, 1902-1908; Secretary of the Senate, 1908-1914; State’s Attor- 
ney, 1912-1914; Tudge of Probate of the District of Windsor from 
1917 to 1920. 
Frederick C. Southgate, of Woodstock, was born at Ipswich, 
Mass., January 28, 1852. He was educated in the common schools 
and at Phillips Andover Academy and Dartmouth College, where he 
graduated in 1874. He studied law in the office of William E. John- 472 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
son of Woodstock and was admitted to the bar in 1876. He has 
practiced at Woodstock, where he held the office of State’s Attorney, 
1892-1894. He has been Judge of Probate for the Hartford District 
since July 15, 1912. 
Roland E. Stevens, of Hartford, was born at Peterboro, N. H., 
November 24, 1868. He was educated at St. Johnsbury Academy, 
where he graduated in 1891, and at Dartmouth College, where he 
graduated in 1895. He studied law in the office of Samuel E. Pingree 
at Hartford and at the New York Law School. He was admitted 
to the bar of Vermont in 1900 and the same year to the bar of Massa- 
chusetts. He has practiced at White River Junction since admission 
and for two years had an office in Hanover, N. H. He has held 
no public offices, but held many places by appointment for the public 
welfare during the late war. He was made a member of the State 
Board of Control in 1921. 
Fred H. Spalding, of Springfield, was born at Dummerston, 
November 11, 1874. He was educated at Glen wood Classical Semin- 
ary and studied law in the office of Waterman and Martin at Brattle- 
boro and at the Albany Law School, and was admitted to the bar in 
1889. He located in Springfield the following year and has practiced 
since at that place. He has been Village Clerk and Town Grand Juror. 
Charles R. Tarbell, of South Royalton, was born at Royalton, 
February 22, 1850. He was educated at the Normal School and 
Academy at Randolph and studied law at the Albany Law School and 
with Philander Perrin at Randolph. He was admitted to the bar 
in 1870 and has practiced at South Royalton since. He was State’s 
Attorney in 1900-1901. 
Herbert G. Tupper, of Springfield, was born at Bakersfield, De- 
cember 24, 1877, and was educated at Brigham Academy, where he 
graduated in 1896, and at the University of Vermont. He studied 
law in the office of Fred S. Tupper at Fairfield and was admitted to 
the bar in 1902. He has practiced at Springfield since admission and 
for many years has been a member of the firm of Blanchard and 
Tupper. He has held only minor town offices. 
Raymond Trainor, of White River Junction, was born at St. 
Johnsbury, December 27, 1878. He was educated at St. Johnsbury 
Academy and at the University of Ottawa, Canada. He studied law 
in the office of Dunnett and Slack at St. Johnsbury and with Joseph 
L. Borham in Hartford, Conn. He was admitted to the bar in Ver- 
mont in 1900 and in Connecticut in 1902. He practiced for a time in DARWIN P. KINGSLEY 
Born in Alburg, Vt., May 5, 1857. He was gradu- 
ated from the University of Vermont in the class of 
1881. He was engaged in journalistic work and in 
teaching for five years after his graduation. Having 
gone to Colorado, he was elected Auditor of that State, 
his term covering the period of 1887-88. At the close 
of his term of office he entered the service of the New 
York Life Insurance Company. He advanced steadily 
in his work and in 1898 was elected vice-president of 
the company. In 1907 he was elected president of the 
company, a position which he has since held, being one 
of the great financial leaders of the American 
metropolis. He is a director of the Chemical National 
Bank and of the New York Trust Company and presi- 
dent of the New York Chamber of Commerce. He has 
been a trustee of the University of Vermont since 1897, 
and has received the honorary degrees of LL. D and 
L. H. D. Mr. Kingsley is a well-known public speaker 
and several volumes of his addresses have been pub- 
lished. His residence is in New York. In 1884 he mar- 
ried Mary M. Mitchell, who died a few year later. In 
1895 he married Josephine I. McCall. THE VERMONT BENCH AND BAR 
473 
Hartford and has since practiced at White River Junction. He has 
been School Director and State’s Attorney of Windsor county. 
Arthur G. Whitham, of South Royalton, was born at Wakefield, 
Yorkshire, England, December 23, 1866. He was educated in the 
private schools of England, taught in Maine and worked in the East 
and West before locating in South Royalton. Here he studied law 
with Charles B. Tarbell and was admitted in 1894 and since then has 
practiced in company with his tutor. He has been Judge of the 
Hartford Municipal Court since 1915. 
Guy Wilson, of Bethel, was born at Bethel, July 11, 1864, and 
was educated at the Randolph High School and at Dartmouth College. 
He studied law in the office of his father, James J. Wilson, at Bethel, 
and was admitted to the bar in 1890 and practiced at Bethel until 1898. 
He has been Town Clerk since 1904. 
John J. Wilson, of Bethel, was born at Bethel, December 15, 
1873, and was educated in the schools of Bethel and at the University 
of Vermont, where he graduated in 1895. He studied law in the office 
of his father, James J. Wilson, at Bethel and was admitted to the bar 
in 1898. He has resided at Bethel, and has been Referee in Bankruptcy 
since 1916. 
The admissions to the bar in 1922 were as follows: 
Paul A. Chase, Brattleboro. 
Marcell Conway, Hyde Park. 
Dean D. Davis, Barre. 
AVilliam H. Edmonds, Burlington. 
Frank K. Foster, Rutland. 
John M. G. Gibson, Mclndoes. 
Mrs. Edna G. Jennings, Barre. 
George F. Jones, Rutland. 
Miss Dorothy F. Leonard, Rutland. 
Leslie Monti, Barre. 
Paul Giloili, White River Junction. RELIGIOUS DENOMINATIONS 
THE CONGREGATIONAL CHURCH 
Rev. C. H. Merrill, D. D. 
IN the early years of the settlement of Vermont several causes 
contributed to give Congregational churches the lead over other 
Protestant communions. The tide of immigration after the first 
few years was largely from Connecticut. Moreover, in the township 
grants, given both by New Hampshire and New York, among the 
lots reserved for public purposes was one which was to become the 
private property of the first settled minister. As only one other 
Protestant communion, the Baptist, “settled” their ministers by or- 
dination or installation, it naturally followed that competition was 
limited. But more potent than all was the fact that in those days 
the Congregational Church was of the “Standing Order.” Church 
and State were united in the early settlement of New England. Civil 
and ecclesiastical establishments went hand in hand. If, as Mr. Pal- 
frey alleges, the first Missionary Society in Protestant Christendom 
was the General Court of Massachusetts, then Connecticut, which 
early required a Congregational Church in every township in the 
State, comes in a close second. Thus it naturally followed that when 
Vermont took on its statehood among the first acts passed by its 
General Assembly was one in 1780 empowering towns to levy 
taxes for both building meeting houses and supporting ministers. 
Subsequent acts required these ministers to be of the order 
favored by the majority of the inhabitants, and exempted only 
those who could show they were supporting other orders. Not until 
1807 were all laws uniting church and State repealed. Thus it was 
that Congregationalism took its early start in Vermont and gained 
a prestige it has never lost. Today it is relatively, in proportion to 
population, the strongest Congregational State in the Union. The 
large foreign immigration has taken this distinction away from Mas- 
sachusetts, and quite recently from Connecticut. While one in fifteen 
of the population of Vermont are members of some Congregational 
Church, there is only one in nineteen in Connecticut, one in twenty- 
two in New Hampshire and one in twenty-seven in Massachusetts. 
The first Protestant service within the boundaries of what is now 
the State of Vermont was probably held in the town of Rockingham, 
near Bellows Falls, at the mouth of the Williams River, in March, 
1704. Rev. John Williams, taken captive by the Indians in the Deer- 
The First Protestant Service RELIGIOUS DENOMINATIONS 
475 
field massacre, tells in the story of his captivity of preaching a sermon, 
during a Sunday halt, to the remnant of his parishioners carried with 
him. Twenty-four years later there is record of a Congregational 
chaplain stationed at Fort Dummer, within the limits of what is now 
the town of Brattleboro. But it was not until 1762 that the first 
organized Congregational Church appeared in the State. This was in 
the town of Bennington. It was composed of two churches from the 
towns of Sunderland and Hardwick, Mass., joined by the church from 
Westfield, Mass., and their pastor, and later by a part of the church 
from Lisbon, Conn. All these were of a class of “separatists” of 
those days, not for a time in “regular” fellowship. 
Early Churches 
The following were for the most part in the valley of the Con- 
necticut River on the eastern side. A church in Newbury far to the 
north, on the “Lower Coos” meadows, appears in 1764, taking in the 
settlers on both sides of the river. Then follow Westminster, Windsor, 
Guilford, Brattleboro, Norwich, Hartford, Thetford, until in 1773 on 
the west side of the State the West Rutland church was organized. 
In 1780 there were twenty-one churches, all with the two exceptions, 
Bennington and West Rutland, on the eastern side of the State. From 
that time on the increase was rapid. In 1800 there were ninety-four, 
nearly all in the southern half of the State. In the year 1818 there 
were one hundred and sixty-seven, the increase being largely in the 
western and northern parts; and in 1830 two hundred and three were 
reported, with 17,236 members. 
Missionary Activities 
Missionary activities are to be credited with a large part of this 
increase. While it is true that none of the early churches up to 
nearly the close of the eighteenth century had direct missionary aid, 
they were not all of them without missionary visitation. In 1774 the 
General Association of Connecticut took into consideration “the state 
of settlements westward and northward of us, who are destitute of 
a preached gospel, many of whom are our brethren, emigrants from 
this colony.” In 1780 they recommended two ministers “for service 
in Vermont and parts adjacent.” And in 1798 a missionary society 
was formed to prosecute the work systematically. The men employed 
were pastors of Connecticut churches who spent their summer vaca- 
tions making horseback tours, visiting settlements where their par- 
ishioners had gone, administering to them the sacraments and organiz- 
ing new work. It is interesting to trace their itineraries as they have 
reported them. Beginning usually in the Champlain valley they went 
north to the mouth of one of three rivers and followed them up to 476 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
their source, rarely going over the divide to the eastern side. One 
man reports a trip of eight hundred miles. Some of these pastors 
remained to take charge of churches that became among the largest 
of our order, and left names most honored in our annals. In 1804 
a group of ministers in the State took over this work, organizing a 
missionary society, which under different names has prosecuted it 
in various ways until the present day. 
Growth, Decline and Recovery 
During the decade following 1830 there were extensive revivals 
throughout the State. At no period during our history have there 
been such large accessions to our churches, especially in rural com- 
munities. It is true that the statistics of those days must be taken 
with a large margin of discount. But even so, there can be no mis- 
taking the upward trend. According to the figures reported there 
were in 1837 one hundred and ninety-three churches with 23,036 mem- 
bers, a number which has not since been reached until 1916, when 
23,129 were reported in two hundred and fifteen churches. The 1921 
statistics show 23,040 members in two hundred and thirteen churches. 
From that time, 1837, on for two decades there was a serious decline. 
This was due to a variety of causes. Internal convulsions among 
the churches, occasioned by Anti-Masonic, Anti-Slavery agitations, 
Millerism, and eccentric evangelism, disrupted many. But the loud 
call West, which took in two instances churches organized for the 
removal, and in several others caused them to have more members 
in single localities West than at home, was the chief contributory 
reason. To meet this condition, in the summer of 1856, Sir Thaddeus 
Fairbanks of St. Johnsbury addressed a letter to the secretary of 
the Missionary Society, calling attention to conditions showed by a 
recent survey and suggesting a plan to be laid before the coming anni- 
versary at Waterbury. An estimate of the expense accompanied it, 
and a pledge for the underwriting was given, duplicated by one from 
his brother, Governor Erastus Fairbanks. Substantially the plan was 
a revival of the old itinerant work, only in this case the men employed 
were students from theological seminaries during their vacations. The 
enga§“ement of these men and the supervision of their work were for 
a time under the direction of Rev. Henry Fairbanks, son of Sir Thad- 
deus, just graduated from Andover Seminary. A large number were 
employed for several years, men of great promise and superior ability, 
many of whom rose to take positions of first rank in the denomination 
outside of the State. The decline was speedily arrested. Even through 
the decade of the Civil War there was slow growth. In the midst of 
the following decade, 1870-80, there came another extensive revival 
in which laymen were prominent leaders. It was under the auspices RELIGIOUS DENOMINATIONS 
477 
of the Y. M. C. A. The men who went out were called “Gospel 
Workers.” All “evangelical” denominations shared in the work and 
in the great ingatherings. Later in the following decade another re- 
view of religious conditions in the State, especially in the rural re- 
gions and in the “Gores” lying between the parishes, led to the em- 
ployment of young women from the Moody Training Schools. These 
were sent out two by two for personal visitation, holding cottage 
meetings, and eventually opening the doors of old abandoned meeting 
houses. The resurrection of old churches and formation of new 
through the two following decades was due largely to this agency. And 
while, like other special efforts made to meet special conditions, both 
workers and methods have changed, the impetus given is still felt in 
our continued growth and enlargement. 
The Vermont Congregational Conference 
The State organization, now bearing the name of the Vermont 
Congregational Conference, had its origin in a gathering of five min- 
isters, among them Swift of Bennington and Burton of Thetford, in 
the study of President John Wheelock of Dartmouth College, in 
Hanover, N. H., August 27, 1795. For many years it was constituted 
wholly of ministers, usually meeting in a pastor’s study. Later it 
admitted laymen under restrictions, in 1841 took the name of Con- 
vention of Ministers and Churches, was incorporated in 1872; but 
not until 1892 did it become democratically representative and is now, 
under the name “Conference,” composed of the pastor and delegate 
from each church, together with permanent officers and members of 
committees and boards. The county organizations consist of Asso- 
ciations or unions of Ministers; and Conferences, now called Asso- 
ciations, of Churches. The latter, fifteen in number, whose boundaries 
do not always conform to county lines, meet annually as a rule, with 
a membership directly representative of the churches. 
The Domestic Missionary Society 
The Domestic Missionary Society, having its origin in 1807 under 
the name of the Vermont Missionary Society, was re-organized in 
1818 under the name of the Vermont Juvenile Missionary Society, 
and again in 1826 under its present name the Vermont Domestic 
Missionary Society. At this last date it became auxiliary to the Na- 
tional Home Missionary Society, and in 1872 it was incorporated. 
This Society has for its functions the raising of home missionary 
money, the larger part of which is used in this State, the supervision 
of aided churches, the holding of trust funds and the publication of 
the State paper. Membership in this body is identical with member- 
ship in the State Conference, with which it annually meets. Quite 478 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
recently radical changes have been made, bringing the two organiza- 
tions into closer vital relations. The board of directors is the same 
for each, and the secretary of the Conference, who also at present 
is the associate secretary of the Missionary Society, has supervision 
of all the churches in the State. This is in accord with the present 
trend toward stressing the principle of fellowship in the Congrega- 
tional order. In missionary work, women’s societies have been active 
from early days. At first they usually bore the name of “Female 
Cent Societies,” after the pattern of those originally formed in New 
Hampshire. Later they were all merged in the Vermont Branch of 
the Women’s Board of Missions, formed in 1872 for the foreign work, 
and the Woman’s Home Missionary Union, formed in 1888. 
Publications 
Religious periodicals have been published for periods of years. 
The Vermont Advisor, a monthly publication, 1809-15, was the first. 
The Evangelical Monitor, a fortnightly magazine, edited and pub- 
lished by Rev. Walter Chapin, Windsor, 1821-23, followed. In 1826, 
under the direction of the State General Convention, the Vermont 
Chronicle was started, a weekly paper published in Windsor, owned 
and edited for many years with marked ability by E. Carter 
Tracy. It was subsequently moved to Montpelier, then to St. Johns- 
bury, printed for a time in connection with the New Hampshire re- 
ligious paper, and in 1898 sold to the Congregationalist. In 1888 the 
Vermont Missionary began to be published as the organ of the Do- 
mestic Missionary Society. It was at first a four-page monthly sheet, 
with matter taken largely from missionary columns in the Chronicle. 
Later it was enlarged to eight pages, dropped connection with the 
Chronicle, became the organ jointly with the Women’s Societies, and 
now is the State representative of all the churches. 
Educational Institutions 
In accordance with the genius of Congregationalism the churches 
of the State have been foremost in fostering its college, Middlebury, 
and its almost innumerable academies. The former, chartered in 
1800, has had a most worthy career in fulfilling its purpose of re- 
cruiting the ministry. And the latter, though in large part now merged 
with the high schools of the State, still shows a list of noteworthy 
survivors in Burr and Burton of Manchester, Thetford, Craftsbury, 
Peacham and St. Johnsbury. GEORGE O. STRATTON 
Born in Greenwich, Mass., June 4, 1851. He was 
educated in the public schools of Montpelier. While a 
young man he entered the office of the Vermont Mu- 
tual Fire Insurance Company and worked his way, step 
by step, to the office of president. He served as presi- 
dent of the Board of Aldermen, was the second Mayor 
of the city, and represented Montpelier in the General 
Assembly of 1904. He married Marion E. Baker in 
1873, and three children were born to them, Arthur N., 
Bertha I.., and William B. Stratton. RELIGIOUS DENOMINATIONS 
479 
Pastors 
The list of pastors, under whose leadership the churches have 
made history, is a long and honorable one. Few only can be men- 
tioned, and those by no means in all instances the most prominent and 
influential. Among the life pastorates are: Asa Burton, Thetford, 
forty-six years, famous for his private “School of the Prophets” and 
defender of the conservative type of Calvinism against Doctor Em- 
mons in his book setting forth what was popularly known as the 
“Taste Scheme”; O. G. Wheeler, South Hero, forty-six years, pithy 
writer of short articles for the Chronicle; Alfred Stevens, Westminster, 
West, forty-four years, “Father” of all his colleagues; Leonard 
Worcester, Peacham, forty-two years, whose son, John H., died early 
in his ministry of the First Church, Burlington; William S. Hazen, 
Northfield, forty-two years, of a family furnishing in three generations 
nine ministers and missionaries, all but two serving in Vermont; 
Cyrus Drake, Royalton, forty-one years, faithful in his chosen field; 
Thomas A. Merrill, Middlebury, thirty-nine years, dominant in church 
and college, leader in State Convention and Missionary Society for 
fifty years, in whose handwriting has come down to us the records 
of our early history, together with anniversary pamphlets carefully 
preserved; Daniel Kent, Benson, thirty-six years, whose son, Cephas 
Henry, served Vermont churches a life time, and grandson, Evarts, 
held two pastorates in the State; and William H. Lord, Montpelier, 
thirty years, who died in active service in his ministry at the capital, 
where his strong personality was felt by all officials of the State. With 
only two exceptions all these men bore the honorary degree of Doctor 
of Divinity. Many became pastor emeritus after active service, con- 
tinued living in the parish and are buried there in “God’s Acre.” Others 
well meriting this classification held well nigh as long pastorates after 
or before serving briefly in other fields. Among them are: Asa Lyon, 
South Hero, forty-six years, a member of Congress, 1815-17; Lemuel 
Haynes, West Rutland, thirty years, the colored minister famous for his 
keen wit and eminent as a scholar; Stephen Fuller, Vershire, twenty- 
eight years, whose son, Joseph, held two pastorates in the same church; 
Ammi Nichols, Braintree, forty-one years; Parsons S. Pratt, Dorset, 
forty years; Daniel Wild, Brookfield, thirty-seven years, whose two 
sons and one grandson were prominent in service in the State; Silas 
McKeen, Bradford, thirty-seven years, in two pastorates; and Isaac 
Jennings, First Church, Bennington, thirty-four years, historian of 
church and town, followed after a brief interval by his son, Isaac. 
The list of families serving two generations is long. Prominent among 
them are: Charles Walker and his son, Geo. Leon, both holding 
pastorates in Brattleboro; William S. Smart of Benson and Brandon, 
father of I. C. Smart of College Street, Burlington; James Buckham, 480 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
Chelsea, father of President Buckham of the University of Vermont; 
and Chandler N. Thomas, New Haven, father of President Thomas 
of Middlebury College. But time would fail to tell of the Barstows, 
Byingtons, Clarks, Ferrins, Ranslows, Sewalls, Tenneys, Torreys and 
others who have done faithful service and left precious memories in 
the churches. A unique record is that of S. R. Hall, who, while 
pastor in Concord, 1822-30, started the first normal school, and was 
author of a textbook upon the geology of the State. Of families 
prominent in civil as well as ecclesiastical affairs are those of the 
Fairbanks of St. Johnsbury and the Smiths of St. Albans. The first 
in two generations furnished two ministers and two governors, while 
Dr. Worthington Smith, pastor in St. Albans, 1823-49, and president 
of the University of Vermont until his death in 1855, furnished in 
the two generations following two governors, who were also pres- 
idents of railroads. 
Historians 
Rev. Pliny White, of Coventry, began collecting material for the 
history of our Congregational churches during the period of the Civil 
War. Much of it he found in the mills where the accumulations of 
garrets had been sold for paper stock. At his death in 1869 he be- 
queathed this material to the General Convention. In the hands of 
the statistical secretary, Rev. A. W. Wild, who labored over it faith- 
fully for many years, but brought it down only to 1830, it had in- 
creased to such an extent that it was found impractical to publish. 
Accordingly, with his consent it was placed in the library of the Con- 
gregational House, Boston. Mr. Wild’s successor in the office of 
statistical secretary, John M. Comstock, of Chelsea, has with 
great labor and rare skill condensed this vast material and brought it 
down to 1914. This little volume of one hundred and ninety-nine 
pages, an invaluable mine of information, has been published by the 
State Conference, and a copy deposited with the clerk of every church. 
Vermont’s Contribution to the Ministry 
In years past the report was popularly current that out from the 
Taconic Range, which extends from the Champlain valley down into 
the Berkshires, had gone more ministers, ministers’ wives and mis- 
sionaries than from any other equal area on the face of the globe. 
Some shadow of substance to such an extravagant claim, surely Ver- 
mont may modestly share. Of the 1,007 Congregational and Presby- 
terian ministers which Mr. Comstock has credited to different towns 
in the State, the town of Hartford heads the list with twenty-five, 
Cornwall closely following with twenty-four. Bennington, Rutland 
and Randolph have each nearly a score, while many of the small towns RELIGIOUS DENOMINATIONS 
481 
make up in quality what they lack in quantity. From Calais, where 
the church has never had more than a fitful existence, there has gone 
N. G. Clark, secretary of the American Board, Constans Goodell 
of St. Louis and Israel Dwinell of Sacramento, Calif. Special men- 
tion may well be made of some in the long list. Jeremiah Evarts 
of Sunderland, 1781-1831, a graduate of Yale, admitted to the bar 
in 1816, was editor of the Panoplist in Boston for a time, then treasurer 
of the American Board and from 1821 until his death its corresponding 
secretary. His son, Senator Evarts, long made his summer home 
in Windsor, where his family has kept up the estate. Bennington 
furnished the first missionary to the Sandwich Islands in the person 
of Hiram Bingham, 1780-1861, who with his family played so large a 
part in the rapid Christian development of that people. From Mid- 
dlebury went out Truman H. Post, 1810-1866, college instructor East 
and West, a student of law, pastor of a Presbyterian church in St. 
Louis, then founder of the First Congregational Church, 1851, and 
long known as the “Outpost” of Congregationalism beyond the Mis- 
sissippi. It was in the Pilgrim church of this city that Constans 
Goodell, 1830-1886, did his great work. Though born in Newbury- 
port, Mass., his family came early to Newbury and it is with the 
Newbury church that the name of Geo. H. Atkinson, 1819-1889, is 
always associated. Commissioned as a missionary of the American 
Board, he sailed round the Horn to Oregon, via Honolulu, 1847-48, 
and was for over forty years a leader in church, missionary and 
educational affairs upon the Pacific coast. From Pittsford went out 
Geo. N. Boardman, 1825-1915, professor in Chicago Theological Sem- 
inary, 1871-1893; and Simeon Gilbert, 1834-1917, associate editor of 
the Advance in Chicago through all its varied career. From Cornwall 
went C. M. Mead, 1836-1911, author and scholar, professor in both 
Andover and Hartford Seminaries; and his brother, Hiram Mead, 
1827-1881, professor in Oberlin Seminary. Enosburg contributed 
Francis B. Denio to Bangor Seminary; and Burlington, John W. Buck- 
ham to the Pacific Seminary. Geo. B. Spalding, Montpelier, 1835- 
1914, was the immediate successor of Horace Bushnell in Hartford, 
Conn., and after pastorates in Vergennes and Dover, N. H., went 
to a long service in a Presbyterian church in Syracuse, N. Y. H. N. 
Burton, 1826-93, of Washington, where the church of our order had 
but a feeble existence, did student work in the State, and after a 
memorable pastorate in Newbury went West to prominent pulpits in 
Ohio and Michigan. From the long list furnished by the churches 
in Brattleboro, John C. Holbrook, 1808-1900, may be noted as one 
who went West to a distinguished career in Iowa and California. 
East Hardwick furnished Elnathan E. Strong, 1832-1914, to be edi- 
torial secretary of the A. B. C. F. M. from 1878 until his decease. 
From St. Johnsbury went F. D. Ayer, 1833 to 1919, for thirty years 482 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
pastor of the First Church, Concord, N. H.; and Geo. H. Ide, 1839- 
1903, pastor of a prominent church in Milwaukee. Geo. Leon Walker, 
1830-1900, pastor of the First Church, New Haven, and the Centre 
Church, Hartford, Conn., was born in Rutland, though his more inti- 
mate relations were with Brattleboro and Pittsford. Of those now 
living mention may be made of James L. Barton, of Charlotte, secretary 
of the American Board, authority on the Eastern questions and ad- 
visor of diplomats and statesmen; and Edward L. Smith, of Mont- 
pelier, a member of the “Washington Band,” since called East to be- 
come district secretary of the American Board. In Berlin was born 
A. W. Hazen, who has had a life pastorate of more than fifty years 
in Middletown, Conn. 
Itinerant Licentiates 
To the great profit both of the workers themselves and of the 
fields where they labored, Vermont has employed young men from 
the seminaries at different times. Of those mentioned here none were 
natives of the State, and no one returned to take a pastorate after his 
graduation. The name of Levi Parsons takes precedence. Though 
born in Massachusetts his father, Justin Parsons, was pastor in Pitts- 
field, Vt., while he attended Middlebury College. During his course 
in Andover Seminary he came in the summer of 1817 to do itinerant 
work in the State. So successful was he in bringing a great spiritual 
uplift to the communities visited and so impressed with the destitution 
which had followed a waning in missionary interest, that he returned 
after graduation and spent a year in canvassing the State, reorganizing 
the Missionary Society and replenishing the treasury. As a mis- 
sionary of the American Board he sailed for Syria in 1819, accom- 
panied by a brother missionary Pliny Fisk, who during the summer of 
1818 had labored in Wilmington. After a brief two years’ work, 
which has placed his name high in missionary annals, he died in 
Alexandria, Egypt, in the care of Mr. Fisk, who survived him only 
two years. In the middle of the last century when the itinerant work 
was revived we find the names of E. P. Goodwin, at Burke, 1859 
and 1860, afterwards pastor of the First Church, Chicago, over thirty 
years; C. H. Richards, at Duxbury, 1858, pastor in Madison, Wis., 
and Philadelphia, now secretary of the Church Building Society; 
F. A. Noble at Barnet, 1859, pastor of the First Church, New Haven, 
Conn., and Union Church, Chicago; Newman Smyth at Plymouth, 
1866, pastor of the First Church, New Haven, Conn.; A. E. Dunning 
at Stratton, 1868, editor of the Congregationalist; and M. C. Julian at 
Bridgewater, 1870, long pastor in New Bedford, Mass. THE EPISCOPAL CHURCH IN VERMONT 
Rt. Rev. George Y. Bliss, D. D., Bishop Coadjutor of Vermont 
THE Diocese of Vermont is coterminous with the boundaries of 
the State. The first clergymen of the Episcopal Church to 
settle in what is now the State of Vermont were the Rev. Bethuel 
Chittenden, a younger brother of Thomas Chittenden, the first Gov- 
ernor of the State, the Rev. Reuben Garlic, the Rev. Daniel Barber 
and the Rev. James Nichols. The Rev. Bethuel Chittenden settled 
in the town of Tinmouth in 1774. He was ordained in Connecticut 
by Bishop Seabury, at that time the only Bishop of the Church in 
New England, on June 1, 1787. Like his older brother, he had only 
a common school education, but like him he had uncommon natural 
abilities, good sense and an unsullied character and reputa- 
tion. He labored at first in Tinmouth, and from 1790 to 1809, the 
year of his death, in Shelburne. So active was he as a missionary 
that groups of church people in scattered sections of the State received 
his ministrations, among whom he administered the sacraments of the 
Church until he became too infirm to travel. The Rev. Reuben Garlic, 
born in New Milford, Conn., about 1742, was ordained by Bishop 
Seabury, July 29, 1787, and two years later removed to Alburg, where 
he was the only settled minister and where he continued to labor, 
going also to Jericho and Essex in his missionary journeys until his 
removal to Canada in 1803. The Rev. Daniel Barber, also born in 
Connecticut, was ordained by Bishop Seabury on October 19, 1786, 
and soon after became the first settled clergyman in the town of 
Manchester, where he continued to officiate until his removal to New 
Hampshire in 1795. The Rev. James Nichols, a native of Connecticut, 
received Holy Orders in England. He came to Arlington in 1784, 
and labored there until 1788, and in Sandgate from 1790 to 1796. He 
was deposed from his office and ministry in 1799. These were the 
first priests to have what may be called definite cure of souls within 
what now is the Diocese of Vermont. 
Earlier Missionaries 
But earlier than the dates given above, clergymen of the church 
from Massachusetts or Connecticut had come into this northern region 
on missionary tours. In 1767 the Rev. Samuel Andrews of Walling- 
ford, Conn., made a journey of three weeks visiting in Vermont, both 
Arlington and Sunderland. He writes: “The settlers have been in 
Arlington three or four years. I am the first clergyman that has 
been among them. However, I found that they had constantly at- 484 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
tended the service of the church at the house of Captain Jehiel Haw- 
ley, a gentleman of unblemished reputation and good understanding, 
who has read prayers for them eve** since they have been settled there, 
by which means a sense of religion is preserved among them.” In 
1769 the Rev. Harry Monro of St. Peter’s parish, Albany, visited 
Arlington and baptized twenty-one persons. The next year the Rev. 
Samuel Peters from Hebron, Conn., came up along the Connecticut 
River, visiting the towns of Strafford, Windsor and Thetford, and 
on his journey of some seven hundred miles preached as often as 
every other day and baptized thirty-five persons. The Rev. Gideon 
Bostwick of Great Barrington, Mass., made eight distinct visits into 
the southern part of the State between the years 1772 and 1789. Serv- 
ices to church people in the Connecticut valley were given also by the 
Rev. Tillotson Bronson of Hanover, N. H., who, between 1786 and 
1788, gave a fourth of his time to Strafford, Vt. The Rev. Ranna 
Cossitt of Claremont, N. H., in the same way divided his time and 
effort between the east and west sides of the Connecticut River. 
By such ministrations from three or four settled ministers and 
from others living elsewhere, the scattered adherents of the Episcopal 
Church in Vermont received the word and the sacraments during the 
last three decades of the eighteenth century. 
Lay People 
Of the settlers who entered this region prior to the year 1800 
few had been trained in the Episcopal Church. But these few were 
staunch churchmen with strong convictions. They had become weary 
in the older portions of New England, of fines and exactions imposed 
for non-attendance at Puritan worship and for using the Prayer Book 
in services of their own. They were attracted moreover by the grants 
of land, “Glebes,” for the benefit of the “Church of England,” made 
by Governor Benning Wentworth of New Hampshire in some one 
hundred and twenty-five townships in what is now Vermont. Em- 
boldened to think that during some years of hardships and peril in 
the wilderness, they might make themselves homes on this fertile 
soil, escape the annoyances to which they had been subject and find 
in these church lands, when brought under cultivation, a means for 
maintaining the ministry of the church, they moved to the "Hampshire 
Grants.” Actuated by these motives, groups of churchmen settled in 
various towns in the southwest, and in a few in the Connecticut val- 
ley. By such men, Arlington was settled about 1764, Tinmouth a 
few years later; Manchester received a number, also Dorset, Rupert, 
Sandgate, Sunderland, Bennington, Pawlet, Wells, Castleton and Rut- 
land. Farther north before 1790 there were clusters of churchmen 
in Bethel, Shelburne, Vergennes and Alburg, while on the east side EARLE S. KINSLEY 
Born in Cambridge, Vt., November 4, 1869. He was 
educated in the public schools in Burlington and in 
Washington, D. C. He entered the insurance business 
and has been a general agent of the National Life 
Insurance Company since 1897, residing at Rutland. 
He was appointed a page in the Vermont House of 
Representatives in 1880 and a messenger in the United 
States Senate in 1881, serving for four years. He was 
Official Reporter of the Vermont Senate, 1886-88. Gov. 
Fletcher D. Proctor appointed him Chief of Staff, 
with the rank of Colonel. He represented the city of 
Rutland in the Vermont Legislature in 1908. In 1916 
he was chosen a Presidential Elector. He was a mem- 
ber of the Republican State Committee, 1908-13, its 
secretary four years, and was acting chairman in 1913. 
He was elected Vermont member of the Republican 
National Committee in 1914 and re-elected in 1916 and 
1930. In 1930 he was National Director of Republican 
Clubs for the National Committee. He was Rutland 
county chairman of the second, third, fourth and fifth 
Liberty Loan Campaigns and Vermont State chairman 
for the war work campaign of 1918. He married Clara 
Chase of Burlington. Two children, George S. and 
Hester M., have been born to them. RELIGIOUS DENOMINATIONS 
485 
similar groups settled in Strafford, Hartland, Norwich, Thetford, 
Springfield and Weathersfield. Among these early settlers were men 
whose family names reappear in the successive records of the church 
from that time to the present. There are the Hawleys, and the Hards 
and the Hurds, the Chittendens and Canfields, Bucks, Bost- 
wicks, Baldwins and Chases, the Whitneys, Squires and Blakes, the 
Ogdens, Chipmans, Whitlocks and Woosters. Some twenty groups 
of these people existed within the borders of the future State prior 
to 1790. Not one of these groups was as yet an organized parish in 
the strict sense of the term. Only two church buildings had been 
erected. Such gatherings for worship as were held were mostly in 
private homes, and laymen read the services from the Prayer Book. 
Such are the facts regarding the condition of the Episcopal Church 
when the first Convention of the Church in Vermont was held in 
Arlington on September 20, 1790. Two clergymen and eighteen lay 
delegates were present. From that date to the present year church- 
men in Vermont have assembled each year in diocesan convention so 
that the meeting in 1922 was the one hundred and thirty-second 
annual convention of the Diocese of Vermont. 
The First Bishop 
The church in Vermont was as yet without Episcopal supervision 
and complete diocesan autonomy was impossible until a bishop had 
been ordained and consecrated. Two attempts before 1800 were made 
to secure such Episcopal oversight, but both attempts failed. It was 
not until 1811 that by a union of the future dioceses of Rhode Island, 
Massachusetts, Maine, New Hampshire and Vermont, the Rev. Alex- 
ander Viets Griswold was chosen, ordained and consecrated to exercise 
Episcopal jurisdiction over this combined territory under the title of 
“Bishop of the Eastern Diocese.” Bishop Griswold was consecrated 
in Trinity Church, New York, on May 29, 1811. From that date 
until 1832, a period of twenty-one years, he continued to minister as 
chief pastor over this distant section of his extensive diocese, making 
trips from time to time from his home, first in Rhode Island, and 
later in Salem, Mass., visiting the scattered congregations, baptizing, 
confirming, consecrating church buildings, and by his wisdom and 
zeal encouraging and strengthening the few and often unshepherded 
members of his flock. Bishop Griswold was not a man of great learn- 
ing or erudition, but his evident piety and meekness, his entire con- 
secration to his work, and his earnest, affectionate simplicity, fitted 
him peculiarly for the pioneer work to which he was called. The 
serious obstacle to the growth of the church during his episcopate 
was the lack of ministers suitably trained. Priests of the church in 486 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
numbers were wholly inadequate. Three and four were as many as 
could be depended upon for the score or more parishes. 
Manchester and Arlington, before 1820, had strong congregations; 
Sheldon and Fairfield in the north had over a hundred baptized mem- 
bers ; ninety-six persons in these two places were confirmed by Bishop 
Griswold in 1817, and seven at St. Albans. Montgomery and Berk- 
shire had congregations organized and supported by a group of able 
laymen, among whom may be mentioned the Hon. Stephen Roycer 
Chief Justice and later Governor of Vermont, Dr. Amherst Willough- 
by, Messrs. Dolphus Paul, Seth Goodspeed, David Coburn, Rufus 
Smith, John H. Clap, Roswell Catlin and Rufus Hamilton. From 
this group of laymen came the Rev. Joel Clap, the first white child 
born in Montgomery, September 4, 1793, son of Capt. Joshua Clap. 
He entered the University of Vermont in 1809, studied law in Sheldon 
with the Hon. Stephen Royce and was admitted to the bar in 1815. 
While practicing his profession in partnership with Mr. Royce he 
studied for the ministry and was ordained by Bishop Griswold in 
October, 1818. He was successively in charge of the congregations 
in Montgomery and Berkshire, in Shelburne and Bethel, in Wood- 
stock and Bellows Falls, finally returning to his parish about 1860, 
and while there died February 21, 1861. On the east side of the State 
congregations were growing up in Windsor, Bellows Falls and Guil- 
ford. Thus the church in Vermont prospered during the score of 
years it was in union with the “Eastern Diocese.” 
The Right Reverend John Henry Hopkins, D. D. 
The Convention of 1831 was the last in Vermont over which 
Bishop Griswold presided. At this convention, held in St. James’ 
Church, Arlington, August 31, it was decided that Vermont should 
sever its connection with the Eastern Diocese. At the next conven- 
tion, held in St. Stephen’s parish, Middlebury, on the 30th and 31st 
days of May, 1832, the act of separation was consummated, the Diocese 
of Vermont became an independent diocese “subject only to the law 
of our Lord and Saviour, and to the constitution and canons of the 
Protestant Episcopal Church in these United States,” and on Thurs- 
day, May 31, 1832, the Rev. John Henry Hopkins, assistant at Trinity 
Church, Boston, was elected Bishop of Vermont. The future bishop 
at the time of his election was forty years old, having been born in 
Ireland, son of Thomas and Elizabeth Hopkins, on January 30, 1792. 
He died in Burlington, January 9, 1868, after presiding over the diocese 
for thirty-five years and seven months. 
Bishop Hopkins was consecrated in St. Paul’s Chapel, New 
York, on October 31, 1832 and immediately arranged to move to 
\ ermont. So expeditious were his movements that the following week RELIGIOUS DENOMINATIONS 
487 
saw him in Burlington, where, on Sunday, November 11, he officiated 
for the first time in his new diocese. On Monday the 12th of No- 
vember, he set out on his return to Boston to wind up his affairs 
there and to secure the removal of his household to Burlington. This 
he did so that he was permanently settled in his new home on No- 
vember 21, 1832, and on the following Sunday, the Sunday next before 
Advent, November 25, he consecrated St. Paul’s Church, Burlington, 
which had been recently completed and the rectorship of which he 
was to hold along with his office and duties as bishop of the diocese. 
These four weeks of expeditious movement are characteristic 
of Bishop Hopkins’ whole episcopate. He was a strong personality, a 
man of great vigor and untiring energy, both intellectual and physical. 
His gifts were varied and by no means inconsiderable; a writer 
whose published works number nearly a score, a musician, a painter, 
the products of whose brush still adorn some of the churches he built, 
and an architect who, when a church was needed in the diocese, could 
furnish both architect’s and builder’s drawings. One of the best 
products of his skill in this direction is the Vermont Episcopal Institute 
at Rock Point, Burlington, probably the earliest example of col- 
legiate Gothic in the United States. It was to be expected that under 
leadership thus endowed the church in Vermont would advance with 
accelerated progress. At the bishop’s first convention, held in Trinity 
Church, Rutland, May 29, 1833, there were reported thirteen clergy- 
men, twenty-five parishes or congregations, sixteen church buildings, 
one rectory and about 1,100 communicants. At the end of twenty 
years, that is, in 1853, the bishop reported twenty-five clergymen, 
thirty-one parishes or congregations, twenty-eight church buildings, 
twelve rectories and about 1,900 communicants. In the fifteen years 
that remained up to the time of the bishop’s death, the above figures 
increased, and in 1868 were as follows: Clergymen, twenty-five (no 
increase); parishes, thirty-eight; churches, thirty-four; rectories, six- 
teen ; and communicants, 2,300. The Senior Bishop by consecration 
is the Presiding Bishop of the Church in the United States. By 
divine providence Bishop Hopkins succeeded to this office in 1865. 
It was, therefore, as the Presiding Bishop of the Church that in the 
summer of 1867, attended by his oldest son, the Rev. John Henry 
Hopkins, Jr., he went to England to be present at the first Lambeth 
Conference. This was his last official appearance outside his own 
diocese. 
To choose a successor to Bishop Hopkins a special convention 
was called to meet at St. Paul’s Church, Burlington, on March 11, 
1868. The convention met and the Rev. William Henry Augustus 
Bissell, D. D., rector of Trinity Church, Geneva, N. Y., was chosen, 
The Second Bishop of Vermont 488 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
and at the annual convention of the diocese held three months later 
in Christ Church, Montpelier, was consecrated bishop and entered 
upon his labors as the second bishop of Vermont. Bishop Bissell by 
birth was a Vermonter. Born in Randolph, November 10, 1814, he 
graduated from the University of Vermont in 1836, was ordained 
deacon in 1839 and priest in 1840. But as a priest he never labored 
in the diocese over which later he presided as bishop. But as he 
stated “no traveller from foreign lands ever returned with greater 
delight to his long forsaken home than he did to the mountains and 
hills of his native State.” It was possibly providential that Bishop 
Bissell in personality, natural endowments, education, training and 
experience, presented so marked a contrast to his distinguished pre- 
decessor. He sprang from Vermont soil, his education and training 
were in his native State, experienced as a teacher and in his long 
rectorship at Geneva as a parish priest, he brought back to the diocese, 
at the age of fifty-four, a sympathy, knowledge and practical wisdom 
that in the administration of the diocese proved to be as valuable as 
were the more brilliant gifts of Bishop Hopkins. His episcopate spanned 
a period of almost exactly twenty-five years. It was a period when the 
population of the State was making little increase and when such 
immigration as was received from abroad came in large measure 
from the Province of Quebec. And yet during this quarter of a cen- 
tury the growth of the Episcopal Church exceeded in percentage the 
growth of population and also the rate of increase in the church during 
the years preceding. In his twenty-five years Bishop Bissell con- 
secrated twenty-two churches, built fourteen rectories, ordained twen- 
ty-three priests and confirmed 5,726 persons. The number of com- 
municants increased from 2,300 to 4,241. The value of church prop- 
erty in the diocese more than doubled. Missionary offerings increased 
as three to one. Sunday schools, both as regards the number of 
pupils and the thoroughness of instruction, greatly improved. The 
diocesan boards that have been such valuable aids to the bishop in 
the administration of the diocese, “the Trustees of the Diocese,” “The 
Trustees of the Fund for the support of the Bishop,” and “The 
Trustees of the Aged and Infirm Clergy Fund” were formed and in- 
corporated during this period. In all departments, financial, parochial, 
educational and missionary, there was a steady and healthy growth. 
The diocese was preparing to celebrate the twenty-fifth anniversary 
of Bishop Bissell’s consecration when he was removed from the scene 
of his earthly labors. He died in Burlington, Sunday, May 14, 1893, 
at the age of seventy-eight years and six months. RELIGIOUS DENOMINATIONS 
489 
The Third Diocesan Episcopate 
A special convention of the diocese to choose Bishop Bissell’s 
successor met in St. Paul’s Church, Burlington, on June 22, 1893. 
The result of the meeting was the election of the Rev. Samuel Hart, 
D. D., a presbyter of the Diocese of Connecticut. The Reverend 
Doctor Hart, having declined the election, a second convention called 
to meet in Burlington on August 30 chose the Rev. Arthur Crawshay 
Alliston Hall, M. A., of Oxford, England, who had served in Massa- 
chusetts from 1873-1891. The election was confirmed and accepted 
and Bishop Hall was ordained and consecrated in St. Paul’s Church 
on the Feast of the Purification, February 2, 1894. At the age of 
seventy-five and after twenty-eight years of vigorous leadership, 
Bishop Hall continues as the chief pastor of his flock, honored and 
revered at home and throughout the church in England and America, 
esteemed and respected for his learning, scholarship and spiritual 
power. 
At the time when the Bishop’s health was seriously impaired 
assistance was given him by the consecration in 1913 of the Rev. 
William Farrar Weeks as Bishop Coadjutor. The short, brave and 
pathetic episcopate of Bishop Weeks was terminated by death on 
October 23, 1914, and on April 21, 1915, the Rev. George Yemens 
Bliss, D. D., was consecrated to carry on the work as Coadjutor that 
Bishop Weeks had so bravely attempted. 
Thirty-five years, twenty-five years, and twenty-eight years are 
the periods of the three episcopates that span the history of the church 
in Vermont as an independent diocese. Progress during the third 
period, as marked by statistics, shows about the same measure of 
growth as in earlier years. In 1921 there were in the diocese seventy- 
two parishes, missions and missions stations, sixty-seven church build- 
ings, thirty-two rectories and twelve parish houses. There were 10,147 
baptized members of the church, of whom 6,150 were confirmed. 
Including the two Bishops and one deacon there were fifty clergy 
canonically connected with the diocese, although not all in active serv- 
ice. There is received, raised and expended for church purposes, 
parochial, diocesan, missionary, educational and benevolent, each year 
about $110,000 and the total value of all church property in the diocese, 
real and personal, aggregates $1,700,000. 
Education 
Bishop Hopkins early devoted himself to the founding and build- 
ing up of a diocesan church school. In less than eight after 
coming to Burlington he had purchased land, erected buildings, opened 
a school, and through financial failure lost all, inheriting from the 
brave but premature venture an indebtedne of $13,000 which he 490 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
personally assumed. Undismayed by this initial failure he later re- 
newed his efforts. He collected funds not only in his own diocese, in 
other parts of the country, but in England also. For years he pursued 
this arduous task before it was felt that the amount collected war- 
ranted a second venture in building. A site on the beautiful property 
at Rock Point, near Burlington, was chosen, ground was broken and 
foundations laid when again the work was checked. It was not until 
1860 that the building now known as the Vermont Episcopal Institute 
was completed, and in September of that year opened for pupils. The 
Rev. Theodore Austin Hopkins, a graduate of the University of Ver- 
mont and a son of the Bishop, was the first principal of the academic 
department. A theological department for the training of young men 
for the priesthood was projected and actually opened but continued 
a few years only. The diocesan school for girls, known as Bishop 
Hopkins Hall, also on the Rock Point property, was built and opened 
its doors in September, 1888. For about ten years the two schools 
were conducted simultaneously and successfully. Later it was deemed 
best to close the Vermont Episcopal Institute. An endowment fund 
of $100,000 was raised for Bishop Hopkins Hall, which under wise 
and careful management has come to be one of the leading private 
schools for girls in northern New England, widely known for its 
high scholastic standing combined with Christian teaching. THE CATHOLIC CHURCH 
Rev. C. C. Delany, D. D. 
THE History of Vermont would be incomplete without some notice 
of the rise and growth within her borders of that institution, 
which has been, since its very foundation, one of the most potent 
factors in the intellectual and moral development of the human family, 
the world over, the Catholic Church. 
While it is the purpose, therefore, of this chapter to avoid such 
an omission in a measure, only a cursory glance can be taken, in a 
general history of the State, of the wide field of Catholic activities, 
that would more properly find fuller space in a specifically ecclesiastical 
work; but a day may come when a more extended account of re- 
ligious events, occurring in over a century of time, may be penned; 
and, no doubt, such a volume will form one of the most interesting 
pages in the annals of the American Church. 
The earliest beginnings of the Catholic Church in Vermont, like 
the lofty peaks of her beautiful mountain range, so often lost in the 
morning mists, are enshrouded in obscurity, at the dawn of her civ- 
ilization. Evidences there are, however, and not a few, to show that 
Catholicity was contemporaneous with the earliest settlements. From 
the Northland came the French at an early date, in the wake of the 
great explorer, Samuel de Champlain, who passed up the Sorel (Riche- 
lieu) and along her coast in the summer of 1609 on his way to Crown 
Point and the Mohawk Country; they glided along the placid waters 
of the lake that bears his name and up the rivers at its northern end, 
those early voyageurs and coureurs de hois, in their rude bateaux and 
canoes, singing their native melodies that recalled the home of their 
childhood in distant Brittany, to the stroke of the oar and the paddle, 
and mingling with their patriotic songs, the sublime chants of the 
Old Church they loved so well, and making the virgin forest ring with 
the echoes of that music which ever thrills the soul of a Frenchman. 
In their periodic trips up and down the lakes and rivers the 
hardy pioneers were never alone in their wanderings; wherever their 
adventures led them for a time the faithful missionary priest followed 
their footsteps and pitched his camp in their midst, sharing their dan- 
gers and ministering to their spiritual needs, and at the same time 
carrying the Cross and salvation to the benighted children of the 
forest. 
In one of those trips up the lake a settlement was established on 
Isle la Motte, and a fort was built there as early as 1665. This for- 
tress, constructed by Captain de la Mothe, was called St. Anne and 
stood there many years as a monument to the courage and enterprise 
of the French explorers. 492 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
From the Archives of Quebec we learn that Bishop Laval of 
Quebec (Bishop 1658-1688) visited Fort St. Anne during the year 
1668; he was the first Bishop to set foot on the present territory of 
the United States. 
Hon. David Read, of Burlington, in his history of the town of 
Colchester, asserts that “Isle-la-Motte, in the county of Grand Isle, 
has the honor of being the first point within the limits of Vermont, 
where a civilized establishment and occupancy were commenced.” He 
dates this occupancy as far back as the spring of 1665, when “M. de 
Tracy, Governor of New France, ordered Captain de la Mothe to pro- 
ceed up Lake Champlain, and erect another fortress” (one had already 
been built at Sorel, the mouth of the Richelieu) upon an island, which 
he designated. It was completed that same year and named Fort 
St. Anne. 
This fortress, he continues, was not only built but occupied for 
a long period of years by the French as a garrison, and the island 
itself was occupied by them for nearly a century. 
I have mentioned these things to show the time as well as the 
nature and extent of this occupancy at Isle-la-Motte; and by com- 
paring dates it will be seen that the building of Fort St. Anne at the 
Isle-la-Motte was but forty-five years after the landing of the Pil- 
grims at Plymouth, twenty-five years before the erection of the little 
stone fort at Chimney Point in Addison by Jacobus de Warm, and 
fifty-nine years before the occupancy of eastern Vermont was com- 
menced, by the building of Fort Dummer, upon the west bank of 
the Connecticut River in the county of Windham. 
It is worthy of note, en passant, that the black gown as the early 
missionary fathers, the Jesuits and the Recollects were called, fol- 
lowed their newly-made converts among the savage tribes in their 
wanderings and lived with them in their camps. 
These Indian camps were situated in northern Vermont (along 
the rivers) at an early period. There is an old tradition among the 
St. Regis Indians, mentioned in the chronicles of Mrs. Smalley 
in her history of Swanton, that as early as 1613, only four years 
after Champlain sailed up the Richelieu and the lake to which 
he gave his name, a missionary priest came to visit them in 
their encampment on the Missisquoi River near Swanton, and then 
passed on to all the small Indian settlements along the eastern border 
of the lake. But these traditions are not authentic history. In the 
light of such historical data as here given, there can be little doubt 
that the very first Christian religious cult established and practiced in 
the State was none other than that of the Catholic Church. But this 
was only of a transitory character, as these first encampments were 
soon abandoned entirely, or at least not continuously occupied. J. WATSON WEBB 
Born in Burlington, Vt., July 1, 1884. He 
was educated at the Groton School and Yale 
University. He travelled abroad in 1908. He was 
with the Chicago and Northwestern Railroad in Mil- 
waukee and Chicago in 1909 and 1910. In March, 1911, 
he moved to New York, where he has since been as- 
sociated with the insurance firm of Marsh and Mc- 
Lennan, one of the largest in the country, with offices 
in nine of the big cities. He served as Captain of 
Field Artillery for nearly two years, 1917-1919, and 
was overseas nine months. In 1921 he played in Eng- 
land on the victorious American International Polo 
team which brought the cup hack to this country. He 
served as member of the Legislature from Shelburne 
in 1921. He married Electra Havemever in 1910 and 
they have five children, three boys and two girls. RELIGIOUS DENOMINATIONS 
493 
While such sporadic attempts at settlement were being made in 
the northern part of the State by the early French explorers and their 
successors, few Catholics, if any, were found among .those who early 
penetrated the New England States as far north as the “New Hamp- 
shire Grants,” coming along the Connecticut River from the south 
or along the Hudson and the lake from the Dutch settlements. 
Not until 1822 is there found any authentic record of a Catholic 
priest connected with a congregation in Vermont. In that year mention 
is made of a Rev. James McQuaide as doing missionary duty among 
the scattered members of his church at Middlebury, in Addison county. 
His services extended over a period of about a year. 
From this time until 1830 this first Catholic congregation was 
without a priest. But the year of 1830 marks a distinct step forward for 
Catholicity in Vermont. On July 15 of this year Father Jeremiah 
O’Callaghan, a zealous Irish priest from Cork, was sent to Burlington 
by Bishop Fenwick of Boston as a permanent missionary in this part 
of the then Diocese of Boston. Burlington, with the rest of Vermont, 
was under the ecclesiastical jurisdiction of Boston until twenty-three 
years later, when it was erected into a separate see. 
During these twenty-three years the Catholic Church in Burling- 
ton and throughout the whole State is closely identified with the name 
of Jeremiah O’Callaghan. He was then not a young man (he died 
and was buried at Holyoke, Mass., in 1861), but in spite of his years 
his activities as a missionary were unflagging, and with the equally 
zealous assistance of Rev. John B. Daley, who was sent to Middlebury 
in 1835 to replace Rev. James Walsh, carried on nearly all the mis- 
sionary labors in the State. 
One of his first undertakings was to secure for the Catholics of 
Burlington a suitable place for worship. This he accomplished in 
1832, when he erected a small church on a portion of the site of St. 
Joseph’s Cemetery on Hyde St. The church was unpretentious, for 
the Catholics were not wealthy, but were naturally proud of their 
achievement. It was the first of its kind in the whole State. 
The land on which it stood, as well as the few acres around it, 
was a donation to the Catholic Society by Colonel Hyde, who sub- 
sequently became a member of the Church. In this building the 
Catholic community, both the English speaking and the French Cana- 
dians, many of the latter having already come into the States, held 
their services until 1838, when the church was destroyed by fire. 
The cause of the fire was never satisfactorily accounted for, but 
it was suspected to have been of incendiary origin. Be this as it 
may, it simply tends to manifest at this time that the Catholics were 
generally looked upon with suspicion by their neighbors and, perhaps, 
not without some reasons. 494 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
Most of them were foreigners or the immediate descendants of 
foreigners, some of them not even acquainted with the language of 
the country. Still they were honest and hard-working, intelligent and 
thrifty, and intensely religious and devoted adherents to the faith of 
their fathers; and with all, they were self-sacrificing and gave gener- 
ously of their scanty means for the upbuilding of their churches and 
schools. 
Burlington was then only a big town (it was chartered as a city 
in 1864) and was not free from the narrowness characteristic of small 
communities. But there were to be found there, even at that early 
day, men like Archibald Hyde, of broad culture and wide experience, 
who were gifted with the prophetic vision of the seer and beheld 
in perspective what others only discovered after years, when placed 
directly under their gaze, that this church was calculated to mould her 
children, not only into loyal and faithful members of her own re- 
ligious communion, but also into staunch and devoted citizens, who 
were to display in the great crisis of the sixties, which shortly fol- 
lowed, a spirit of loyalty and staunch adherence to country and flag, 
equal to that entertained for and exhibited toward their church and 
their religion. 
Nor has this same spirit of generous loyalty ever been wanting 
on any occasion when the country has required a sacrifice on the part 
of her citizens. In the Civil War, in the great battles for the Union, 
and in the World War the Catholic population was everywhere nu- 
merically prominent, betraying a courage and whole-souled coopera- 
tion equally distinguished. 
Speaking of the early Catholic population of St. Albans half a 
century ago, Mrs. B. H. Smalley makes this pertinent comment: “A 
large proportion of the Catholic congregation which assembles in this 
place is composed of young people (descendants of foreign Catholics) 
who were born and brought up on the soil and who will compare 
favorably with any class descended from Americans, for native intel- 
ligence, education, industry, morality and piety, while in physical 
power and endurance they are greatly superior.” 
“The bitter prejudices, created and fostered by the rancorous par- 
tisans of the most un-American of all our parties, which styled itself 
par excellence, the American party, have been proved to be cruelly 
unjust and the experience of the country during the past war has 
abundantly demonstrated that the foreign Catholic population and their 
descendants, so far from forming a dangerous element in our society, 
are in fact among its best and most reliable safeguards. 
Instructed by a clergy who abstain from all interference in po- 
litical matters, except to admonish their people diligently of their 
duty to be subject to their rulers in all obedience, taught by the bitter 
experiences of oppression abroad, the value of free and liberal institu- RELIGIOUS DENOMINATIONS 
495 
tions here, and unbiased by the temptations of ambition which un- 
fortunately lure too many of our fellow citizens from the paths of 
rectitude and duty in the quest of office, they are not to be outdone 
by any class in the practice of the social and domestic virtues or in 
the exercise of true patriotism. 
But these mists of misunderstanding and suspicion that hung for 
a time over Catholicity and its professors gradually melted away in 
the light of knowledge and truth, and a better feeling towards the 
Catholics was begotten by that spirit of fair play so distinctive of our 
American people. 
After the loss of their little church on Hyde St. the Catholics 
were given the use of the basement of the Old Court House, where 
they held services from 1838 till 1841, when Father O’Callaghan, gen- 
erously assisted by the people of his own flock and encouraged by 
the other citizens, erected St. Mary’s Church on the corner of St. 
Paul and Cherry Streets, which served as the parish church until the 
construction of the Cathedral, when it was appropriated for the paro- 
chial school. 
While diligently laboring for the welfare of his own flock at 
Burlington, Father O’Callaghan was not unmindful of the other Cath- 
olic communities scattered here and there throughout the State. All 
these missions to the north and east were periodically visited by him 
or some other priests—principally French Canadians, like Father Mig- 
nault of Chambly, who was made a Vicar General of the Boston Dio- 
cese—and their spiritual needs attended to. 
Contemporaneously with Father O’Callaghan, or nearly so, from 
1835 Father Daley of the Boston Diocese was engaged in similar labors 
among all the scattered missions of the southern part of the State, 
where he acquired a wonderful reputation for spiritual powers. 
But about the years 1847 and 1848, the period of the famine 
in Ireland and that of railroad building in Vermont, there was an 
influx of desirable citizens and the tide of immigration was at its 
flood from the Green Isle. Up the St. Lawrence and through the lake 
to the port at Burlington came many a boatload of poor, Irish immi- 
grants, seeking their fortune in a new land, “the land of the free and 
the home of the brave,” came with all their native wealth, not much 
materially, but with honest hearts and with an intense love for 
liberty and for the faith of their forebears, and with an undying re- 
membrance of the land of their birth; they came and pitched their 
tents in the Green Mountain State, where they felt “at home”— so 
much did it put them in mind of the little Green Isle of the Ocean they 
had so recently left behind them. 
At this period also, and for some years before, many Canadian 
families crossed the northern frontier and settled along the border 
in the neighborhood of the Lamoille and the Missisquoi Rivers. The 496 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
Catholic population forthwith greatly increased owing to the above- 
mentioned reasons and the natural prolificness and moral purity of 
these families. 
Thus it was soon perceived by the ecclesiastical authorities that 
the missionary system up to this time obtaining in Vermont was no 
longer adequate for the requirements of the Church. It was, therefore, 
determined to detach the State from the jurisdiction of Boston and 
erect it into a separate diocese with the episcopal see at Burlington. 
In pursuance of this wise determination, Rev. Louis de Goes- 
briand, then a missionary priest of the Diocese of Cleveland, Ohio, 
was consecrated Bishop in the Cathedral in New York City, November 
3, 1853, and placed over the newly created see of Burlington, which 
included the entire State of Vermont in its jurisdiction. 
This was a red-letter day for the Catholics of Vermont. The 
choice of Louis de Goesbriand as the first Bishop of Burlington in 
these pioneer days of religion was a most happy one. His ecclesias- 
tical training under the direction of the venerable Father Icard of 
Paris, who afterward became the Superior General of the Sulpican 
Society, and his extensive experience in missionary work in Ohio in 
his early sacerdotal career, rendered him well qualified in every way 
for the arduous duties that fell to his lot as missionary Bishop of 
Vermont; for Bishop de Goesbriand was above all a missionary Bishop. 
Filled with a spirit of zeal that recalled the days of the Apostles and 
a firm and abiding faith, endowed with a clear and sympathetic intel- 
ligence and fairly good physical constitution, although he was not 
apparently robust, he traveled up and down the State, teaching, cat- 
echizing and preaching (in season and out of season) for nearly half 
a century, during which time he guided the spiritual destinies of the 
people committed to his care, “with a fervor of mind,” as Parkman 
has said of the Jesuit martyr, Father Lalement, “that sustained him 
through exertions of which he seemed physically incapable,” and re- 
mained till his death as full of holy enthusiasm as when he came fresh 
from the unctions of the consecrating prelate. 
The zeal and energy displayed by the young Bishop, then about 
thirty-seven years old, soon infused new religious life and vigor into 
all the Catholics of the diocese. In many of the larger towns and 
villages, where formerly priestly visits, like the proverbially angelic 
ones, were few and far between, missions now grew up, parishes were 
established, and suitable church buildings were constructed and per- 
manent charges given. 
But, abundant as the harvest seemed to be even for these early 
times, the laborers were few; there was a great lack of priests. It 
was too soon to expect native vocations to replenish the ranks of the 
clergy, lo remedy this condition of affairs the new Bishop was 
obliged to make repeated trips to the Old World for recruits. In these RELIGIOUS DENOMINATIONS 
497 
journeyings he was rewarded with some success. From France, espe- 
cially from Brittany, his native province, be brought back with him 
zealous men, willing to exchange the comforts of home and country 
for a life of toil and suffering in the new missionary fields of America. 
From Ireland, too, came some few generous souls, impelled by the 
prospect of affording their expatriated brethren in the New World, 
the priceless consolations of their holy religion. 
Among this devoted band of pioneer priests who were induced 
by the new Bishop’s self-sacrificing example to share his labors for 
God and Church the names of Fathers O’Reilly, Halpin, Boylan, Lynch, 
Riordan and Druon, Clavier and Cloarec were household words in 
Catholic families for many a year, and will be ever held in reverence 
by the Catholic people of the State. 
Upon his return from his recruiting trip to Europe the Bishop 
made the children of the congregation one of his first cares. It was 
his frequent practice to gather them around him on Sunday after- 
noons in Old St. Mary’s—he was endowed with an excellent voice 
and a practical knowledge of music—and to lead them in congrega- 
tional singing. 
His love of the little ones was very marked, particularly for the 
orphans. Before the end of the year 1854 he had acquired the old 
Pearl Street House that stood at the corner of South Prospect and 
Pearl Streets, across the way from the new Medical College building, 
and converted it into a convent and school for girls. 
This building, besides, was used for many years as an orphan 
asylum until a new structure was erected for a like purpose, on North 
Avenue in 1883, and now known as St. Joseph’s Orphanage. 
To take charge of the orphans of the diocese and to conduct the 
parochial schools of the parish, Bishop de Goesbriand invited the 
Sisters of Charity of Providence from Montreal, where this commu- 
nity of the Sisterhood had then recently been instituted by Bishop 
Bourget. 
The coming of the nuns to Burlington stirred up in the bosom of 
many a young woman a desire to follow a religious vocation. Many 
a one very effectively answered the call, and they have become models 
to hundreds of self-sacrificing young women of Vermont, who have 
since, for God’s glory, devoted their lives nobly to the welfare of 
humanity in our charitable and educational institutions. 
The Sisters of Providence were superseded in the care of the 
Catholic schools of Burlington in 1874 by the Sisters of Mercy, but 
they still retained their charge of the Orphanage—a function they at 
present exercise. 
While the church at Burlington was thus being more systematic- 
ally organized, other Catholic communities caught the good inspiration, 
and the next decade saw the erection of substantial buildings at Mid- 498 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
dlebury, Brandon, East and West Rutland, Bennington, Brattleboro, 
Montpelier, St. Albans and Swanton. 
At Middlebury the Rev. John B. Daley had constructed a good 
brick church as early as 1839, a building forty by sixty feet, and the 
parish was placed in charge of Father Duglue in 1854. This edifice 
served as a place of worship for the people in this locality and its 
environs till the present fine marble church replaced it, under the 
direction of Rev. James D. Shannon. 
About the time of Bishop de Goesbriand’s coming to Burlington 
there were some fifty Catholic families at Brattleboro near old Fort 
Dummer, the second earliest white settlement in Vermont. Like Mid- 
dlebury, in Addison county, where the white man colonized earliest, 
Brattleboro was destined to have a church and Catholic mission from 
the very beginning. Father Z. Druon, who had been ordained to the 
ministry in 1853, was sent there the following year. 
He did not build a church at once, but secured an old paint shop 
on Elliott Street, refitted the building for a place of worship, and 
here for about a year held services for the few members of his flock. 
The following year, 1855, saw Rev. Charles O’Reilly in charge of this 
mission, which soon began the erection of a handsome brick church. 
Father Halpin took charge of the parish in 1869, and after his 
death Rev. N. St. Onge attended the mission till Father Henry Lane 
became pastor. Under the latter’s administration a school house and 
a rectory were purchased for the parish and the Sisters of St. Joseph, 
who had come to Rutland from Flushing, L. I., in 1873, were placed 
in charge of the school. 
Many improvements were made by Father Lane and Father Cun- 
ningham, who had replaced him, in the church property. St. Michael’s 
parish has indeed become, under these priests and their successors, 
Fathers Carmody and Rand, the present pastor (1921), one of the 
most prosperous and promising missions in the diocese. 
The Catholics of Bennington, like those at Burlington, held their 
services in the Court House for a number of years before 1850, and 
were visited from time to time by Father O’Callaghan of Burlington. 
When Father John B. Daley came to Middlebury he relieved Father 
O’Callaghan, going to Bennington at regular periods. But in 1855 
the Bishop sent Father Druon, who had been at Brattleboro, to take 
up his residence at Bennington. He built a suitable church for the 
people and attended them in spiritual matters for two years, being 
succeeded by Father Boylan of Rutland, who cared for this mission 
until 1869, when Father Jerome Cloarec was sent there as resident 
pastor. 
During the latter part of the eighties and the earlier of the nine- 
ties Rev. John S. Michaud, who afterwards became Coadjutor Bishop 
of Burlington, erected a large and handsome marble edifice as a church WALLACE W. NICHOLS 
Born in Dauby, Rutland county, Vt., March 26, 
1876. He was educated in the public schools, the 
Wallingford High School, Rutland Business College 
and had spent one year in the College of Medicine of 
the University of Vermont. He removed to Rutland 
in 1892 and was employed for several years as a clerk 
and travelling salesman. In 1902 he helped to organize 
the Rutland Power Company, serving as vice-president 
and secretary. He is a member of the clothing firm 
of Nichols and Barney, is president and treasurer of 
the Nichols-Chapman Hardware Company and is a 
director of an investment company at Oberlin, Kans. 
He is a director of the Baxter National Bank, and is 
active in the farm loan and real estate business. He is 
also president of the State Mutual Fire Insurance Com- 
pany. He has been an Alderman of the City of Rut- 
land and was a State Senator in 1920. He was city food 
administrator during a part of the World War. He 
has been active in the Baptist denomination in the 
State and in Y. M. C. A. work. He is a trustee of 
Vermont Academy. He married Anza L. Butler, 
daughter of Judge and Mrs. F. M. Butler, November 
24, 1900. RELIGIOUS DENOMINATIONS 
499 
building. His successor, Father Barron, constructed a convent and 
school and the present rector, Rev. Thos. R. Carty, increased and 
further embellished the church buildings by the purchase of a com- 
modious residence near the church for a rectory. 
At St. Albans, in August, 1864, Bishop de Goesbriand solemnly 
blessed and dedicated the then recently completed church of St. Mary’s. 
He was assisted by Rt. Rev. Bishop McFarland of Hartford, Conn., 
who delivered the sermon of the occasion, a most eloquent one, we 
are told, in the presence of a large number of clergy and an immense 
congregation. The construction of this edifice was begun many years 
before, and the work several times suspended for various reasons. 
Up to this period, from far back in 1825, the few Catholics in 
this vicinity were attended at intervals by Rev. William Ivers, Rev. 
George A. Hamilton, Rev. Henry Lennon, Rev. T. Shahan and Rev. 
E. McGowan, and the ubiquitous and untiring Father O’Callaghan 
from Burlington. The corner stone of the church was laid in August, 
1849, by Bishop McCloskey, then of Albany, N. Y., and afterwards 
Archbishop of New York City and Cardinal. Successively in charge 
of this parish, which was known as St. Mary’s, and a French parish, 
which had grown up in more recent times, were Rev. T. Riordan, Rev. 
E. Danielou and in the latter part of 1865 Rev. Z. Druon was made 
permanent rector, who was succeeded upon his demise by the late 
Rev. D. J. O’Sullivan. 
No records are found at the State’s capital to show that any 
Catholic Church was founded in Montpelier before 1850; but the 
statement historically made that about that date the Catholic congre- 
gation is the largest in the town (1850-53) would indicate that the 
place was occasionally visited by a priest and that the Catholics were 
not neglected before this time. 
In 1850 a Canadian priest, Father H. Drolet, took up his residence 
at Montpelier and ministered to all the Catholics there and in the 
surrounding towns until his return to Canada in 1854. It was this 
priest who bought the Old Court House and converted it into a church, 
which was made use of by the Oblate Fathers who succeeded him in 
1856, when Very Rev. Z. Druon, V. G., was given charge of the parish. 
During his assignment, which extended till July 15, 1864, when he 
was replaced by Father Duglue, he built a brick church here in 1859, 
which was dedicated to St. Augustine. The Catholics were ably as- 
sisted in their efforts to obtain a suitable site for their church through 
the interest of Gen. D. W. C. Clarke, who was Secretary of the State 
Senate that term. 
The General wrote to his wife on November 3, 1850: “I attended 
mass at Montpelier, Friday morning (All Saints), stealing quietly 
away from my seat in the Senate Chamber for that purpose. The 
poor Catholics looked upon me with surprise as I knelt among them, 500 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
and declined the offer of a ‘better place.’ I rather like you know to 
kneel right among the most humble, and God knows I belong there. 
Mass was celebrated in the new Church the Catholics are finishing 
off. It was formerly the Court House, within a dozen rods of the 
State House.” On November 13 of the same year he obtained the 
adoption by both branches of the Legislature of a resolution (87, 
Acts of 1850) whereby the Catholic Society was given by the State 
the use of so much land as the completion of their new church would 
require. 
Since that day the Catholic population has increased many-fold 
and hold their services in a splendid granite edifice built by Father 
William O’Sullivan. 
The Capital can boast likewise of one of the largest parish schools 
in the diocese. 
For some years the increasing duties with the administration of 
ecclesiastical affairs imposed on Bishop de Goesbriand had become 
more and more burdensome, and on April 4, 1892, Rev. John Stephen 
Michaud, ordained a priest of the diocese June 7, 1873, was named 
Coadjutor Bishop, with the right of succession. He was consecrated 
at Burlington, his native city, by Most Rev. J. J. Williams, then Arch- 
bishop of Boston. The selection of the new Bishop Coadjutor, whose 
already long and eminently successful career in the ministry gave 
fevery reason for promise, fulfilled the most sanguine expectations. 
A thoroughly versed business man, practical in the best sense of the 
word both by inclination and acquirements, the Coadjutor Bishop left 
on every one of his undertakings—and these were numerous, for he 
was closely connected with every good work in the diocese for sixteen 
years—the impress of his own thoroughness and his own sound judg- 
ment and common sense. 
On one occasion he said to me, “Do you know I was born for a 
builder.” And in truth he was, for he was never idle, but always had 
some building project in mind or in hand. The sixteen years of his 
Bishopric witnessed the greatest material prosperity in the diocese; 
and if Louis de Goesbriand merited by his tireless activity in missionary 
work the title of “the missionary bishop,” just as rightfully is John 
Stephen Michaud entitled to be called the “builder bishop” of the 
Catholic diocese of Vermont. 
Among the many noteworthy acts of administration due to the 
wisdom and foresight of Bishop Michaud was the incorporation of 
the diocese. Hitherto all church property had been deeded to the 
Rt. Rev. Bishop de Goesbriand and held in his name. By the act 
of incorporation all the titles of ecclesiastical realities, such as churches, 
schools, rectories and cemeteries were vested in a self-perpetuating 
body, composed of the Rt. Rev. Bishop and four priests, the incor- 
porators, to be known and legally recognized as the “Roman Catholic RELIGIOUS DENOMINATIONS 
501 
Diocese of Burlington, Vermont.” This act of incorporation, need- 
less to say, gave great strength and prestige to the Catholic body 
through the State, especially in financial circles. 
The articles of incorporation were signed at Burlington, March 
25, 1896, and the first meeting of the newly created corporation took 
place in that city, April 7, in the same year. The several persons 
named in the Articles of Association as corporators, to wit: Louis 
de Goesbriand, John S. Michaud, Daniel J. O’Sullivan, Norbert Proulx 
and James D. Shannon were present, and organized the meeting by 
the election of Rt. Rev. Louis de Goesbriand chairman and C. C. 
Delany clerk.* 
In recognition of his many services to his native State in the 
spiritual and material order, the University of Vermont conferred 
on Bishop Michaud the honorary degree of Doctor of Laws. 
In his premature demise (December 22, 1908) Vermont lost one 
of its foremost churchmen and one of its most progressive citizens.f 
The See of Burlington left vacant by the death of Bishop Michaud 
was filled by the consecration, April 14, 1910, of Rev. Joseph John 
Rice, D. D., a priest of the Springfield Diocese and pastor of St. 
Peter’s Church, Northbridge, Mass. 
Since the present Bishop’s incumbency continued progress and 
expansion have gone on apace in religious circles. Ecclesiastical affairs 
have been better coordinated and the educational system more fully 
organized and invigorated. The parish school, where the moral train- 
ing of the child is more adequately looked after, has attained its widest 
development in the last decade, over twenty-one parishes having their 
own schools conducted by able teachers. 
In the new Catholic High School, recently established in Burling- 
ton, the Bishop has opened the way for undreamed of possibilities in 
the realm of higher education; and in St. Michael’s College at Winooski 
Park an academic course of studies is placed at the door of every 
ambitious Catholic boy in Vermont. 
But the material and spiritual progress of the church, thus far 
seen in the larger villages and towns, reflecting the new impetus to 
religious life, radiating from Burlington, was only one phase of her 
marvelous expansion. 
Outside the “little fold” the seed, being more plenteously scattered, 
fell at times upon “good ground” and the positive doctrines and author- 
itative teachings of the Old Church made deep impressions on serious 
minds and soon “brought forth good fruit.” 
♦By-laws of the R. C. Diocese of Burlington, Vermont. 
tA more extensive notice of Bishop Michaud’s life and works may be 
found in The Vermonter of November and December, 1908, page 343. 502 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
The first notable person to catch the rays of the “kindly light” 
Dr. Newman wrote of when catching its genial glimmer himself was 
Fanny, the youngest daughter of the great hero and leader of the 
Green Mountain Boys, Gen. Ethan Allen. 
Fanny Allen was one of General Allen’s three children by his 
second wife, Fanny (erroneously called Lydia) Buchanan, whom he 
married at Sunderland or Westminster, and when she had grown to 
womanhood she entered the Convent of the Hotel Dieu at Montreal 
and died there after a saintly career. The Fanny Allen Hospital at 
Winooski Park, in sight of her father’s monument in Green Mount 
Cemetery, was named after her by the late Bishop Michaud, who 
founded the institution and placed it in charge of the Sisterhood of 
which she was a devoted member, as a fitting monument of her faith 
and charity. 
Another noteworthy convert to Catholicity, a name of national 
fame, was that of Orestes A. Brownson, who was born in 1803 and 
entered the Church, after many spiritual wanderings, in 1844. A great 
thinker and a great writer, he is said to have been one of the brightest 
lights America has produced. A suitable monument to his memory 
has been erected by the Knights of Columbus at Stockbridge, his birth 
place. 
Rt. Rev. Bishop Wadhams, the first incumbent in the See of 
Ogdensburg, N. Y., was a Vermonter and a convert to the Catholic 
Church. 
Miss Abbie M. Hemenway, one of Vermont’s noted historians, 
who was born in Ludlow, also became a member of the Church. 
Between 1855 and 1860 the Misses Barlow of Fairfield, Debbie, 
Helen and Anna, became members of the Catholic communion; but 
perhaps the most remarkable accretion was that of the Rev. William 
Henry Hoyt, who was for some years pastor of the Episcopal Church 
at St. Albans and afterwards became editor of the Burlington Sentinel, 
one of Vermont’s oldest newspapers. Upon the reception of Father 
Hoyt into the Church (he became a priest after the death of his wife) 
all his family followed his example, as well as his sister-in-law, the 
wife of Captain Tucker of Burlington, and her children. 
Mention has been made of these few converts to the Catholic 
Faith, and there were many others, to show the powerful influence 
of the Catholic teachings even outside her own communion. 
Mr. Hoyt embraced the Catholic faith in July, 1846, and his 
step was followed by several other well-known non-Catholics, all in 
that section of the State. 
Among the most prominent were G. G. Smith and his family, 
Hon. L. B. Hunt with his first wife and at a later period his second 
wife with her daughter, B. H. Smalley, Esq., a well-known lawyer 
of Franklin county, with his sister, Miss Laura B. Smalley, and his RELIGIOUS DENOMINATIONS 
503 
whole family, as well as his mother-in-law, Mrs. Cynthia Penniman, 
widow of the later Dr. Jabez Penniman of Colchester. 
In recent times two of Vermont’s most distinguished sons have 
embraced the Catholic religion, Judge Wendell P. Stafford, formerly 
of St. Johnsbury, now Judge of the Supreme Court of the District 
of Columbia, and Dr. Julius Hayden Woodward, a native of Castleton, 
formerly professor in the Vermont Medical School and later head 
of the eye department of the Post-Graduate School of New York City. 
Within the fold there were not wanting, even in these infant days 
of the Church, promising young minds who were afterwards to become 
men on national note and of world-wide repute. Among such may 
be recalled the name of the late Most Rev. John Ireland, Archbishop 
of St. Paul, Minn., who spent his early boyhood days in Burlington. 
On North Prospect Street in that city can be pointed out to the visitor 
the site of the family home of this illustrious churchman. 
A no less distinguished name is that of Most Rev. Alexander 
Christie, a native of the northern part of the State, who still occupies 
the arch-episcopal see of Oregon City. 
The Catholics of Vermont, animated with that zeal which their 
Church has ever manifested in every age and in every clime, to fulfill 
the divine mission of teacher and guide, committed to her care, early 
began the establishment of schools. 
In doing so they had no apology to make their fellow citizens; 
they were not antagonistic to the public schools already maintained 
by the State, in which no religious instruction could be imparted, but 
they realized this deficiency and, while courageously bearing their pro- 
portionate share of taxation for the support of the public schools, 
generously contributed to the building and the upkeep of their private 
or parochial schools, where their children might receive all the ad- 
vantages of a secular training, and at the same time be not deprived 
of the rich spiritual legacy handed down to them by their fathers, 
which their Church has ever regarded as the only true basis and founda- 
tion of Christian morality. 
How few adequately appreciate the enormous economy to the 
State and the great relief from extra taxation to the taxpayers in gen- 
eral afforded by the parish school system. It is difficult indeed to 
form a just estimate. 
In a small town on the Connecticut River the annual expenditure 
for the schools in 1920 was little less than $95,000 and the average 
attendance at school about 850 pupils, making a cost of nearly $112 
per pupil. If such a basis of computation may be assumed, one can 
glean what an extra weight of taxation would be immediately thrown 
upon the taxpayers, in addition to the ponderous burden they already 
bear, were the 7,750 children, now under Catholic tuition in the twenty- 
one parochial schools (1920), to be provided for from public funds, 504 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
in the event of the suspension of the parochial schools—an amount 
something like $868,000 annually, not to mention the cost of building 
and equipping new schools to replace the present parochial schools. 
Before the Bishop’s arrival in Burlington, in 1853, the parochial 
schools were in the hands of laymen. But soon they were placed in 
charge of the religious of the various orders, the Sisters of Mercy 
having their supervision till the present day at Burlington. St. Pat- 
rick’s Academy was built on the site of the old McWilliams’ place on 
St. Paul Street and served as a convent and home for the sisterhood 
till the erection of Mt. St. Mary Academy on Mansfield Avenue. 
Under the late Bishop Michaud’s administration, St. Michael’s 
College, conducted by the Fathers of St. Edmund, was established 
at Winooski Park, and the Cathedral schools replaced the old St. 
Mary’s school at Burlington. The present Bishop, Rt. Rev. Joseph 
John Rice, has largely widened the field of Catholic educational en- 
deavor in the entire State, particularly by the encouragement he has 
afforded pastors in the establishment of new schools in their parishes 
and by the strong incentive given to Catholic parents, to fit their 
children for higher courses of education, in his recent erection in 
Burlington of an attractive and substantial edifice, the Cathedral High 
School building, which is reckoned as second to none of its kind in 
the State. 
Outside of Burlington, where there are two young ladies’ acad- 
emies, St. Joseph’s and Mt. St. Mary, in charge of the sisterhood. 
Catholic education has made marvelous advances in the last half 
century. 
Besides the parochial schools, academies and boarding schools 
for young women have been organized in the larger places, such as 
the “Villa Barlow” at St. Albans, St. Joseph’s at Rutland, and St. 
Francis de Sales at Bennington, St. Peter’s at Winooski, St. Michael’s 
at the capital, and St. Louis’ at St. Johnsbury. 
Nor has the Church, in her solicitude for the intellectual advance- 
ment and moral welfare of her members, lost sight of her obligations 
to charity. For the sick she has two hospitals to her credit, one at 
Winooski Park in charge of the Sisters of the Hotel Dieu, another at 
St. Johnsbury under the direction of the Sisters of Providence, and 
still another, the Bishop de Goesbriand Hospital, now (1922) under 
construction in the city of Burlington. Two homes for the aged, 
one at Burlington, the other at Rutland, attest her thoughtfulness 
for the old people, and the little ones, prematurely bereft of their 
natural protectors, find a safe home with the kind Sisters of Prov- 
idence in St. Joseph’s Orphanage at Burlington. Here two hun- 
dred and forty orphans find a foster-home. Allowing $4.00 per 
week for each orphan (the sum which the State Board of Charity 
allows to foster-parents who care for orphans) this means an annual Born in St. Albans, October 19, 1877. He was edu- 
cated in St. Albans High School and Middlebury Col- 
lege, graduating from the latter institution in 1903. 
His occupation is that of a farmer and he has suc- 
cessfully practiced modern agricultural methods. He 
has served as State Commissioner of Agriculture since 
1913 and is well known throughout agricultural circles 
in the United States. The University of Vermont 
bestowed upon him the honorary degree of Master of 
Science. 
ELBERT S. BRIGHAM RELIGIOUS DENOMINATIONS 
505 
saving of $49,920.00 to the State. Add to this the sum it would 
cost the State to supervise the placing out and caring for these children, 
one realizes the enormous savings to the State through St. Joseph’s 
Orphan Asylum. 
In fine, the organization that practically came into being ninety 
years ago with two priests, a few irregular assistants, no churches and 
a handful of scattered Catholics through the State, now (1921) has 
to its credit a Bishop and over one hundred priests, ninety churches 
and a Catholic population of nearly 100,000. 
While the foregoing brief sketch of Catholic activities in the Green 
Mountain State traces in part the beneficent results flowing from 
the Church’s influence exercised for good in a little more than three- 
quarters of a century, and is indeed creditable to those whose disin- 
terested efforts were instrumental in achieving so much in so short 
a space of time, it points out, likewise, the way to greater projects 
which remain yet to be undertaken and realized in the future, and 
calls for that same spirit of self-sacrifice and generosity, so evident 
in years gone by, if the Church shall attain her full measure of use- 
fulness. THE BAPTIST CHURCH 
THE first Baptist Church in Vermont was organized at Shafts- 
bury in August, 1768. It is related that Samuel Robinson, the 
most influential member of the Bennington settlement, was 
accustomed to inquire the denominational preferences of would-be 
purchasers of land. Congregationalists were settled in Bennington, 
Episcopalians were directed to Arlington, while it was recommended 
that Baptists seek homes in Shaftsbury or Pownal. No pastor was 
settled for several years, but it is related that two of the members 
had “ministerial gifts.” The first Baptist pastor was John Millington, 
who was ordained November 23, 1782. A church was organized at 
Pownal in 1772, but its activities were discontinued for several years. 
The church at Wallingford, organized February 10, 1780, is said to 
be the oldest Baptist Church in the State now (1921) in existence. In 
1780 a second Baptist Church was established in Shaftsbury. A 
third in 1782 and a fourth in 1783. Later there was a union of 
churches. The Shaftsbury Association was formed in 1780, con- 
sisting of the two Shaftsbury churches and the Baptist organizations 
in Cheshire, Mass., and White Creek and Stillwater, N. Y. In 1801 
the Shaftsbury Association commended to the churches a proposition 
to raise funds “for the purpose of sending missionaries to preach the 
Gospel in destitute parts of our frontier settlements.” Itinerant min- 
isters were sent into Vermont from Maine and Massachusetts. 
Delegates from the Baptist churches in Clarendon, Danby, Man- 
chester, Granville, N. Y., and Middleton, N. Y., with four pastors 
met in Elder Joseph Cornell’s barn in Manchester, in May, 1785, and 
organized the Vermont Association. In 1791 there were fifteen 
churches and four hundred and four members in the Association, 
which included a region extending from Manchester to Georgia. In 
1817, eight hundred and sixty-six persons were received by baptism 
and one hundred and seven by letter. Ten years later most of the 
churches of the Vermont Association were north of Manchester and 
in 1818 another meeting was held in Elder Cornell’s barn and the 
Manchester Association was formed. It included Arlington, Man- 
chester, Dorset, Rupert, Londonderry, Winhall and Hebron, N. Y. 
A little later Pawlet and Wallingford joined. 
The Addison County Association was formed November 13, 1833, 
at Whiting, and included Addison, Bridport, Bristol, Ferrisburg, Mid- 
dlebury, Monkton, Panton, Weybridge and Whiting. 
The first Baptist Church in the eastern part of the State was 
organized at Guilford, in 1780, with Richard Williams as its pastor. 
A second church was organized in Guilford in 1781, a third in 1782 
and a fourth in 1797. The second and third churches were united RELIGIOUS DENOMINATIONS 
507 
in 1800. The First Baptist Church in Woodstock was organized in 
1780 and the Second in 1785. Other churches in this part of the 
State were organized as follows: West Dummerston, 1782; Halifax, 
1793; Westminster West, probably about 1782; Brookline, probably 
in 1785; Windsor, 1785. Aaron Leland, an apostolic preacher, came 
to Chester in 1786 and organized a church in 1789. He visited neigh- 
boring towns and organized churches. Four churches were set off 
from the parent church in Chester. Mr. Leland became a prominent 
man in State affairs and was Lieutenant-Governor of Vermont, 1822- 
24. The Windham County Association was originally organized as 
the Leyden Association in 1793. In 1796 it contained fourteen 
churches. The Vermont members were the First, Second and Fourth 
Guilford churches and societies in Dummerston, Halifax, Marlboro, 
Newfane, Putney and Somerset. Newfane appointed a missionary 
committee as early as 1806. The Woodstock Association was organ- 
ized in 1783 and in 1791 contained thirty-one churches and 1,598 
members. Aaron Leland was moderator for twenty-six years. The 
Barre Association, later known as the Vermont Central Association, 
was formed in 1807, and the Danville Association in 1809. The Asso- 
ciation included three Vermont and two New Hampshire churches. 
Some Canadian churches joined later. The Danville church was or- 
ganized in 1792 and the Hardwick church in 1795. In 1842 the Dan- 
ville Association contained twenty-one churches and 1,127 members. 
Other early churches were established as follows: Fairfax, 1792; 
Georgia, 1793 ; Bolton, 1794; Waterbury, 1800. The first minister 
ordained in the northwestern part of the State was Elisha Andrews, 
at Fairfax, in 1793. The ceremony was conducted on a flat rock 
beside a log cabin in the wilderness. 
The Richmond Association was formed probably in 1795 or 1796, 
and included a few Canadian churches. When the War of 1812 began 
relations with these churches were suspended. In 1812 the Fairfield 
Association was organized. In 1834 there was a division along the 
line of the Lamoille River. The southern portion became the Onion 
River Association, while the northern part retained the name of Fair- 
field Association. The two were united in 1844 as the Lamoille Asso- 
ciation and included twenty-seven churches. The Vermont Baptist 
State Convention was organized at Brandon, October 26, 1824. Its 
president was Rev. Ezra Butler of Waterbury, later Governor of 
Vermont. Home missionaries were employed, one of them being Rev. 
William Arthur, father of Chester A. Arthur, the only President of 
the United States born in Vermont. In 1886, Rev. Alexander Mc- 
George was appointed State missionary and held the office until 1895. 
Rev. Thomas Cull held the office from 1896 to 1900 and Rev. W. A. 
Davison, D. D., has held it since 1900. 508 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
In 1853 the New Hampton Literary and Theological Institution 
was transferred from New Hampton, N. Y., to Fairfax, Vt., and 
flourished for a few years, several theological students being graduated, 
but lack of financial support crippled the school and it ceased to be 
a denominational institution. Other educational institutions established 
under Baptist auspices are the Vermont Literary and Scientific Insti- 
tution at Brandon in 1833; Black River Academy at Ludlow in 1834; 
Leland English and Classical School, named for Rev. Aaron Leland, 
at Townshend in 1835; the Derby Literary and Theological Institute 
at Derby in 1840; Vermont Academy at Saxtons River in 1873. The 
last named school was closed for several years, but was reopened in 
1921. 
The records of the State Convention of 1920 showed seventy-one 
ministers in active service with Vermont churches, three in special 
service and thirteen ministers not in active service. The treasurer 
reported invested funds and cash on hand amounting to $378,346.70. 
Three Baptist clergymen were elected to high offices—Ezra Butler, 
Governor; Aaron Leland, Lieutenant-Governor; Alvah Sabin, Con- 
gressman. Among the prominent laymen were Gov. Ryland Fletcher, 
Gov. Levi K. Fuller, Gov. Wm. W. Stickney, Jacob Estey, founder 
of the Estey Organ Works, and Lawrence Barnes, a well-known lum- 
ber dealer. 
The first Free Will Baptist Church was organized at Strafford, 
in 1793, with nine members. Another was organized at Corinth in 
1798. Twenty churches were organized between 1800 and 1810; 
eleven between 1810 and 1820; and sixteen between 1820 and 1830. 
Quarterly meetings were organized in Strafford, Wheelock, Hunting- 
ton, Dover, Enosburg, Rutland and Corinth. In 1892 there were in 
Vermont forty-nine churches, fifty-three ministers and 2,445 mem- 
bers. In 1911 there were twenty-seven churches, eighteen ministers 
and 1,079 members. THE METHODIST EPISCOPAL CHURCH 
THE religious movement out of which grew the Methodist Epis- 
copal Church began in England under the leadership of John 
Wesley in 1739. It was transferred to America before the 
Revolution by Philip Embury, a local preacher, and others. Societies 
were organized by him in Washington county, N. Y., near the Ver- 
mont border, and Methodism gradually extended into southwestern 
Vermont. Methodist preaching in this State was begun as early as 
1788, through the Cambridge (N. Y.) circuit, Rev. Freeborn Garrett- 
son, an efficient evangelist, being the presiding elder. Vermont towns 
included in New York and Massachusetts circuits before the year 
1800 were Arlington, Castleton, Clarendon, Danby, Fair Haven, Pow- 
nal, Wells and Whitingham. 
Methodism was introduced into eastern Vermont in 1796 at Ver- 
shire, Rev. Nicholas Snethen, afterward a Chaplain in Congress, being 
the preacher appointed. Mrs. Margaret Pecket, formerly a member 
of Mr. Wesley’s household, had settled in Bradford and Mr. Snethen 
preached in her house in 1797. Rev. Jesse Lee, the pioneer of Meth- 
odism in New England, was the presiding elder who had charge of 
the work in eastern Vermont. The first pastoral appointments in 
western Vermont were Joseph Mitchell and Abner Wood, assigned as 
circuit preachers, with headquarters at Vergennes. In 1799, Lorenzo 
Dow, a celebrated itinerant preacher, was assigned to the Essex circuit. 
The number of Methodists in Vermont at the close of the year 1800 
was 1,044. There were four circuits with six preachers in the eastern 
part of Vermont, and three circuits with five preachers in the western 
portion of the State. 
The Troy Conference was organized in 1832, and was divided into 
two districts, one of which was the Middlebury district, with Rev. 
T. Spicer as presiding elder. It included the Vermont towns of Brid- 
port, Castleton, Charlotte, Leicester, Middlebury, Monkton, Pittsford, 
Poultney and Wallingford. The other division, known as the Platts- 
burg district, included the Vermont towns of Burlington, Essex, Fair- 
field, Grand Isle, Highgate, Milton, St. Albans, Sheldon and Stowe. 
The New Hampshire and Vermont Conference was organized 
in 1829. The Vermont territory included the Danville and the Ver- 
mont districts. The name was changed to the New Hampshire Con- 
ference in 1832. The Vermont Conference was organized in 1845, 
the first session being held at Rochester, Bishop Edmund Janes pre- 
siding. He presided over this Conference on six subsequent occasions, 
the last time being in 1873. The first Conference reported 9,335 mem- 
bers and sixty-two charges, or parishes. The Conference was divided 
into the Danville and Springfield districts. 
One of the most famous of the early Methodist leaders was Elijah 
Hedding, who entered the ministry from Starksboro. He preached 510 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
on the Fletcher, Barre and Vershire circuits, was presiding elder sev- 
eral terms in New England, preached in several important Boston 
churches, and was elected Bishop in 1824. In 1801, Martin Ruter 
entered the ministry from Bradford. He was promoted rapidly and 
was elected Book Agent at Cincinnati, Ohio, in 1820, being the founder 
of the business at that place. Later he was president of Augusta 
College, Kentucky, and Allegheny College, Pennsylvania. 
Wilbur Fisk, born in Brattleboro, August 31, 1792, entered the 
University of Vermont in 1812, but left college when the buildings 
were occupied as barracks by the United States Army. He graduated 
from Brown University and entered the ministry in 1818. He was 
presiding elder of the Vermont district from 1823 to 1826; principal 
of Wilbraham Academy for five years; and founder and first presi- 
dent of Wesleyan University. He was elected Bishop in 1836, but 
declined the office. Stephen Olin, born in Leicester, March 2, 1797, 
and a graduate of Middlebury College, was one of the famous preachers 
of his time. He became president of Wesleyan University in 1842. 
Edwin W. Parker, afterward a Bishop, entered the Vermont Confer- 
ence in 1857. 
In 1830 there were thirty-five pastors and the church membership 
had increased to more than ten thousand. Thompson’s “Vermont” 
is authority for the statement that in 1841 there were in this State 
one hundred and twenty-eight traveling ministers, one hundred and 
twelve local preachers and 16,039 members. 
The first church building erected by Methodists in this State was 
at Danby and was occupied as early as 1793. The first church edifice 
built in eastern Vermont was erected at Barre in 1801. 
The first Methodist school established in this State was Newbury 
Seminary, founded at Newbury in 1834, with Rev. Charles Adams 
as principal. What is said to have been the first theological class in 
American Methodism was formed at Newbury Seminary in 1844 by 
the principal, Rev. Osman C. Baker, afterward a Bishop. This de- 
partment, known as the Wesleyan Institute Association, was supported 
by the annual conferences of the six New England States. In 1847 
the department was removed to Concord, N. H., and was known as 
the Concord Biblical Institute. Later it became a part of Boston 
University. In 1868 the school at Newbury Seminary was transferred 
to Montpelier and was named the Vermont Conference Seminary and 
Female College, its first principal being Rev. Simeon F. Chester. The 
student attendance during the first year was one hundred and sixty. 
A Methodist school established at Springfield in 1847, and named 
the Springfield Wesleyan Seminary, after twenty years of existence 
was united with the Vermont Conference Seminary at Montpelier. 
Rev. John W. Hatch, D. D., is now (1921) the principal. HORACE M. FARNHAM 
Born in Williamstown, Vt., May 14, 1868. He at- 
tended the public schools of Williamstown and 
Montpelier Seminary and taught ten years in the dis- 
trict schools of Williamstown, Washington and East 
Barre and one year in Illinois. For eight years 
he was Superintendent of Schools in Williamstown. 
In 1899 he moved to East Montpelier, where he was 
engaged in farming and dealing in Western draft horses 
until 1911, since which time he has lived in Montpelier, 
where he has devoted his time more fully to buying 
and selling horses and cattle. Mr. Farnham is a Re- 
publican. He represented the city of Montpelier in 
1915-1916, serving on the Ways and Means and the 
Railroad committees, and was president of the Farmers’ 
Club. He was State Senator from Washington county 
in 1921-22, serving on the Committee on Highways and 
Bridges, Fish and Game Committee, and was chairman 
of the Municipal Corporations Committee. While liv- 
ing in East Montpelier he was an active member of the 
East Montpelier Grange, serving as its first master, 
was instrumental in organizing the Winooski Valley 
Pomona Grange, and was its master for several years. 
Mr. Farnham is a member of the Board of Trustees of 
Montpelier Seminary and a member of several frater- 
nal organizations and clubs. He is a member of Trin- 
ity Methodist Episcopal Church, being for many years 
one of its trustees. He married I.enora Rachel Ste- 
vens of East Montpelier, daughter of Thomas Byrd 
and Jane (Bliss) Stevens, January 22, 1896. They have 
two sons, Stanley Horace and Hector Stevens, both of 
whom are associated with their father in business. RELIGIOUS DENOMINATIONS 
511 
Troy Conference Academy at Poultney was chartered in 1834 and 
was opened for instruction in 1836. One of the principals of the 
academy was Rev. Jesse T. Peck, afterward elected a Bishop. 
The official journal of the Vermont Conference held in 1920 
showed ninety-two ministers, one hundred and thirteen pastoral 
charges, 11,943 lay members and 881 probationers. The value of 
church property was estimated at $236,700. The Board of Conference 
Trustees reported $19,821 in permanent funds. The Preachers’ Aid 
Society held a fund of $49,696.51. The Conference is divided into 
the St. Albans and the St. Johnsbury districts. The Burlington dis- 
trict, which includes that part of the State west of the Green Moun- 
tains, extending southward from and including Winooski, is a part of 
the Troy (N. Y.) Conference. 
Conference sessions have been held as follows: June 18, 1845, 
Rochester; June 10, 1846, Springfield; June 9, 1847, Irasburg; July 
5, 1848, Barre; June 20, 1849, Peacham; June 12, 1850, Bradford; 
June 18, 1851, Woodstock; June 27, 1852, Northfield; June 2, 1853, 
St. Johnsbury Center; June 1, 1854, Putney; May 23, 1853, Plain- 
field; June 27, 1856, Newbury; May 6, 1857, Brattleboro; May 13, 
1858, Montpelier; May 4, 1859, Barton; April 19, 1860, Springfield; 
April 17, 1861, Barre; April 16, 1862, Northfield; April 15, 1863, 
St. Albans; April 13, 1864, St. Johnsbury; April 17, 1867, Newbury; 
April 9, 1868, Swanton; April 15, 1869, Waterbury; April 21, 1870, 
Springfield; April 20, 1871, Northfield; April 8, 1872, Chelsea; April 
23, 1873, Richford; April 22, 1874, Danville; April 28, 1875, Bel- 
lows Falls; April 19, 1876, St. Johnsbury; April 26, 1877, Barre; 
May 1, 1878, Woodstock; May 1, 1879, Swanton; April 14, 1880, 
Barton Landing; April 20, 1881, Bradford; April 26, 1882, Ludlow; 
April 25, 1883, St. Albans; April 16, 1884, Montpelier; April 30, 
1885, Bellows Falls; April 29, 1886, Chelsea; April 21, 1887, St. 
Johnsbury; April 11, 1888, West Randolph; April 18, 1889, Morris- 
ville; April 17, 1890, Brattleboro; April 23, 1891, Northfield; April 
13, 1892, Montpelier; April 19, 1893, Barton; April 18, 1894, Brad- 
ford; April 10, 1895, Waterbury; April 8, 1896, Barre; April 22, 
1897, Barre; April 21, 1898, Springfield; April 19, 1899, Newport; 
April 11, 1900, Bellows Falls; April 17, 1901, Lyndonville; April 
9, 1902, St. Albans; April 9, 1903, Northfield; March 30, 1904, Mont- 
pelier; April 19, 1905, Enosburg Falls; April 18, 1906, Morrisville; 
April 17, 1907, St. Johnsbury; April 15, 1908, Barre; April 13, 1909, 
Hardwick; April 13, 1910, Island Pond; April 12, 1911, Waterbury; 
April 10, 1912, Newport; April 9, 1913, Richford; April 22, 1914, 
Hardwick; April 21, 1915, Brattleboro; March 29, 1916, Montpelier; 
April 18, 1917, Newport; April 24, 1918, St. Johnsbury; April 2, 
1919, St. Albans; April 21, 1920, *Springfield; April 27, 1921, Barre. 
*The author is indebted to Rev. L. O. Sherburne for many of the facts 
in the above article. 'THE UNITARIAN CHURCH 
EARLY in the nineteenth century an element of the Congregational 
Church, known sometimes as the “liberal party,” broke away 
from the Calvinistic portion and formed the Unitarian Church. 
Organized Unitarianism in Vermont began in 1810, when there was a 
division in the Congregational Church at Burlington. A large church 
edifice was built in 1816, the first pastor being Rev. Samuel Clark. 
For many years the pastor of this church was Rev. L. G. Ware, a 
scholarly and cultured man, greatly beloved by the people irrespective 
of creed. The Unitarian Church in Brattleboro was organized April 
8, 1831, the first pastor being Rev. Addison Brown. The Windsor 
church was organized in 1836. In 1864 the Church of the Messiah 
was organized at Montpelier by Rev. Charles A. Allen. He was suc- 
ceeded by Rev. J. Edward Wright, who ministered to this church for 
forty years. He was one of the prominent clergymen of the denomina- 
tion in New England, a man who stood for all the fine and noble 
things of life. There have been Unitarian churches at Middlesex, 
Stowe and Warren. THE UNIVERSALIST CHURCH IN VERMONT 
Rev. George F. Fortier 
UNIVERSALISM as a distinct sect was established in America 
on September 30, 1770, when John Murray, an English preacher, 
delivered his first sermon at Good Luck, N. J., in a church 
which had been built by one Thomas Potter in anticipation of some 
day finding a preacher who should stand upon the faith in which 
Potter believed. 
The first organized Universalist Church was established at Glouces- 
ter, Mass., in 1774. 
Universalism in Vermont developed in almost exact coincidence 
with the history of the State, the first known preaching of Univer- 
salism being in the year 1777 in the northern portion of the State. 
Universalism seems to have developed in the State from four well- 
defined sources. First, in northern Vermont there appears to have 
arisen a spontaneous outburst of faith in what was termed “the doc- 
trine of God’s universal love,” which resulted in the splitting of various 
“town churches” into adherents and opponents of this new doctrine 
and the dividing up of the preaching rights of the local churches 
according to the proportionate strength of the contending parties. 
Secondly, into the southern section of the State, probably first at 
Cavendish, there came settlers from Massachusetts who brought with 
them the new doctrine which Murray was preaching at Gloucester. 
Thirdly, into the Champlain valley, first appearing at Shoreham, there 
came through new arrivals among the settlers a following of Rellyism, 
brought direct from England. Fourthly, from the town of Richmond, 
N. H., there came into Vermont a young country lad, Elosea Ballou, 
who established himself at Barnard, Vt., and gathered around himself 
not only a congregation, but the first theological school of the new 
faith, in the disciples whom he taught in his own study. This latter 
movement, while the latest of the four, resulted in the first real or- 
ganization of the new faith in Vermont and the Universalist parish 
at Barnard was the first Universalist Church to be firmly established 
in Vermont, in 1794. 
The Universalist denomination was without organization in the 
earlier years of its existence, each preacher and each church acting 
independently. In 1804 the Northern Association of Universalists 
was organized by the ministers of the State and immediately took over 
the ecclesiastical control of the State. Gradually four other associa- 
tions were organized, the Green Mountain in 1829, the Champlain in 
1830, the Windham and Bennington in 1834, and the Central in 1848. 
These organizations, however, yielded their ecclesiastical authority in 
1833, when the Universalist Convention of Vermont and Province 514 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
of Quebec was organized, all of the associations with the exception 
of the Champlain continuing to exist however. 
The Universalist Convention of Vermont and Province of Quebec 
has been the business and ecclesiastical organization of the denomina- 
tion since 1833. It is a representative body composed of the ordained 
clergymen in fellowship and delegates from each parish. It is in 
authority over the parishes and in its turn yields to the authority of 
the Universalist General Convention. 
The history of the Universalist denomination in Vermont has 
been a proud one. It has founded, in the earlier days, schools of the 
academy class at Glover, at South Woodstock and at West Brattleboro. 
In the changing of school systems all of these have been discontinued. 
It established Goddard Seminary in 1863 at Barre. Norwich Uni- 
versity was established at Norwich by Captain Alden Partridge under 
the patronage of the Universalist denomination. The denomination 
in Vermont was also prominent in the founding of Tufts College and 
the original plan was to establish the college at Brattleboro. The first 
Universalist newspaper, the Christian Repository, was established by 
Rev. Eli Ballou at Montpelier in 1831 and continued until 1870, when 
it was merged with The Universalist and published at Boston. At 
the Perkins Liberal Green Mountain Institute at South Woodstock 
there gathered a notable company of denominational writers headed 
by Rev. John S. Lee, D. D., and by Caroline Sawyer, which did valiant 
work in the controversial period. 
As a producer of clergymen of the faith, the denomination in 
Vermont has ever been very prolific. Rev. Hosea Ballou wrote at 
Barnard his Treatise on the Atonement which established the theo- 
logical position of the denomination. Rev. Eli Ballou at Montpelier 
was for many years the literary authority of the denomination. The 
famous Skinner family of Cavendish for generation after generation 
sent able men into the ministry of the church. When Tufts College 
was established practically the entire faculty of the theological school 
was taken from men who had been trained for their work in Vermont. 
As a leader of reforms, the denomination has always taken a 
foremost place. At its first convention the denomination espoused 
the temperance cause and as Vermont was the first to declare in favor 
of the abolition of slavery, so the Vermont Universalist Convention 
was the first in the denomination to declare for this reform. It early 
championed the cause of woman suffrage and was the first to ordain 
women to the Christian ministry. 
The Universalist denomination in 1921 had fifty-four church 
organizations and thirty-eight settled clergymen. It had per- 
manent and trust funds amounting to $45,000. The Universalist Con- 
vention of Vermont and the Province of Quebec was incorporated 
under the laws of Vermont in 1888. Its present officers (1921) are: RELIGIOUS DENOMINATIONS 
515 
George C. Felch, St. Johnsbury, president; F. R. Vaughan, Brattle- 
boro, vice-president; George F. Fortier, Morrisville, secretary and 
superintendent; R. L. Richmond, Rutland, treasurer; S. S. Watson, 
St. Albans, S. C. Greene, St. Albans, and E. E. Paul, Wells, Trustees. OTHER DENOMINATIONS 
THE first settlement of Jews in Vermont was made in 1873 and 
a Hebrew congregation was established in Burlington, May 25, 
1875. Burlington is the center of Hebrew activities in the 
State. 
The first Seventh Day Adventist churches in Vermont were or- 
ganized at Sutton and Wolcott about 1845. The Vermont Conference 
held its first session at Wolcott in October, 1862. 
Several churches of the Advent Christian denomination have been 
established in Vermont. In 1903 there were twenty-one churches 
in the State, with a membership of about one thousand. 
A denomination known as the Christian Church organized its 
first Vermont parish at Lyndon in 1801. In 1842 there were between 
thirty and forty of these churches in this State. In 1836 the Vermont 
Conference of the Christian Connection and the Presbytery of Chris- 
tian Brethren united as the Vermont Christian Conference. In 1840 
the Vermont Eastern and Western Conferences were organized. In 
1893 the few churches of the denomination were united in one con- 
ference. In 1903 there were six churches of the denomination in the 
State. The number has been reduced since that time. 
There are a few Presbyterian churches in Vermont, some of 
them founded by early Scotch emigrants who settled in Caledonia 
county. In the slate district of Rutland county are Welsh Presby- 
terian and Welsh Congregational churches. Two or three Swedish 
Lutheran churches have been established. There are about twelve 
Christian Science congregations in Vermont (1921). There are some 
members of the Spiritualist faith in the State. In the early history 
of Vermont there were several Quaker congregations in Rutland and 
Addison counties and some members of that faith in the southern 
part of Chittenden county. The Salvation Army is organized in some 
of the cities of the State. 
Joseph Smith, the founder of the Mormon Church, was born in 
Sharon, and a monument thirty-eight and a half feet high has been 
erected to mark his birthplace. At the time it was erected it was 
said to be the largest polished granite monolith in America. Brigham 
Young, the Mormon leader, was born in Whitingham, Vt. THE FIRST SUNDAY SCHOOLS 
THE first Sunday School Convention in New England was held 
at Greensboro, June 25, 1817, in Squire Ashbel Hale’s barn. 
Nearly all the clergymen in that part of the State were present, 
some driving nearly fifty miles to attend the gathering. The hundredth 
anniversary of this convention was held at Greensboro and six gen- 
eral secretaries of the New England State Sunday School Associations 
participated. Probably the beginning of Sunday Schools in Vermont 
was made by Deacon Ashbel Washburn of Greensboro in 1808. He 
taught his own family on Sunday evenings and permission being 
granted to other children of the neighborhood, the class grew until 
it was necessary to hold it in the school house. In 1812, Rev. Samuel 
Goddard organized a Sunday School in his church at Concord, Vt. 
Later he established a training class for Sunday School teachers and 
this developed into what has been called the first normal school in the 
United States, having been enlarged to include the training of public 
school teachers. EDUCATION* 
ONE of the first requirements of the Vermont pioneers, after 
lands had been cleared and shelters had been constructed, was 
the common school. It is known that a lot was sequestered for 
school purposes in Guilford as early as 1761, and Hiland Hall is 
authority for the statement that in 1765 schools had been established 
in Bennington. In 1763 Bennington had voted money for three schools. 
In February, 1773, Chester voted to build a schoolhouse 22 by 18 feet 
in size and to raise thirteen pounds in York currency for that purpose. 
Hartford, in 1775, elected a committee to care for and rent school 
lands. In 1778 Pomfret voted to raise eight pounds for school pur- 
poses, the tax to be paid in grain, the rate per bushel being, wheat, six 
shillings; rye, four shillings; Indian corn, three shillings. Clarendon 
and Wells were divided into school districts in 1779. Vermont’s first 
Constitution, adopted in 1777, declared that “a school or schools shall 
be established in each town by the Legislature for the convenient 
instruction of youths,” and further asserted that “one grammar school 
in each county and one university in this State ought to be established 
by direction of the General Assembly.” 
The first general school law was passed by the Legislature in 1782. 
Provision was made for the election of school trustees, raising money 
and dividing towns into districts. Judges of County Courts were 
given power to appoint trustees of county schools. These provisions, 
however, were permissive, rather than mandatory. 
The town of Shaftsbury, in 1787, voted that none of the public 
money should be used for the maintenance of a school taught by a 
woman, and that no school money could be drawn for a pupil under 
the age of four years. 
Vermont’s first secondary school was Clio Hall, at Bennington, 
incorporated November 3, 1780. 
Educational conventions were held in Vermont as early as the 
winter of 1830-31, and a State Teachers’ Convention was held at 
Montpelier in 1836. In 1845 the Vermont Society for the Improve- 
ment of the Common School was organized, and in the same year the 
office of State Superintendent of Schools was created, Horace Eaton 
being the first incumbent. Teachers’ institutes were held first in 1846. 
About this time the School Journal and Vermont Agriculturist was 
established. In 1850 a State Teachers’ Association was formed. 
*Considerable material dealing with the subject of this and other special 
chapters has been embodied in the narrative portion of this History. For 
this reason the special topics in some instances are not treated as fully as 
they would be if various phases had not been considered elsewhere. HENRY AUGUSTUS WILLARD 
Born in Westminster, Vt., May 14, 1822, the son of 
Joseph and Susan Dorr (Clapp) Willard. He attended 
school at the Walpole (N. H.) Academy. At an early age 
he secured employment in a store at Bellows Falls. Later 
he worked in a Brattleboro hotel, going from there to 
Troy, N. Y., where he secured a position on a Hudson 
River steamer, being advanced to the position of stew- 
ard. In this position he was entrusted by patrons with 
large sums of money for deposit in New York banks. 
His faithfulness as steward brought him the offer of 
the position of manager of the City Hotel at Wash- 
ington, D. C., which he accepted in October, 1847. A 
little later he purchased the property and changed the 
name to Willard Hotel. This was a profitable invest- 
ment and in a few years it became the leading hotel 
at the national capital. The most famous Americans 
and many distinguished guests from foreign lands were 
entertained at Willard’s Hotel, and Mr. Willard became 
one of the most famous hotel men in America. For 
several years the hotel was leased and in 1892 Mr. 
Willard sold his interest in the property. He built 
a large house in Washington in which he resided 
for many years. He was long recognized as one 
of the most prominent residents of Washington. Mr. 
Willard was one of the founders of the Columbia Fire 
Insurance Company and was the first president of the 
National Savings Bank of Washington and for many 
years was vice-president of the National Metropolitan 
Bank. He was a director of the American Security 
and Trust Company, one of the founders and vice- 
president of the Garfield Memorial Hospital, was a 
member of the Washington Monument Society and an 
active member of the Vermont Association of the Dis- 
trict of Columbia. In 1855 Mr. Willard married Sarah 
Bradley Kellogg of Westminster, Vt., a great-grand- 
daughter of Stephen R. Bradley. A son, Henry K. 
Willard, was born to them. Mr. Willard died Decem- 
ber 4, 1909. EDUCATION 
519 
A State Board of Education was authorized in 1856, the first 
members being Calvin Pease, Dorr Bradley and T. P. Redfield. J. S. 
Adams was elected secretary and was the executive officer of the 
board. He held office for eleven years, and during that period he 
did a great work for education in Vermont. Charles G. Burnham 
held the office of State Superintendent of Education during the years 
1850-51. The Legislature then refused to fill the office and for five 
years there was no State Superintendent. The Secretary of the Board 
of Education continued to perform his duties, and when Mr. Adams 
retired he was succeeded by Andrew E. Rankin, who held office from 
1867 to 1870. John H. French was secretary from 1870 to 1874. The 
office of State Superintendent was revived in 1874, and Edward 
Conant of Randolph was elected, holding the position from 1874 to 
1880. He was succeeded by Justus Dartt of Weathersfield, who held 
office during the years 1880-88. Other State Superintendents have 
been Edwin F. Palmer of Waterbury, 1888-92; Mason S. Stone of 
Montpelier, 1892-1900; Walter E. Ranger, 1900-1905; Mason S. Stone, 
1905-1916. The Legislature of 1915 created the office of Commissioner 
of Education and Milo B. Hillegas of New York was chosen, holding 
office until 1920, when he was succeeded by Clarence H. Dempsey. 
It is recorded that Jacob Eddy, Town Clerk of Danby, from 1785 
to 1788, “taught a select school for the purpose of training young 
men for the vocation of teaching.” Mrs. Emma Willard, deservedly 
famous as the pioneer in the movement for the higher education for 
women, in 1814 opened a school for girls at Middlebury. In a letter 
written about this time she said that her proximity to Middlebury Col- 
lege made her feel bitterly the disparity in educational facilities be- 
tween the sexes. 
The training school for teachers established at Concord, Vt., by 
Rev. Samuel R. Hall in March, 1823, has sometimes been styled the 
first normal school in America, but Jacob Eddy’s select school, opened 
in Danby, was nearly forty years older. Mr. Hall’s school was in- 
corporated as the Concord Academy, and his “Lectures on School- 
keeping” were published in 1829 and were widely distributed in the 
New England and Central States. Young pupils were admitted to the 
academy and were organized as a model school. After conducting this 
school for seven years Mr. Hall left the State. He returned to Ver- 
mont about 1840 and became principal of Craftsbury Academy, where 
he established a three-year training course for teachers. 
A normal school and teachers’ institute was founded in Brattle- 
boro in 1847 and continued for about two years. Later James K. 
Colby established a teacher training department in St. Johnsbury 
Academy. 520 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
The Johnson Normal School was incorporated in December, 1866; 
the Randolph Normal School in February, 1867; and the Castleton 
Normal School in August, 1867. 
Edward Conant, principal of the Orange County Grammar School 
became the first principal of the Randolph Normal School, resigning 
in 1874 to accept the position of State Superintendent of Education, 
which he held six years. For the next four years he was principal 
of the Johnson Normal School. In 1884 he returned to the Randolph 
school. As principal of two normal schools, head of the State educa- 
tional systems and author of a textbook in Vermont, he was one of 
the notable figures in the educational life of Vermont. 
A. E. Leavenworth, a gallant Vermont soldier, was long prom- 
inent as the principal of the Castleton school. S. H. Pearl was the 
first principal of the Johnson school, and he is said to have been a 
man of mark. 
The Randolph Normal School was discontinued in 1910, when 
the State Agricultural School was established in its place. The Legis- 
lature of 1919 refused to continue the schools at Johnson and Castleton 
and they were closed in 1920. In 1921 teacher training courses were 
established at the University of Vermont, at Lyndon and Castleton. 
Lyndon Institute, chartered in 1867 and opened at Lyndon Center 
in 1871, was taken under the patronage of Theodore N. Vail, famous 
as head of the great system of the American Telephone and Telegraph 
Company, in 1911. He called O. D. Mathewson of Barre, one of 
the most successful educators of the State, to become its principal. 
He also established the Vail School of Agriculture at Lyndon, and 
after spending a quarter of a million dollars on it in 1914 he gave it, 
with a portion of his estate, to Vermont for a State School of Agri- 
culture. Later the school was discontinued. 
The report of the State Board of Education for the year 1919-20 
shows that there were at that time 2,349 public schools, employing 
8,120 elementary teachers and attended by 61,785 pupils. There were 
in the State eight junior high schools, forty-seven junior-senior high 
schools and eighty-four high schools. Twenty-four teacher training 
classes were in operation in selected schools. 
The State Board of Education (1921) consists of Luther B. John- 
son of Randolph, chairman, Arthur W. Hewitt of Plainfield, Mar- 
velle C. Webber of Rutland, Fred A. Howland of Montpelier, and 
Mrs. Dorothy Canfield Fisher of Arlington. Clarence H. Dempsey 
is the Commissioner of Education. 
Sketches of the institutions of higher education in the State are 
given herewith: EDUCATION 
521 
THE UNIVERSITY OF VERMONT 
(This sketch is based largely upon an article written several years 
ago by the late Prof. J. E. Goodrich.) 
The University of Vermont was chartered in 1791, the year in 
which Vermont became a State of the American Union, and, by vote 
of the Legislature it was established at Burlington. The man most 
influential in founding this institution was Ira Allen, a brother of 
Ethan Allen, and one of the principal founders of the State. 
Vermont’s first Constitution declared that “one University in the 
State ought to be established by direction of the General Assembly.” 
This is said to have been the first declaration of any American State 
in favor of a single “State University.” This provision did not ap- 
pear in the revised Constitution of 1786; and it is supposed that the 
influence of Dartmouth College was a factor in its omission. 
There was considerable delay in establishing the University after 
it was chartered, due largely to the absence of General Allen in Europe 
for several years. Its site was chosen on the hill crest overlooking 
Burlington and sloping toward Lake Champlain. The ten-mile wide 
expanse of water backed by the Adirondack Mountain masses and 
the long range of the Green Mountains to the east, with Mount Mans- 
field and Camel’s Hump, highest and third highest, respectively, of 
its peaks, united to make it one of the most beautiful college sites 
in America. The fathers chose wisely in selecting this noble location. 
In 1800 the University was organized, and instruction begun by 
President Daniel C. Sanders (Harvard, 1788), who, for a time alone, 
and until 1809, with a single tutor constituted the faculty. Four pro- 
fessors were added in 1809-1811; of mathematics and natural phil- 
osophy, of anatomy and surgery, of Latin and Greek, and of juris- 
prudence. In 1801-1802, at a cost of thirty-five thousand dollars, 
a four-story brick edifice was erected, 160 by 75 and 45 feet in the 
wings, with forty-six rooms for students and administrative uses. The 
library was begun in 1809, and astronomical and philosophical appa- 
ratus procured. In 1804 four young men received the bachelor’s de- 
gree; in 1807 forty-seven students were enrolled; and in 1808 sixty- 
one “paying” students are reported, the “pay” being twelve dollars 
a year. The president, whose salary was six hundred dollars, increased 
by a stipend of four hundred dollars paid by the first parish of Bur- 
lington, found time to teach, preach, and write occasional discourses 
including an excellent “History of the Indian Wars.” 
In 1814 the United States Government seized the college building 
for use as barracks for the soldiers stationed at Burlington. President 
Sanders resigned and college exercises were suspended until peace 
was declared. 522 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
When the war was ended the Government placed the college edifice 
in complete repair, and college exercises were revived. A new presi- 
dent was chosen, Rev. Samuel Austin, D. D. (Yale, 1783), local Con- 
gregational pastor, as well as a faculty of three men. He was a schol- 
arly theologian, having collected and issued the “Works of Jonathan 
Edwards.” 
The institution rallied slowly, lack of funds hindered its develop- 
ment, and after six years’ service President Austin retired and was 
succeeded by Rev. Daniel Haskell (Yale, 1802), likewise local Con- 
gregational pastor. Had it not been for the enthusiasm of Arthur L. 
Porter and the student body, it is probable that the college doors would 
have been closed; but through their exertions the number of students 
entering increased from twenty-two to seventy, and the outlook again 
was promising, until on May 27, 1824, the college building and most 
of its contents were burned. This disaster rendered President Haskell 
temporarily insane. However, Professor Porter and his student asso- 
ciates once again came to the rescue, additional funds were raised and 
a new building erected, the corner stone being laid by General Laf- 
ayette, then on a journey through New England. Rev. Willard Preston 
(Brown, 1806), another local Congregational pastor, was chosen pres- 
ident. He held office for one year and was succeeded by Rev. James 
Marsh (Dartmouth, 1817), a man of scholarly attainments who soon 
developed into a broad and progressive educator. The curriculum 
was reorganized and classification was made according to studies and 
attainments. Something corresponding to the elective system was 
inaugurated. College government was made more liberal and less 
formal. These educational reforms were described in a pamphlet 
published in 1829, which was received with such favor that a larger 
edition was printed two years later. This document has been called 
a landmark in the development of the American college. The Depart- 
ment of Philosophy was a notable feature of President Marsh’s edu- 
cational system. He was probably the first educator in America to 
include in a senior course a series of lectures and discussions on the 
Philosophy of the Fine Arts, this course having been given as early 
as 1831. The late Professor J. E. Goodrich said of President Marsh 
that “he was the first in the United States to oppose the prevalent 
utilitarian and materialistic systems of thought, and teach instead a 
philosophy which bases morality on something higher than personal 
or general advantage. He made philosophy religious and theology 
philosophical, and did away with oppositions and jealousies between 
science and religion.” President Marsh did not enjoy the executive 
duties of his position and found invaluable the assistance of Professor 
George W. Benedict (Williams, 1818), of the chair of mathematics. 
He was a man of affairs, of sagacity and energy, progenitor of the 
Benedicts who for seventy-five years were connected with the Uni- EDUCATION 
523 
versity. From his plans was erected the old college dome, long a land- 
mark for all the countryside. President Marsh resigned the pres- 
idency in 1833 and for the ensuing nine years gave his whole time to 
teaching philosophy, his favorite subject. He had introduced Cole- 
ridge to the American public, having written a “Preliminary Essay” 
upon his philosophy and edited his “Aids to Reflection” in 1829. 
President Marsh was succeeded by Rev. John Wheeler (Dart- 
mouth, 1816). He organized University finances, secured generous 
subscriptions, added to the college property and secured a valuable 
library and philosophical apparatus. Upon the death of Doctor Marsh, 
who, after retirement from the presidency, had continued to teach 
Philosophy, Joseph Torrey, Professor of Greek and Latin since 1827, 
succeeded to the vacant chair. He also was a great scholar and well 
known both at home and abroad for his translation of Neander’s 
“Church History.” Thanks to the labor of these two men the Uni- 
versity early enjoyed high rank among American colleges in subjects 
pertaining to Philosophy. To Professor Torrey was assigned the 
task of purchasing a library and he was sent abroad for this purpose. 
He was so successful that it has been said that at that time no other 
American college, with the possible exception of Harvard, had as good 
a working library. 
The great panic of 1837 seriously affected the University as it did 
most institutions of higher learning. Subscriptions were uncollected, 
rentals lapsed, students’ bills were in arrears, professorial salaries were 
not paid, and the University library was attached in a legal suit. Heroic 
efforts and sacrifices enabled the University to weather the storm with- 
out impairing its credit or diminishing its patrimony; indeed more land 
was bought and additional courses of instruction offered. 
President Wheeler resigned in 1848, but retained his connection 
with the corporation. He was succeeded by Rev. Worthington Smith 
of St. Albans (Williams, 1816), a well-trained, dignified and affable 
gentleman, particularly successful in raising funds for the University. 
He resigned in 1855, being succeeded by Calvin Pease (U. V. M., 
1838), who acceptably filled the position for six years and until 
the outbreak of the Civil War. During much of the war period Pro- 
fessor Joseph Torrey (Dartmouth, 1816) served as acting president. 
The Civil War called many to the colors, nearly one-half the 
entire student body having entered the service by 1862. Some re- 
turned and some fell in their country’s service. Following the war 
small numbers and inadequate funds greatly hampered the conduct 
of the institution. 
However, a most important piece of legislation profoundly affect- 
ing the University was in the making. The Federal Congress, largely 
as a result of the persistency of Senator (then Representative) Justin 
S. Morrill of Vermont (see Vol. Ill, p. 545), enacted in 1862 a law es- 524 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
tablishing and endowing with funds a college in each State “for the 
benefit of agriculture and the mechanic arts.” In view of this legis- 
lation the General Assembly in three successive sessions attempted to 
adjust Vermont’s educational problems, first by organic union of all 
her institutions of higher learning, secondly, by chartering an inde- 
pendent Agricultural College, and, lastly and finally, by incorporating 
the State Agricultural College with the University of Vermont (No- 
vember 9, 1865) as the University of Vermont and State Agricultural 
College. A new head to this reorganized institution was secured in 
the person of James B. Angell, thirty-seven years of age, graduate 
and former professor of Brown University and then editor of the 
Providence (R. I.) Journal. His task was almost that of establishing 
a new institution, but he entered upon it with earnestness and zeal, 
visited all parts of the State, made new friends, raised money, attracted 
students, and conciliated alumni who deplored the recent affiliation. 
He was so successful that, a few years later, he was offered the 
presidency of the University of Michigan. The first offer was refused, 
but a second was accepted in 1871. The vacancy thus created was 
filled by the election of Matthew H. Buckham (U. V. M., 1851), for 
fourteen years Professor of Greek and, during a part of this time, 
of Rhetoric and English Literature. President Buckham’s long and 
notable occupancy of the presidency (1871-1910) is the greatest of all 
events in its history. Coincidently women were admitted to all courses 
in the academic department. 
The principal buildings, stated in the order of their erection, are: 
Main College Building, reconstructed in 1881-82 through the gener- 
osity of the late John P. Howard. 
The Billings Library, the gift of Frederick Billings (U. V. M., 
1844), built in 1885. Its exterior is of brown sandstone, its architec- 
ture Romanesque, its rich interior of oak and Georgia pine. H. H. 
Richardson, one of America’s leading architects of the last generation, 
whose major work, perhaps, was Trinity Church, Boston, looked upon 
the Billings Library as “one of his best.” It contains more than one 
hundred thousand volumes and thirty-eight thousand pamphlets, in- 
cluding several notable special collections. 
The Engineering Buildings (1891), including the usual labora- 
tories, classrooms, machine shops, foundries, testing rooms, etc., per- 
taining to modern instruction in civil, mechanical, and electrical en- 
gineering. 
The Williams Science Hall (1896), the gift of Dr. and Mrs. E. H. 
Williams of Philadelphia, the former being the son of the Hon. 
Norman Williams (U. V. M., 1810), a four-story fireproof brick and 
granite building. 
The Gymnasium (1901), with drillhall and baseball cage annexed 
(1915), enclosing more than a half acre of floor space. EDUCATION 
525 
The Medical Building (1905)—replacing an edifice remodeled and 
presented to the University by the late Hon. John P. Howard and 
burned in 1904—is a four-story brick structure housing the multi- 
farious activities of the College of Medicine, laboratories, classrooms, 
amphitheaters, etc. The University administrative offices are in this 
building. 
Morrill Hall (1907) is the home of the College of Agriculture, 
This is the only building on the University campus erected by State 
appropriation. 
Since President Buckham’s death two men have been seated in 
the presidential chair, Dr. Guy P. Benton, 1911-1919, and the present 
incumbent, Guy W. Bailey, 1919-. 
Doctor Benton was successively president of Upper Iowa Uni- 
versity, 1899-1902, Miami (Ohio) University, 1902-1911, and the Uni- 
versity of Vermont. He was long active as an official of the important 
National Association of State Universities. During most of the last 
two years of his University connection Doctor Benton was on leave 
of absence for war work in Europe. He was a member of the Com- 
mittee on Education affiliated with the Council of National Defense, 
was the first of American college presidents to go to Europe under the 
auspices of the National War Work Council of the Y. M. C. A., 
organized Y. M. C. A. work in Paris and in the advanced sectors, 
locating warehouses, amusement centers, and installing secretaries, and, 
after the armistice, became Educational Director of the American 
Army of Occupation at Coblenz. He received the Distinguished 
Service medal for his work during the war. 
President Bailey, for eight years Secretary of State of Vermont 
and for two years comptroller of the University, became acting pres- 
ident on President Benton’s resignation, and president at Commence- 
ment, 1920. He was graduated in 1900, admitted to the bar in 1904, 
Secretary of State, 1908-1917, trustee of the University since 1914, 
comptroller since 1917, delegate to the Republican National Conven- 
tion 1916. His thorough knowledge of the State, his wide acquaintance 
with the people and his proved executive ability should be of inesti- 
mable value to the institution. 
The 1921 catalogue lists—persons as connected with the ad- 
ministrative, instructional, research and extension staffs of the Uni- 
versity, including—five deans, forty-nine professors, four associate 
professors, nineteen assistant professors, sixty-two instructors and 
lecturers. The Experiment Station staff numbers fourteen and that 
of the Agricultural Extension Service thirty-three. The several facul- 
ties comprise, Arts and Sciences, sixty; Medicine, forty-four; En- 
gineering, nine; Agriculture (exclusive of Experiment Station and 
Extension Service), sixteen, inclusive sixty-three. 526 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
The student body numbers 936, 741 of them, or 79 percent, being 
Vermonters, listed: Arts and Sciences 515, Medicine 103, Engineering 
179, Agriculture 139. The registration includes 622 men and 314 
women, the proportion being approximately two to one. The Summer 
School registration of 1921 was 620, and the Winter Short Course 
registration of 1921 was 60. The total, excluding duplicates, was 1,616. 
From 1804 to 1920, 5,506 degrees in course have been given, 2,912 
in the academic colleges and 2,594 in the College of Medicine. The 
academic degrees were given to 2,428 men and 484 women. For 
many years approximately 80 percent of the student body has been 
Vermonters. Furthermore, of recent years more than one-half of 
the total number of students going to college from Vermont, in all 
colleges both within and without State borders, have been registered 
at the University. 
The University as founded in 1791 contemplated only the old 
type classical college. Early in the last century (1822) medical instruc- 
tion was started in a Medical College which, with a lapse of seventeen 
years (1836-1853) during which time the enterprise was abandoned, 
maintained a quasi-connection with the University, being in essence a 
private venture. Some ten or more years ago it became an integral 
part of the University. Instruction was held until 1884 in the building, 
frequently altered and enlarged, at the head of Main Street; since 
1884 on the present site at the north end of the campus. 
In 1865, by virtue of the Federal and State enactment, to the 
old-time University was added the so-called State Agricultural College. 
During the latter portion of President Buckham’s incumbency differ- 
entiation began to be made which in President Benton’s day became 
definite. The University cosmos now comprises: 
1. The College of Arts and Sciences, including classical, literary, 
scientific, chemical and commerce and economics departments. 
2. The College of Medicine, now and for several years rated 
as an “A” grade institution by the American Medical Association, 
requiring for entrance two years of premedical academic work. 
3. The College of Engineering, including Civil Engineering, Me- 
chanical and Electrical Engineering departments. 
4. The College of Agriculture, including the Agricultural and 
Home Economics departments, the Agricultural Experiment Station 
and the Agricultural Extension Service. 
The University functioned effectively in the late war. There 
were nine hundred and forty-three stars on the service flag and nine- 
teen of them are golden. Sixty-eight percent of the men were com- 
missioned officers, and twenty-nine were cited for bravery. During the 
war the University plant was in a large measure turned over to the 
Federal Government. Several temporary wooden buildings were 
erected, barracks, administration and recreation buildings, drill hall, FRANKLIN H. ORVIS 
GEORGE ORVIS 
Franklin H. Orvis, the son of Levi Church and Electra 
Sophia (Purdy) Orvis, was born in Manchester, 
July 12, 1825. As a young man Mr. Orvis was engaged 
in the wholesale silk business in New York City, but on 
the death of his father he returned to Manchester to 
manage the family property and opened the Equinox 
House as a hotel in 1853. From that time until his 
death, November 30, 1900, he remained its proprietor. 
Mr. Orvis was also known as a pioneer hotel man in 
Florida, owning the Putnam House at Palatka and 
the Windsor Hotel at Jacksonville in the days when 
Florida was first known as a health and pleasure re- 
sort. Mr. Orvis was a Senator from Bennington county 
in the Legislatures of 1869 and 1892. 
In 1909 George, the fifth son of Franklin H. and 
Sarah Maria (Whitin) Orvis, acquired the Equinox 
House from the Orvis estate and immediately began ex- 
tensive improvements upon the property. George 
Orvis also had for a time the Windsor Hotel in Jack- 
sonville, Fla., and the Osborne, the Lorraine and No. 
11, East 45th St., in New York City but his real in- 
terests, like those of his father, were in the Equinox 
and Manchester, as well as Vermont, his native State. EDUCATION 
527 
radio laboratory, and dining hall. Dormitories and fraternity houses 
were utilized for barracks. Four successive Signal Corps registering 
730 men and two mechanics schools registering 1,034 men were held, 
and 471 men were trained in the Student Army Training Camp, a 
total of 2,235 men trained for military service. 
The University of Vermont has had and has an excellent teaching 
plant, an admirable teaching force, widely diversified and wisely shaped 
curricula,—but so have scores of its sister colleges the land over. But 
few of them possess as fine an outlook. “The delicate quality of 
June in the amphitheater where the college rests, and the more than 
royal glories of October outlast the Greek and the Calculus.” 
“The mere panorama outspread here before the boy’s gaze is 
an educating influence. He must have a dull heart and an irresponsive 
brain if his four years’ residence in constant view of one of the fairest 
of earth’s landscapes, of river, lake and valley, and the pomps of sun- 
rise and sunset over distant mountain ranges, do not refine his thoughts, 
elevate his ambitions, kindle his imagination, and fill his memory 
with pictures destined to be ‘a joy forever,’ his mind with high aims 
that ‘wake to perish never’.” 
MIDDLEBURY COLLEGE 
(Written by Prof. Frank W. Cady) 
Middlebury College was chartered by act of Legislature on No- 
vember 1, 1800. The chief promoters of the plan for a college were 
the following residents of Middlebury and vicinity: Gamaliel Painter, 
Seth Storrs, Daniel Chipman, Samuel Miller, Jedediah Buckingham 
and Darius Matthews. For some years they had felt their isolation 
from the institutions of learning to the south. It was a long trip 
in those days from Vermont to any of the New England colleges 
except Dartmouth. Nor were they forgetful of the beneficent influence 
which a college would have upon the community. They had seen the 
attempt to found a university at Burlington apparently abandoned 
and the way seemed open for launching their own project. There 
was much preliminary discussion; counsel was taken of the wisest men 
they knew; President Dwight of Yale himself made two visits to 
Middlebury to assist in formulating the plans. But it was not until 
the details were fully matured that they were presented to the Legis- 
lature. 
The founders of the college had as their model the type of institu- 
tion then characteristic of New England, an institution which, by 
training in the humanities and such natural science as then was known, 
prepared men for the learned professions, and which in all its teaching 528 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
was permeated by the ideals of the Christian religion common to the 
orthodox Congregationalism of that day. This was the only kind 
of an institution demanded by the constituency which the college was 
to serve, and by serving the community in just that way the college had 
its hearty cooperation from the start. It was indeed a fortunate thing 
that, in the days before the relation of the State to higher education 
had been so thoroughly worked out and organized as it is today, the 
college received no grant of money or lands with its charter and was 
thus left free to develop itself without the inevitable bias of political 
necessity. 
President Atwater, the first president, continued in the service 
of the college for nine years, assisted during the years 1800-1806 by 
a succession of tutors, each serving a year at a time. Among these 
was Rev. Thomas A. Merrill, a graduate of Dartmouth College in the 
class of 1800, and its valedictorian over Daniel Webster. His sub- 
sequent call to the pastorate of the Middlebury church made him 
a life-long resident of Middlebury and a man of great influence in 
the affairs of the college. In 1806 the first professorship, that of 
Mathematics and Natural Philosophy, was founded largely through 
the generosity of Samuel Miller, who started with a gift of one 
thousand dollars the fund for its endowment. Frederick Hall, a grad- 
uate of Dartmouth College, was called to the chair. In the same year 
Daniel Chipman became professor of law. In the year 1809 President 
Atwater resigned to accept the presidency of Dickinson College. 
Plis successor was Henry Davis, professor of languages in Union 
College, a graduate of Yale. He served until 1817, and after refusing 
the presidency of Yale, resigned to become President of Hamilton 
College. Almost coincident with his appointment, Col. Seth Storrs 
gave to the college the land comprising the present lower campus and 
under the leadership of Gamaliel Painter an effort was made to secure 
the assistance of the State in the erection of a new building upon 
that land. Nothing seems to have come of the effort, for we find 
that the building, now known as Painter Hall, was finally completed 
in 1815 by private benefaction, chiefly that of Judge Painter, and 
under his superintendence. It is now the oldest college building in 
Vermont. 
President Davis was succeeded in 1818 by Rev. Joshua Bates, 
pastor of the church in Dedham, Mass. His election illustrates in a 
remarkable way the temper of the men who were directing the policy 
of the college. They were evidently fearful of the more liberal tenden- 
cies of the theology of their day. Doctor Bates was a man of intense 
religious beliefs, one of those who would be driven by liberal assaults 
into a more intense and fervent evangelism. For fifteen years he had 
succeeded in preserving the orthodoxy of his Dedham parish against 
continued attacks. How potent his influence had been is seen by the EDUCATION 
529 
effect of his removal. No sooner had he left them than schism broke 
out and reft the church beyond the possibility of reconciliation. In 
Vermont, orthodoxy still prevailed, although a more liberal theology 
had here and there a stronghold. It is as though the trustees had 
scented the battle from afar and realizing first the menace of schism 
and second the orthodox solidarity, as yet, of the Vermont community 
had determined to fortify themselves against the assaults of those 
bearing false doctrine. It is evident that they sensed aright the situa- 
tion as it was in 1818, for the administration of President Bates was 
one of the longest and most prosperous in the history of the college. 
The student attendance grew rapidly for the time and place until in 
1836, three years before President Bates resigned, it had reached 168. 
In that same year also, the building now called the Old Chapel, was 
completed as the consummation of a campaign for a fund of fifty 
thousand dollars for the erection of new buildings. The college had 
never been more prosperous and the prospects of continuous healthy 
growth had never been better. 
And yet the very things which were elements of strength at the 
beginning of President Bates’ administration were the eventual cause 
of his resignation and of the almost total disruption of the college. 
The penetration of liberal religious beliefs was slowly taking place 
even in Vermont and as an inevitable consequence those influences 
in the church which were most evangelical were thrown into a cor- 
responding extreme of effort which was potentially possible of offence 
to the more staid, conservative, and old-fashioned forces in the com- 
munity, the forces upon which the college had heretofore had the 
strongest hold. By nature and predisposition President Bates was 
strongly evangelical. In this view he was supported by Doctor Mer- 
rill, the pastor of the Middlebury church; and so he went about in his 
own way to that conflict with liberalism which had been as wine to 
his youth. The most sensational evangelist of the times, Rev. Jedediah 
Burchard, was called to Middlebury and a series of meetings under- 
taken, whose consequences were both unexpected and far-reaching. 
The more staidly orthodox people of the community were scandalized 
and those of the liberal party were quick to excite their alarm and to 
discredit President Bates in their eyes. He was represented as having 
drifted far from the place which a guide and mentor to the community 
should take and as having carried his college with him. These insin- 
uations were successful. By his very zeal in good works President 
Bates exposed himself and the college to the attacks of his enemies 
and lost for himself and the college the confidence of the constituency 
which the college had served for forty years. It was a malicious 
counter-attack; the grounds of it were not true; the essential attitude 
of the college on matters of orthodoxy and methods of revivalism 
and true worship had not changed. But the country believed it had, 530 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
and the zealous mistake of President Bates and Doctor Merrill cost 
the college its prosperity. In the course of two years all the active 
faculty including the president had resigned and the student attendance, 
in 1830, 168, had fallen in 1840 to 46. It was an unparalleled disaster 
from which recovery was made only after years of toil and suffering. 
In 1840, Benjamin Labaree, a graduate of Dartmouth College, 
assumed the presidency. It was, of course, a time of the greatest 
gloom and discouragement. There was practically no endowment. 
An entirely new faculty must be organized. The student body had 
been so depleted that “the class that graduated in 1838 was equal to 
the number present in all the classes in 1840.” The community had 
evidently lost confidence in the college. Every effort of the new 
president must be bent toward the restoration of that confidence. 
To this work he consecrated himself. He saw clearly that the 
loss of confidence was based upon a superficial judgment; and so he 
held consistently to the ideals which had become the college tradition. 
The reward of his efforts was two-fold. In 1848 he could announce 
that a fund of twenty-five thousand dollars had been raised, and the 
gradually increasing number of students showed that the confidence 
of the conservative element in the State was being restored. 
The semi-centennial celebration in 1850 was the one bright spot 
in these years of struggle. It was followed by ten years of unremitting 
toil and of comparative prosperity. In 1860 the student attendance 
was for the first time since the catastrophic ending of President Bates’ 
administration, slightly over 100. Neither President Harvey Denison 
Kitchel, who succeeded President Labaree and served until 1873, nor 
President Calvin B. Hulbert, who served from 1875 to 1880, were 
able to counteract the forces tending to separate college and community. 
It was still to be a long time before the depression of the trying 
experiences which its second forty years had brought the college could 
be overcome; but the men who should lead it out into better days were 
even then being prepared. In the meantime the trustees elected Dr. 
Cyrus Hamlin, the heroic ex-president of Robert College, to the pres- 
idency. He administered the college for five more most discouraging 
years. Thus President Hamlin’s administration, beginning as it does 
the third forty years, is seen to be the twilight before the oncoming 
of the day. It was in the administration of President Brainerd, his 
successor, that the foundations and the essential timbering of the 
present edifice were laid down. He began his duties in 1885 with 
a student body of 44. He relinquished them in 1908 when the students 
numbered 156, the largest attendance since 1836. He had seen over 
two hundred and fifty thousand dollars added to the endowment of 
the college and the erection of two beautiful new buildings flanking 
the other three—the Starr Library and Warner Science Hall. He 
resigned the president’s office assured that Middlebury College had EDUCATION 
531 
been restored to its ancient position in the confidence of the community 
and had been put upon a sound basis for the continuance of that 
relationship. 
John Martin Thomas became president of Middlebury College 
in 1908 and resigned in 1921. From the very beginning he caught 
the note of service which had been the ever-growing ideal of President 
Brainerd’s administration. 
The major appeal which President Thomas has made has been 
for those private benefactions which have from the beginning made 
the college possible. Most generously have the replies come, and 
the result has been a healthy and inspiring growth. In 1908 there 
were in the college 156 students, the largest enrollment for seventy 
years. In 1909 there were in the college 203 students, the largest 
enrollment in its history to that date. In 1920-21 the enrollment is 
447. The faculty has increased from ten to over forty. The endow- 
ments have grown from $415,340 in 1908 to $1,597,329 in 1920, the 
value of the plant from $240,000 to $771,363, and the campus from 
30 to 244 acres. There have been added nine new buildings, five of 
major importance. These are Pearsons Hall, a dormitory for women, 
made possible by the gift of $25,000 by D. K. Pearsons toward a fund 
of $100,000 announced by President Thomas at his inauguration; 
the McCullough Gymnasium, the gift of Gov. John G. McCullough; 
the Chemistry Building; Hepburn Hall, the gift of A. Barton Hep- 
burn of the class of 1871; and the Mead Memorial Chapel, the gift 
of Gov. John A. Mead of the class of 1864. Notable among the be- 
quests have been over four hundred thousand dollars from Joseph 
Battell, including some thirty thousand acres of forest land; one hun- 
dred thousand dollars from Dr. Henry F. Walker for a Furlough and 
Emergency Fund; one hundred thousand dollars from Mrs. Russell 
Sage; and fifty thousand dollars from Theodore N. Vail. 
NORWICH UNIVERSITY 
(Written by Prof. A. W. Peach) 
In Northfield, Vt., is located Norwich University, the military 
college of the State. This institution was founded August 6, 1819, 
at Norwich, Vt., under the name of “The American Literary, Scien- 
tific and Military Academy,” by Capt. Alden Partridge, U. S. A., 
a former superintendent of West Point. The Academy was the 
realization of an educational plan formulated by Capt. Alden Par- 
tridge ; his conception of an education included not only training for 
civil pursuits but also training in military science with the idea that 
young men should be prepared to be of service in maintaining law and 532 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
order in State and national life and ready to meet the requirements 
of leadership in case of war. For a century the University has fol- 
lowed the particular theory laid down by its founder—training for 
effective service in time of peace or in time of war. 
The Academy in Norwich was opened for the reception of 
students September 4, 1820. The attendance during the first year 
numbered one hundred, students coming from eleven States and one 
foreign country. In 1825 the Academy was removed to Middletown, 
Conn., where the attendance rose to four hundred and eighty students. 
The school at Middletown met opposition in the Connecticut Legisla- 
ture when it sought a charter to confer degrees, award diplomas, and 
to raise by lottery, a common practice of the time, forty thousand 
dollars for chemical, astronomical and philosophical apparatus and for 
a library and buildings. As a result, the Academy buildings were 
sold to the Methodist Church for five thousand dollars and became 
the property of Wesleyan University. On June 4, 1827, Captain 
Partridge opened a preparatory school in Norwich in the Academy 
building to prepare pupils for admission to the seminary at Middle- 
town. 
In April, 1834, a convention of the Universalist Church met in 
Norwich, and liking the town and the substantial buildings, voted to 
found a college there. Captain Partridge was invited to become the 
president; a charter was procured that winter, and the college was 
opened in the spring of 1835. 
During the successful years at Norwich came the Civil War with 
its immediate challenge of the worth of the training the college offered. 
The records show that the institution furnished a larger proportion of 
officers according to the number of its graduates than any other college 
in the country. No graduate bore a musket in the ranks. There were 
thirteen general officers and forty Colonels who took their degrees at 
Norwich. 
The college remained at Norwich until the building known as the 
“South Barracks” burned in March, 1866. The town of Northfield 
immediately invited the college authorities to remove the college to 
Northfield. The invitation was accepted, and the institution entered 
upon a period of growth that has been fruitful in accomplishment. 
The first building erected on the site at Northfield was a barracks 
now known as Jackman Hall, which was ready for occupancy in 
1868. Dodge Hall, at present used for recitation and laboratory 
purposes, the gift of Gen. G. M. Dodge, 1851, was erected in 1892. 
Owing to the steadily increasing attendance it became necessary to 
provide a new barracks. The alumni of the University under the 
effective leadership of General Dodge raised funds for the building 
of Alumni Hall in 1906 in memory of Captain Partridge. In 1905 
the Carnegie Library was given to the University by Andrew Carnegie. EDUCATION 
533 
The erection of Dewey Hall was made possible by the achievement 
of a son of Norwich, Admiral George Dewey, 1855, in defeating the 
Spanish fleet in the historic battle of Manila Bay. The idea of a 
memorial hall, erected in his honor at Norwich University, where he 
first received military training, was suggested and at once became 
popular with the people of the State and throughout the country 
generally. The building was completed in 1902. 
In October, 1919, the founding of the University was commem- 
orated with appropriate exercises and ceremonies through a period 
of four days. One of the features of the centennial celebration was 
the opening of the new cavalry stables, built with funds given by 
Gen. Rush C. Hawkins, the leader of the famous “Hawkins’ Zouaves” 
in the Civil War, and other interested friends, including the Rough 
Riders’ Association. The stables were constructed under the super- 
vision of an expert cavalry officer and are considered to represent 
the last word in such construction. It may be said in passing that 
the interest of General Hawkins in Norwich rose from his belief, as 
stated later in the magazine Science, “above all else in military educa- 
tion, its tendency being to develop self-respecting, real men, who are 
more likely than others to be faithful in all relations which should 
adorn decent society. I am proud of the record made by Norwich 
graduates in the field and at sea whenever they have been called upon 
to serve their country.” 
On October 19, 1920, the Moses Taylor, Jr., Riding Hall was 
dedicated. Like the cavalry stables, this riding hall is considered 
to be as perfect in its field as such a hall can be. The hall was made 
possible by the gift of Moses Taylor of New York City in memory 
of his son, Lieut. Moses Taylor, Jr. Lieutenant Taylor was one of 
the many students who left the University to enter the service of 
the country during the World War. He was mortally wounded while 
leading a patrol in No Man’s Land. 
Under the terms of its charter the University is empowered to 
grant the degrees of Bachelor of Science, Bachelor of Science in 
Chemistry, Bachelor of Science in Civil Engineering, Bachelor of 
Science in Electrical Engineering, also the advanced degrees of Mas- 
ter of Arts, Master of Science, Civil Engineer, Electrical Engineer, 
and the usual honorary degrees. The courses are arranged on the 
usual collegiate basis of two semesters for a period of four 
years. In addition to the usual collegiate courses, the charter requires 
“a course of military instruction, both theoretical and practical.” For 
this reason the discipline is military in form and principle. This 
course of instruction covers four years, and includes both recitation 
work and actual practice in the field. 
As one of the institutions from which the National Government 
may draw trained officers, qualified for duty as officers of the Regular 534 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
Army and Reserves at all times, and for the National Army in time of 
war, the University has in charge of its military department, as pro- 
fessors of Military Science and Tactics, two officers of the Regular 
Army. The arms and equipment used in instruction are supplied by 
the War Department. 
Under the provisions of the National Defense Act, approved 
June 3, 1916, the University has been designated as a Cavalry Unit 
of the Reserve Officers’ Training Corps, Senior Division. It has the 
distinction of being the only exclusively cavalry institution of learning 
in the United States. 
The General Staff of the United States Army, through its del- 
egated officers, makes a thorough inspection of the military department 
annually, the result of which determines the rank held by the college 
in the War Department classification. The inspection of 1920, as 
of previous years, warranted the continuance of the rating held without 
interruption since the first inspection under this rating in 1904, “Dis- 
tinguished College, M. C. Class.” 
There is only one other educational institution in the United 
States which has been so continuously rated. 
The records of the graduates of the institution are indicative of 
success not only in military affairs but also in civil. The latest com- 
pilation (“History of Norwich University” by Dodge-Ellis, 1911) of 
records shows the division to be as follows: five hundred and forty- 
nine civil engineers, two hundred and sixteen lawyers, one hundred 
and twenty physicians, three hundred and thirty-four business men, 
ninety-eight bankers, thirty-four editors, and eighty authors. The 
list is, of course, not final nor entirely inclusive, but it serves to suggest 
the breadth of service which the graduates enter. 
Among the names of prominent alumni of the University may 
be found those of Admiral George Dewey and Gen. Grenville M. 
Dodge. 
The Honor Roll of the Civil War numbers over five hundred 
officers. With those who served in other wars and those now enrolled, 
the number totals about one thousand. The list includes eight Major 
Generals, twenty Brigadier Generals, sixty-two Colonels, one Admiral, 
six Real Admirals, eight Commodores and nearly nine hundred officers 
of lesser rank. Norwich was represented by trained officers in all 
wars from the Black Hawk War to date. Col. Truman B. Ransom, 
1825, an early president of the University, met his death while leading 
the Ninth U. S. Infantry in its charge on the fortress of Chapultepec. 
At the outbreak of the Civil War the graduates and students were 
in demand as drill masters and rendered efficient service throughout 
the North. The national character of the University is shown in 
the fact that forty of the alumni served in the Confederate Army. 
On the breaking out of the Spanish-American War eighty percent of EDUCATION 
535 
the alumni and past cadets immediately offered their services. This 
record was bettered in the World War. The college was among the 
first to offer its services through President Reeves. Norwich alumni 
and cadets of military age numbered one thousand four hundred and 
forty-three; over one-half, or 58.4 percent, were in service, and 86 
percent of those were commissioned officers. Such a record through 
the wars of the country is suggestive of the reason why Gen. Leonard 
Wood in a public address at the University made this comment: “The 
splendid thing about Norwich is that she has always kept the faith.” 
The century of successful effort, which has been briefly outlined, 
is due in no small part to the earnest and unselfish labor of the pres- 
idents of the University. The first president and founder, Captain 
Partridge, was born in Norwich, February 12, 1785, and died there 
January 16, 1854. He entered Dartmouth in August, 1802, and in 
1805 received the appointment of cadet in the Artillerists, U. S. serv- 
ice, with orders to report at West Point, where he was graduated 
October 30, 1806; and on that date he became Assistant Professor 
of Mathematics. In 1808 he was detailed to act as superintendent, 
and he continued to act in that capacity with brief intervals until 
January 3, 1815, when he received the permanent appointment and 
served for two terms until July 28, 1817. He resigned from the 
army in April, 1818, and from that time devoted himself to the dis- 
semination, by lectures and otherwise, of the views which he held of 
education required by the American citizen and the establishment 
of institution in which these views could be carried out. 
The presidents who succeeded Captain Partridge held steadfastly 
to the ideals of the founder. The ensuing years witnessed critical 
times for the University, but effective leadership was not wanting, 
not only in the past, but down to and in present times. On May 22, 
1920, Charles A. Plumley, a graduate in the class of 1896, was called 
to the presidency. 
President Plumley was born in Northfield, April 14, 1875. He 
was educated in the public schools, preparing for college in the North- 
field High School, and entering the University in 1892. The years 
that followed after his graduation eminently fitted him for the office 
which able teachers and officers of the army have held. His experience 
has been gained as a teacher, as an officer in the Vermont National 
Guard, and as State Tax Commissioner from 1913. By virtue of 
such service, which includes a term as Speaker of the Vermont House 
of Representatives, and his long interest in and familiarity with the 
affairs of the University, it may be expected that the traditions and 
peculiar characteristics of the University’s scheme of education will 
be continued and made increasingly useful to the individual student, 
to the State and to the country. 536 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
At the gateway to the University the visitor will note a bronze 
tablet on which is this inscription: 
“This Institution was founded upon the principle that a Citizen- 
Soldiery is essential to the maintenance of free government. Through- 
out a hundred years that principle has been cherished and men have 
here learned that obedience to law is liberty. In the centuries to come 
let all who enter through this gate be faithful to the past.” 
Norwich University stands today an integral part of Vermont’s 
history. Like the sister colleges of the State, the graduates have helped 
to make Vermont traditions; they have also been particularly active 
because of their special training, in the wars in which the State has 
nobly borne a distinguished part. The future may ask much of 
Norwich, but the answer to every request will undoubtedly be the 
answer of the past—the answer of graduates trained for the quiet 
ways of peace and, when the need arises, for the tumultuous ways of 
war. 
ST. MICHAEL’S COLLEGE AND HIGH SCHOOL 
St. Michael’s College is situated on one of the foothills of the 
Green Mountains, about one mile from Winooski and a half hour’s 
trolley ride from Burlington, in the locality known as “Winooski Park.” 
In close proximity are the Fanny Allen Hospital and Fort Ethan 
Allen. The College is under the direction of the Fathers of St. Ed- 
mund of Canterbury, a religious community founded at Pontigny, 
Burgundy, France. The same community also has charge of the 
parish in Swanton, Vt., where the Fathers have a Novitiate and a 
school for the community, also of missions in Montana among which 
is the Cheyenne reservation of St. Labre’s Mission. 
The history of St. Michael’s College is comparatively short in 
years, dating from 1904, when it was opened by its first president, Very 
Rev. Amand Prevel, S. S. E., with an enrollment of forty-four stu- 
dents. Three years later, in 1907, an addition doubling the capacity 
of the original frame structure was erected. Successors to the founder 
were Rev. Ernest M. Salmon (1907 to 1913), Rev. Edmund M. Total 
(1913 to 1919). Since 1919 Rev. William JeanMarie has been in 
charge of the institution. 
St. Michael’s College was incorporated January 28, 1913, by an 
act of the Vermont Legislature and empowered to grant the usual 
college degrees. 
The college course comprises four years, including two years of 
Philosophy. Together with the college course St. Michael’s has from 
the beginning maintained a High School. This school has received 
recognition from the State of Vermont and the Board of Regents of EDUCATION 
537 
the State of New York. It comprises the following four-year courses: 
Classical, Latin-Scientific, English Scientific and Commercial. 
Depending solely upon the moderate fees of the students, without 
endowment or State aid, St. Michael’s, nevertheless, can boast of her 
progress. Within the last ten years the extent of her grounds has 
reached eighty-six acres by the acquisition of adjoining small estates. 
With the increase of students the houses on these estates were turned 
into dormitories known as St. Edmund’s Hall and Prevel Hall. The 
college buildings accommodate about one hundred and forty-five 
students. The space now (1921) is quite insufficient for the number 
of applicants. 
Full and partial scholarships have been established of late years, 
known as the Rev. C. E. Prevost, the Rev. J. F. Audet, the Rev. 
William Lonergan, the Catholic Foresters, and the Fathers of St. 
Edmund Scholarships. 
St. Michael’s College has its religious sodalities, its literary and 
debating organizations, its musical department, its athletic and its 
quarterly review, The Purple and Gold. 
In 1920, St. Michael’s had its first alumni meeting. Former stu- 
dents, now priests, lawyers, doctors and business men, assembled from 
Vermont and outside to pay homage to their alma mater. VERMONT AUTHORS 
THOMAS ROWLEY 
THOMAS Rowley, of Danby, known as “the poet of the Green 
Mountain Boys,” was the first Vermonter who may properly 
be included in a list of authors. He was a native of Hebron, 
Conn., who came to Danby in 1768, and soon took a commanding 
position, being chosen proprietor’s clerk, the first Town Clerk, and 
chairman of the local committee of safety. He was the first Town 
Representative from Danby and was a prominent member of the 
General Assembly. He was active in declaring Vermont an inde- 
pendent State and aided in framing the Constitution. During his 
later years he lived in Shoreham. 
In Goodhue’s “History of Shoreham” it is said: “Rowley was 
chiefly distinguished in his time as a wit and poet. If Ethan Allen 
roused by every Green Mountain Boy in his log cabin and called 
him forth armed to the teeth in defense of his hearth and home by 
the vehemence of his appeals in homely phrase, Rowley set the moun- 
tains on fire by the inspiration of his muse. These poems, once every- 
where sung in the State, have mostly faded from the memory of 
men.” * * * 
Many of his poems were published in the Rural Magazine and in 
the Bennington Gazette. A pamphlet, entitled “Selections and Mis- 
cellaneous Works of Thomas Rowley,” was published in 1802. One 
of his best known poems was an invitation to poor tenants in New 
York to settle on lands in the New Hampshire Grants. 
Rowley died in Benson in 1803. His verses were crude, but 
they were forceful, and they suited the time and the people for which 
they were written. 
ROYALL TYLER 
The first distinctively American play to be acted on an American 
stage, “The Contrast,” was written by Royall Tyler, who removed 
from Massachusetts to Vermont not long after the play was brought 
out and became one of the most prominent citizens of the State. The 
date of its first production was April 16, 1787, and it was given in 
the John Street Theater in New York. It was presented in Phila- 
delphia, Wilmington and Baltimore and was given again in New 
York in 1789, at the Park Street Theater, while the First Congress 
of the United States was in session in that city. The comedy was 
written in three weeks, and the profits on one night’s performance 
were given to the sufferers from a fire at Boston. VERMONT AUTHORS 
539 
Stedman and Hutchinson’s “Library of American Literature” 
quotes liberally from Judge Tyler’s prose and verse, and says of 
“The Contrast”: “It is the first essay of American genius in a difficult 
species of composition; it was written by one who never critically 
studied the rules of the drama and, indeed, had seen but few of the 
exhibitions of the stage.” Prof. Perley I. Reed of Maryland State 
College, in “Realistic Characters in American Plays,” has said of 
“The Contrast”: “It was the earliest production of an American play 
into which had been introduced an acting character, distinctive, na- 
tional and vital, not drawn from the imagination or the current list 
of stock dramatic types but reproduced fundamentally from the very 
substance of American civilization. * * * With the presentation of 
‘The Contrast’ American drama may be said to have come under 
significant theatrical influence.” 
Mr. Tyler’s brother, Col. John Tyler, became manager of the 
Boston Theater about this time, and the author of “The Contrast” 
was asked to write some plays. Among those which he contributed 
were “The Dualists,” a farce in three acts; “The Georgia Spec, or 
Land in the Moon,” based on the prevailing speculation in Yazoo 
lands; “The Doctor in Spite of Himself,” an imitation of Moliere’s 
comedy; and “Baritaria, or the Governor of a Day,” based on the 
adventures of Sancho Panza. These plays were received with much 
favor. 
Royall Tyler was a frequent contributor to The Farmers’ Weekly 
Museum or the New Hampshire and Vermont Journal, a magazine 
published at Walpole, N. H., by Joseph Dennie. James Melvin Lee, 
in his “History of American Journalism,” says Judge Tyler’s humorous 
squibs were the precursor of the modern newspaper “column.” He 
further says: “No paragraphers of the nineteenth century ever sur- 
passed Tyler in skilful alliteration, of which he was unusually fond.” 
What has been called Tyler’s most important literary work was 
a novel entitled “The Algerine Captive,” published by David Carlisle 
at Walpole, N. H., in 1797. It received respectful attention from 
English reviewers and is said to have been the first American work 
of fiction republished in London. 
Judge Tyler contributed prose and verse to The Polyanthus, a 
Boston magazine, and in 1810 a series of letters from his pen repre- 
senting the sojourn of an American youth in London for nine months 
was published under the caption of “The Yankee in London.” 
Royall Tyler easily ranks among Vermont’s ablest and most bril- 
liant men. He was born in Boston, July 18, 1757, and graduated 
from Harvard College in 1776 at the age of nineteen, being distin- 
guished for his scholarly attainments and keen wit. At the same time 
he received from Yale College, the rival of Harvard, the degree of 
A. B. He studied law from 1776 to 1779. In the summer of 1778 540 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
he enlisted in the American army and served as an aide on General 
Sullivan’s staff. He was admitted to the bar in 1779 and practiced 
law in Portland, Me., for about two years. He then removed to 
Quincy (then known as Braintree), Mass., but his business increased 
and he returned to Boston. Early in 1787 he was appointed an aide 
on the staff of General Lincoln, when the militia was called out to 
suppress Shays’ Rebellion. During this period of military service 
he visited Vermont and made the acquaintance of the leading public 
men of the State. 
The young Boston lawyer was very popular at this time. His 
plays were produced with great success. “The Contrast” was given 
in the Park Theater the evening of the day on which George Wash- 
ington was first inaugurated President of the United States. A letter 
written by a friend said: “He was petted, caressed, feasted and 
toasted, and no doubt lived too freely.” He was engaged to marry 
Abigail, daughter of John Adams, but the engagement was broken, 
probably on account of reports concerning the gay life he led. This 
affair may have been the motive which induced him to abandon Boston 
and remove to Vermont. In 1791 he opened a law office in Guilford, 
then the most populous town in the State, and his practice grew 
rapidly. In 1794 he married Mary, the daughter of Gen. Joseph P. 
Palmer of Framingham, Mass. He was elected State’s Attorney 
for Windham county in 1798 and held the office until he was chosen 
a Judge of the Supreme Court in 1801. In 1807 he was made Chief 
Justice, holding the position until 1813. He then resumed the practice 
of law in Brattleboro, whither he had removed in 1801. He was an 
unsuccessful candidate for United States Senator, a position which he 
would have adorned. For a considerable period he was a member of 
the corporation of the University of Vermont and for several years 
he was a professor of jurisprudence in that institution. He died 
August 16, 1826. 
SAMUEL WILLIAMS 
“The Natural and Civil History of Vermont,” the first history 
of the Green Mountain State, was written by Rev. Samuel Williams 
of Rutland in 1794. It was published by Isaiah Thomas and David 
Carlisle, Jr., at Walpole, N. H. A second edition, in two volumes, 
was published by Samuel Mills of Burlington in 1809. 
Samuel Williams was born at Waltham, Mass., April 23, 1743, 
and graduated from Harvard College in 1761, at the age of eighteen 
years. He was chosen by Professor Winthrop to accompany him 
to Newfoundland to observe the transit of Venus. He taught school, 
studied theology, and in 1763, at the age of twenty, was licensed to VERMONT AUTHORS 
541 
preach. In 1765 he became pastor of the Bradford, Mass., Congre- 
gational Church. In 1780 he was appointed Hollis professor of math- 
ematics and natural philosophy at Harvard College. While here he 
was given the degree of LL. D. by Yale College and the University 
of Edinburgh. He was an active member of the American Academy 
of Arts and Sciences, and a member of the Philosophical Society of 
Philadelphia and the Meteorological Society of Mannheim, Germany. 
In 1786 he was appointed one of the Massachusetts agents for locating 
the boundary between that State and New York. 
Mr. Williams resigned his professorship in Harvard in 1788 and 
removed to Rutland, Vt. The exact reason for this change is un- 
known at the present time, but at the time there were rumors of certain 
business complications which may have been the cause of his removal. 
He preached in Rutland for several years, and edited the Rutland 
Herald. In the latter capacity he became a power in the Federalist 
party in the State. He was appointed in 1805 an agent to ascertain the 
northern boundary of the State. He preached two years in Burlington 
and was a lecturer in the University of Vermont. He died January 
2, 1817. 
ZADOCK THOMPSON 
Of all the persons who have written concerning Vermont, probably 
no one has equalled Zadock Thompson in time and labor expended 
and in useful publications produced. He was born in Bridgewater, 
May 29, 1796. As a child he was studious and was naturally inclined 
to scientific studies. His parents were too poor to give him the college 
education which he earnestly desired, and he paid his way through 
the University of Vermont by making and selling almanacs. The 
first edition was published in 1823, the year in which he entered col- 
lege. His sisters sewed the almanacs and he peddled them up and 
down the State, traveling on foot and on horseback, sometimes taking 
paper and rags in payment. In this way he visited nearly every town 
in Vermont, and on these journeys he took occasion to consult 
town records and converse with old residents, thus gathering material 
for historical works which he published in later years. He graduated 
from the University of Vermont in 1823 and in 1825 he was ap- 
pointed a tutor in that institution. In the same year he published 
“The Youth’s Assistant in Practical Arithmetic,” a volume of one 
hundred and sixty pages. Several editions of this textbook were 
issued, and in 1828 “Thompson’s New Arithmetic” was published, 
containing two hundred and sixteen pages. The tenth edition was 
issued in 1837. In 1828 Mr. Thompson edited The Iris and Burlington 
Literary Gazette. He taught in Hatley and Sherbrooke, Que., in 1833, 
and in 1835 published the “Geography and History of Lower Canada,” 542 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
designed for use in schools. He was ordained an Episcopal clergy- 
man in 1835, and in 1837 became a teacher in the Episcopal Institute 
at Burlington. 
Mr. Thompson’s most important service, probably, was the pro- 
duction in 1824 of “A Gazetteer of the State of Vermont,” three hun- 
dred and ten pages; a “History of the State of Vermont From Its 
Earliest Settlement to the Close of the Year 1832,” two hundred and 
fifty-two pages, published in 1832, a second edition appearing in 1836; 
and a “History of Vermont, Natural, Civil and Statistical,” in three 
parts, six hundred and fifty pages, issued in 1842. An appendix to 
the work last named was published in 1853, designed to bring the 
record down to the date mentioned. This history, known popularly 
as “Thompson’s Vermont,” devotes much space to a description of 
the animals, birds, fishes, plants, trees, minerals and geography of the 
State, its history and sketches of each town in Vermont. It is a mon- 
umental work and for seventy years (1921) has been the main reliance 
of the people of the State for historical facts. 
In 1849 he published “The First Book of Geography for Vermont 
Children,” and in 1852 a “Journal of a Trip to London, Paris and 
the Great Exhibition of 1851.” He also wrote several guide books 
dealing with Vermont and Lake Champlain. He was appointed pro- 
fessor of chemistry and natural history at the University of Vermont 
in 1851. For thirty-four years he furnished the astronomical calcula- 
tions for “Walton’s Vermont Register.” Beginning in 1841 he served 
the State as Geologist, Naturalist, and Curator of the State Cabinet, 
holding these positions during the remainder of his life. He died at his 
home in Burlington, January 19, 1856. Zadock Thompson belongs in 
the list of Vermont’s great men. It is doubtful if any Vermonter 
has equalled this man in the variety of important facts concerning 
Vermont dug out from original sources and made available for the 
people of the State. 
OTHER HISTORIANS 
Hall’s “History of Eastern Vermont” is one of the standard 
historical works relating to this State. It was written by Benjamin 
H. Hall of Troy, N. Y., a lawyer and newspaper man, was published 
by D. Appleton & Co. of New York in 1858, and contains about eight 
hundred pages. As its title indicates it deals with that portion of 
the State east of the Green Mountains. It is an excellent history, 
treating the various subjects in detail, and contains valuable biograph- 
ical material. 
Hiland Hall’s services to the State as Congressman and Governor 
have been treated elsewhere, but valuable as they were, he is remem- EQUINOX HOTEL, MANCHESTER, VT. Equinox Elouse, Manchester VERMONT AUTHORS 
543 
bered more often for his historical rather than his political labors. 
His “History of Vermont from the Discovery to Its Admission into the 
Union in 1791” covers the period treated more completely than any 
other publication. 
Like Hiland Hall, E. P. Walton served his State with distinction 
in Congress. For many years he was an influential editor, but he is 
more often remembered as the compiler of “Governor and Council” 
than as politician or newspaper man. There is a vast amount of his- 
torical information in the eight volumes, which give a detailed account 
of the early Vermont conventions, the formation of the Constitution, 
the proceedings of the Council of Safety and the doings of Governor 
and Council from the beginning of the State government to the aboli- 
tion of the Council in 1836. The appendixes in each volume contain 
a large number of historical documents and many biographical sketches. 
The work is a mine of information for the student of Vermont history. 
These volumes were published during the period 1873-79, inclusive. 
“Hemenway’s Gazetteer,” issued originally as a magazine by its 
author, Abby Maria Hemenway, was published later in five large 
volumes, containing approximately six thousand pages. It embraces 
all the towns of all the counties, with the exception of Windsor county. 
The manuscript history of the several towns of the last named county 
was ready for publication, but financial conditions were not opportune 
and the manuscript was accidentally burned, an irreparable loss. This 
is a great storehouse of the raw material of State and local history. 
Miss Hemenway’s first publication was “Poets and Poetry of Ver- 
mont,” issued in 1858. The “Gazetteer” appeared during the period 
1867-90, inclusive. Miss Hemenway was born in Ludlow in 1827 
and died in Chicago in 1890. 
L. F. Wilbur, of Jericho, between 1889 and 1903, produced a 
four-volume “History of Vermont,” containing much valuable infor- 
mation. Rowland Robinson is better known as a writer of Vermont 
tales than as an historian, but his “Vermont, a Study of Independence,” 
a volume of three hundred and seventy pages, published in 1892 by 
Houghton Mifflin & Co., in the “American Commonwealth” series, is 
an admirable condensation of the history of the State. “Vermont 
in the Civil War,” in two volumes, published in 1886-88, and written 
by George Grenville Benedict, one of Vermont’s most prominent 
editors, is an excellent and thorough presentation of Vermont’s part 
in the war of 1861-65. Mr. Benedict also published “Army Life in 
Virginia.” 
In 1890, Edward Conant, a well-known educator, prepared the 
“Geography, History and Civil Government of Vermont,” which was 
published by the Tuttle Company of Rutland. This book has been 
used in the public schools of the State. Several editions have been 
published, the later ones being brought up to date by Mason S. Stone, 544 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
for several years State Superintendent of Education. In 1903, Ginn 
& Company published an excellent “History of Vermont,” containing 
three hundred and twenty-five pages, written by Edward D. Collins, 
a member of the faculty of Middlebury College. “Vermont 
for Young Vermonters,” by Miriam I. Kimball, is an excellent 
textbook. “The Vermont Revolutionary Rolls,” compiled by Prof. 
John E. Goodrich of the University of Vermont and published by 
authority of the State in 1904, contains a list of Vermont’s Revolu- 
tionary soldiers. “A History of Lake Champlain,” containing three 
hundred and thirty-five pages, written by Walter H. Crockett, was 
published in 1909. VERMONT POETS 
CHARLES G. EASTMAN 
CHARLES Gamage Eastman published a volume of poems in 
1848, and these poems were reprinted in 1880. His descriptions 
of various phases of Vermont life are excellent. He was a 
close observer of nature and his descriptions of out-of-door life are 
particularly good. Born in Fryeburg, Me., June 1, 1816, he came to 
Vermont at an early age. He studied at the University of Vermont, 
but did not graduate. While in college he was an associate editor of 
the Burlington Sentinel. He established the Lamoille Express at John- 
son in 1838 and published it for two years. He then removed to 
Woodstock and founded the Spirit of the Age, which he conducted 
until 1846, when he purchased the Vermont Patriot and State Gazette 
at Montpelier, which he published until his death. He was active 
in public affairs and a prominent member of the Democratic party. 
He was a close friend of John G. Saxe. 
JOHN G. SAXE 
Probably Vermont never produced a more popular author, or one 
as widely known, as John Godfrey Saxe. He was born in Highgate, 
June 2, 1816, one day after his friend, Charles G. Eastman. The 
young man prepared for college at St. Albans, entered Wesleyan 
University, and at the end of one year transferred to Middlebury 
College. He graduated in 1839, studied law at Lewiston, N. Y., and 
in 1841 married Sophia Sollace of Bridport, sister of a college class- 
mate. He completed his law studies at St. Albans and was admitted 
to the bar in 1843. He practiced law in Highgate and St. Albans for 
seven years. About this time be began to contribute to the Knicker- 
bocker Magazine. In 1850 he removed to Burlington, and for ten 
years he resided in that city. He was elected State’s Attorney of 
Chittenden county in 1851. Finding the practice of law irksome he 
abandoned it and with a few thousand dollars inherited from his 
father, he purchased the Vermont Sentinel in 1851 and became its 
editor. For a time he was a deputy collector of customs. In 1859 
and 1860 he was the Democratic candidate for Governor. 
His first volume of poems appeared in 1849 and during the active 
period of his literary work more than forty editions of his poems 
were published in America and Europe. He was noted for his humor 
and was a famous punster. His poems included “The Flying Dutch- 
man,” “The Money King and Other Poems,” “Clever Stories of Many 546 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
Nations Rendered in Rhyme,” “The Masquerade and Other Poems,” 
“Fables and Legends of Many Countries Rendered in Rhyme,” “The 
Proud Miss MacBride” and “Leisure Day Rhymes.” Complete edi- 
tions of his poems were also published. 
People who came in contact with him were charmed by his genial 
personality and wit and he became a national favorite. His verses 
were quoted both at home and abroad and such was his popularity 
that he was soon obliged to leave prose and the press and move to 
Albany and confine his work to poetry and to the lecture platform. 
He lived in Albany from 1860 to 1870 and during these years visited 
England twice, where he lectured and where he was much sought 
after by literary people. His life at Albany was very happy. He 
was then at the height of his fame. He was a contributor to the 
leading magazines, was welcomed to the best society and had acquired 
a competence. He was a handsome man, six feet, two inches in height, 
with a finely poised head on broad shoulders. He was a brilliant 
conversationalist and was in his element at the fashionable resort of 
Saratoga Springs, which he visited for twenty-three consecutive sum- 
mers. 
The Poet’s lectures were delivered from Maine to California and 
he was in great demand. During the troublesome years just previous 
to the Civil War he spent many of his winters in the Southern States 
and was a guest at many of the old manor houses, where he was 
welcomed because of his abundance of good cheer and his well-known 
political views. During the year 1867 he visited England as a 
guest of the late George Peabody and through his influence and intro- 
duction delivered many lectures and was hailed by the English press 
as “A Second Tom Hood,” and when he returned in the fall he brought 
with him many gifts from England’s best people. During the years 
from 1855 to 1870 one would seldom pick up a paper that did not 
contain some joke or witty speech or poem from the poet’s pen. 
d he poet Saxe died in 1887, after an illness of many years, the 
result of a railroad accident which occurred while he was returning 
from a lecturing tour in the West. He was taken from burning cars 
unconscious and brought home and afterwards developed melancholia. 
During these years his devoted wife and all but one of his five children 
were removed by death, and the poet who had done so much toward 
contributing a cheerful note to the world never recovered. 
The State of Vermont has erected at the old homestead at High- 
gate a monument to his memory, which was unveiled in August, 1920. 
In 1916 Middlebury College observed the one hundredth anniversary 
of the poet’s birth, and reciprocated his services in officiating as the 
poet on the occasion of Middlebury’s fiftieth anniversary by conferring 
upon his namesake, John G. Saxe, of New York, the degree of Doctor 
of Laws. VERMONT POETS 
547 
MRS. JULIA C. R. DORR 
The foremost place among Vermont poets is generally awarded 
to Mrs. Julia Caroline (Ripley) Dorr. She was born in Charleston, 
S. C., her father, William Y. Ripley, being a man of New England 
ancestry. Her mother, Zulma DeLacy Thomas, was the daughter of 
French parents, who resided in San Domingo. Owing to Mrs. Rip- 
ley’s failing health the family removed to Vermont, where Mr. Ripley 
became associated with the development of the Rutland marble inter- 
ests. In 1845 she married Seneca M. Dorr, who became a prominent 
citizen of Rutland, being a successful lawyer and banker. The Dorr 
homestead, known as “The Maples,” with its beautiful gardens and its 
extensive and noble views of the Vermont mountains and valleys, 
was frequented by many famous literary people. 
Mrs. Dorr began to write at the age of twelve years, but she pub- 
lished nothing until after her marriage, her first poem appearing in the 
Union Magazine in 1849, having been sent by her husband without 
her knowledge. Her first prose work to be published was a story 
which secured one of ten hundred-dollar prizes offered by Sartain’s 
Magazine. Other winners in this contest were James Russell Lowell 
and Edward Everett Hale. For more than sixty years she was active 
with her pen. She wrote sonnets, ballads and poems for anniversary 
occasions, contributing frequently to magazines. Several editions of 
her poems have been published. In her later years the volume entitled 
“Afterglow” appeared, and still later, “Beyond the Sunset.” Some 
of her best known poems are “Vermont” (written for the centennial 
anniversary of 1877), “Gettysburg,” “The Dead Century,” “The 
Armorer’s Errand,” “The Last of Six,” “Supplicamus,” “Our Flags 
at the Capitol,” “In the Wilderness,” “Heirship,” “Friar Anselmo,” 
“The Legend of the Organ Builder,” “Entering In,” “The Old 
Fashioned Garden,” “My Lovers,” “At Rest,” “Day and Night,” 
“Mercedes,” “The Fallow Field,” “O Wind That Blows Out of the 
West,” “The Doves of Mendon,” “The Blind Bird’s Nest,” and “Come 
What May.” 
Her prose works included “Farmingdale,” “Lanmere,” “Sybil 
Huntington” and “Expiation,” novels; and “Bermuda,” “The Flower 
of England’s Face,” “A Cathedral Pilgrimage” and “In Kings’ Houses.” 
Emerson gave her a place in his “Parnassus,” and Stoddard included 
ten of her poems in his “Female Poets of America.” E. C. Stedman 
in his “American Anthology” wrote: “Mrs. Dorr holds a distinguished 
and enviable position among American women.” 
Her literary friends included Longfellow, Lowell, Whittier, Emer- 
son, Holmes, Stoddard, Higginson, Julia Ward Howe, Lucy Larcom 
and Harriet Beecher Stowe. 548 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
Middlebury College conferred upon her the degree of Doctor of 
Letters. Mrs. Dorr was a woman of charming personality, a gentle- 
woman in the best sense of the term. Her literary labors continued 
until the end of her long life. She died on January 18, 1912, lacking 
only a few weeks of reaching the age of eighty-eight years. 
WENDELL P. STAFFORD 
Judge Wendell P. Stafford deserves a high place among Ver- 
mont poets. A reference has been made to his appointment as 
Justice of the Supreme Court of the District of Columbia, and he 
is also a professor of equity jurisprudence in George Washington 
University. He retains his legal residence at St. Johnsbury. His 
published works include the following volumes of poems: “North 
Flowers” (1902) ; “Dorian Days” (1909) ; “Voices, a Dramatic Ode” 
(1915) ; “The Land We Love” (1916) ; “War Poems” (1917). Some 
of his Vermont poems deserve to rank among the best of the kind 
ever written, the graceful phraseology and loyal sentiments expressed 
being altogether admirable. Judge Stafford is an eloquent orator and 
a volume of his speeches was published in 1913. 
JAMES BUCKHAM 
James Buckham, eldest son of President Matthew H. Buckham 
of the University of Vermont, was born in Burlington, Vt., November 
25, 1858. He graduated from the University in 1881 and for six 
years was a member of the editorial staff of the Burlington Free 
Press. He established a humorous column known as “The Kaleid- 
oscope,” and his original jokes were widely copied throughout the 
United States and Canada. He took a special course at Johns Hop- 
kins University in 1888 and a post-graduate course at Andover Theo- 
logical Seminary in 1889-90 and 1891-92. From 1893 to 1898 he was 
a member of the editorial staff of the Youth’s Companion, the de- 
partment of poetry being under his supervision. He resigned in order 
to devote his entire time to literary work, residing at Atlantic, Mass., 
and later at Melrose, Mass. He was a writer of graceful verse and 
was a successful author of short stories. Seventy of his short poems 
were published by Copeland and Day of Boston in 1897 under the 
title of “The Heart of Life.” He was at his best in nature studies and 
devotional articles. Other publications were “Where Town and Coun- 
try Meet” (1903) ; “A Wayside Altar,” poems (1905) ; “Afield with 
the Seasons” (1907) ; and “The Heritage of Life” (1907). He died 
January 8, 1908, in his fiftieth year. VERMONT POETS 
549 
DANIEL L. CADY 
“Vermont Rural Life Poems” by Daniel L. Cady, several editions 
of which have been printed, have been very popular. Mr. Cady has 
performed a real public service in preserving in rhyme the quaint and 
half forgotten rural habits and customs of Vermont in the middle of 
the nineteenth century. Mr. Cady was born in West Windsor, Vt., 
March 10, 1861, fitted for college at Kimball Union Academy, Meriden, 
N. H., and graduated from the University of Vermont in 1886. He 
practiced law in New York City until 1912, and since that time has 
resided in Burlington, Vt. He was the poet of the Plattsburg, N. Y., 
Lake Champlain Tercentenary celebration in 1909. A volume of 
poems written by Mr. Cady, entitled “Maize and Milkweed,” has 
been printed for private distribution. 
Among other Vermonters who have written excellent verse, Pro- 
fessor A. W. Peach of Norwich University, Rev. A. W. Hewitt of 
Northfield, and Sylvia Bliss of Calais, should be mentioned. VERMONT NOVELISTS 
DANIEL P. THOMPSON 
PROBABLY more persons have become familiar with the early 
struggles of Vermont through reading D. P. Thompson’s stir- 
ring tale, “The Green Mountain Boys,” than from the pages of 
all the histories of the commonwealth ever written. Based on facts, 
this story has held the interest of three generations of American 
readers. Daniel P. Thompson was born at Charlestown, Mass., near 
historic Bunker Hill, October 1, 1795. With his parents he came to 
Vermont in 1800. He graduated from Middlebury College in 1820, 
was a tutor in the South for several years, studied law, was admitted 
to the bar and opened an office in Montpelier. He was soon appointed 
Register of Probate, and held the office from 1825 to 1833. He served 
as Judge of Probate for Washington county from 1837 to 1840 and 
1841 to 1842. He was Clerk of Washington County Court from 1843 
to 1845 and Secretary of State from 1853 to 1855. From 1849 to 
1856 he edited the Green Mountain Freeman and in this paper he pub- 
lished many historical reminiscences. 
His literary career began with the publication of “May Martin, 
or the Money Diggers,” which won a prize offered by the New Eng- 
land Galaxy, a Boston newspaper. The story was published in book 
form in 1835 and was reprinted in London. During the same year he 
produced a satirical novel, “The Adventures of Timothy Peacock,” 
dealing with the Anti-Masonic movement. His next novel, and his 
most famous work, was “The Green Mountain Boys.” It was dedicated 
to Hon. Heman Allen, United States Minister to Chili. The preface 
was dated March, 1839, and the book was published in Montpelier 
in 1840, being reprinted in Boston and London. “Locke Amsden” 
was published in Boston in 1845, and was designed to bring about a 
reform of the school system. “The Rangers, or the Tory’s Daughter,” 
published in 1850, described incidents of the campaigns of 1777, includ- 
ing the battle of Bennington. Other volumes by Thompson appeared 
as follows: “Tales of the Green Mountains” (1852) ; “Gaut Gurley,” 
a tale of the Umbagog (1857) ; “The Doomed Chief, or King Philip” 
(I860) ; “Centeola” (1864). His “History of Montpelier” was pub- 
lished in 1860. According to Appleton’s Cyclopedia of Biography he 
left an unfinished novel, “The Honest Lawyer, or the Fair Castaway.” 
In personal appearance he was tall and slender, and was a man 
of genial and pleasant manner. The children of the neighborhood 
found him a fascinating story teller and he would hold their attention ARTHUR B. WILDER 
Born in Ponltney, Vt., April 23, 1857, being the son 
of Jonas and Lucy (Brickett) Wilder. He attended 
the public schools and private schools of Rupert and 
Poultney. He was employed as a clerk in stores at 
Rupert, Vt., and Saratoga, N. Y., in various railroad 
positions and as manager of a hotel at Big Stone Gap, 
Va. In July, 1889, he purchased the Eagle Hotel at 
Woodstock, Vt. The following year he sold the prop- 
erty and a new hotel, the Woodstock Inn, was built. 
Mr. Wilder became clerk and later manager, a position 
which he has held (1922) twenty-four years. This is 
one of the largest tourist hotels in the State. He is a 
director of the Woodstock Electric Company, and 
president of the Vermont Hotel Association. Mr. 
Wilder became interested in art at an early age, and 
studied in the Art Students’ League in New York and 
in the Art Guild at Brooklyn. It was his intention to 
make art his profession, but ill health and other cir- 
cumstances prevented. He has painted a large num- 
ber of pictures, is a member of the Boston Water 
Color Club and has exhibited his pictures in Boston, 
New York, Philadelphia and Chicago. Among his pic- 
tures are: “The Open Brook,” “The Oak Tree,” “Snow- 
ing Mount Tom,” “Barnard Hills,” “Apple Boughs in 
Winter,” “Ascutney Mountain,” “Bend in the River,” 
“Autumn Birches,” “Snow Sketch,” “Late Afternoon,” 
“River in the Spring,” “Willows in Spring,” “The Old 
Covered Bridge,” “A Quiet Smoke,” “Interior Sketch,” 
“Night Sketch” (charcoal), “A Grey Day,” “Autumn in 
Virginia,” “The Fair Grounds,” “Charcoal Sketch,” 
“Sewing,” “The Hill Farm” (pastel), “Channel in the 
River” (pastel), “Play House” (pastel), “Moonlight on 
Mount Tom” (pastel), “River in Spring” (pastel), 
“Wayside” (pastel), “Snow Storm,” “Sunlight and 
Shadow” (pastel), “Autumn,” “The Intruder,” “The 
Canal to the Mill,” “Ascutney Mountain” (from 
Amsden), “The Fireside,” “Interior,” “Sketch of Boy,” 
“Winter” (monotype), “Sketch” (monotype). On 
November 14, 1889, he married Juliet McBurney of 
Saratoga, N. Y. Their children are Katherine, Juliet 
R„ Frederick J., Margaret S., Marion I/., and Arthur 
B. Wilder, Jr. VERMONT NOVELISTS 
551 
by the hour. He was fond of out-door life and was an ardent fisher- 
man. 
Mr. Thompson died at his home in Montpelier, June 6, 1868, 
aged nearly seventy-three years. A handsome bronze tablet in his 
memory has been erected in the State House and was dedicated Jan- 
uary 19, 1915. 
ROWLAND E. ROBINSON 
The most popular Vermont novelist of the latter half of the 
nineteenth century was Rowland E. Robinson. A close observer and 
a keen lover of nature, familiar from his childhood with the people 
of this State, their traditions and their customs, he was able to depict 
Vermont life with great accuracy. No writer has equalled Rowland 
Robinson in the use of the Vermont dialect of a generation or more 
ago, and his reproduction of the French-Canadian dialect is equally 
good. He was born in Ferrisburg, May 14, 1833, of Quaker parentage. 
His father was an active Abolitionist and the Robinson homestead was 
a station on the “Underground Railroad” that transported runaway 
slaves to Canada in the period preceding the Civil War. His mother 
was the daughter of a New York painter and from her he inherited 
an artistic temperament. As a lad he spent much time in the fields 
and woods and became familiar with the birds, the animals and the 
fishes of the region in which he lived. 
Mr. Robinson spent a part of his life in New York. Many of 
his sketches appeared as illustrations in Leslie’s Weekly, and he was 
a draughtsman for the Orange Judd publications for several years. 
He was a frequent contributor to Forest and Stream, and was a mem- 
ber of its editorial staff. Failing eyesight compelled him to return 
to the ancestral homestead in Ferrisburg, and after seven years of 
impaired vision he became totally blind in 1893. Fortunately his mem- 
ory was stored with recollections of the world around him, and with 
a grooved board prepared for the blind he was able to write some 
of his best stories, which were prepared for publication by his faithful 
wife. He died at his home, October 15, 1900. 
Mr. Robinson’s books include the following titles: “Uncle Lisha’s 
Shop” (1887); “Sam Lovel’s Camps” (1889); “Vermont, a Study 
of Independence” (1892) ; “Danvis Folks” (1894) ; “In New Eng- 
land Fields and Woods” (1896) ; “Uncle Lisha’s Outing” (1897) ; 
“A Hero of Ticonderoga” (1898); “In the Green Wood” (1899); 
“A Danvis Pioneer” (1900); “Sam Lovel’s Boy” (1901); “Hunting 
Without a Gun, and Other Tales” (1905) ; “Out of Bondage” (1905). 
Several of his books were not published until after his death. 552 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
Mr. Robinson ranked among the best of American dialect writers 
and he performed a valuable service in preserving pictures of early 
Vermont life that without his pen might have been lost to later gen- 
erations. 
DOROTHY CANFIELD FISHER 
One of the best known of present-day (1921) writers is Mrs. 
Dorothy Canfield Fisher, whose home is in Arlington. She is a 
daughter of the late James H. Canfield, president of Ohio State Uni- 
versity and afterward librarian of Columbia University. She was 
born at Lawrence, Kan., February 17, 1879, graduated from Ohio 
State University in 1899, and received her Ph. D. degree at Columbia 
in 1904. In 1907 she married John R. Fisher of New York. She 
was secretary of the Horace Mann School, 1902-05, studied and 
traveled extensively in Europe, was a frequent contributor to maga- 
zines, and was engaged in war work in France for three years. She 
carried on work for soldiers blinded in battle, organized a Red Cross 
hospital for children from the evacuated portions of France, and 
conducted a camp on the edge of the war zone where her husband 
was training young ambulance workers. When peace came the Fisher 
family returned to their Vermont home. In 1921, Governor Hartness 
appointed Mrs. Fisher a member of the State Board of Education. 
Her books include the following: “Corneille and Racine in England” 
(1904) ; “What Shall We Do Now” (1906) ; “Gunhild” (1907) ; “The 
Squirrel Cage” (1912) ; “The Montessori Mother” (1913) ; “Mothers 
and Children” (1914) ; “Hillsboro People” (1915) ; “The Bent Twig” 
(1915); “The Real Motive” (1916); “Understood Betsy” (1917); 
“Home Fires in France” (1918) ; “The Day of Glory” (1919) ; “The 
Brimming Cup” (1921). 
SARAH N. CLEGHORN 
Another Vermont author is Sarah N. Cleghorn, who was born 
in Norfolk, Va., February 4, 1876. She graduated from Burr and 
Burton Seminary, at Manchester, Vt., in 1895, and later studied at 
Radcliffe College. Her home is at Manchester. Her published works 
include: “A Turnpike Lady” (1907) ; “The Spinster” (1916) ; “Fel- 
low Captains” (with Dorothy Canfield Fisher) (1916) ; “Portraits 
and Protests” (poems) (1917). VERMONT NOVELISTS 
553 
THEODORA A. PECK 
Theodora A. Peck was born in Burlington, October 25, 1882, 
being the only child of Gen. and Mrs. Theodore S. Peck. She grad- 
uated from the Burlington High School in 1900 and studied two years 
in the University of Vermont. She has written several historical 
novels and some poems. Among her best known novels are: “Hester 
of the Grants” (1905) ; “The Sword of Dundee” (1908) ; and “White 
Dawn” (1914). 
RUDYARD KIPLING 
Rudyard Kipling’s wife was a Miss Balestier of Brattleboro and 
this fact induced him to build a residence in the style of an Indian 
bungalow a little way out from that Vermont village, which he named 
“Naulakha.” Here he lived for several years and here some of his 
children were born. While living here he went to the Grand Banks 
of Newfoundland with Dr. James Conland of Brattleboro, his family 
physician, to obtain materials for “Captains Courageous.” Here he 
wrote this novel, also “The Jungle Book,” a collection of short stories 
entitled “The Day’s Work,” and poems in “The Seven Seas.” 
Raymond McFarland 
Prof. Raymond McFarland, until recently a member of the faculty 
of Middlebury College, now (1921) principal of Vermont Academy 
at Saxtons River, has written several interesting sea tales. SOME VERMONT NEWSPAPERS AND EDITORS 
PROBABLY the first printing press in Vermont was set up at 
Brattleboro in 1773 by Samuel Gale, a New York surveyor, who 
became clerk of Cumberland County Court. He was a Royalist, 
fought with the Court party at the Westminster Massacre, so-called, 
was arrested and imprisoned and his property was confiscated. 
The first printing press to be operated m Vermont, concerning 
which there is any definite knowledge, was set up in the town of 
Dresden in 1778, the year in which the State government of Vermont 
began its existence. Dresden included Hanover, N. H., and Dart- 
mouth College, and at that time was claimed as a part of Vermont. 
The printers who settled here were Alden and Judah P. Spooner and 
Timothy Green, who had been conducting a similar business in Nor- 
wich, Conn., since 1773. One of the early acts of the Vermont Legis- 
lature was the designation of the Spooner brothers as State printers. 
It appears that President Wheelock of Dartmouth College invited 
Alden Spooner to locate in the vicinity of that institution. Judah 
Spooner and Timothy Green soon followed. 
The Spooners took to Vermont a press on which was printed the 
first Vermont newspaper, which was the first printing press brought 
into North America north of Mexico. The facts concerning this 
valuable relic were assembled by the late Gen. Rush C. Hawkins, 
a native of Vermont and an authority on early printing, by Henry 
O. Houghton, the famous publisher, also a native of Vermont, and 
by Robert F. Roden in a book entitled “The Story of the First Printing 
Press in the United States.” 
Stephen Daye, the first American printer, established an office 
in Cambridge, Mass., in 1638 and purchased in England a small print- 
ing press. On this press the Bay State Psalm Book was printed, which 
is said to have been the first book printed in what is now the United 
States. This printing press was used by Stephen Daye’s son and later 
by Samuel Green and his son, Timothy. A second Timothy Green 
formed a partnership with Alden and Judah P. Spooner. The press 
was taken first to Dresden (N. H.) and in 1781 to Westminster, the 
first Vermont newspaper being printed on it. After being discarded 
for many years the old press was purchased by L. O. Green of the 
Woodstock Standard, M. O. Perkins of the Windsor Journal, and one 
or two other Vermont printers, and given to the Vermont Historical 
Society. It is on exhibition in the Historical Society rooms at Mont- 
pelier, being its chief treasure. 
The first Vermont newspaper was known as the Vermont Gazette 
or Green Mountain Post Boy. There is in the possession of the Ver- 
mont Historical Society No. 8 of volume 1 of this paper, bearing VERMONT NEWSPAPERS AND EDITORS 
555 
date of April 2, 1781. If the paper was issued weekly, then the first 
number was printed February 12, 1781. A Vermont Almanack, printed 
in 1796, announced as a fact the statement that the first Vermont 
newspaper was printed December 14, 1780. There were so many 
delays in the issuing of newspapers during the early period of Ver- 
mont’s existence that it is entirely possible that the date given may 
have been correct. The paper maintained a precarious existence for 
two years. In August, 1783, the press and type were removed to 
Windsor, where Alden Spooner and George Hough began the pub- 
lication of the Vermont Journal and Universal Advertiser, using the 
old Daye press. Until his death in 1827, Alden Spooner was a well- 
known figure in Vermont affairs. This paper under different names 
and once transferred to Woodstock, still exists under the name of the 
Windsor Journal. 
It is worthy of note that many of the earliest newspapers in 
Vermont, in the United States and in the world at large bore the 
name “Gazette.” The term comes from a small Italian coin known 
as gazetta, the price for which some of the earliest newspapers were 
sold. 
The Vermont Gazette or Freeman’s Depository, Vermont’s second 
newspaper, was established at Bennington in May, 1783, by Anthony 
Haswell, who was born in England and came to Boston in 1769 or 
1770. He served as a printer’s apprentice under Isaiah Thomas, one 
of the founders of the Massachusetts Spy, one of the most famous 
of early American journalists and a leader of the Revolutionary party. 
Thomas aided Paul Revere in spreading the information of the ap- 
proach of British troops at Lexington, and a price was set upon his 
head. His type and press were sent to Worcester, Mass., where the 
paper was published for many years. For about a year, in 1777-78, 
Haswell conducted the Spy, until Thomas was ready to resume its 
management. For twenty-three years Haswell conducted the Gazette, 
most of the time under rather discouraging circumstances. There 
were frequent suspensions for brief periods, owing to lack of financial 
support, and the files will show that several fresh starts were made 
with Vol. 1, No. 1 appearing on the title page. Appeals for the pay- 
ment of subscriptions overdue, for produce and for firewood, give 
some idea of the editor’s troubles. On one occasion Haswell’s house 
was burned. In 1792 he established The Herald of Vermont or The 
Rutland Courier, at Rutland. In about three months fire destroyed the 
office. The Legislature granted the right to raise the sum of 
two hundred pounds by lottery, but the venture did not prove profit- 
able and the publication was not resumed. Twice, without success, 
Haswell tried to publish a monthly magazine. He was Postmaster- 
General of Vermont from 1784 probably until Vermont’s admission 556 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
to the Union. He was also Clerk of the Vermont House of Repre- 
sentatives for several years. 
In April, 1793, James Lyon of Fair Haven, son of Matthew 
Lyon, established The Farmer’s Library, or Vermont’s Political and 
Historical Register, at Rutland. Later Matthew Lyon established 
The Fair Haven Gazette, which was published by his son, James Lyon, 
and Judah P. Spooner. 
One of the ablest Vermonters, either in the earlier or later periods 
of Vermont history, was Samuel Williams. When James Lyon sold 
The Farmer’s Library, so-called, it was transferred to Judge Samuel 
Williams and Rev. Samuel Williams and the name was changed to 
the Rutland Herald or Vermont Mercury. Rev. Samuel Williams was 
the editor and the paper became a supporter of the Federalist party. 
The controversies between the Vermont Gazette and the Rutland 
Herald were spirited and at times somewhat personal. Mr. Williams 
was a grandson of Rev. John Williams, captured by the Indians at 
Deerfield, and was also a descendant of the famous Mather family. 
In 1825 a young and awkward lad, whose parents lived at West 
Haven, answered an advertisement for an apprentice, printed by 
Amos Bliss of East Poultney in his paper, the Northern Spectator 
(established as the Poultney Gazette in 1822), and so, at the age of 
fifteen, Horace Greeley began his newspaper career in this little Ver- 
mont hamlet. For six months he worked for his board and for 
about four years thereafter he worked for $40 a year and his board. 
Most of his scanty earnings went to his bankrupt father. At a de- 
bating society in the East Poultney school house he made his first 
speech. Finally the paper suspended publication, and one June morn- 
ing in 1830, with his first overcoat on his arm, given him by the man 
with whom he boarded, he started on foot for Pennsylvania, whither 
his father had preceded him. The Vermont Press Association has 
purchased the house at East Poultney in which Greeley learned the 
printers’ trade. 
During the period when Greeley was living in Poultney, a native 
of that town, a lad of about the same age, named George Jones, was 
employed in the same office and was an attendant at the same church 
frequented by the future editor of the New York Tribune. Jones 
was associated with Greeley on the New Yorker and on the Tribune. 
He aided Henry J. Raymond (a graduate of the University of 
Vermont in 1840) in founding the Nezv York Times and assumed 
full control when Mr. Raymond died. It is related that he was 
offered five million dollars to refrain from publishing facts ex- 
posing the corruption of Tammany Hall in New York City affairs, 
but declined, saying: “I don’t think the devil will ever make a higher 
bid for me than that.” Mr. Jones made the Times one of the leading 
American newspapers. He died August 11, 1891, in his eightieth year. VERMONT NEWSPAPERS AND EDITORS 
557 
The Burlington Centinel was first published at Burlington by 
J. H. Baker, March 14, 1801. The name was changed to Northern 
and Burlington Centinel (Sentinel), and with the exception of one 
lapse, the paper was published until 1869, during which time John G. 
Saxe was one of the editors. 
The Burlington Free Press was established March IS, 1827, by 
Luman Foote. H. B. Stacy became associated with Mr. Foote in 
February, 1828, and in January, 1833, became sole proprietor until 
July, 1846, when D. W. C. Clarke became owner and editor. April 
1, 1853, G. W. and G. G. Benedict became proprietors. The daily issue 
was begun in April, 1848, and up to 1868 was published as an evening 
newspaper. G. G. Benedict’s connection with the paper continued 
until his death in 1907, or fifty-four years. Mr. Benedict was a prom- 
inent figure in the life of the State for many years, as soldier, editor, 
business man and public spirited citizen. A controlling interest in 
the paper was purchased in 1902 by W. B. Howe. J. L. Southwick, 
the managing editor, has been on the staff of the paper since 1884. 
In 1868 the Burlington Times was merged with the Free Press and 
the daily was known as the Free Press and Times. The Burlington 
Times had been started in June, 1858, by D. W. C. Clarke and in 1860 
transferred to George H. Bigelow. The Burlington Daily News, an 
evening paper, was established by Joseph Auld in 1894. 
The Federal Galaxy was started at Brattleboro in 1797 by Ben- 
jamin Smead and published until about 1802. In 1822 the Brattleboro 
Messenger was established by Alexander C. Putnam, and sold in 
1826 to George W. Nichols, who had learned the printers’ trade in 
the office of Isaiah Thomas at Walpole, N. H. In 1834 it was merged 
with the Vermont Phoenix and from 1852 to 1855 was known as the 
Vermont Statesman. The Phoenix is published as a weekly edition of 
the Daily Reformer. The Reformer was established as a weekly in 
1876 by C. H. Davenport & Co. O. L. French became associated in 
the control of the Phoenix and later acquired the sole ownership, 
which he held until he sold it to W. E. Hubbard. Later the two papers 
were united, and the Reformer was made an evening daily. 
The first newspaper at Bellows Falls was the Intelligencer, which 
was established in January, 1807, and edited by Thomas Green Fessen- 
den, a lawyer and a Federalist. Mr. Fessenden continued to edit the 
paper until 1822, when he removed to Boston and established the 
New England Farmer; the paper was published until about 1835. 
The Bellows Falls Gazette was begun by John W. Moore and con- 
tinued until 1851. The Belloios Falls Times was founded by O. H. 
Platt about 1851 and soon after purchased by A. N. Swain, who 
published it until 1888. It has been in the hands of various publishers, 
but for several years has been published and edited by W. C. Belknap. 558 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
In 1829 an Anti-Masonic paper was started at Chester. The 
Northfield News was established by George H. Richmond in 1879. 
This paper, which became very influential, was published by F. N. 
Whitney until his death and later purchased by F. T. Parsons, who 
had been business manager of the Rutland Herald and Montpelier 
Journal and later held the office of Sergeant-at-arms. The Manchester 
Journal, established in 1861, was published by D. K. Simonds for 
many years and later by O. R. Bennett. 
In 1883, Lewis and Fisk established the Morrisville News and 
Citizen, the editor being L. H. Lewis. The Morrisville Messenger 
was started by J. E. Harris, a brilliant newspaper writer, and later 
bought by L. P. Thayer. 
The National Opinion was established at Bradford in June, 1865, 
with A. A. Earle as editor. The name was changed to Bradford 
Opinion in 1874, and from 1876 to 1881 two papers by the name of 
Bradford Opinion were published. In the latter year the two papers 
were merged by H. E. Parker under the title of United Opinion. 
A Methodist paper, the Vermont Christian Messenger, was estab- 
lished at Newbury in 1847. It was later published at Northfield and 
Montpelier, and discontinued some time in the eighties. 
C. M. Chase, one of the most interesting characters in Vermont 
journalism, established the Vermont Union at Lyndon, February 1, 
1865. It was continued as the Union-Journal by his son, John B. Chase. 
The first Barre newspaper was the Times, which was published 
monthly during the year 1871. In December, 1880, L. P. Thayer 
established the Barre Enterpriser and in 1897 the Barre Daily Times 
was started by Frank E. Langley, now (1921) Mayor of Barre. The 
Barre Telegram, established in 1898 as an evening paper, was made 
a morning paper in 1905 and later discontinued. 
The Vermont Statesman, published at Castleton from 1824 to 
1855, was a Whig paper. In 1832 the Green Mountain Eagle was 
established at Castleton as an Anti-Masonic organ. It suspended 
publication with the decline of that party. 
The first St. Johnsbury paper was the Farmers’ Herald, estab- 
lished by Luther Jewett, July 8, 1828. The Caledonian, established 
in 1837, was for a long time published by C. M. Stone and later pub- 
lished and edited by Arthur F. Stone. It was purchased by W. J. 
Bigelow, who established a daily edition. William Dudley Pelley, 
a well-known writer of short stories, purchased it in 1918. Later 
it was sold to H. A. Smith. The St. Johnsbury Republican, started in 
1885, was published as a daily from 1892 to 1894. In 1895 it was 
purchased by L. P. Thayer and later by C. T. Walter. In 1920 it 
was made the weekly edition of the Caledonian. 
The first St. Albans paper, the Adviser, was published by Rufus 
Allen in 1807. This was followed by the Champlain Reporter, pub- VERMONT NEWSPAPERS AND EDITORS 
559 
lished by Morton & Willard from April, 1809, until the spring of 
1811. There was no paper published in Franklin county from that 
time until May, 1823, when Judah P. Spooner established the Re- 
pository, which he continued until April, 1836. The Franklin Journal, 
started in May, 1833, by Samuel N. Sweet as an Anti-Masonic paper, 
was published for a time by Joseph H. Brainerd and in December, 
1837, sold to E. B. Whiting, who changed the name to the St. Albans 
Messenger and later in 1863 converted it into a daily. In 1871 he 
sold it to Clarke and Taylor, who had purchased the Vermont Daily 
Transcript, founded at St. Albans in 1868 by W. P. Davis, and who 
consolidated the two papers. Albert Clarke was sole editor and pro- 
prietor from 1873 until 1880, when the Messenger was consolidated 
with the Advertiser, which had been established in 1874 as a semi- 
weekly and made a daily in 1878. From 1886 to 1892 the Messenger 
was published by Warren Gibbs and since that time by the Messenger 
Company. For several years Col. George T. Childs was editor; 
Frank L. Greene became assistant editor in 1899 and later editor, 
holding the position until his election to Congress in 1912; John T. 
Cushing is now editor (1921). 
In January, 1807, the Danville North Star was established by 
Ebenezer Eaton. It was long an influential paper and suspended 
publication in 1891. About the period of the War of 1812 Joseph 
Dix conducted a printing office at Barnard for several years. His 
daughter, Dorothy Dix, famous later as an author and philanthropist, 
lived here as a young girl. 
The first newspaper in Montpelier, The Precursor, was established 
by Clark Brown in 1806 and in the summer of 1807 was sold to Samuel 
Goss, who changed the name to the Watchman. In 1810 the Watch- 
man was purchased by Mark Goss and Ezekiel P. Walton, the latter 
becoming sole proprietor about 1817. Upon the death of the Anti- 
Masonic party, its organ, the State Journal, was absorbed and the 
title was changed to the Vermont Watchman and State Journal. The 
paper remained in the control of the Walton family until it was sold 
to J. and J. M. Poland in 1868. During the Civil War and during 
legislative sessions daily editions were published. The Montpelier 
Daily Journal was established in 1897 with Arthur Ropes as editor, 
the Watchman being the weekly edition of the Journal, which was 
later made a morning paper. Both the Watchman and the Journal 
have been discontinued. The Watchman was both Federalist, Whig 
and later Republican. Under E. P. Walton the Watchman was a 
power in Vermont affairs. 
The Freemen’s Press, a Democratic paper, was established at 
Montpelier, August 25, 1809, by Derrick Sibley and later was pub- 
lished by Wright and Sibley. It was afterward suspended and no 
Democratic paper was published in Montpelier until 1826, when Hon. 560 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
Isaac Hill of Concord, N. H., a famous politician, established the 
Vermont Patriot and State Gazette, George W. Steele, being man- 
ager and Horace Steele, editor. In July, 1851, Charles G. East- 
man, the poet, became owner and editor of the Patriot, holding 
this position until his death, September 16, 1860. After Mr. Eastman’s 
death the Vermont Patriot was published for a time by his estate and 
later by E. M. Brown, until the fall of 1861, when publication was sus- 
pended. In February, 1863, it was resumed by Hiram Atkins, who 
had established the Bellozus Falls Argus in December, 1853. He now 
moved his publication to Montpelier and called it the Argus and 
Patriot. The paper became successful and was a pioneer in its field, 
having a large list of items from many towns. The paper was aggres- 
sively Democratic and Mr. Atkins was influential in State and na- 
tional Democratic councils. He was active in securing Hancock’s 
nomination for the Presidency in 1880. Dr. Talcott Williams, formerly 
head of the Columbia University School of Journalism, has used the 
incident to illustrate the power which the editor of a small newspaper 
may wield. The Daily Argus was established in 1897. 
The Green Mountain Freeman was established at Montpelier in 
1844 by Joseph Poland as the organ of the Liberty party. It was at 
one time owned by D. P. Thompson, author of “The Green Mountain 
Boys,” and in 1861 was purchased by C. W. Willard, by whom it 
was edited and published until 1869. Mr. Willard was Secretary of 
State from 1855 to 1856 and was elected to Congress in 1868, where 
he served three terms. The Freeman was published by J. W. Whee- 
lock and later by H. R. Wheelock, the publication being suspended in 
1885. 
In August, 1798, Samuel Chipman established the Vergennes 
Gazette and in 1838 Rufus W. Griswold started the Vergennes Ver- 
monter, which is still published. The Vergennes Enterprise, estab- 
lished in 1900, was consolidated with the Vermonter in 1901. 
The Middlebury Mercury was published from 1801 to 1810. 
Dr. Thomas E. Powers did editorial work on the Vermont Mer- 
cury, published at Woodstock. He was editor of the Vermont Tem- 
perance Standard, established in 1853, which later became a local 
paper, the Vermont Standard. Doctor Powers was elected Speaker 
of the House in 1850 and in 1857 was made superintendent of the 
construction of the State House, carrying the work to completion. 
He had great powers of leadership, although he was pugnacious and 
domineering. Gilman, in his “Bibliography of Vermont,” says of him: 
“ ‘Tom’ Powers was one of the most remarkable men the State 
of Vermont has produced. * * * Doctor Powers’ best place was in 
public debate. Of commanding stature and presence and with a voice 
of remarkable power, he was able to crush most opponents by mere 
denunciation; and being able to reason clearly and rapidly, an adept WOODSTOCK INX, WOODSTOCK, VT. Woodstock Inn, Woodstock VERMONT NEWSPAPERS AND EDITORS 
561 
at appealing to the prejudices of men, quick at retort and strong in 
sarcasm, he was an antagonist feared by all. Other men have accom- 
plished more in Vermont legislation, but certainly no man ever ap- 
proached him in effectiveness on the floor of the Vermont House. * * * 
Other men have been more successful in politics in the State, but 
while on the summit of the temperance wave he had done so much 
to create, he probably had the strongest personal following ever known 
in Vermont. It was said that, single handed, he made Ryland Fletcher 
Governor in 1856.” 
The Bennington State Banner was established in 1841 and the 
Bennington County Reformer was published from 1881 to 1883 by 
R. P. Childs and later by J. H. Livingston. H. L. Stillson was editor 
of the Banner for many years. In 1903 Frank E. Howe purchased 
both papers, consolidated them and established an evening daily, of 
which he is editor. Mr. Howe has been Speaker of the House and 
Lieutenant-Governor. 
The Burlington Suburban List was established at Essex Junction 
in 1891 by L. M. Hays and L. P. Thayer. It is now (1921) operated 
by Milo C. Reynolds. 
The Newport Express and Standard, of which David M. Camp 
was editor and publisher for nearly twenty-five years, was established 
in 1864; D. W. Hildreth was also the editor and publisher for a 
long time. 
The Enosburg Standard was established in 1874. 
In 1874 the Randolph Herald was established. For many years 
Luther B. Johnson has been editor and publisher. Mr. Johnson has 
served in the State Senate and is now (1921) chairman of the State 
Board of Education. 
The Orleans County Monitor was established at Barton by George 
H. Blake about 1871 and later was purchased by Wallace H. Gilpin, 
who has been a member of the State Board of Education. 
The Vermonter, a monthly illustrated magazine, was established 
at St. Albans in August, 1895, by Col. C. S. Forbes. It was later 
sold to Charles R. Cummings and removed to White River Junction. 
The Household, established at Brattleboro in 1868, was developed 
by George E. Crowell into a magazine for women. It attained a very 
large circulation and was sold to a Boston concern in 1891. 
For a brief time, from October 5, 1828, to March 27, 1829, Wil- 
liam Lloyd Garrison, later a famous anti-slavery leader, edited The 
Journal of the Times at Bennington. 
James R. Spaulding, a native of Montpelier and a graduate of 
the University of Vermont in the class of 1840, was associate editor 
of the New York Courier and Enquirer, James Watson Webb’s news- 
paper, in the fifties, and in 1859 or 1860 was one of the founders of 562 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
the New York World. Mr. Spaulding was later an associate editor 
of the New York Times. 
A classmate of Mr. Spaulding in the University of Vermont was 
Henry J. Raymond, and while in college he began to write for Horace 
Greeley’s New Yorker. When the New York Tribune was founded 
Raymond became associate editor. He is said to have been the swiftest 
long-hand writer in the newspaper profession at that time and Daniel 
Webster preferred to have his speeches taken by Raymond if possible. 
Raymond was an able orator and held many public positions, among 
them Speaker of the New York Assembly, Lieutenant-Governor of 
New York and member of Congress. He is best known, however, 
as the founder of the New York Times in 1851. He married Miss 
Weaver of Winooski. 
Wilbur F. Storey, a native of Salisbury, in his time was one of 
the most widely known editors in the Middle West, and was the 
founder and long time editor and owner of the Detroit Free Press. 
Among former Vermonters prominent in the newspaper world 
are Andrew J. Aikens, a native of Barnard, long editor and manager 
of the Milwaukee Evening Wisconsin, and originator in 1864 of the 
“patent inside” for newspapers. 
Luther Tucker, born in Brandon, publisher and editor of the 
Rochester Union and Advertiser and founder of The Country Gentle- 
men. 
Charles B. Murray, also born in Brandon, founder and editor 
of the Cincinnati Commercial Review, pork and crop statistician and 
superintendent of the Cincinnati Chamber of Commerce. 
George P. Rowell, a native of Concord, founder of the first adver- 
tising agency in the United States, who published the first newspaper 
directory in 1867 and established the well-known publication known 
as Printer’s Ink. 
Jay B. Benton, born in Guildhall, long a member of the editorial 
stafif of the Boston Transcript. 
Charles Whiting Baker, a native of Johnson and an alumnus of 
the University of Vermont, long editor-in-chief of the Engineering 
Nezi’s. His brother, Moses N. Baker, also a graduate of the Univer- 
sity, has been editor of the Engineering News-Record. 
Joseph H. Barrett, born in Ludlow, editor of the Cincinnati Ga- 
zette and United States Commissioner of Pensions, 1861-1868. 
Charles M. Thompson, born in Montpelier, a son of D. P. Thomp- 
son, the author, for several years editor-in-chief of the Youth’s Com- 
panion. 
Charles Kellogg Field, also a native of Montpelier, editor of the 
Sunset Magazine at San Francisco. VERMONT NEWSPAPERS AND EDITORS 
563 
Charles S. Gleed, born in Morristown, lawyer, banker, former 
editor of the Denver Daily Tribune and president of the Kansas City 
Journal corporation. 
Henry Mills Alden, born in Mount Tabor, who became managing 
editor of Harper's Weekly in 1864 and for over fifty years was editor 
of Harper’s Magazine. 
Everett Chamberlain, a native of Newbury, at various times was 
editor of the Milwaukee Sentinel, the Chicago Tribune and the Chicago 
Times. 
John E. Wheeler, born in Newfane, long associated with Horace 
Greeley in publishing the Nezv York Tribune and later editor of the 
Chicago Tribune. 
Frank Gilbert, born in Pittsford, successively editor of the 
Dubuque Times, the Chicago Evening Journal, the Chicago Inter- 
Ocean and the Chicago Tribune. 
Burges Johnson, a native of Rutland, on the literary staff of 
Harper’s, later assistant editor of Everybody’s Magazine, editor of 
Outing and later president of the publishing firm of Thompson, Brown 
and Co. 
Charles G. Whiting, a native of St. Albans, long literary editor of 
the Springfield Republican. 
Frederic W. Pangborn, also born in St. Albans, at one time 
editor of Godey’s Magazine. 
Rev. Charles H. Parkhurst, born in Sharon, for a considerable 
period editor of Zion’s Herald. 
Warren B. Ewer, born at Windsor, founder and editor for thirty 
years of the San Francisco Mining and Scientific Press. He is said 
to have induced Henry Wilson to enter public life and John B. Gough 
to begin his career as a lecturer. 
To these names should be added those of Lucius Bigelow, former 
editor of the Portland Oregonian, and William H. Field, son of Hon. 
Henry F. Field of Rutland, business manager of the Chicago Tribune 
from 1909-1917, vice-president and general manager of that paper 
during the absence of Col. Robert McCormick and Capt. Joseph Pat- 
terson in the war during 1917 and 1918, and later its general Eastern 
representative, with headquarters at New York. 
Bert Leston Taylor, formerly employed on Brattleboro and Mont- 
pelier papers and editor of the Barre paper, was well known as the 
author of a popular “Line o’ Type or Two” column. 
Clifton L. Sherman, born at Brattleboro, for many years was 
managing editor of the Hartford Courant. 
Henry Conland, son of the late Dr. James Conland of Brattleboro, 
a former employee of the Brattleboro Reformer, became business 
manager of the Hartford Courant. 564 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
William T. Porter, born in Newbury, employed by Horace Gree- 
ley; in 1851 founded and for twenty-five years edited The Spirit of 
the Times, the first sporting paper in America. 
VERMONT NEWSPAPERS IN 1921 
Following is a list of Vermont newspapers and their editors in 
1921: 
Daily Newspapers: 
Barre Times, D. A. Perry; Frank Langley, publisher. 
Bennington Banner, Frank E. Howe. 
Brattleboro Reformer, W. J. Bigelow; Ephraim Crane and H. C. 
Rice, publishers. 
Burlington Free Press, J. L. South wick; W. B. Howe, publisher. 
Burlington News, John H. Lawton. 
Montpelier Argus, Morris F. Atkins. 
Rutland Herald, Howard L. Hindley. 
Rutland News, D. G. Babbitt. 
St. Albans Messenger, John T. Cushing. 
St. Johnsbury Caledonian, Arthur F. Stone; Herbert A. Smith, 
publisher. 
Weekly Newspapers: 
Barton Monitor, W. H. Gilpin. 
Bellows Falls Times, W. C. Belknap. 
Bradford Opinion, H. E. Parker. 
Brandon Union, R. C. Flood. 
Bristol Herald, M. W. Wilson. 
Essex Syndicate, M. C. Reynolds. 
Essex County Herald, Harry W. Osborne. 
Enosburg Falls Standard, E. J. Tyler and D. A. Rose. 
Fair Haven Era, John Metcalf. 
Groton Times, Bert Heath, Jr. 
Hardwick Gazette, J. E. Appolt. 
Ludlow Tribune, J. W. Sault. 
Lunenburg Times, H. H. Sanderson. 
Lyndonville Uni on-Journal, John B. Chase. 
Manchester Journal, O. R. Bennett. 
Middlebury Register, C. E. Crane. 
Morrisville News and Citizen, L. H. Lewis. 
Morrisville Messenger, L. P. Thayer. 
Northfield News, F. T. Parsons. 
Poultney Journal, C. W. Humphrey. 
Randolph Herald and News, L. B. Johnson. VERMONT NEWSPAPERS AND EDITORS 
565 
Richford Gazette, M. J. Maloney. 
Richford Journal, C. L. Reed. 
South Londonderry Sifter, G. C. Dixon. 
Springfield Reporter, Georgia White; F. D. Johnson, publisher. 
Swanton Courier, J. H. Tomson. 
Vergennes Enterprise and Vermonter, W. H. Wheeler. 
Waterbury Record, H. C. Whitehill. 
White River Junction Landmark, L. V. Chew. 
Deerfield Valley Times (Wilmington), F. J. Brabston. 
Woodstock Standard, W. H. Moore. 
The Vermonter, C. R. Cummings. VERMONT ARTISTS 
WILLIAM L. PICKNELL 
WILLIAM L. Picknell was born in Hinesburg, in 1854. He was 
aided by his uncle, Daniel S. Ford of Boston, in securing an 
art education. He studied with George Inness at Rome for 
two years, living in the artist’s home. Later he studied at the Ecole des 
Beaux Arts in Paris, under Gerome, and with Robert Wylie in Brit- 
tany. Picknell was famous for his brilliant light effects, and rich color, 
and also for shimmering mists in his gray marine pictures. He was 
a member of the Society of American Artists, and the Society of 
British Artists. He won medals at Boston in 1881 and 1888. His 
principal works include: “Route de Concarneau” (1880) and “En 
Province,” in the Corcoran Art Gallery at Washington; “Borders of 
the Marsh” (1880), Academy of Fine Arts, Philadelphia; “Morning 
on the Loire” and “Coast of Ipswich” (1882), in the Boston Museum 
of Fine Arts; “Borders of the Loing” and “Bleak December,” Metro- 
politan Museum, New York; “Wintry March,” Walker Gallery, Liver- 
pool, England; “Morning on the Mediterranean,” Luxembourg Gallery, 
Paris; “Toiler of the Sea,” Carnegie Institute, Pittsburg. 
The artist died in 1897. 
WILLIAM MORRIS HUNT 
William Morris Hunt was a member of a distinguished Vermont 
family being the son of Congressman Jonathan Hunt and the grandson 
of Lieut.-Gov. Jonathan Hunt. His brother, Richard M. Hunt, was a 
famous architect. He was born at Brattleboro, March 31, 1824. He 
attended the public schools and entered Harvard College but did not 
complete his course. The routine work was not to his liking and a 
threatened attack of tuberculosis induced his mother to take the 
family to Europe. He studied painting in the Acadmey at Dusseldorf, 
and later went to Paris, where he studied for five years, being one 
of the favorite pupils of Couture. Afterward he became the friend 
and follower of Millet. He returned to America in 1855 and opened 
a studio in Boston. 
His most ambitious works were the “Flight of Night” and “Dis- 
covery,” colossal decorations in the New York Capitol at Albany. 
Among his most important pictures were “The Boy and the Butterfly,” 
“Head of a Jewess,” “Sheep Shearing at Barbizon,” “The Farmer’s 
Return,” “The Fortune Teller” and “The Prodigal Son.” The Boston 
Museum contains “Girl with a Kitten,” “Girl Reading,” “Peasant Girl CHARLES S. CAVERLY 
Born in Troy, N. H., September 30, 1856. He gradu- 
ated from Dartmouth College in 1878 and from the 
College of Medicine of the University of Vermont in 
1881, where he was class leader and won three prizes. 
After a year and a half of post-graduate work in New 
York, he located in Rutland in 1883 and made a spec- 
ialty of diseases of the throat and lungs. He was an 
assistant surgeon of the Vermont National Guard, at- 
tending physician of the Rutland Hospital, consulting 
physician of the Proctor Hospital, a trustee of the Ver- 
mont Tuberculosis Sanatorium, president of the Ver- 
mont State Medical Society (1892) and a director of 
the American Public Health Association. In 1890 he 
was made a member of the State Board of Health and 
was its president from 1891 until his death. He per- 
formed the duties of this responsible position with 
great efficiency. He was also professor of hygiene in 
the College of Medicine of the University of Vermont, 
and was given the honorary degree of Doctor of Science 
by that institution. He was an authority on infantile 
paralysis and was the author of the first report on this 
disease made to the medical profession of the country. 
He published many articles on this subject and through 
his efforts money was contributed for research work. 
He made several trips to Europe for the purpose of 
studying methods of sanitation and health. He was 
associated with the most eminent specialists in America 
in the study of tuberculosis and infantile paralysis. 
When the influenza epidemic of 1918 visited Vermont, 
Doctor Caverly, as president of the State Board of 
Health, took personal charge of the efforts to combat 
this plague. His efforts overtaxed his strength and he 
fell a victim to the disease, dying October 16, 1918. In 
1885 he married Mabel A. Tuttle of Rutland. One son, 
Harley T., died in 1910, aged twenty-three years. VERMONT ARTISTS 
567 
at Barbizon,” “Marguerite” and “Hurdy Gurdy Boy” by Mr. Hunt. 
In the Metropolitan Museum at New York are “The Bathers” and 
“Girl at the Fountain,” by the same artist. Among his best known 
landscapes are, “Gloucester Harbor,” “Magnolia, Mass,”, and “Dead in 
the Snow.” He held high rank as a portrait painter, and among his 
best known portraits were those of Chief Justice Shaw of Massa- 
chusetts and William M. Evarts. 
He died in 1879. 
THOMAS WATERMAN WOOD 
Thomas Waterman Wood was born in Montpelier, November 12, 
1823. It is said that he was first attracted to the life of a painter by 
a travelling artist, who painted portraits of Montpelier citizens. He 
studied in the studio of Chester Harding in Paris for a short time. In 
1850 he married Minerva Robinson of Waterbury, and in the same 
year built a summer home on a Montpelier hillside, on the Northfield 
road, and named it “Athenwood.” During the next four years he 
painted portraits in Canada, Washington and Baltimore. In 1858 Mr. 
and Mrs. Wood went to Europe and the artist studied for two years 
in the galleries of London, Paris, Florence and Rome. Returning to 
this country, he painted portraits in Nashville and Louisville, and in 
1866 opened a studio in New York City as a figure painter. He was 
elected an associate of the National Academy of Design in 1869 and an 
Academician in 1871. In 1878 he was elected President of the 
American Water Color Society, and held the office until 1887. In 
1879 he was chosen Vice-President of the National Academy of 
Design, holding the position until he was elected President, in 1891. 
Many of the figures for Mr. Wood’s pictures were persons living 
in or near Montpelier. “The Village Post-Office” represented the 
interior of a store at Williamstown, Vt. A tin peddler living in 
Calais, Vt., was the model for “The Yankee Peddler.” A long search 
was made for a suitable model for “The Country Doctor,” and, through 
the efforts of Secretary of State, George Nichols, an ideal choice 
was made in the person of Dr. Joel Holton of Jamaica, then a Repre- 
sentative in the Legislature. 
Mr. Wood made many copies from Old Masters. Among his 
best known pictures were “The Contraband,” “Recruit and Veteran,” 
“The Quack Doctor,” “White Rats,” “The Return of the Flag,” and 
“Coffee Sir.” 
Mr. Wood left to Montpelier a splendid gift, the Wood Art 
Gallery, which contains many of his paintings and his copies of famous 
pictures. Fie died April 12, 1903. 568 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
ROBERT GORDON HARDIE 
Robert Gordon Hardie was born in Brattleboro, March 20, 1854. 
He studied at Cooper Institute, the Academy of Design, the New York 
Art League, and for five years was a pupil of Gerome at the Ecole 
des Beaux Arts in Paris. Later he studied with Cabanel. In 1888 he 
exhibited a full length of David Dudley Field at the National Academy 
in New York. He painted portraits of Gov. Levi K. Fuller, Senator 
Redfield Prootor, Chief Justice Morton, President Eliot of Harvard, 
his wife, who was a daughter of Senator Cullom of Illinois, and his 
mother. 
JULIAN SCOTT 
Julian Scott, a well known painter of war scenes, was born in 
Johnson, February 14, 1846. He served in the Union army from 
1861 to 1863, and while in service made studies of field and hospital 
life. He entered the National Academy in 1863 and studied under 
Emmanuel Leutze. He was made an Associate of the National Acad- 
emy of Design in 1871. Among his famous pictures are the “Rear 
Guard at the White Oak Swamp,” owned by the Union League Club of 
New York; “The Battle of Cedar Creek,” a great canvas which 
covers the greater part of one side of the reception room in the Ver- 
mont State House; “In the Cornfield at Antietam,” “The Blue and the 
Gray,” “Battle of Golding’s Farm,” “Charge at Petersburg,” “The 
Death of General Sedgwick,” and “Duel of Burr and Hamilton.” He 
died July 4, 1901. 
THEODORE ROBINSON 
Theodore Robinson, a portrait and landscape painter, was born 
in Irasburg in 1852. He was awarded the one thousand-dollar Shaw 
prize for his “In the Sun,” and his “Winter Landscape” took the Webb 
prize. 
GEORGE T. TOBIN 
George T. Tobin was born in Weybridge, Vt., July 26, 1864, was 
educated in the public schools of Middlebury and St. Albans, and 
studied in the Art Students’ League under George DeForest Brush. 
He has been a portrait painter since 1898. His residence is in New 
Rochelle, N. Y. VERMONT ARTISTS 
569 
RACHEL ROBINSON ELMER 
Rachel Robinson Elmer was the eldest child of Rowland Robinson, 
the well known Vermont author. She inherited artistic ability from 
both her father and her mother. She studied under Ernest Kneufft in 
New York and later at the Art Students’ League, where her teachers 
were Kenyon Cox, Childe Hassam and Appleton Clark. She furnished 
illustrations for The Youth’s Companion and several well known pub- 
lishing houses, and in 1910 went abroad for a year’s study. In 1911 
she married Robert F. Elmer of New York. She began her work 
as a book cover designer, but it was as an illustrator of books that 
she was best known. Among the books which she illustrated were 
“John Bunyan’s Dream Story” and “Dutch Fairy Tales.” She was 
commissioned by a New York house to make twelve water color paint- 
ings of New York City scenes, and from these were made a series of 
post cards in color, said to have been the most beautiful pictures of 
their kind done in America. Her untimely death, February 12, 1919, 
ended a career of much promise. VERMONT ARCHITECTS 
RICHARD M. HUNT 
RICHARD M. Hunt was born at Brattleboro, October 31, 1828. 
He graduated from the Boston High School and went to Europe 
with his mother and brother, William Morris Hunt. He studied 
architecture in Switzerland in 1844-45, and later entered the Ecole des 
Beaux Arts at Paris. He travelled for several years, and returning to 
Paris, was given a government position in the construction of buildings 
connected with the Tuileries and the Louvre. He returned to America 
in 1855 and opened an atelier in New York. He was invited to assist 
in the completion of the Capitol at Washington and for six months was 
assistant to the architect in charge of the work. He soon achieved a 
high position, ranking as one of the greatest American architects. It 
was said that he divided with H. H. Richardson supremacy in archi- 
tectural inspiration. 
The beautiful Administration Building, the center of the archi- 
tectural plan of the World’s Columbian Exposition at Chicago, was 
the work of Mr. Hunt. For this achievement he received the gold 
medal of the Royal Institute of British Architecture, one of the chief 
prizes of architectural merit in the world. Among his important works 
were the Lenox Library, the Presbyterian Hospital, the Coal and Iron 
Exchange, the Tribune Building, the Vanderbilt Mausoleum, the 
pedestal for the Statue of Liberty, the entrance to Central Park and 
several fine residences, including those of Levi P. Morton, H. G. 
Marquard and Ogden Goelet, in New York; also the residence of 
George W. Vanderbilt at Biltmore, N. C., W. K. Vanderbilt’s Marble 
House at Newport, R. I., several college buildings at Princeton and 
Yale, the Yorktown Monument, the United States Naval Observatory 
at Washington and the Fogg Art Museum at Cambridge, Mass. 
He was President of the American League of Architecture. 
Death came July 31, 1895. 
WILLIAM R. MEAD 
William R. Mead, a brother of Larkin G. Mead, the sculptor, 
was born at Brattleboro, August 20, 1846, and graduated from Amherst 
College in 1867. He studied architecture with Russell Sturgis, Jr., 
in New York and spent two years in study in Europe. Upon his re- 
turn to America he became a member of the firm of McKim, Mead 
and White, which became one of the most famous architectural firms in VERMONT ARCHITECTS 
571 
the United States, being architects for Columbia University, the Uni- 
versity of the City of New York, the University of Virginia, the 
Boston Public Library, the Metropolitan, University and Century 
Clubs, and many private residences. Other structures designed by 
this firm are Madison Square Garden, the New York Life Insurance 
Company and the New York Herald buildings, the Rhole Island Capitol 
and the Agricultural and New York State buildings at the Columbian 
Exposition held at Chicago. In 1910 he was chosen a member of the 
National Academy of Design, and was awarded the gold medal of 
honor by the National Institute of Arts and Letters. He has been 
President of the American Academy at Rome. VERMONT SCULPTORS 
HIRAM POWERS 
HIRAM Powers was born in Woodstock, Vt., July 29, 1805. His 
father lost his property as a result of becoming surety for a 
friend and soon after died. The young lad was employed as 
boy of all work in a tavern, sold newspapers, and aided a watchmaker, 
in an effort to earn money, sorely needed for the support of the family. 
When it was possible to leave home he went to Cincinnati, where he se- 
cured employment at the Barnum Museum. A Chamber of Horrors 
was a feature of the place and Powers was able to devise many in- 
genious mechanical effects. This work led him to the modeling of 
busts in clay. His skill was observed by Edward Everett and Nicholas 
Longworth, and they made it possible for him to go to Italy in 1833. 
Florence became his home. Business came to him and with it fame. 
Among his best known works were “Eve,” “The Greek Slave,” 
“Proserpine,” “Indian Girl,” “II Penseroso,” “California,” “America,” 
“Genevra,” “Daniel Webster” for the State House grounds at Boston. 
“Benjamin Franklin” for the Capitol at Washington, and busts of 
George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, John Marshall, John C. 
Calhoun, John Quincy Adams, Andrew Jackson, Martin Van Buren, 
Gen. P. H. Sheridan and others. He died June 27, 1873. 
The sculptor completed eight copies of “The Greek Slave,” so 
great was its popularity. 
LARKIN G. MEAD 
Larkin Goldsmith Mead was born in Chesterfield, N. Y., January 
3, 1835, but removed to Braittleboro at an early age. He studied in 
the village schools and at the age of fifteen became a clerk in a hard- 
ware store. He developed a love for art, and on the last night of the 
year 1856, on a street corner of Brattleboro, aided by his sister Eleanor, 
afterward Mrs. William Dean Howells, he modelled a colossal statue 
of “The Recording Angel” in snow. This work attracted much at- 
tention, mention being made of it in newspapers throughout the 
country. He studied drawing and sculpture with Henry Kirke Brown 
of Brooklyn for two years. During the first year of the Civil War he 
furnished war illustrations for Harper’s Weekly. He went to Italy 
in 1862 and was associated for a time with his brother-in-law, W. D. 
Howells, in the United States Consulate at Venice. Florence, how- 
ever, became his home. His best known works include the statue of 
“Ceres,” surmounting the dome of the Vermont State Capitol; the Born in Brownington, Vt., in 185G. He studied in 
the public schools and at Derby Academy and gradu- 
ated from the College of Medicine of the University of 
Vermont in 1883. He took post-graduate work in New 
York and travelled in Europe. He located in Bur- 
lington for the practice of his profession and has be- 
come one of the foremost surgeons in the State. He 
has been a member of the teaching staff of the College 
of Medicine of the University of Vermont since 1889. 
He was a demonstrator of anatomy from 1884 to 1890, 
adjunct professor of anatomy from 1890 to 1894, pro- 
fessor of anatomy from 1894 to 1911, professor of 
clinical surgery since 1904 and dean of the College of 
Medicine since 1898. During the World War he was 
a member of the State Draft Board. He was a mem- 
ber of the Burlington Board of School Commissioners 
for eight years and its chairman for four years. 
HENRY CRAIN TINKHAM VERMONT SCULPTORS 
573 
statues of “Ethan Allen” on the portico of the Vermont Capitol and in 
Statuary Hall at Washington, the Lincoln statue at Springfield, 111., in 
which the President is represented as sitting in an arm chair, signing 
the Emancipation Proclamation, and the Soldiers Monument at St. 
Johnsbury, Vt. Other well known works are “The Returned Soldier,” 
“Echo,” “La Contadinella,” “Sappho,” “Venice,” “The Mississippi 
River,” “Columbus’ Last Appeal to Queen Isabella,” “Cavalry,” “In- 
fantry,” “Artillery,” and “Navy.” A pediment sixty feet long, repre- 
senting “The Return of Proserpine from the Realms of Pluto,” was 
over the main entrance to the Agricultural Building at the World’s 
Fair at Chicago. He produced busts of W. D. Howells, John Hay, 
Henry James, and one of Lincoln which is in the State House at 
Montpelier, the gift of Mrs. Mead. The sculptor died October 15, 
1910. 
HERBERT ADAMS 
Herbert Adams was born at Concord, Vt., in 1856. He studied 
at the Massachusetts Manual Art School and was a pupil of Mercie at 
Paris. He received awards at the Chicago, Paris, St. Louis and San 
Francisco Expositions, the medal of honor of the Architectural 
League in 1915 and a prize from the National Academy in 1916. He 
is a member of the United States Commission in Fine Arts and Presi- 
dent of the National Academy of Design. VERMONT LIBRARIES 
Rebecca W. Wright 
LIKE other colonies, Vermont started her first libraries fairly soon 
after her early settlers had had time to “settle.” The earliest 
known association library, of uninterrupted life to date, is the 
Brookfield Library Association, started “to promote useful knowledge 
and piety” in 1791. The books were auctioned ofif quarterly, each 
shareholder being allowed to take as many books as he was willing to 
pay for. In 1916 Brookfield celebrated the one hundred twenty-fifth 
anniversary of her library, which had become a free library with town 
support. 
Bradford boasts the first incorporated library, 1796; Middlebury 
College began its collection in 1800; the Williamstown Social Library, 
with auctions at quarterly meetings like her Brookfield neighbor, dates 
from 1801 ; the Peacham Juvenile Library Association was started in 
1810 by Thaddeus Stevens and other pupils of the Caledonia County 
Grammar School at Peacham; the State Library at Montpelier was be- 
gun in 1825. Doubtless many others were started during these early 
years, but those above named are of continuous life to date. Most of 
the rules were strict, with many and various fines for mishandling 
books, specifying pencil marks, grease spots, etc., etc. 
An unusual example of intercommunity work has recently come 
to light, in which towns in New Hampshire and Vermont shared the 
benefits of a library: in 1860 leaders in Hanover, Wentworth, Haver- 
hill, Orford and Lyme, N. H., and Bradford and Newbury, Vt.. invited 
surrounding towns to form a “Division or Branch” of the People’s 
Circulating Library Association, under the care of A. B. Palmer of 
Orfordville, N. H. The library of 1,100 volumes was to be “dis- 
tributed among the several divisions, according to the number of mem- 
bers in each” and “exchanged, entirely or in part, once in every three 
months.” It would be interesting to know how this “branch library” 
cooperative arrangement worked out, and whether there was anything 
similar started before 1860 in any other State. 
In 1893 the total number of libraries in the State was 59, of which 
comparatively few were free. The State needed aid in the spread of 
free books and the development of up-to-date and active town libraries. 
Through the influence of public-spirited citizens of St. Johnsbury 
in 1894 the Legislature passed a law establishing the Board of Library 
Commissioners (now known as the Free Public Library Commission) : 
five members, without pay, the large sum of $300 for necessary ex- 
penses, and the power to give $100 in books to each town desiring to 
establish a free town library and complying with the laws as to mini- VERMONT LIBRARIES 
575 
mum appropriation, election of trustees, etc. Vermont was the fifth 
State in the Union to establish such a commission. As a result, forty- 
one towns applied for this State gift in 1895, and nineteen in 1896. In 
the following years the numbers applying necessarily diminished, vary- 
ing from thirteen to one. 
The next step, with the help of the Vermont Federation of 
Women’s Clubs, was to start a system of “traveling libraries” for 
communities too small to support town libraries. Eleven collections 
of books were given by Federated clubs in 1900, each collection put 
in a box with the club name on it; and sent forth on its travels. The 
State Legislature also gave an annual appropriation of six hundred 
dollars for more books in this department. The following year (1901) 
the commission owned twenty-seven traveling libraries. In 1920, 
it has 284 libraries (“General,” “School,” and “Study Club” collec- 
tions), 14,130 pictures, 17,151 books, with a total circulation (for the 
year ending March, 1920) of 736 collections of all kinds. This de- 
mand keeps the staff busy. The annual allowance for books, pictures, 
and binding in this Traveling Library department (June, 1920) is 
$1,400. 
In 1907 the Legislature voted $1,000 per year for aid in books to 
active town libraries, for which they should apply annually. Two 
years later this was increased to $1,500. The average number of 
libraries each year to which this aid has been given is sixty. In 1911 
another department (the first of its kind in any State) was established: 
$500 for hooks to be placed in four State institutions, and $200 annually 
thereafter. Vermont beat a Middle-Western State by a few days in 
passing this act. 
At the request of Chaplain John M. Thomas (President of Mid- 
dlebury College) the Commission in 1916 was the first State to supply 
its soldiers in Texas with reading matter. These 265 books were used 
also by men from Kansas, Tennessee, and Maryland. 
Vermont raised nearly $17,000 for American Library Association 
“war service” work in camps and hospitals in 1917. And in 1918, in 
the campaign to secure gift books, the Secretary of the Free Public 
Library Commission as State Chairman collected 23,832 books, given 
by individuals and libraries. Fort Ethan Allen was supplied, through 
the Y. M. C. A. huts and a collection in charge of the chaplain. The 
Secretary was appointed also Library Publicity Director for Vermont 
in the food conservation campaign. 
More and more towns instinctively turn to the Commission for 
help and advice. More and more schools (both rural and city) de- 
pend upon it for attractive and instructive children’s books, pictures, 
aid in high school essays and debates, and general reference work. 
More and more women’s clubs rely upon it for help in their program 
work. 576 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
The Vermont Library Association, a club for librarians, library 
trustees, and all others interested in library work, was formed in 1894, 
and reorganized in 1903. Since the latter date it has held annual meet- 
ings of a day or two in length, cooperating with the Free Public Library 
Commission in its yearly program; and several years the two have 
held a 2-5-day institute for librarians. It has also endeavored to pro- 
mote library interests in rural sections by district meetings. The Ver- 
mont Library Association has done excellent work in joining more 
closely schools and libraries throughout the State. Its membership 
(in 1920) was about 76. 
The Vermont Commissioner of Education has given generous sup- 
port to all library development and the spread of good books. 
The number of library buildings has slowly but surely increased; 
and Vermont has several of which she may well be proud as excellently 
designed for their purpose and beautiful in appearance. TRANSPORTATION 
SKETCHES of the beginnings of Vermont railroads have been 
given in the narrative portion of this work, but brief summaries 
of various railroad companies are given herewith. 
CENTRAL VERMONT RAILWAY 
The Central Vermont Railway system is made up of the Central 
Vermont Railway, the New London Northern Railroad, the West 
River Railroad and the Bethel Granite Railway. It operated 422.9 
miles in the United States from New London, Conn., to the Canadian 
Vermont line and Rouses Point, N. Y. 
The records of the corporation show that the Vermont Central 
Railroad Company was incorporated October 31, 1843. Books were 
opened for stock subscriptions October 29, 1844, and directors were 
elected at the first meeting of stockholders, held July 23, 1845. The 
line from White River Junction to Bethel was opened June 26, 1848; 
from Bethel to Roxbury, September 17, 1848; from Roxbury to North- 
field, October 10, 1848; from White River Junction to Windsor, 
February 13, 1849; from Northfield to Montpelier, June 20, 1849; 
from Montpelier Junction to Middlesex, August 30, 1849; from Mid- 
dlesex to Waterbury, September 29, 1849; from Water bury to Bur- 
lington, December 31, 1849. 
The Vermont Central was operated by the corporation from June 
26, 1848 to June 28, 1852; from June 28, 1852 to July 1, 1855 by 
trustees for the holders of the first mortgage bonds; from July 1, 
1855 to May 6, 1856, by the Vermont & Canada Railroad Company, 
under terms securing the lease of that company by order of the 
Chancery Court of Franklin County, Vt., issued May 17, 1855; from 
May 6, 1856 to July 13, 1861, by receivers appointed by decree of 
the Chancery Court of Franklin County; from July 13, 1861 to 
August 16 1867, by receivers appointed by decree of the Chancery 
Court of Franklin County; from August 16, 1867 to June 30, 1873, 
by a board of managers and receivers appointed by the Chancery 
Court of Franklin County; June 30, 1873 to June 30, 1884, by the 
Central Vermont Railroad Company as receivers and managers ap- 
pointed by the Chancery Court of Franklin County; June 30, 1884 to 
December 14, 1891, by the Central Vermont Railroad Company under 
a lease; from December 14, 1891 to March 30, 1896, by the Central 
Vermont Railroad Company as owners; from March 20, 1896 to April 
20, 1899, by E. C. Smith and C. M. Hays, receivers for the Central 
Vermont Railroad Company; from April 20, 1899, by the Central Ver- 
mont Railway Company as owners. 578 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
Tihe Vermont and Canada Railroad Company was incorporated in 
Vermont October 31, 1845. The main line from Essex Junction to St. 
Albans was opened October 18, 1850; from St. Albans to the New 
York State line, 1851; Winooski Bridge to Burlington, May, 1861; 
Swanton Junction to the Canadian boundary line, November 14, 1864. 
On May 21, 1866, Congress established a mail route across Lake 
Champlain and authorized the construction of a bridge. 
The Central Vermont Railroad Company was incorporated No- 
vember 23, 1872. The Consolidated Railroad Company of Vermont 
was incorporated April 23, 1883. Under a decree of the United States 
Circuit Court the property of the Central Vermont was sold to the 
Consolidated Railroad Company, a corporation formed by the first 
mortgage bond holders, and the property was leased, June 30, 1884, for 
ninety-nine years to the Central Vermont Railroad Company. 
The Central Vermont Railway Company was incorporated No- 
vember 16, 1898. 
The Montpelier & White River Railroad Company was incorpo- 
rated November 8, 1867, and was organized August 23, 1871. The 
line from Montpelier to Barre was opened July 1, 1875, and from 
Barre Junction to Williamstown, June 30, 1883. The line is 13.7 miles 
long. 
The Burlington & Lamoille Railroad Company was incorporated 
February 24, 1875 and was organized March 3, 1875. The main line 
from Burlington to Cambridge Junction, thirty-five miles long, was 
opened July 31, 1877. The property was sold under foreclosure in 
accordance with a decree of the United States Circuit Court, to the 
Burlington & Lamoille Valley Railroad Company, a corporation 
chartered April 20, 1899. 
The Missisquoi Railroad Company was incorporated November 
14, 1867. The line from St. Albans to Richford, a distance of 28.85 
miles was opened July 1, 1872, and was leased, July 1, 1873, to the re- 
ceivers of the Vermont Central and Vermont & Canada Railroads. 
The Company was reorganized, December 24, 1886, as the Missisquoi 
Valley Railroad Company and was leased, June 30, 1888, to the Central 
Vermont Railroad Company for ninety-nine years. 
Twelve miles of railroad, from Maquam to the New York State 
line were opened December 31, 1883, and property was leased the 
same day in perpetuity to the Ogdensburg & Lake Champlain Railroad 
Company. The Central Vermont had acquired a controlling interest 
in the Ogdensburg & Lake Champlain in July, 1887. The Lamoille 
Valley Extension Railroad Company was incorporated October 25, 
1872, and was organized, August 24, 1880. This line paralleled the 
Maquam road and when the latter was acquired, work was suspended 
on the Lamoille Valley Extension. HENRY DWIGHT HOLTON 
Born in Rockingham, Vt., July 24, 1838. He was edu- 
cated at Vermont Academy, studied medicine in Boston 
and graduated from the medical school of the Univer- 
sity of New York in 1860. He removed to Brattleboro 
in 1867 and practiced his profession there with great 
success for many years. For thirteen years he was 
professor of materia medica and general pathology in 
the College of Medicine of the University of Vermont 
and for eighteen years he was a trustee of that insti- 
tution. In 1873 he was elected president of the Ver- 
mont Medical Society. The State Board of Health was 
established largely as a result of his efforts. For many 
years he was a member of the board and long its sec- 
retary. In 1902 he was elected president of the Amer- 
ican Public Health Association. He was president of 
the Vermont National Bank of Brattleboro and was 
actively interested in many business and civic enter- 
prises. He was a member of the State Senate in 1884, 
of the House of Representatives in 1888 and a dele- 
gate-at-large to the Republican National Convention in 
1896. He was one of the leading laymen in the Baptist 
Church in Vermont. In 1862 he married Ellen Hoit of 
Saxtons River. He died February 12, 1917. TRANSPORTATION 
579 
The Vermont & Massachusetts Railroad Company (the Brattle- 
boro branch) was organized in 1851. From 1870 to 1872 it was oper- 
ated by the receivers and managers of the Vermont Central and Ver- 
mont & Canada Railroads, and later by the Central Vermont Railroad. 
The Brattleboro & Whitehall Railroad Company was incorporated 
November 17, 1876, and was organized February 1, 1877. The line 
from Brattleboro to South Londonderry, 35.7 miles in length, was 
opened November 3, 1880. It was leased at once to the Central Ver- 
mont Railroad Company and has been operated by its successors. On 
April 21, 1905, at was incorporated as the West River Railroad Com- 
pany. 
The Brattleboro & Fitchburg was leased to the Vermont Central, 
and the Vermont and Canada Railroads, December 1, 1870, and later to 
successive reorganizations of the same corporation. 
The New London Northern Railroad Company, incorporated June 
7, 1859, was leased, November 21, 1871, to J. Gregory Smith, W. C. 
Smith and B. P. Cheney, for twenty years from December 1, 1871. 
The lease was assigned to the Central Vermont Railroad Company in 
1873. 
The Bethel Granite Railroad Company was incorporated August 
4, 1904. The line from Bethel to the granite quarries, 5.4 miles in 
length, was opened November 20, 1905. 
In a paper reviewing the twenty-seven years of litigation in which 
the Central Vermont was engaged, read by Max L. Powell of Burling- 
ton, before the Vermont Bar Association, he said: “Vermont has 
never produced a man more diplomatic and forceful than John Gregory 
Smith. In this entire litigation from the time he succeeded his father, 
John Smith, his was the leading spirit, his was the controlling will, 
his, the master mind, his, the guiding hand. * * * 
“Of indomitable will, of dauntless courage in the face of obstacles 
seemingly insurmountable, he combined in rare measure and proportion 
the suaviter in modo and the fortiter in re. * * * He was a strong 
and vigorous man, whose sympathies were as a child’s, in whose veins 
coursed warm, red blood, and whose brain was teeming with far-reach- 
ing plans for a greater and better Vermont.* * * With a less intrepid 
leader, Vermont would have been much later in exchanging her stage 
coach for the iron horse.” 
RUTLAND RAILROAD 
The Champlain and Connecticut River Railroad Company was in- 
corporated November 1, 1843. The name was changed, November 1, 
1847, to the Rutland and Burlington Railroad Company. The line was 
built from Bellows Falls to Burlington, and was opened for business in 580 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
December, 1849. The property passed into the hands of mortgage 
trustees in November, 1853. The road was reorganized in July, 1867, 
as the Rutland Railroad Company. In December, 1870, the property 
was leased to the Central Vermont Railroad Company, and was 
operated under the terms of the lease until May 7, 1896, when, on 
account of the receivership of the Central Vermont, the Rutland was 
turned over to its owners. 
In January, 1901, the Rutland was consolidated with the Benning- 
ton and Rutland Railway Company, the Rutland-Canadian Railroad 
Company, and the Ogdensburg and Lake Champlain Railroad Com- 
pany; and in 1902, with the Chatham and Lebanon Valley Railroad 
Company. 
The Western Vermont Railroad Company was incorporated No- 
vember 5, 1845, and included the line from White Creek, N. Y., and 
Bennington to Rutland. The property was sold under foreclosure 
proceedings and a new company was formed, August 1, 1865, under 
the name of the Bennington and Rutland Railroad Company. On 
August 8, 1877, new articles of association were filed and the name 
changed to the Bennington and Rutland Railway Company. The 
property was leased to the Rutland Railroad Company, March, 1900, 
and was consolidated with that road, July 30, 1901. 
The Rutland-Canadian Railroad Company was incorporated 
November 4, 1898, for the construction of a railroad from Burlington, 
across a part of Lake Champlain from the end of Colchester Point to 
the southern end of South Hero, thence through the Islands of Grand 
Isle County to the Canadian border and the New York State line. 
This road, which forms part of a through line from New York to 
Montreal, was opened December 15, 1900. It was leased to the 
Rutland Railroad Company, July 1, 1899, and was consolidated with 
the Rutland Railroad Company, January 18, 1901. 
The Addison division, 13.4 miles long, extends from Leicester 
Junction to Larrabee’s Point, on Lake Champlain. 
The Lebanon Springs Railroad Company was organized March 25, 
1852, covering the line from Chatham, N. Y., to the Vermont State 
line. The New York and Vermont Railway Company was chartered 
November 3, 1865, and extended from Bennington to the New York 
State line. The Lebanon Springs Railroad Company and the New 
York and Vermont Railway Company were consolidated August 20, 
1867. On January 11, 1870, the Lebanon Springs Railroad Company 
was consolidated with the Bennington and Rutland Railroad Company, 
under the name of The Harlem Extension Railroad Company. This 
property was operated as a division of the New York, Boston and 
Montreal Railway for a short time. On December 1, 1873, it was 
leased to the Central Vermont Railroad Company and operated by that 
company until 1877. On September 16, 1877, the Harlem Extension TRANSPORTATION 
581 
Railroad South Cove Transportation Company assumed operation 
of the road for the bondholders. Receivers were appointed, October 
1, 1880, and the road was sold under foreclosure June 12, 1885, to a 
syndicate of bondholders who transferred it April 1, 1886, to the New 
York, Rutland and Montreal Railway Company, chartered December 
31, 1883, for the purpose of consolidating the Lebanon Springs Rail- 
road with the Bennington and Rutland Railroad Company. On 
February 27, 1888, the Lebanon Springs Railroad again passed into the 
hands of a receiver, and was reorganized September 23, 1899, under 
the name of the Chatham and Lebanon Valley Railroad Company. It 
was consolidated with The Rutland Railroad Company, January, 1902. 
The Northern Railroad Company was incorporated May 14, 1845, 
covering a line from the Vermont boundary at Rouses Point, N. Y., to 
Ogdensburg, N. Y. The road was opened for business in 1850. It 
was reorganized in 1857 as the Ogdensburg Railroad Company, and on 
August 1, 1865, was transferred to the Ogdensburg and Lake Cham- 
plain Railroad Company. A receiver was appointed November 1, 
1896, and it was reorganized as the Ogdensburg and Lake Champlain 
Railway Company. It was consolidated with the Rutland Railroad 
Company in January, 1901. 
Presidents ot the Rutland Railroad 
1843-1847—Timothy Follett. 
1848-1853—Harry Bradley. 
1854 —William R. Lee. 
1855-1862—Thomas Thacher. 
1863 —D. A. Smalley. 
1864-1867—Albert S. Catlin. 
1868-1883—John B. Page. 
1884-1887—Charles Clement. 
1888-1901—P. W. Clement. 
1902-1904—W. S. Webb. 
1905-1908—W. H. Newman. 
1909-1913—W. C. Brown. 
1914-1917—A. H. Smith. 
1918-1919—E. G. Buckland. 
1920-1921—A. H. Smith. 
BOSTON AND MAINE RAILROAD 
The Boston and Maine Railroad Company was organized in June, 
1835, under the laws of Massachusetts, Maine and New Hampshire. 
It is a consolidation of the Boston and Portland Railroad of Massa- 582 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
chusetts, the Boston and Maine Railroad of New Hampshire and the 
Maine, New Hampshire and Massachusetts Railroad of Maine. The 
Vermont portion of the road includes the Ashuelot branch of the 
Connecticut River Railroad, from South Vernon to Keene, N. H., 
approximately a mile of which is in Vermont. The Connecticut and 
Passumpsic Rivers Railroad Company was chartered October 27, 1843, 
and was organized January 15, 1846. It was leased for ninety-nine 
years from January 1, 1887, to the Boston and Lowell Railroad and 
passed with the lease of that road to the Boston and Maine. It ex- 
tends from White River Junction to North Derby, on the Canadian 
border, a distance of 109.33 miles. 
The Vermont Valley Railroad Company was chartered November 
8, 1848, and business over the road began in 1851. In May, 1865, the 
property passed into the hands of trustees and was operated by them 
for ten years. In January, 1871, it was leased by the Rutland Rail- 
road and operated by that corporation until April 5, 1877, when it 
became a part of the Connecticut River system. It passed under the 
control of the Boston and Maine Railroad, January 1, 1893, as a re- 
sult of the lease of the Connecticut River Railroad by the last named 
road. The Vermont Valley Railroad extends from Brattleboro to 
Bellows Falls, a distance of 24.44 miles. 
The St. Johnsbury and Lake Champlain Railroad represents a 
consolidation of the Essex County Railroad Company, chartered in 
1864; the Montpelier and St. Johnsbury Railroad Company, chartered 
in 1866; and the Lamoille Valley Railroad Company, chartered in 
1867. It was first operated as the Vermont division of the Portland 
and Ogdensburg Railroad. The road went into the hands of receivers, 
October 18, 1877, the year after it was opened for business. It was 
organized as the St. Johnsbury and Lake Champlain Railroad Com- 
pany, July 1, 1880. In April, 1885, the Boston and Lowell purchased 
a controlling interest in the road. When the Boston and Maine pur- 
chased a majority of the stock of the Boston and Lowell, the St. 
Johnsbury and Lake Champlain lease also was transferred. The main 
line extends from Lunenburg to Maquam. in the town of Swanton, a 
distance of 120 miles. The Victory branch of the St. Johnsbury and 
Lake Champlain, extending to lumber districts in Victory, Granby and 
East Haven, was built in 1882-83. 
The Montpelier and Wells River Railroad Company was chartered 
November 6, 1867, and the road was opened November 24, 1873. The 
interest on the bonds having been defaulted for several years, the 
bondholders foreclosed and took possession, placing the property in 
the hands of trustees, March 1, 1876. The company was reorganized 
January 1, 1877. The Vermont Valley Railroad having purchased a 
majority of the shares of capital stock, it passed into the control of 
the Boston and Maine. The main line of the road extends from TRANSPORTATION 
583 
Montpelier to Wells River, a distance of 38.3 miles. A branch line 
extends from Montpelier to Barre, a distance of 7.04 miles. 
The Barre and Chelsea Railroad Company was organized Septem- 
ber 18, 1913, the constituent companies being the Barre Railroad Com- 
pany, organized April 9, 1888, and the East Barre and Chelsea Rail- 
road Company, organized September 11, 1892. The Boston and Maine 
controls the road as the result of a purchase of a majority of the stock 
by the Vermont Valley Railroad. 
A portion of the Fitchburg Railroad, controlled by the Boston and 
Maine, extends across the town of Pownal, from the Massachusetts 
border to the New York boundary line, and consists of two single 
tracks of 12.70 miles. 
ATLANTIC AND ST. LAWRENCE RAILROAD 
The Atlantic and St. Lawrence Railroad Company was organized 
in Maine in 1845, in New Hampshire in 1847, and in Vermont on 
October 27, 1848. The road was opened from Portland, Me., to Island 
Pond, Vt., January 29, 1853; and on August 5, 1853, it was leased 
to the Grand Trunk Railway Company for 999 years. The Vermont 
portion of the road extends from the New Hampshire line to Norton 
Mills, on the Canadian border, a distance of 30.56 miles. 
The Grand Trunk also controls the Canada and Atlantic Railway 
Company. The only Vermont portion extends from Alburg Junction 
to the Canadian border, a distance of 3.16 miles. 
NEWPORT AND RICHFORD RAILROAD 
The Newport and Richford Railroad Company, organized Decem- 
ber 9, 1880, and sometimes known as the Montreal and Atlantic Rail- 
way Company, was chartered and constructed as the Missisquoi and 
Clyde Rivers Railroad. The Canadian Pacific Railway Company on 
June 19, 1881, leased the road for ninety-nine years. It extends from 
Newport Center to Richford, a distance of 31 miles, but the Vermont 
portion of the road is only 21 miles long. 
MAINE CENTRAL RAILROAD 
The Maine Central Railroad Company was organized October 28, 
1862, and operates in the States of Maine, New Hampshire, and Ver- 
mont, and in Quebec and New Brunswick. The Vermont portion is 
13.85 miles long and extends from Guildhall to Canaan. 584 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
THE HARDWICK AND WOODBURY RAILROAD 
The Hardwick and Woodbury Railroad Company was chartered 
in 1894 and organized March 16, 1895. It began operation in 1896. 
The road extends from Granite Junction in Hardwick to the granite 
quarries in Woodbury. It has seven miles of main line and six miles 
of branches and spurs. It is used almost wholly for the transporta- 
tion of granite. 
WHITE RIVER RAILROAD 
The Vermont Valley Railroad Company was chartered in 1876. 
Construction was begun in June, 1899, and was completed December 
26, 1899, when the line was opened from Bethel to Rochester, a dis- 
tance of 19 miles. It was reorganized November 21, 1902, as the 
White River Railroad Company and was operated until September 13, 
1906, when it was closed by order of the Railroad Commission. The 
management was changed and the road was reopened December 1, 
1907. 
THE WOODSTOCK RAILWAY 
The Woodstock Railroad Company was chartered October 30, 
1863. Construction was begun April 21, 1868, and the road was 
opened for travel September 29, 1875. Owing to the foreclosure of a 
mortgage the company was reorganized July 1, 1890, as the Wood- 
stock Railway Company. The road extends from White River Junc- 
tion to Woodstock, a distance of 13.88 miles. 
THE BRISTOL RAILROAD 
The Bristol Railroad Company was chartered in 1882. The 
charter was amended in 1886 and the company was organized in 1890. 
The road was opened for business January 5, 1892. It extends from 
New Haven Junction to Bristol, a distance of 6.14 miles. 
THE CLARENDON AND PITTSFORD RAILROAD 
The Clarendon and Pitts ford Railroad Company was organized 
September 10, 1885, and began operations in July, 1886. It is about 
17 miles long, and was built by the Vermont Marble Company for the 
transportation of marble and not for passenger traffic. JULIUS HAYDEN WOODWARD 
Born in Castleton, Vt., in 1858. He was educated in 
the public schools, studied in Norwich University and 
graduated from Cornell University in 1879 with the 
degree of B. S. He attended medical lectures at the 
University of Vermont and graduated from the Col- 
lege of Physicians and Surgeons in New York in 1883. 
He was president of his class and a prize winner. In 
1888 he was appointed assistant professor of diseases 
of the throat in the College of Medicine of the Uni- 
versity of Vermont and in the same year went to Berlin, 
where he studied under one of the most prominent eye 
specialists of Europe. In 1887 he was appointed in- 
structor of materia medica and therapeutics in the Uni- 
versity of Vermont and at the end of the year was 
made full professor. After seven years in this chair 
he was elected professor of diseases of the eye, ear 
and throat in the same institution, holding the position 
for ten years. He removed to New York, where he be- 
came a prominent specialist in diseases of the eye, ear 
and throat. He was director of instruction in the 
ophthalmologieal department of the Post-Graduate 
Hospital Medical School, president of its faculty asso- 
ciation and for two years president of the Alumni 
Society of Bellevue Hospital. He was a member of 
many medical societies in America and Europe, of the 
New York Athletic Club, the Fencers’ Club, and the 
Campfire Club of America. He was a noted athlete, 
having won bronze, silver and gold medals for fencing 
and was an expert marksman and horseman. He was 
the author of “Adirondack Days,” of medical pamph- 
lets, and wrote the section on diseases and injuries of 
vision and audition in Witthaus and Becker’s “System 
of Jurisprudence and Toxicology.” Doctor Woodward 
married Mary Madeline Donohue, who survived him. 
He died at his home in New York Citv, July 2, 1916. TRANSPORTATION 
585 
MANCHESTER, DORSET AND GRANVILLE RAILROAD 
The Manchester, Dorset and Granville Railroad Company was 
chartered June 21, 1902, and was organized December 9, 1902. Con- 
struction was begun in January, 1903, and the carrying of freight was 
begun April 1, 1903. Passenger service was begun September 23, 
1903. The road extends from Manchester to West Dorset, a distance 
of 5.09 miles. It is owned and operated by the Vermont Marble Com- 
pany, and was built for the purpose of transporting marble from 
the Dorset quarries to the mills at Manchester. 
THE DELAWARE AND HUDSON RAILROAD 
The Delaware and Hudson Railroad Company was chartered 
under the laws of New York, April 23, 1823. The lines operated by it 
in Vermont were chartered as the Rutland and Washington and the 
Rutland and Whitehall Railroads and were leased to the Rensselaer 
and Saratoga Railroad Company. On March 1, 1871, they were leased 
to the Delaware and Hudson, which company operates 36.59 miles of 
road in this State, from Rutland City to the New York State line. 
DEERFIELD RIVER RAILROAD 
The Deerfield River Railroad Company was organized July 16, 
1906, and is controlled by the Deerfield Lumber Corporation of 
Mountain Mills, Vt. 
HOOSAC TUNNEL AND WILMINGTON RAILROAD 
The Hoosae Tunnel and Wilmington Railroad Company was 
chartered December 28, 1886, and was built from Hoosae Tunnel, 
Mass., to Readsboro, Vt., by the Deerfield Valley Company for the 
transportation of freight from its woodpulp, lumber and paper mills. 
The extension from Readsboro to Wilmington was built by the Deer- 
field Valley Railroad Company and was opened November 4, 1892. It 
is the only narrow gauge railroad in the State, and is 24.25 miles long, 
the Vermont portion of the road being 16.03 miles in length. 
ELECTRIC RAILROADS 
The Winooski and Burlington Horse Railroad Company was 
chartered October 31, 1872. The company was organized in 1885 and 
was equipped with electric power September 5, 1893. The name was 586 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
changed to the Burlington Traction Company in 1896. The company 
operates 12 miles from Winooski to Queen City Park, and branch lines 
in Burlington. The Military Post Street Railway Company was 
chartered in 1892. The company was organized December 7, 1893 
and the road was opened July 27, 1895. It extends from Winooski to 
Essex Junction, a distance of five miles, and is operated in connection 
with the Burlington Traction Company. 
The Rutland Street Railway Company was chartered July 20, 
1885, as a horse railway and was built and operated as such. It was 
changed to a trolley line during the summer of 1894. It was trans- 
ferred later to the Rutland Light and Power Company. It extends 
from Rutland to Castleton, Lake Bomoseen, Fair Haven and Poultney, 
a distance of 22.69 miles. 
The Brattleboro Street Railway Company was chartered January 
21, 1893, and the road was opened in August, 1895. It was trans- 
ferred later to the Twin State Gas and Electric Company. It operates 
5. 35 miles of road from Brattleboro to West Brattleboro. 
The Barre and Montpelier Power and Traction Company was 
chartered in 1892, the company was organized in 1897, and the road 
was opened June 29, 1898. 
The Bellows Falls and Saxton’s River Railroad Company was 
chartered in 1892, organized November 22, 1892, and opened in July, 
1900. 
The Bennington and Hoosick Valley Railway Company was 
chartered in 1894 and was consolidated with the Hoosick Railway 
Company in 1898, the road extending from Bennington to Hoosick, 
N. Y., the total mileage being 16.5 miles. The road was opened July 
1, 1898. On January 1, 1907, it was consolidated with the Bennington 
and North Adams Street Railway Company which was incorporated in 
1902, and was built through Bennington and Pownal to connect with a 
line to Williamstown, Mass., North Adams, Mass., and Pittsfield, 
Mass. The entire property from Hoosick, N. Y., to Bennington and 
the Massachusetts points named is operated as the Berkshire Street 
Railway Company. The Vermont portion of the road includes 19.55 
miles. 
The St. Albans Street Railway Company was chartered in 1892, 
was organized in 1900 and the road was opened in August, 1901. In 
1905 a receivership was established, the road being operated by re- 
ceivers until May 14, 1912, when it was reorganized as the St. Albans 
and Swanton Traction Company. The line extends from St. Albans to 
Swanton, 9.4 miles and St. Albans to St. Albans Bay, 3.2 miles, a total 
distance of 12.6 miles. 
The Springfield Electric Railway Company was organized June 6, 
1896, and the road was opened in 1897. The Springfield Electric Rail- 
way Company of New Hampshire and the Cheshire Bridge Corpora- TRANSPORTATION 
587 
tion were leased for a period of 99 years. The distance from Spring- 
field to the New Hampshire State line is 5.96 miles. 
The Mt. Mansfield Electric Railroad Company was organized 
November 27, 1894, and the road was opened December 1, 1897. The 
property went into the hands of receivers in February, 1907, and the 
company was reorganized April 12, 1909. The road extends from 
Waterbury to Stowe, a distance of 10.5 miles. VERMONT BANKS 
REFERENCE has been made elsewhere to the establishment and 
discontinuance of State banks in Vermont, and to the opposi- 
tion toward banking institutions which was shown during the 
early part of the Nineteenth Century. In 1817 a charter was granted 
for a bank in Windsor but no organization was effected. In 1818 banks 
were incorporated at Burlington and Windsor, and in 1821 a charter 
was granted for a Brattleboro bank. Other charters during this period 
were granted as follows: Bank of Rutland, in 1824; Bank of Mont- 
pelier, Bank of Caledonia and Bank of St. Albans, in 1825; Bank of 
Vergennes, 1826; Bank of Orange County and Bank of Bennington, 
1827. 
A law known as the Safety Fund Act, was passed in 1831, author- 
izing the appointment of three bank commissioners and the creation of 
a fund out of which creditors of insolvent banks might be paid. Each 
bank chartered was required to pay in six annual instalments a sum 
equal to four and one-half per cent, of its capital stock in order that a 
safety fund might be established. No bank was permitted to make 
loans until fifty per cent, of its capital stock had been paid in. 
The conditions of the forty Vermont banks in 1861 showed total 
resources of $7,446,945.94 and liabilities amounting to $7,244,906.81. 
Four years later ten State banks had surrendered their charters and 
all but six had changed from State to National banks. As a result 
of a Congressional act the State banks went out of business, a ten 
per cent, tax having been levied upon circulation. 
The Windham Provident Institution of Brattleboro, chartered in 
1846, was the first savings bank established in Vermont. The second 
was the Rutland Savings Bank, incorporated in 1850. The first trust 
company was chartered in 1869. 
There were thirty-nine national banks in 1866, most of them hav- 
ing been transferred from State banks, with an aggregate capital of 
$6,310,012.50 and a circulation of bank notes amounting to $5,676,800. 
The report of the State Bank Commissioner for the fiscal year 
ending June 30, 1920, showed twenty savings banks, and forty trust 
companies or savings banks and trust companies. There were in 1920 
forty-eight national banks in Vermont, making a total of one hundred 
and eight banking institutions in the State. 
The mutual savings banks and the savings bank and trust com- 
panies had resources amounting to $139,025,943.22. Their savings 
deposits were $8,814,613.12. The total number of depositors was 
251,007. The average deposit amounted to $493.63. Loans on real 
estate in Vermont amounted to $24,988,946.41. Banks reporting re- 
sources in excess of four million dollars were: Burlington Savings VERMONT BANKS 
589 
Bank, $20,519,869.04; Rutland Savings Bank, $8,634,407.42; Vermont 
Savings Bank, Brattleboro, $5,582,793.69; Citizens’ Savings Bank and 
Trust Company, $4,995,586.21; Burlington Trust Company, $4,192,- 
329.60; Passumpsic Savings Bank, St. Johnsbury, $4,000,077.05. 
The total amount of deposits in national banks in Vermont in 1920 
was $36,398,620. National banks reporting deposits exceeding one 
million dollars were: Clement National, Rutland, $2,250,000; Howard 
National, Burlington, $1,702,110; Welden National, St. Albans, 
$1,568,400; First National, Montpelier, $1,529,860; People’s National, 
Barre, $1,509,390; Montpelier National, $1,493,910; People’s National, 
Brattleboro, $1,440,910; National White River of Bethel, $1,300,000; 
First National of White River Junction, $1,300,000; Merchants’ Na- 
tional of St. Johnsbury, $1,295,220. 
The total amount of deposits in Vermont’s National banks, sav- 
ings banks and trust companies in 1920 amounted to $159,303,638. INSURANCE IN VERMONT 
THE history of insurance in Vermont begins with the organization 
of the Vermont Mutual Fire Insurance Company, at Montpelier. 
Daniel Baldwin, a merchant and a public spirited citizen of that 
town, succeeded in interesting some of the prominent business men of 
Montpelier in forming such a company, and a charter was secured in 
1827. The company was organized, January 21, 1828, and began busi- 
ness March 30, 1828. Mr. Baldwin took out policy No. 1. 
During the first four years of the company’s existence its business 
was transacted in the law office of Joshua Y. Vail, one of the incor- 
porators. The treasurer’s cash on hand was concealed over night in a 
hole in the floor. In 1832 a small brick building was erected for the 
use of the company. The structure now the home of the company 
was erected in 1869-70. Its presidents have been Chapin Keith, Israel 
P. Dana, John Spaulding, Daniel Baldwin, James T. Thurston, W. H. 
H. Bingham, Fred E. Smith, Horatio N. Taplin and George O. Strat- 
ton. Policies in force increased from 1,869 in 1831 to 12,012 in 1841; 
22,237 in 1861; 32,521 in 1891; 58,175 in 1920. On August 1, 1920, 
the company carried risks on property valued at $119,521,413. Its 
assets on that date were $795,820.59; its liabilities $637,342.80. 
The National Life Insurance Company of Montpelier was incor- 
porated November 13, 1848, the list of incorporators being headed 
by the name of Henry Clay of Kentucky. The first board of directors 
contained such well known men as Paul Dillingham, William Upham, 
Samuel S. Phelps, Timothy P. Redfield, William C. Kittredge, Julius 
Converse, John A. Page, Lucius B. Peck, Homer W. Heaton, Julius 
Y. Dewey and Daniel Baldwin. 
The company began to do business January 17, 1850, the first 
policy being written upon the life of Daniel Baldwin. Its first office 
was a low room in the second story of a small building occupied by the 
Vermont Mutual. The first president was William C. Kittredge of 
Fair Haven. The active work was done by Dr. Julius Y. Dewey of 
Montpelier, father of Admiral George Dewey, and he was elected 
president in 1851. In March, 1860, a two-story brick house nearly 
opposite the State Capitol, was purchased as headquarters. Having 
outgrown these quarters, in 1873 the company rented the upper floor 
of the present Vermont Mutual building. In 1890-91 a handsome 
three-story office building was erected, which has been its home since 
that time. The business has grown to such an extent that larger quar- 
ters are needed, and the erection of a large granite office building just 
below the State House grounds has been begun (1921). Charles 
Dewey succeeded to the presidency of the company upon the death of THEODORE WOODWARD 
Born in Barre, Vt. He studied medicine and practiced 
in Castleton, Vt., and vicinity. He became, probably, 
the leading surgeon of his time in Vermont and had a 
large consulting practice throughout Vermont and 
northern Vermont. He was a surgeon in the War of 
1812 and helped in the care of the wounded at the bat- 
tle of Plattsburg. He founded the Castleton Medical 
College, and was professor of surgery and obstetrics 
in the institution from 1818 to 1838. He married Mary 
Winnington. The children born to them were Lucia 
(Mrs. John H. Philip), Edwin T. (a Captain in the 
I'nited States Navy), Caroline M. (Mrs. Egbert Jami- 
son), Adrian T. and Mary A. (Mrs. John Ross). INSURANCE IN VERMONT 
591 
his father in 1877. When he retired in 1900, James C. Houghton was 
elected. Upon his death in 1902, Joseph A. DeBoer was chosen, and 
held the position until his death in 1915. He was succeeded by Fred 
A. Howland. 
The career of Joseph A. DeBoer is one of the most remarkable 
in the history of Vermont. Born in a little village in Holland, June 17, 
1861, his father died when the iboy was very young, and the mother 
brought her family of children to Albany, N. Y. Here the lad learned 
English, earned money as a newsboy, attended the public schools, 
winning high rank. He worked his way through Dartmouth College, 
became principal of the Montpelier High School, where he made a 
record for his efficiency, and in 1889 was elected actuary of the Na- 
tional Life. He was promoted successively to the positions of secre- 
tary, second vice-president, first vice-president and president. Mr. 
DeBoer was one of the notable insurance men of his time. More than 
that he was one of the leading citizens of Vermont. He served in 
both branches of the Legislature, and was frequently considered as a 
suitable candidate for Governor. He was an eloquent and logical 
public speaker and was frequently called upon for anniversary speeches. 
No Vermonter whose ancestors served with the Green Mountain Boys 
was more familiar with the history and traditions of the State, or 
prouder of the record of the commonwealth, than this native of Hol- 
land. His death at the height of his usefulness, and in the prime of 
life, was a distinct loss to the State. 
Mr. Howland, the present head of the company (1921) is a 
lawyer, having been a member of the well known firm of Dillingham, 
Huse and Howland. He served as Secretary of State from 1898 to 
1902. In 1903 he became Counsel for the National Life and in 1909 
its vice-president. He was elected to the presidency in 1916. 
The company’s statement for 1919 shows that the total income for 
the year was $13,355,102.84, and the total disbursements were 
$10,956,917.32, of which sum $8,491,995.79 was paid to policy holders. 
The amount received in premiums was $9,648,187.71, the gross assets 
were $73,060,254.79, and the insurance outstanding amounted to 
$267,801,560. 
The Union Mutual Fire Insurance Company of Montpelier was 
incorporated in 1874 and began business in 1875. The last report of 
the State Insurance Commissioner shows the total amount of premiums 
and assessments from the organization of the company to date to be 
$3,208,519.62 and the total amount of losses paid during the same 
period to be $2,289,316.51. The amount of insurance at risk was 
$35,696,281. 
The Burlington Mutual Fire Insurance Company was incor- 
porated in 1906 and began business in 1907. The total amount of 
premiums and assessments from organization to December 31, 1918, 592 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
was $265,753.87, and the total amount of losses paid during the same 
period was $144,044.79. The amount of insurance at risk was 
$7,122,178.16. 
The Granite Mutual Insurance Company of Barre, was incor- 
porated in 1906 and began business in 1907. The total amount of 
premiums and assessments from organization to the end of the year 
1918 was $499,695.96 and the total amount of losses paid during the 
same period was $322,189.62. The amount of insurance at risk was 
$12,996,580. 
The Green Mountain Fire Insurance Company of Montpelier was 
incorporated in 1916 and began business in 1919. The total amount 
of insurance at risk according to the insurance report for 1919 was 
$1,319,378. 
The Patrons’ Cooperative Fire Insurance Company was incor- 
porated in 1915 and began business the same year. The total amount 
of insurance in force at the end of the year 1918 was $1,228,031.01. 
The State Mutual Fire Insurance Company of Rutland was incor- 
porated in 1898 and began business in 1899. The total amount of 
premiums and assessments from organization to the end of the year 
1918 was $298,722.13, and the total amount of losses paid during the 
same period was $167,562.31. 
The American Fidelity Company of Montpelier was incorporated 
in 1900 and began business in 1901. The net premiums received since 
organization amount to $8,720,239.10 and the net losses paid during 
that period total $4,914,330.05. 
The Vermont Accident Insurance Company of Rutland was incor- 
porated in 1900 and began business in 1906. There were 1,966 policies 
in force at the end of the year 1919, insuring to the amount of 
$852,916. 
Among native Vermonters who have achieved notable success in 
the insurance world are Darwin P. Kingsley, born in Alburg, who 
has been president of the New York Life Insurance Company since 
1907, and Daniel A. Heald, a native of Chester, and at one time presi- 
dent of the Home Life Insurance Company. VERMONT INDUSTRIES 
FOR several decades the quarries and mines of the State have con- 
stituted an important feature of the industrial life of the State. 
The quarrying of marble is the oldest of the stone industries of 
Vermont. Isaac Underhill opened a marble quarry in Dorset in 1785, 
and about the same time a stone quarry was opened at Isle La Motte, 
from which black marble is obtained. It is said that people came one 
hundred miles to Dorset to secure hearths, chimney stones and lintels 
for their fireplaces. The manufacture of marble headstones began 
here in 1808. The first marble quarry at Middlebury was opened in 
1805 and the first marble mill at Swanton was erected in 1812. The 
early discoveries of marble induced many persons to invest money in 
opening quarries and not a few fortunes were lost in these enterprises. 
In 1838, William F. Barnes established a lime kiln at Sutherland 
Falls, on the site of the present village of Proctor, then a part of the 
town of Rutland. After carrying on his lime business for several 
years he became satisfied that this stone might be used for gravestones 
and monuments. For a tract of barren, swampy land, and part of a 
hill, he gave in exchange an old horse worth not more than seventy- 
five dollars. The land, then considered practically worthless, contained 
nearly all of the extensive marble deposits of West Rutland, among the 
most valuable in the world. Before his death Mr. Barnes sold this 
tract for one hundred and thirty thousand dollars. 
The Rutland marble quarries were developed by Charles Clement 
& Sons, Sheldon & Sons, Ripley Sons, Gilson and Woodfin, and others. 
One of the early contracts at Washington was the marble panelling for 
the Gold Room in the United States Treasury Building. 
The entire marble output of Vermont in 1870 amounted only 
to $130,000. In that year Redfleld Proctor was appointed receiver 
for a marble company operating at Sutherland Falls. Seeing the 
possibilities of the industry Colonel Proctor organized the Vermont 
Marble Company, which began business in an old mill beside Otter 
Creek, in which only six or eight blocks of marble could be sawed at 
a time. A track led to a quarry nearby, the marble being lowered by 
a cable, while a yoke of oxen drew the empty car back. Gradually the 
business grew. Sheds and mills were built and equipped with modern 
machinery. Sutherland Falls furnished electric power. New quar- 
ries were purchased at Pittsford, West Rutland and elsewhere. Shops 
were built at Center Rutland and West Rutland. The little hamlet at 
Sutherland Falls became the manufacturing village of Proctor, and 
many shops and mills were built along the Otter Creek. Forest lands 
were purchased to secure a lumber supply and a cable line was con- 
structed two and one-quarter miles over a mountain to bring sand 594 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
for the rubbing beds. In twenty years the output of Vermont marble 
had increased from $130,000 to $2,169,560. 
The State of Vermont is far and away the greatest marble pro- 
ducing State of the Union and the Vermont Marble Company is the 
largest marble producing concern in the world, with branch offices in 
the principal cities of the United States. There are said to be at least 
one hundred varieties of marble in Vermont, ranging from pure white 
to jet black. 
Vermont leads all other states in the production of granite as 
well as marble. Miilstone Hill, in Barre, received its name from the 
millstones quarried there. In 1824 there were three mills in Barre 
which produced such stones. Robert Parker, a Revolutionary soldier, 
and his partner, Thomas Courser, are believed to have opened the first 
granite quarry in Barre. The year 1781 is given as the time when the 
discovery was made that the Barre rock made good millstones. In 
1833 stone for the construction of the State House was drawn by ox 
teams to Montpelier. At that time the prediction was made that “this 
is the last structure that will ever be built of Barre granite and the last 
load that will ever be drawn from Harrington Hill.” In spite of this 
pessimistic forecast this region became, a few years later, the center 
of the monumental granite business of the world. 
An order for ten million paving blocks for the city of Troy, N. Y., 
first aroused an interest in the possibilities of Barre granite. In 1871 
about one thousand tons of granite were quarried at Barre. A little 
more than forty years later the output of Barre granite had increased 
to nearly three hundred thousand tons. 
There are in the Barre district (1921) about seventy granite 
plants with an annual output valued approximately at eight millions 
of dollars. The quarries cover an area about five miles long and 
three miles wide. A dozen different firms own the fifty-six quarries 
operated. 
The Barre granite is of three shades, dark, medium and light. 
Unlike the marble industry, the granite business is in the hands of 
many companies, although there are several large corporations which 
operate quarries and finishing plants. The World War seriously inter- 
fered with the stone industry of Vermont, but before the outbreak of 
hostilities, approximately five thousand men were employed in the 
Barre granite business under normal conditions. 
Most of the granite quarried here is used for monumental work. 
The statue of Robert Burns, on the pedestal of which have been carved 
scenes from “The Cotter’s Saturday Night,” erected in Barre, has been 
described by Professor Finley of Columbia University as “probably 
the noblest piece of granite carving to be found in any city.” 
Hardwick is the center of the building granite industry of 
America, and it is operated in connection with quarries and cutting VERMONT INDUSTRIES 
595 
sheds at Woodbury, Bethel and Northfield. The Woodbury granite 
is cut at Hardwick, and most of it comes from Robeson Mountain. 
It is said that the summit of this mountain was sold at one time for 
fifty dollars. The white granite of Bethel is a popular building stone. 
Cambridge University, in England, has made a collection of specimens 
of granite from all parts of the world and the whitest sample obtained 
came from Bethel, Vt. 
Within the past few years (1921) Vermont has advanced from 
second to first place in the production of talc, although the last figures 
published showed that New York still held first place in the value of 
the product. The principal mines are at Rochester, East Granville, 
Waterbury, Moretown, Johnson and Chester. There are in the State 
many talc deposits as yet undeveloped. 
For many years Vermont has ranked second in the development 
of slate. A quarry was opened at Guilford as early as 1812. The first 
Fair Haven quarry was opened in 1839 and was operated eight years 
before roofing slate was produced. About six-sevenths of the Ver- 
mont product is now roofing slate. Fair Haven is the center of the 
only district in the United States producing unfading green, purple and 
mottled slate. Some quarries produce mill stock. 
There are extensive deposits of asbestos in Lowell and Eden, 
which are supposed to be a part of the valuable Black Lake vein in 
Canada. The asbestos mined thus far is the short fibre product. A 
little asbestos was mined in Lowell in 1870, but the work was soon 
abandoned. In 1894 a wood chopper from the Black Lake region 
of Canada discovered asbestos in Lowell and in 1900 deposits were 
found in Eden. Considerable money has been spent in Lowell and 
Eden in developing the mines. 
The lumber business has always been important in Vermont and 
in the early history of the State much timber was exported to Canada. 
About 1850 lumber began to come in from the Dominion. In 1856 
Lawrence Barnes opened a lumber yard in Burlington and the business 
grew rapidly, lumber coming from the north by way of the Chambly 
Canal and Lake Champlain. Burlington became an important dis- 
tributing point, and at one time ranked third among the lumber markets 
of the United States. 
Various wood working plants are among the most important Ver- 
mont industries, including manufactories of sash, doors and blinds, 
chairs, tanks and silos, packing boxes, refrigerators, butter tubs, shade 
rollers, toys and many wood novelties. 
Thaddeus Fairbanks of St. Johnsbury invented the platform 
scale in 1830. It was originally designed for the weighing of hemp, 
but developed into a great variety of balances, ranging from apparatus 
that will weigh a ship with its cargo, or a railroad train to' an in- 
strument so delicate that it will weigh the dust resulting from the 596 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
sharpening of a lead pencil. This business grew with great rapidity 
until the firm of E. and T. Fairbanks and Company became the world’s 
leading scale producers. 
In the spring of 1857 John Howe, Jr., of Brandon, bought a 
patent obtained by two Vermonters, Frank M. Strong of Vergennes 
and Thomas Ross of Rutland, for platform scales and began their 
manufacture in Brandon. In 1864 the Howe Scale Company was 
organized, and in 1878 the shops were removed to' Rutland. In 1888 
Dr. John A. Mead was elected president and through his foresight and 
skill a great business was built up, this manufacturing establishment 
becoming the second largest of its kind in the world. 
Another great Vermont industry is the Estey Organ Works at 
Brattleboro. In 1833 Jacob Estey established a lead pipe and pump 
business in that village, and later he rented part of a shop he owned 
to a firm of melodeon makers. The partners in this enterprise desired 
to go to California when the discovery of gold was reported and Mr. 
Estey bought their business. During the next few years the annual 
output was from fifty to seventy-five instruments, the price varying 
from seventy-five to two hundred and twenty-five dollars each. Mr. 
Estey was accustomed to load a wagon with melodeons and drive from 
town to town until they were sold, a trip sometimes covering portions 
of several States. Later cottage organs and pianos were developed 
and the business grew to large proportions. Branch houses were es- 
tablished in several of the large cities of America and Europe. In 
recent years the manufacture of pipe organs has been developed into 
one of the greatest establishments of its kind in America. 
One of the largest factories in the United States making screen 
doors and windows is located in the village of Winooski. 
A woolen mill was established at Bennington before the American 
Revolution. During the early part of the Nineteenth century a con- 
siderable number of small mills sprang up in various parts of the 
State, some of which are still doing business. There are large woolen 
mills at Burlington and Winooski and large cotton mills at Burlington 
and Brattleboro. The manufacture of knit underwear was begun at 
Bennington in 1802, and that village is one of the important centers in 
this country for the production of knit goods. 
A paper mill was erected at Bennington in 1784, and a similar 
mill at Fair Haven ten years later. Bellows Falls is one of the most 
important paper mill centers in New England, and is said to contain 
the largest plant in the United States manufacturing waxed paper. 
This village is said to have been the first place in the world where 
paper was made successfully from wood pulp. William A. Russell of 
Lawrence, Mass., having carried on this work here from 1866 to 1870. 
About the middle of the Nineteenth century an important machine 
tool industry was established at Windsor. ADRIAN T. WOODWARD 
Born in Castleton, Vt., July 17, 1827. He graduated 
from Castleton Seminary in 1845, and from Castleton 
Medical College in 1847, at the age of twenty. He 
practiced medicine four years at Whitehall, N. Y. 
Later he was on the staff of an Albany, N. Y., hospital 
and was demonstrator of anatomy in the Albany Medi- 
cal College. He was professor of obstetrics and the 
diseases of women at the Castleton Medical College 
until he removed to Brandon in 1860. For several years 
he was professor of the surgical diseases of women in 
the College of Medicine of the University of Vermont 
at Burlington. He was surgeon of the Fourteenth Ver- 
mont Volunteers in the Civil War and saw service in 
the battles of Gettysburg, Spottsylvania Court House 
and the Wilderness. For many years he was one of 
the leading surgeons of Vermont. He married Miss 
Martha Chapin of Whitehall, N. Y., who died in 1853. 
Two children born to them also died. Later Doctor 
Woodward married Lois C. June of Brandon. Two 
children were born to them, Julius H. and Irving. The 
second son died in childhood. VERMONT INDUSTRIES 
597 
Springfield, Vt., has become the leader of the world’s develop- 
ment of the turret lathe, with which Governor Hartness is so actively 
connected. It also leads in the manufacture of last lathes and contains 
a large shoddy mill. In more recent years the manufacture of auto- 
matic screw machines and automatic drills has added materially to the 
growth of Windsor. A great business in calf skins has been built up 
at Hyde Park by Carroll S. Page. 
The electric motor was invented by Thomas Davenport of 
Brandon, who carried on his experiments amid great privations. On 
September 28, 1910, the Allied Electrical Associations of America 
dedicated a bronze tablet to his memory at Forestdale, in the town of 
Brandon. 
About 1812 the first manufacture of globes for use in schools was 
established at Bradford by James Wilson. 
Soon after the close of the War of 1812, a peddler stopped at the 
blacksmith shop of Silas Hawes in South Shaftsbury to have his horse 
shod. Some old saws were taken in part payment for the transaction. 
Howes took two straight pieces from the saw blades, welded them to- 
gether in the form of a right angle, removed the rust, marked ofT inches 
with a cold chisel, and made the first steel square. Jeremiah Hall of 
Middlebury invented the circular saw and a townsman, Isaac E. Mark- 
ham, originated the process of sawing marble by water power with 
the aid of sand, water and toothless saws. 
One of the great water powers of the East has been developed 
on the Connecticut River at Vernon, and there are others in the 
headwaters of the Deerfield River in southern Vermont, at Chittenden, 
Fairfax, Essex Junction, Bellows Falls, Vergennes, Bolton and Spring- 
field. VERMONT AGRICULTURE 
r[E history of Vermont agriculture is told to a considerable 
extent in the pages of the narrative portion of this work. 
Census reports have been quoted from the time agricultural 
statistics were available, showing Vermont’s development. This 
sketch, therefore, is intended merely to supplement the previous de- 
scription of farming operations. 
Although Vermont is a mountainous State and much of its sur- 
face is too rocky to permit cultivation, its soil is fertile and the crop 
records for many years show that it has consistently ranked well up 
on the list in its yield per acre of staple crops. During the past year 
(1920) it ranked ahead of all other States of the Union in yield of 
bushels of corn per acre. The principal crops are hay, oats, corn, 
potatoes, barley, buckwheat, rye, apples, maple sugar and maple 
syrup. During the World War the amount of wheat grown was 
largely increased, but under normal conditions Vermonters prefer to 
raise other crops and buy flour. 
Vermont primarily is a dairy State. This has been true for 
many years but the first two decades of the Twentieth century have 
seen a steady growth along dairy lines, an intensifying of the industry, 
resulting in better bred herds and more successful marketing condi- 
tions. The rapid growth of the metropolitan cities of New York and 
Boston has necessitated a reaching out farther for a milk supply for 
these great cities and a daily supply is now (1921) drawn from the 
western part of the State for New York City, and from eastern Ver- 
mont for Boston. Regular refrigerator milk trains are run over Ver- 
mont railroads, and a system of gathering milk from farms has been 
organized. There are also many creameries, some of them organized 
on a co-operative basis, which care for most of the milk not sent to 
the city markets. 
As a result of this highly specialized development, Vermont has 
become one of the greatest dairy States in the Union, taking into ac- 
count area and population. In no other American Commonwealth are 
there as many dairy cows on each acre of improved land as in Vermont. 
As a result of the large number of cows kept in this State, Vermont’s 
soil fertility is being maintained. Hay is the principal crop of the 
State, and a large amount of corn is raised for silage purposes. In 
fact the important crops generally are those which contribute to the 
maintenance of dairy herds. The census report for 1920 shows that 
in 1919 the value of all Vermont’s dairy products amounted to $27,- 
207,813. 
At one time Vermont ranked high in the production of cheese and 
the first cheese factory, it is claimed, was established at Pawlet, in 
March, 1864. VERMONT AGRICULTURE 
599 
The Vermont Dairyman’s Association, one of the most active 
organizations of its kind in the United States, was organized in the 
room of the Committee of Agriculture in the State House at Mont- 
pelier, October 27, 1869. The meeting was called to order by Senator 
Homer E. Royce, of Franklin County. R. J. Saxe, of Sheldon, was 
elected temporary chairman, and O. S. Bliss, of Georgia, temporary 
secretary. On the following day, October 28, another meeting was 
held, when E. D. Mason, of Richmond, was chosen president, and Mr. 
Bliss was continued in the office of secretary. The first winter meet- 
ing was held at St. Albans, January 19-21, 1870. These annual meet- 
ings have long ranked among the important gatherings of the year in 
Vermont. 
One of the great farming organizations is the National Grange, 
established December 4, 1867. One of the seven founders was John 
R. Thompson, who served in a Vermont regiment during the Civil 
War. The Vermont State Grange was organized at St. Johnsbury, 
July 4, 1872. 
The rise and decline of the Merino sheep industry in Vermont is 
of sufficient importance to deserve special attention. It is said that 
at the time of the invasion of Spain by the French, early in the Nine- 
teenth century, that country contained the largest number of fine 
wooled sheep in the world. According to Spanish legends, sheep were 
introduced into Greece from Colchis, thence to> Italy, and the Romans 
introduced them into Spain. The sheep had thrived in this peninsula 
and for centuries had been under the protection of the Spanish Gov- 
ernment. The Moors had given particular care to their flocks and the 
number of Merinos in Spain, at the time of the invasion by Napoleon’s 
soldiers, has been estimated at six millions. 
Col. David Humphreys, appointed United States Minister to 
Madrid by President Adams in 1797, was recalled by President Jeffer- 
son in 1802. When about to leave that country the customary present 
of a number of bars of silver was offered, and declined, as contrary 
to the laws of this country. The American Minister intimated, how- 
ever, that for the benefit of the people of the United States he would 
accept some Merino sheep. He was informed that such exportation 
was forbidden but that as a personal favor he might be able to secure 
some for himself and no notice would be taken of the transaction. 
He succeeded in getting one hundred pure Merinos, seventy-five ewes 
and twenty-five rams, from one to two years old. They were delivered 
at Lisbon, and on April 10, 1802, they were placed on shipboard. After 
a voyage of fifty days they were landed at Derby, Conn. Two of 
the imported rams were placed by Col. Humphreys on a farm in 
Hartland, Vt. William Jarvis of Weathersfield, Vt., former United 
States Consul to Portugal, learning of the success of Colonel 
Humphreys in securing Merino sheep from Spain, applied for per- 600 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
mission to secure some of these famous animals. Through the inter- 
vention of the United States Minister to Spain, he secured, as a 
special favor, two hundred of the Royal Escurial flock, these being 
the only Escurials ever sent to this country. Mr. Jarvis presented a 
pair of the sheep to President Madison and a pair to ex-President 
Jefferson. After the second Napoleonic invasion of Spain the gov- 
ernmental authorities, lacking funds, consented to sell some of the 
Merino flocks. Through an agent, Mr. Jarvis purchased one thou- 
sand, four hundred of the Paular flock, said to be one of the best in 
Spain. They were originally owned by the Carthusian friars of 
Paular, on the borders of Andalusia. Later purchases made by Mr. 
Jarvis, brought his total importations to 3,630 sheep. He sent about 
four hundred of these to his Weathersfield, Vt., farm. Mr. Jarvis 
sold Merino sheep at prices sufficiently low to permit Vermont farmers 
to buy. During the first half of the Nineteenth century the Merino 
sheep developed rapidly in Vermont and sheep raising became one of 
the principal industries in the State. Elsewhere allusion has been 
made to the great importance which sheep raising attained in Vermont, 
and particularly in Addison county. With the opening of the West 
this industry passed largely to the Western States. 
Vermont is the home of a famous breed of horses, the Morgans. 
Justin Morgan came to Randolph, Vt., from West Springfield, Mass., 
in 1789. A little later he brought to Vermont a colt which was used 
by him as a breeding animal. Later he sold the horse, which was 
owned in St. Johnsbury and Montpelier. The animal, known as the 
Justin Morgan horse, and afterward as Justin Morgan, was about 
fourteen hands high, weighed approximately 950 pounds, and was 
a dark bay, with black mane and tail. The Morgan Horse Register 
says this horse was sired by True Briton, said to have been captured 
from Col. James DeLancey, a British officer. 
The Morgans have been famous for their endurance. It was said 
of Justin Morgan that he could “out-walk, out-trot, out-run (and) 
out-pull every horse entered against him.” Six of the most famous 
sons of Justin Morgan were Sherman Morgan, Bulrush Morgan, 
Woodbury Morgan, the Fenton Horse, the Hawkins Horse, and 
Revenge. Black Hawk was a son of Sherman Morgan and Ethan 
Allen was a son of Black Hawk. Green Mountain Morgan, a son of 
Gifford Morgan and a grandson of Woodbury Morgan, probably was 
one of the most attractive animals ever reared in the United States. 
General Wool of Mexican war fame, said he was “the finest parade 
horse in the country,” Governor Banks of Massachusetts, seeking the 
handsomest possible mount for a muster in 1860, sent to Williamstown, 
Vt., for Green Mountain Morgan. The horse was then twenty-five 
years old, but he played his part to perfection. VERMONT AGRICULTURE 
601 
The American Farmer's Encyclopedia published in Philadelphia, 
said in 1844: “Perhaps the very finest breed of horses in the United 
States, when general usefulness is taken into consideration, is what 
is commonly known in the northern and eastern States as the Morgan 
horse.” The American Horsebreeder said: “Probably no other family 
of horses ever existed in which so large a proportion of its members 
‘acted well their part’ with greater honor to themselves and their 
family than that founded by the noted stallion, Justin Morgan. The 
majority of these were remarkably cheerful, docile and faithful in 
whatever station they were placed. Their great strength in propor- 
tion to their size was proverbial, and their endurance was wonderful. 
No horses of their size could compete with the old time Morgans, 
either for pulling logs in the clearing, loads on the road in a team, 
on the plow, the family carriage or under saddle on parade. There 
never has been a family that transmitted its valuable qualities with 
greater uniformity than the Morgan.” When one of the sculptors en- 
gaged to model the statuary for the World’s Fair, held at Chicago, 
sought a model for a typical American horse, a Vermont Morgan, a 
daughter of Daniel Lambert, was chosen. While the Morgans have 
not been chiefly noted as trotting horses, some of the speediest of 
American racers, Dan Patch, Lou Dillon, Uhlan, Major Delmar, Sweet 
Marie and The Harvester had Morgan blood in their veins. 
Senator Proctor of Vermont, as chairman of the Senate Agricul- 
tural Committee, succeeded in interesting the Department of Agricul- 
ture in the revival of the Morgan type, which, in the latter part of the 
Nineteenth century had declined in popularity. Col. Joseph Battell 
of Middlebury, in 1906, gave to the United States four hundred and 
thirty-five acres in Weybridge as a breeding farm and in 1917, six 
hundred acres were added to this tract by purchase. From sixty-five 
to one hundred horses are maintained on this farm, the primary object 
being the preservation of the Morgan breed of horses and a gradual 
increase in size by careful selection. 
The present State Commissioner of Agriculture (1921) is Elbert 
S. Brigham of St. Albans, a successful farmer, who has held office 
since 1913. Under his capable direction the department has increased 
largely in size and usefulness. The department includes a State 
Forester, creamery and cheese factory inspectors, inspectors of seed 
potatoes, an inspector of nurseries, an inspector in charge of insect 
suppression, a farm labor and sales agent, a dairy manufacturing 
specialist, an inspector in charge of cow-testing associations and a Live 
Stock Commissioner. 
The report of the State Commissioner of Agriculture for 1918-20 
reported the following State forests: 602 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
Name 
Town 
Area in Acres 
George Aitken 
Mendon 
800 
Arlington 
Arlington 
225 
Battell 
Duxbury-Huntington 
4,500 
Downer 
Sharon 
800 
Groton 
Peacham-Marshfield 
6,000 
M. J. Hapgood 
Peru 
100 
L. R. Jones 
Plainfield 
600 
Lyndon 
Lyndon 
75 
Mansfield 
Stowe 
5,000 
Proctor-Piper 
Cavendish 
400 
Putnam 
Worcester 
1,400 
Townshend 
Townshend 
700 
West Rutland 
West Rutland 
350 FRED T. KIDDER 
Born in Woodstock, Vt., October 14, 1858. He 
graduated from the University of Vermont in 1880 and 
from the College of Medicine of that institution in 
1883. He has practiced as a physician and surgeon in 
Woodstock since his graduation. He has been a mem- 
ber of the State Board of Health for many years and 
is its president. He is a trustee of the University of 
Vermont. He was a member of the House of Repre- 
sentatives in 190(1 and of the Senate in 1908. HISTORY OF THE MEDICAL PROFESSION IN 
VERMONT 
By Dr. Charles S. Caverly of Rutland* 
President of the State Board of Health 
Revised by Dr. Henry C. Tinkham of Burlington 
Dean of the College of Medicine of the 
University of Vermont 
DISEASES OF VERMONT 
The settlers on the New Hampshire Grants were a hardy race. 
Inured to toil and_ privation, accustomed to contend with natural 
foes—human, animal and elemental, living perforce the “simple 
life,” they developed into the proverbially vigorous Green Mountain 
Boys. 
Except for the occasional inroads of epidemics, the physical ills 
of the early settlers in Vermont were chiefly confined to such acci- 
dental injuries as necessarily attach to pioneer life. 
Small pox was the chief of epidemic diseases of the early days. 
It had long been the scourge of the Indians and the early settlers of 
the older colonies. Gov. Hiland Hall, speaking of the disease in Ben- 
nington, says: 
“The first mention of the disease on the town records is in March, 
1773, when some cases of it occurring, a meeting was warned to see 
whether the town will give liberty to inoculate for the Small Pox, 
with suitable restrictions, and upon a vote being taken, it was passed 
in the negative.”! 
Governor Hall further says: 
“In the year 1776, the disease had prevailed among the American 
troops in Canada, largely contributing to the unfortunate result of the 
expedition to that province, and it threatened to become general 
throughout the country. 
By this time the efficiency of inoculation had become generally 
acknowledged, and at a special meeting held on the 10th of Feb’y, 
1777, it was voted to establish a Pest House and to place it in charge 
of a committee appointed for that purpose. To prevent the spreading 
of the disease, it was declared by vote that any person who should 
*Owing to the death of Doctor Caverly, the text of this chapter was 
revised and supplemented by Dean Tinkham in order that it might be 
brought up to the date of publication. 
tHemenway’s Gazetteer. 604 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
presume to have the infection on either of the several of the main 
roads through the town, should be liable to a penalty of twenty pounds, 
or having taken it, if he should go more than 30 rods from the Pest 
House, he should forfeit the like sum of £20.” 
Further: “In November, 1794, at a special town meeting it was 
voted to recommend to the Selectmen to give liberty to Capt. Hutchins 
to inoculate for the disease till the 15th of March ‘under the most 
rigid and careful restrictions, such as they should think proper’.” 
In 1784 and 1787 the Governor and Council enacted laws making 
it the duty of the Selectmen in the various towns to attend to cases 
of this disease, provide medical attendance, and guard against danger 
to the uninfected. Thence dates our disease quarantine. For many 
years small pox was the only quarantinable disease. From this time 
the Selectmen were the local boards of health. 
Governor Hall says that Dr. Benjamin Robinson, son of Samuel 
Robinson, advertised in the Vermont Gazette in 1800 that he was in- 
oculating for kine pox and that he had the best European authority 
for stating that it was a prevention of small pox. As proof of this 
statement, he vaccinated three lads and later allowed them to enter 
the pest house and inoculated them with the small pox, and “not one 
of them was in the least degree affected by the pest house disease.” 
From five to ten deaths a year have been recorded in the State 
in some years as late as in the seventies, and rather widespread out- 
breaks of from twenty to one hundred cases have occurred. Since 
the Spanish War rarely has there been a death in these epidemics. 
Malaria was one of the diseases with which the early settlers had to 
contend. Fevers of the intermittent type were common along the 
border of Lake Champlain until the middle of the Nineteenth century. 
For the past three or four decades, malaria of Vermont origin has 
been almost unknown in the State. 
Dr. Joseph A. Gallup of Woodstock published a book in 1815, en- 
titled “Sketches of Epidemic Diseases in the State of Vermont from 
Its First Settlement to the Year 1815.” Doctor Gallup’s technical 
knowledge was apparently quite up with the times and he seems to 
have been in touch with many physicians in all parts of the State. 
Probably he was better qualified than any writer to speak of diseases 
prevalent in Vermont during the years covered by his book. Many of 
the following facts relating to the years 1790-1815 are quoted from 
Doctor Gallup. 
From the earliest days, even as late as 1872, dysentery was' a 
common and very fatal disease. It created havoc in Burgoyne’s armv 
as well as in the American army about Lake Champlain. It appeared 
in all parts of the State, usually in the late summer or early fall (dysen- 
teric months) and was regarded as a true pestilence; as many as one 
hundred and fifty to two hundred and fifty deaths a year were not THE MEDICAL PROFESSION 
605 
uncommon. With increased knowledge of its cause, and improvement 
in our water supplies, the name has disappeared almost entirely from 
our mortality tables. 
“Malignant sore throat,” “putrid sore throat,” “malignant angina” 
was a common disease in the earliest days. Inasmuch as this disease 
seems to have attacked children chiefly, it is not unlikely, as Doctor 
Gallup hints, that the early outbreaks were really either scarlet fever 
(canker rash) or diphtheria. 
Scarlet fever has prevailed in epidemic form from Revolutionary 
days. It was formerly a very fatal disease. From two hundred and 
fifty to three hundred deaths a year from this disease were not unusual 
as late as 1880. In recent years this disease under strict preventive 
measures has nearly disappeared as a cause of death. 
Typhus fever was a rather prevalent disease and fatal during the 
first century of our State. In the absence of exact knowledge of the 
causes of these diseases, it is quite certain that typhus fever, dysentery 
and typhoid fever were very loosely diagnosed in pre-bacterial days. 
The first registration report of Vermont (1857) returns all deaths 
attributed to “typhus,” “typhoid,” “ship” and “continued” fevers, as 
well as simply “fever,” as “typhus fever.” 
That all these diseases occurred in the earliest times is undoubted, 
but it is quite certain that “typhoid” was oftenest the true infection. 
This disease, typhoid fever, is the typical water-borne disease 
and has been a very constant autumnal visitor to our State from its 
beginning. From two hundred to five hundred deaths annually was 
long its regular toll. With a better understanding of its cause and the 
elimination of local foci in the State, it has also been reduced to a 
minimum of prevalence. In 1913, there were but thirty deaths in 
Vermont from this cause. 
“Spotted fever,” a disease so designated, appeared in Vermont 
about 1811. Doctor Gallup describes it as a cold weather disease and 
mentions, besides Woodstock, Barnet, Randolph, Barre, Reading, 
Greensboro, Hardwick, Pomfret and Plymouth as suffering severely 
from the disease during 1811 and 1812. 
Continuing, he says: 
“The autumn of 1812 and the winter of 1813 ushered in the most 
severe epidemic disease that has ever afflicted the inhabitants of Ver- 
mont, the epidemic peripneumony or disease of the lungs. It seemed 
to have the features of the disease, that had been in the State for about 
two years, called spotted fever,” etc. 
This epidemic as described by Doctor Gallup and others was 
without doubt the worst scourge that ever has befallen our people. 
It seems to have started among the soldiers at Burlington, spreading 
from there to the people in that town and thence was scattered over 
the State. The number of deaths among the soldiers in four months 606 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
was stated at not less than seven hundred or eight hundred. The 
fearful ravages of this epidemic are reflected by the deaths reported 
from various towns. Woodstock reported fifty-four deaths; Pomfret, 
forty-four; Sharon, forty; Arlington, ten; Sandgate, twenty; Man- 
chester, sixty to seventy; Dorset, forty to fifty; Rupert, forty to fifty; 
Shaftsbury, thirty; Bennington, seventy; Pownal, seventy to eighty; 
Clarendon, eighty; Castleton, sixty; Reading, forty-four. These fig- 
ures given mostly in round numbers are from local reports to Doctor 
Gallup, and compared with figures from other sources, seem to be no 
exaggeration. 
Doctor Gallup estimates the total fatalities in the State during 
five months, including army deaths, at 6,400. The census population 
for 1810 was 217,913. 
It is a matter of record that epidemic cerebro-spinal meningitis 
or spotted fever appeared in certain parts of Massachusetts about 
1805 and was epidemic in New England and some of the Middle 
States from that time until about 1815. 
From this fact and from the description given of individual cases 
in this great epidemic in Vermont, it is safe to venture the statement 
that the essential disease in this scourge of 1813 was epidemic menin- 
gitis, frequently complicated with pneumonia. It is hard to realize the 
extent of the suffering this disease entailed on the young State. Whole 
families were attacked and death frequently occurred in a few hours. 
There were often none who were well enough to care for the sick or 
bury the dead. Dr. Edward Lamb of Montpelier had fourteen sick 
physicians under his care. 
The name “spotted fever” has only disappeared from our death 
records within a very few years, being gradually supplanted by 
“cerebro-spinal meningitis” or “epidemic meningitis.” 
Asiatic cholera was imported into Canada in June, 1832. It 
claimed several thousand victims in Quebec and Montreal and much 
alarm was created in Vermont. Four deaths are recorded as having 
occurred in Burlington and about ten or twelve in the State. 
Erysipelas was a frequent epidemic disease during the first three- 
fourths of the Nineteenth century in Vermont. 
Diphtheria appeared in our State under that name in 1858. 
“Croup,” “membranous croup,” “malignant sore throat,” “putrid sore 
throat,” “malignant angina” were, however, names that had been known 
to the profession for a hundred years or more. The name diphtheria 
dates from about 1858; the disease undoubtedly was very old. It 
quickly assumed epidemic proportions and attained its maximum 
prevalence in 1863. In 1862, eight hundred and ninety-one deaths 
occurred from this disease and in 1863 there were recorded 1,313 
deaths in Vermont from diphtheria and croup. This epidemic was 
second only to the spotted fever epidemic of 1813 in the suffering it THE MEDICAL PROFESSION 
607 
caused. Like most of our epidemic diseases, this has nearly vanished 
under the light of modern research and sane preventive measures. 
One other epidemic of disease in Vermont should be recorded, 
because of the present widespread interest attaching to it, and because 
at the time of its occurrence, it was unprecedented in its extent and 
seriousness. An outbreak of acute anterior poliomyelitis (infantile 
paralysis) occurred in the valley of the Otter Creek in 1894, involving 
one hundred and thirty-two cases and sixteen deaths. This disease 
has since occurred in epidemic form in many parts of Europe and 
America, including other parts of our own State and has found classi- 
fication among the infectious diseases which may occur epidemically. 
The most severe epidemic of infantile paralysis in Vermont was 
in 1914, although the disease continued in epidemic form for four 
years. This outbreak involved three hundred and four recognized 
cases, while there were undoubtedly many more unrecognized, of the 
so-called “abortive type.” There were five hundred and eighty-three 
cases reported during the four years. Per capita of population, the 
1914 outbreak was probably the most serious epidemic of this disease 
recorded. The fatalities were seventeen percent of the cases, a very 
high rate. It involved chiefly the northern counties of the State, 
Orleans, Franklin, Chittenden and Addison. 
It was this 1914 outbreak which attracted the attention of one of 
Vermont’s loyal citizens, who placed a considerable sum of money 
($25,000) in the hands of the State Board of Health for the purpose 
of prosecuting research work to determine the cause of this disease 
and methods of its prevention. A research laboratory has been estab- 
lished in Burlington, the University of Vermont furnishing rooms in 
the College of Medicine for this purpose. This laboratory has been 
to a large extent under the direction of the Rockefeller Institute and 
cooperating with it. Several matters of importance relating to this 
disease have been discovered in this laboratory. The seriousness of 
this disease is not measured by its fatalities but quite as much by the 
various forms of permanent paralysis that result. 
In September, 1918, the epidemic of influenza, which became 
nation-wide, made its appearance in Vermont. The city of Barre in 
Washington county was the first place to be seriously affected. 
The disease spread rapidly over the State, and while it made its 
appearance in practically every town in the State it was much more 
severe in some localities than in others. In Barre and Montpelier the 
disease appeared in its most aggravated form. Possibly this may have 
been due to the large number of men working in the stone sheds, an 
occupation which seems to favor disease of the air passages. 
The epidemic became serious in St. Johnsbury, St. Albans, Burl- 
ington and many other towns and cities. The worst form of the dis- 
ease appeared in the larger towns. This was probably due to poorer 608 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
housing conditions and the less sanitary condition of the homes of the 
laboring class in these places. 
Judging from the number of cases which were reported to the 
State Board of Health it is safe to assume that there were more than 
50,000 cases in the State, and 1,772 deaths were reported. 
The epidemic assumed such serious proportions that State-wide 
restriction of public gatherings was promulgated. Schools and 
churches were closed and all public meetings were forbidden. The 
number of people sick with the disease was so great that it was im- 
possible to care for them in their homes or in existing hospitals, and 
many temporary hospitals were established in different parts of the 
State. 
Consumption or tuberculosis, the universal scourge, has occurred 
in Vermont as elsewhere from earliest times. The number of deaths 
attributable to tuberculosis in our State for many years ran steadily 
from seven hundred to nine hundred annually. It was probably 
neither more nor less prevalent than in other parts of the country. 
The discovery of the cause of this disease in 1882, together with the 
adoption of rational methods of prevention and cure, have cut this 
annual death rate to less than three hundred. An important factor in 
this anti-tuberculosis campaign has been the systematic campaign of 
popular education, provided by our State Legislature. 
So far as consumption can be called an industrial disease, Ver- 
mont has furnished favorable conditions for its prevalence in two 
counties, viz., Washington and Rutland, among the stone cutters. The 
granite industry of Washington county especially has been an un- 
doubted factor in fostering this disease. 
Epidemic disease in our State is fast disappearing. The old-time 
infections, like typhoid fever, diphtheria, puerperal fever, erysipelas 
and dysentery, scarlet fever, tuberculosis and small pox gradually and 
surely are giving way to scientific prevention. None of them now 
causes the panicky feeling in the community which was so common 
in the early days. Our people have learned that preventive measures, 
promptly and rigidly enforced, do prevent; and as a rule insist on 
their application, whenever any of these diseases appear. 
Longevity is increasing. Since the systematic official registration 
of deaths in Vermont (1857) ten years has been added to the span 
of human life. 
The suppression of acute epidemic diseases has resulted in a 
tremendous saving of young life, for it is the young and vigorous that 
chiefly suffer from these infections. Therefore more of our people 
than formerly are living to advanced age. 
Largely as a result of this lengthening of life, the diseases of 
senility are increasing. Bright’s disease, apoplexy, heart diseases and 
cancer belong in this class. The strenuous modern life contributes to WILLIAM N. BRYANT 
Born in Weston, Yt., September 2(i, 1851. He 
studied in Montpelier Seminary, Harvard Medical 
School and graduated from the College of Medicine of 
the University of Vermont in 1873, locating in Ludlow 
for the practice of his profession. He was president 
of the Vermont Medical Society in 1904. He has been 
one of the Supervisors of the Insane. He was a mem- 
ber of the House in 1910 and was appointed in 1921 a 
member of the State Highway Commission. THE MEDICAL PROFESSION 
609 
the same results, though not to the same extent in rural Vermont as 
among urban populations. Vermont, a distinctly rural State, with 
the best air, water and climate of our northern latitude, is calculated 
to maintain its reputation for rugged virility, if safeguarded from 
infectious diseases. 
VERMONT MEDICAL SOCIETIES 
Prior to 1783, the medical profession of Vermont was composed 
of men scattered through the settlements; some, army surgeons 
left by the subsidence of the war; others, young practitioners at- 
tracted by the opening of a new country. Whether in war or peace, 
these pioneer medical men with hardly an exception had been loyal 
and enthusiastic supporters of the young State. Of matters of mutual 
interest, purely professional, hitherto they had had little time to think. 
Now, however, the interests of their profession, as well as those of 
their State, invited association. 
The First Medical Society 
In October, 1784, the physicians of Rutland and Bennington 
counties secured a charter for a medical society with the title above 
given. 
Its objects and charter members are thus set forth: 
“Whereas, it is a matter of the greatest importance to the in- 
habitants of this State that the professors of the medical art should 
receive all proper encouragement to excite them to improve and to 
acquire a thorough acquaintance with a science so interesting, to those 
who may be in distress through indisposition of body and limbs: and 
whereas, it appears by a petition by Jonas Fay and Lewis Beebe in 
behalf of themselves and a number of gentlemen physicians and sur- 
geons in the counties of Bennington and Rutland and parts adjacent, 
to wit: Nathaniel Dickinson, Seth Alden, Samuel Huntington, Elisha 
Boker, Lemuel Chipman, William Johnson, William Gould, Aaron 
Hastings, Hitchcock, Silas Holbrook, William Wolcott, 
Ezra Boker, Ebenezer Tolman, Ezekiel Porter and Jacob Roebeck, 
did on the 19th day of August, 1784, form themselves into a medical 
association and formed a constitution for the government thereof; 
prayed the Legislature of this State to patronize and establish the 
same.” 
Following this example similar societies were chartered in Wind- 
ham, Franklin and Windsor counties in the order named. Most of 
the other counties had medical societies later. One of the chief, if 
not the chief, function of these first county organizations was the 
regulation of admission of members into the profession. 610 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
The State Society was the result of these county organizations. 
The original charter for a State Society, granted in October, 1813, 
provided that the physicians of the several counties might form county 
societies, these societies to be corporations with corporate powers and 
a corporate seal. They were empowered to tax the members “for 
the purpose of procuring a library and suitable apparatus,” provided 
the tax did not exceed three dollars. 
The first meeting was held at Montpelier, July 7, 1814, and Ezekiel 
Porter was the first President. 
The State Medical Society entered at once on a vigorous exist- 
ence. Its birth was coincident with the direst outbreak of epidemic 
disease that ever visited the State. Its activities were not confined 
to the welfare of its members alone, they had to do with the public 
health. Like its predecessors, it decided the qualifications of mem- 
bers of the profession and granted diplomas to such as met the re- 
quirements. The remoteness from centers of medical teaching made 
it practically impossible for aspiring students to attend lectures at 
such institutions. They studied consequently with practitioners of 
standing, and in due time presented themselves to the Censors of a 
Chartered Society for examination. 
A diploma issued by “The First Medical Society” reads: 
“James Porter having been approved by the Censors is hereby ad- 
mitted a Member thereof, and entitled to every privilege thereunto 
belonging: 
“And with full confidence we Recommend him to the Public as a 
safe and successful practitioner in Physic and Surgery. 
“Signed and dated in July 1801 by Ezekiel Porter, President and 
John Sargent, Secretary.” 
Endorsed on its back this document has: 
“Saratoga County: Clerk’s Office Aug’t. 29th, 1806, a copy of 
the written certificate has this day been filed in my office. 
“A. C. Baldwin, Clerk.” 
This indicates that the license of these societies was honored in 
other States. 
After the establishment of medical colleges, the State Society 
sometimes sent delegates to their examinations. During the first ten 
years of its existence, the State Society had full control of the ad- 
mission of members to the medical profession. 
At the meeting in 1825 a report by special committee appointed 
to look up the subject of the requirements for admission to practice 
reported in substance as follows: (Two medical colleges, it should be 
remembered, were then in operation in Vermont.) 
“The Medical Society of this State regrets the scanty require- 
ments of candidates who ofifer themselves for examinations for 
licenses to practice and also for degrees in the Medical Institutions in THE MEDICAL PROFESSION 
611 
this State; and likewise in adjoining States. We experience an earnest 
concern on account of the general laxness that prevails. We further 
consider this abatement of requirements as tending to depreciate the 
reputation of the profession and to injure the community.” 
It was therefore ordained by the Society that candidates for 
licenses should bring a certificate of preparatory studies sufficient to 
enter the freshman class in a college or submit to an examination to 
this effect, unless he had a degree of A. B. Any candidate who had 
the degree of A. B. must have studied three full years with some 
licensed practitioner with an absence of not more than six weeks in 
each year. If such candidate had only been fitted to enter college, he 
should have studied four years as above. Each candidate was required 
to have attended at least two courses of medical lectures, have arrived 
at the age of twenty-one years and brought a certificate of good moral 
character. These certificates as to length of study, morals, etc., were 
to be sworn to before a competent official. 
Again, “being fully informed with a mind of the necessity of a 
general reform, this Society with due reverence” recommended to the 
Medical Institutions of this and neighboring states that the degree of 
Bachelor, instead of Doctor of Medicine be given students after the 
above period of time, and that the degree of M. D. be conferred only 
on those who merit it seven years after the degree of M. B. is granted. 
The Society further directed its secretary to ask the medical 
societies and medical colleges of New York, Connecticut and Massa- 
chusetts, Rhode Island, New Hampshire and Maine to adopt similar 
regulations “For the benefit of the community and the reputation of 
the profession.” It was furthermore proposed that if their proposition 
were rejected by the several States and institutions mentioned then 
they should not be obligatory on the Medical Societies of this State. 
This action of the Vermont State Society speaks well for the 
progressive spirit which animated it in those early days. There is no 
report as to how the above propositions were received in other States, 
but it is a creditable record of the early days of the Vermont Society 
that it should have done pioneer work toward the proper training of 
medical men. In 1827 we find the Society endorsing the “measures 
adopted by the medical societies of the states of Massachusetts and 
New Hampshire in relation to the suppression of intemperance.” 
The Society pursued this active existence until 1829, the last 
eleven years having been under the presidency of Dr. Joseph A. Gallup. 
There was then a twelve years’ lapse of the meetings of the Society. 
Prominent medical men in the State were occupied with medical col- 
leges and lost interest in societies. 
On October 14, 1841, we find this entry in the records: 
“The Vermont Medical Society, having for a long time been 
neglected the physicians from the several parts of the State as- 612 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
sembled together in Convention on Thursday, Oct. 14, 1841, for the 
purpose of considering said Society, and of devising some means of 
remodeling and reviving and of placing it on a more sure foundation 
than ever, and proceeded to organize by W. R. Ranney appointed 
Chairman and Z. B. Burnham, Secretary.” The annual meeting of the 
Society was held the following day, and a modification of the by-laws 
was made. 
When the State Society was revived the conditions of member- 
ship included a provision that all regular physicians, who had been 
members of the Legislature of the State and the professors of medical 
institutions in the State, who had degrees in medicine; and all mem- 
bers of county societies might become members of the State Society. 
A board of counsellors, the total number not to exceed the num- 
ber of Senators from any county, was authorized. The duty of the 
board of counsellors was to transact the business of the Society. This 
board, representing the constituent county societies, corresponded very 
closely to the “House of Delegates” of the present organization. 
After the reorganization the Society maintained regular annual 
meetings. Semi-annual meetings were held beginning with 1844. Dr. 
Horace Eaton, a year later elected Governor of the State, was presi- 
dent in 1845. He was the only active practitioner who was ever elected 
to that office. 
There seems to have been difficulty in maintaining the attendance 
and interest in the State Society under the plans that had been in 
vogue up to this time. These plans limited the attendance at meetings 
and sought to maintain close connection between the county and the 
State organizations. At any rate, in 1851, a further reorganization of 
the Society was effected, in which the county unit of representation 
was abandoned. Under this reorganization of 1851, any physician in 
the State of good moral character, who had received the degree in 
medicine from any legally authorized medical school, could become a 
member upon the payment of one dollar as an initiation fee and one 
dollar as annual dues. Under this plan the Society led a flourishing 
existence for fifty years. 
Most of the State legislation relating to public health and medical 
matters has originated with this Society. Thus as early as 1851, a 
resolution was adopted calling the attention of the Legislature to the 
advisability of a complete registration of births, marriages and deaths. 
This action of the State Society resulted in a law, new to those days, 
which has given us vital statistics since 1856. 
In 1873, the Society appointed a committee to urge upon the physi- 
cians of the State and others the necessity of a central health board. 
The movement thus initiated resulted thirteen years later in the estab- 
lishment of the State Board of Health. THE MEDICAL PROFESSION 
613 
The State Society in 1901 again changed its organic law in con- 
formity with suggestions from the American Medical Association. A 
new constitution and by-laws were adopted. The chief change con- 
sisted in placing all the business of the Association in the hands of a 
House of Delegates, representing the various county societies, accord- 
ing to their membership. It is worth recalling that this reorganization 
of the Society placed it upon a footing very similar to that which 
originally obtained as regards the close relationship and interdepend- 
ence of the State and county organizations. 
In 1904, the Society, together with the other State Societies, was 
instrumental in securing a medical practice act. 
During the hundred years of its existence, this Society always has 
exerted a wholesome influence upon legislation. It has contended 
steadily for higher standards in medical practice and better public 
health laws. 
The State Homeopathic Society was chartered in 1858. There 
had been a society for homeopathic physicians for some years be- 
fore that in which Dr. C. B. Darling of Lyndonville was influ- 
ential. Besides Doctor Darling, the physicians prominent in the early 
history of this society were Doctor Taplin of Montpelier, Doctor Eels 
of Cornwall, Dr. G. E. E. Sparhawk of Burlington. This society 
meets annually in such place as its members may vote. 
Homeopathic Society 
Eclectic Society 
The Vermont State Eclectic Society was organized June 6, 
1866, and incorporated the following November. The early offi- 
cers of this society were Dr. A. G. Brush, Dr. J. M. Templeton, 
Dr. W. D. Wells, Dr. J. Furkee, Dr George A Bagley, Dr. F. Grin- 
ned. This society also holds annual meetings at times and places 
decided upon from year to year. 
In cooperation with the Vermont State Medical Society, both the 
State Homeopathic Society and the State Eclectic Society were instru- 
mental in securing the present medical practice act. All of these 
societies have exerted a wholesome influence on sanitary and medical 
legislation in the State. 
MEDICAL EDUCATION 
Medical education in the early days of our State seldom was ob- 
tained at a college. The New England boy who had aspirations 
toward medicine usually obtained his education by “reading” with a 
practitioner who enjoyed a good “ride” and as has been noted, quali- 
fied before a chartered Medical Society for practice. 614 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
Some of the best known practitioners always had one, often more, 
students, who were thus being initiated into the technicalities of the 
art. 
Dr. Nathan Smith was the genius of medical education in New 
England at the beginning of the Nineteenth century. He had excep- 
tional executive ability as an organizer. He was the founder of three 
institutions, viz., Dartmouth, Yale and Bowdoin. This great medical 
authority and organizer was reared in Vermont and there received 
his first inspiration to the study of medicine. While teaching school 
in one of our Vermont towns at the age of twenty-one years, he 
learned that an important surgical operation was to be performed by 
Dr. Josiah Goodhue at Chester. He was present at this operation and 
the impression then made upon him determined him in the choice of a 
vocation. It should be stated that Dr. Goodhue was a rather excep- 
tional surgeon for those days, was president of the trustees of Berk- 
shire Medical College and was the first in New England to amputate 
at the shoulder joint. Dr. Nathan Smith was a physician of more than 
ordinary ability and became an authority on medical and surgical sub- 
jects. He was among the first surgeons of the country to perform 
some of the major surgical operations. 
As stated, the prominent men in the profession were sought by 
aspiring medical students, and under their direction theory and prac- 
tice were gained together. Dr. Frederick Ford of Cornwall, an orig- 
inal and successful practitioner, and one of the first to successfully 
make use of hydrotherapy, had many such students and in the con- 
struction of his house planned with reference to accommodating them. 
Castleton Medical College 
The inception of the three regularly recognized medical schools 
in this State was due to the demands made upon practitioners for pri- 
vate instruction. These men were Doctor Gridley at Castleton, Doctor 
Pomeroy at Burlington and Doctor Gallup at Woodstock. 
Dr. Selah Gridley, born in 1767 in Farmington, Conn., came to 
Castleton in 1795 and had an extensive practice and so wide was his 
reputation that it attracted to him many students. The impossibility 
of doing justice to them as an individual led directly to the etablish- 
ment of the Castleton Medical Academy. 
The first regular course of medical lectures was de- 
livered by Doctors Gridley, Theodore Woodward and John L. 
Cazier in March, 1818. The charter of the Castleton Medical Academy 
was granted October 20, 1818. By act of November 7, 1822, the name 
of this institution was changed to the Vermont Academy of Medicine. 
From 1820 to 1827 “a conventional connection” existed with Middle- 
bury College by which the degrees were conferred by this institution WILLIAM SEWARD WEBB 
Born in New York City, January 31, 1851, being a 
son of Gen. James Watson Webb, a famous New York 
editor. He was educated at Columbia University and 
studied medicine in Vienna, Paris and Berlin. For 
many years he was president of the Wagner Palace 
Car Company. He is president of the Fulton Chain 
Railway Company, the Fulton Navigation Company, a 
director of the Rutland Railroad Company, the Central 
Vermont Railway Company, and the Pullman Company. 
He built the Mohawk and Malone Railroad and for- 
merly was its president. He purchased 200,000 acres 
of land in the Adirondacks and converted it into a game 
preserve. He has a large estate at Shelburne, Vt. He 
has held the rank of Colonel in Vermont, has served in 
the State Legislature and was a delegate to the Re- 
publican National Convention in 1904. He is the 
author of “California and Alaska” and editor of the 
papers of Gen. James Watson Webb and of Samuel 
Blatchley Webb. He married Eliza O., daughter of 
William H. Vanderbilt. THE MEDICAL PROFESSION 
615 
on such students “as were found worthy.” The Vermont Academy of 
Medicine grew and prospered under the wise guidance of Doctors 
Gridley and Woodward until 1838. We are reminded that ways and 
means may have troubled these sturdy men by the references to peti- 
tions “for a lottery” for the Castleton Medical Academy found in the 
Proceedings of the Governor and Council at sundry times in 1820-24. 
For instance, this record occurs in October, 1822: “Resolved 
that the Com relative to the disposition of the State bank 
property to the support of common schools be instructed to enquire 
into the expediency of granting .... so much of said property as is 
situated in the counties of Rutland and Addison .... as shall not 
exceed the sum of one thousand dollars to the use and benefit of the 
Medical Academy .... at Castleton.” Until 1835 lectures were 
given in a single annual term of fourteen weeks. In 1835-37, the 
lecture terms were semi-annual, one beginning in March, the other, in 
August, each fourteen weeks. 
In 1838, owing to Doctor Woodward’s illness and the defection 
of the two other members of the faculty, the school suspended opera- 
tions two years. In 1840 the school reopened under a new faculty; 
in 1841 the lecture room was remodeled and an anatomical museum 
(Professor McClintock’s) and materia medica cabinets were added. 
In October, 1841, the General Assembly again changed the name 
to the Castleton Medical College. The school again prospered. During 
the interval between lecture terms, instruction was given at the col- 
lege by the resident members of the faculty, Dr. James McClintock 
and Dr. Jamieson. The school continued in successful operation until 
1852, when the dean, Prof. Joseph Perkins, had some misunderstand- 
ing with other members of the faculty and the trustees went to Burl- 
ington, where Doctors Thayer and Carpenter were just reviving the 
Medical College connected with the University. 
The College now lost prestige and finally was abandoned at the 
outbreak of the Civil War. For the greater part of forty years it had 
been the chief feature of the village where it was located and had 
filled an honorable place in the medical world. Its graduates num- 
bered 1,542 and, scattered over the whole country, reflect credit on 
this pioneer Vermont medical school even to this day. 
The list of names of the men who at various times gave instruc- 
tion at Castleton is sufficient testimony to the high character of the 
institution. On this list are : 
William Tulley, Professor of Theory and Practice, whose name 
is perpetuated in the profession by “Tulley Powder” and who wrote 
an authorative work on Materia Medica and made many original re- 
searches in the application of drugs; Solomon Foot, Horace Green, 
Theory and Practice, a native Vermonter, who later became a high 
authority on diseases of the Throat and Chest; Frank H. Hamilton, 616 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
Surgery, one of the great surgeons of America; Alfred C. Post, an- 
other metropolitan surgeon; Thomas M. Markoe, still another high 
authority in surgery, and James McClintock. 
Vermont Medical College 
Dr. Joseph A. Gallup of Woodstock was the father of the Ver- 
mont Medical College. Doctor Gallup had filled the chair of prac- 
tice and materia medica at Castleton for three years until 1823. 
Leaving Castleton in that year he was connected with the medical 
school at Burlington a short time. His mind seemed to have turned 
to the need of another medical school on the other side of the moun- 
tain and he busied himself in organizing such a school at Woodstock. 
This school was first called “The Clinical School of Medicine.” It had 
no charter and for several years the degrees were granted its gradu- 
ates by the Waterville College of Maine. Doctor Gallup at first seems 
to have been the college. He issued his first prospectus in August, 
1826. 
Owing to “unexpected derangements,” the operation of the col- 
lege was deferred until the following March. On the fifth day of that 
month in 1827, the first course of lectures in the Medical College at 
Woodstock began. They continued twelve weeks. 
At the next session of the Legislature, an attempt was made to 
obtain a charter for this school but unsuccessfully, and the new school 
was obliged to worry along without legal standing, or, as expressed 
by Dana, “it rested solely on its own merits.” No lecture course was 
held during the following year, but on the tenth of July, 1829, it was 
announced that arrangements had been made for resuming lectures. 
A new brick building had been erected meanwhile, a faculty formed 
and a curriculum announced. On March 4, 1830, the introductory 
lecture of the next course was delivered and the course continued 
until the second day of June. 
The faculty consisted of Drs. Joseph A. Gallup and Willard 
Parker, assisted by Dr. David Palmer. Frederick A. Willard gave 
instruction in chemistry and the natural sciences and the first degrees 
were issued that year, with examinations conducted by the faculty 
and two censors from Waterville College and two from the Vermont 
State Medical Society. The next two years were promising for the 
Clinical School. In 1832 there were eighty students. Trouble, how- 
ever, seems to have arisen about this time over the control of the in- 
stitution. Doctor Gallup, who had been the main factor in the estab- 
lishment and running of the school to this time, seems to have en- 
countered more or less opposition among his fellow members of the 
faculty. Two rival factions developed, each aspiring to control the 
situation. THE MEDICAL PROFESSION 
617 
“In the course of a few weeks two advertisements appeared, each 
bearing date January 20, 1834, each headed ‘Clinical School of Medi- 
cine at Woodstock, Vermont,’ and each announcing the commence- 
ment of the annual course of lectures on Thursday, the 6th of March 
next. This twofold aspect of the Medical School created some con- 
fusion in the general mind, and it was remarked by way of comment 
on this condition of things, that Woodstock was the only city in the 
United States, with the exception of Philadelphia, which could boast 
of its two medical schools.”* 
In this unfortunate situation some one was obliged to yield and 
Doctor Gallup, for the sake of harmony and the interests of the school, 
transferred all his right and property in the institution to the “gentle- 
men, who had adopted the views of his former colleagues.” On abdi- 
cating, the doctor carried with him to private life the respect and 
sympathy of a large part of the community. Degrees were conferred 
upon the graduates of this school from 1830 to 1832 by Waterville 
College; from 1833 to 1837 by the President of Middlebury College. 
In 1835, the institution was incorporated by the Legislature as 
the “Vermont Medical College.” The prosperity of the institution 
thereafter was assured. 
A new building, urgently needed to accommodate the increasing 
number of students, was erected through the liberality of the medical 
faculty and the citizens in 1839 and was completed for lectures in 1840. 
The attendance of students increased apace and the Vermont Medical 
College became favorably known by the profession and the public. 
It pursued its successful career until 1856. At the close of the 
college year, many of the professors resigned and the members of the 
corporation, after meeting several times, decided to abandon the enter- 
prise. In due time agents were appointed and in 1862, the real estate, 
including the college building, and the personal property of the insti- 
tution were sold. 
During its career, this institution had graduated five hundred and 
fourteen physicians. The years- from 1846 to 1853 were years of its 
greatest prosperity. It could not be hoped that the rural State of 
Vermont could long maintain three medical colleges. All had done 
honorable service in the cause of medical education. Woodstock, the 
last to be established, was the first to succumb. Castleton soon fol- 
lowed. 
These institutions at Castleton and Woodstock and the College of 
Medicine of the University of Vermont are the only reputable medical 
colleges that ever have existed in the State. Several abortive attempts 
have been made to establish irregular medical colleges, of one kind 
and another. Such institutions have been started in Rutland, Ben- 
*Dana’s History of Woodstock. 618 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
nington and Newbury. They led a brief and precarious existence and 
all are extinct. 
College of Medicine; University of Vermont 
Dr. John Pomeroy was chiefly instrumental in organizing the 
medical department of the University of Vermont. Doctor Pome- 
roy, who was a prominent physician in Burlington, became a member 
of the corporation of the University in August, 1807. 
In August, 1809, the honorary degree of M. D. was conferred 
upon him and he was elected “Professor of Physic, Anatomy and 
Surgery in the University.” The following resolution was adopted 
by the corporation of the University at this session in 1809: 
“Resolved that any person who has been licensed to practice 
physic by any medical society, established by law, and has attended 
two courses of lectures delivered by the Professor of Physic, Anat- 
omy and Surgery of this University and shall deliver an inaugural 
dissertation on some subject proposed by said Professor, ‘shall be 
eligible to the degree of Bachelor of Physic.’ ” 
Doctor Pomeroy’s standing in the community and especially in the 
profession of the State attracted to him medical students from the 
surrounding country. He gave regular lectures on anatomy and sur- 
gery, beginning in the winter of 1814 in a building which he secured 
on Water Street. He had at times the assistance of other practi- 
tioners, especially in the subjects of obstetrics and practice. In 1815, 
the corporation voted to allow Doctor Pomeroy to use two rooms in 
the college. In January, 1817, Doctor Pomeroy resigned the professor- 
ship in anatomy and physiology and received the thanks of the corpora- 
tion for his services in teaching the aforesaid branches. At the same 
time, Dr. J. L. C. Cazier was elected to the same professorship “with- 
out any salary from the corporation until an appropriation for that pur- 
pose shall be made by them.” Doctor Pomeroy continued meantime 
to fill the chair in surgery until after the regular establishment of the 
medical department in 1822. 
In March, 1821, it was voted by the corporation that: “A Com- 
mittee of two be appointed to confer with the Medical Gentlemen in 
Town on the subject of delivering lectures in the College.” This com- 
mittee, after conference with the medical gentlemen referred to, re- 
ported that they had “consented to receive appointments,” and in 
August, 1822, the corporation voted that the President of the Uni- 
versity in the interim between this and the next annual commence- 
ment have discriminating power to confer medical degrees on such 
persons as shall attend the medical lectures and are recommended by 
the medical professors and lecturers of the University. THE MEDICAL PROFESSION 
619 
Besides Doctor Pomeroy, the first faculty consisted of Nathan R. 
Smith (son of Nathan Smith)—anatomy and physiology; William R. 
Paddock—botany and materia medica, and A. L. Porter—chemistry 
and pharmacy. In 1822, the faculty was further strengthened by the 
appointment of Nathan Smith, the founder of Dartmouth and other 
medical schools, as lecturer in medicine and surgery. 
It is a significant fact and one that undoubtedly gave this young 
institution instant prestige than Nathan Smith and his son, Nathan 
Ryno, thus early were associated with its teaching force. As has been 
mentioned, Nathan, Sr., was the personification of medical education 
in New England. Nathan R., his second son, was a thoroughly 
equipped young man, then just entering on a successful career as 
teacher and practitioner. He married in Burlington a Vermont girl, 
Juliette Octavia Penniman, whose mother, when she married Doctor 
Penniman, was the widow of Gen. Ethan Allen (“Life and Letters of 
Nathan Smith” by Emily Smith). 
The first medical degrees were conferred in 1823. 
A special committee of the corporation reported in August, 1824, 
recommending the following article in addition to existing rules re- 
lating to the conferring of Medical Degrees: 
“Practitioners of Physic who have sustained a respectable stand- 
ing in their profession for five years previous to the year 1822 and 
who have attended one course of Medical Lectures in this University 
and otherwise complied with the aforesaid regulation may nevertheless 
be admitted to the examination for a degree of Doctor of Medicine.” 
This regulation throws a side light on the standards of the profession 
of 1824 and wras quite creditable to the young college. 
In 1825, a proposition was received by the corporation from the 
“Medical Institution of Troy,” proposing that there be a “cooperation” 
between their institution and the Medical Department of the Univer- 
sity. Whereupon the following recital and resolution was adopted: 
“Whereas a communication has been received from the Troy Medical 
Institution, soliciting the cooperation of the University of Vermont in 
aid of this college—in conformity thereto it is— 
“Resolved that the University of Vermont confer the degree of 
Doctor of Medicine upon such medical students as shall hereafter, at 
the Troy Medical Institution, be educated in acquiescence with the 
general rules and usages of Medical Colleges of the United States— 
and this resolution continue in force for the space of five years.” It 
is not recorded whether any students from the Troy institution did or 
did not take advantage of this action. 
The University Medical Department pursued its way until 1832, 
meanwhile occupying a new building at the south end of the College 
Green, erected in 1829. The number of students dwindled after 1832, 620 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
until, in 1836, but one degree was conferred in this department. 
During this time there were many changes in the faculty. 
In 1836, this department was abandoned. During the thirteen 
years of its existence it had graduated one hundred and fourteen 
students. While various reasons were given for the lack of students 
and the suspension of the college, the competition encountered from 
the two colleges at Woodstock and Castleton and from the medical 
school at Hanover undoubtedly were factors. It was also thought that 
the failure of the University trustees to encourage the medical faculty 
contributed to its failure. In 1840 and 1842, Dr. Samuel W. Thayer, 
Jr., then a resident of Northfield, made fruitless attempts to reorgan- 
ize the medical department. 
In December, 1852, a memorial was presented to the corporation 
of the University by Dr. L. W. Bliss, asking for the resuscitation of 
the medical department. Dr. S. W. Thayer, Jr., was associated with 
Doctor Bliss in this request. The corporation referred the matter to a 
special committee, which after due investigation and correspondence 
with other institutions, reported favorably on reviving the medical 
department. The report of this special committee of the corporation 
states in detail the number of subjects that shall be taught in the 
medical department and the relation which the president and corpora- 
tion were to bear to that department. The pay of the professors, the 
tuition that should be charged, and the general oversight of the medical 
department were assigned to the medical faculty, “subject to the ap- 
proval of the corporation.” It was, however, provided that: “Said 
medical faculty shall have no power to charge the corporation with 
any pecuniary liability whatever.” 
According to the terms of these articles adopted by the corpora- 
tion, the medical faculty assumed all responsibility and financial obli- 
gations pertaining to the re-establishment and maintenance of the 
medical department and in return therefor were allowed a nominal 
connection with the University, use of the medical building on the 
south of the College Green, the museum, chemical apparatus, other 
appurtenances and such books as formerly belonged to the medical 
library, all of which were to revert to the University in case the Medi- 
cal College was not opened within one year from January 1, 1854, or 
was suspended for a year thereafter. Under this plan the medical 
department grew and prospered for nearly fifty years. The professors 
elected by ballot at this time were: Dr. Samuel White Thayer, North- 
field, surgery; Dr. Owen Smith, Montpelier, theory and practice; Dr. 
Levi Wild Bliss, Bradford, anatomy; Dr. Ezra S. Carr, Castleton, 
chemistry and pharmacy. 
In August of the same year, 1853, Dr. Horace Nelson and Dr. 
Walter Carpenter were added to the faculty. CHARI.ES B. PORTER 
Born in Rutland, Vt., January 19, 1840, the son of 
James Burnham and Harriet (Griggs) Porter. He 
graduated from Harvard College, receiving the degree 
of A. B. in 1862, A. M. in 1863 and M. D. in 1865. 
From April to September, 1865, he served in the Union 
army during the closing months of the Civil War as 
acting assistant surgeon. He was a member of the 
staff of the Massachusetts General Hospital for many 
years, serving as surgeon to out patients, 1866-75, and 
visiting surgeon from 1875 to 1903. His long period 
of service on the teaching staff- of Harvard Medical 
School began as an assistant demonstrator of anatomy, 
a position which he held from 1867 to 1868. He was 
demonstrator of anatomy, 1868-75; instructor in 
surgery, 1875-82; professor of surgery, 1882-87; and 
professor of clinical surgery, 1887-1903. He was 
vice-president of the American Surgical Association in 
1892. Doctor Porter married Harriet A. Allen at 
Cambridge, Mass., in 1865. His residence was in Boston. THE MEDICAL PROFESSION 
621 
Thenceforth this department led an uninterrupted existence with 
little variation in its prosperity. The largest class ever graduated was 
one hundred and one, in 1884. The classes soon outgrew the old 
building and it became necessary, soon after the resuscitation of the 
college, to enlarge this building. Subscription lists were circulated 
and fairs held in Burlington for this purpose. Again, in 1870, the 
citizens contributed generously to enlarging and refitting the building. 
In 1884, an entirely new and commodious Medical College building 
was erected through the generosity of John P. Howard at the north 
end of College Park. Here the college was housed and continued to 
prosper until this building was burned in 1903. Nothing daunted, the 
medical faculty, under the lead of Henry C. Tinkham, Dean, quickly 
addressed themselves to the task of rebuilding; and the result is the 
present modern building, which was completed for occupancy in Janu- 
ary, 1906. 
During the sixty years since the reorganization of the college 
under Doctors Thayer and Carpenter, a strong faculty has been main- 
tained which has contained names of the best specialists obtainable in 
the East. 
The College of Medicine of the University of Vermont has kept 
pace with the development of medical knowledge and has increased 
the scope of its teaching facilities to meet the demands of modern 
medical education. 
Preliminary education required to enter the College of Medicine 
has been increased from a common school education to two years in 
college. The course of medical study has been increased from two 
sessions of fourteen weeks each to four years of thirty-six weeks each. 
The College of Medicine has graduated 2,529 physicians who have 
located in nearly every State in the Union. Over eighty percent of 
the physicians of Vermont are graduates of the University of Ver- 
mont College of Medicine, and a large percentage of the members of 
each graduating class locate in Vermont. 
The College of Medicine of the University receives an annual 
appropriation from the State, and the State also offers fifty scholar- 
ships for young men and women of Vermont. 
Like all the best medical colleges in the country the number of 
students has decreased with the raising of standards of education. 
Until 1899 the relation of the Medical College to the University was 
only nominal. At that time the department was taken over by the 
Board of Trustees and became an integral department of the Uni- 
versity under the control of the Board of Trustees. In 1911 there was 
still further reorganization, when full-time professors were employed 
to teach the science branches of medicine. This department of the 
University is thoroughly established and its importance to the State 622 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
recognized in the liberal support given it by the General Assembly of 
Vermont. 
PUBLIC HEALTH 
The young State of Vermont early took cognizance of the health 
of its inhabitants. One disease only in the early days was regarded 
with horror, viz., small pox. In 1784 an act was passed relating to the 
“Unlimited Spread of the Small Pox.” Another act, with the same 
title, was passed in February, 1787. This latter act made it the duty 
of the Selectmen to attend to cases of this disease, furnish medical 
attendance and guard against danger to the uninfected. From this 
act undoubtedly dates the association of local boards of health with the 
office of Selectman. 
For a hundred years the only local health boards, which the 
statutes recognized, were Selectmen. Small pox was the chief concern 
of these boards until about the middle of the Nineteenth century. In 
February, 1797, a rather elaborate act was passed dealing with this 
disease. It provided that if any person becomes infected with small 
pox, it was the duty of the Selectmen, or the major part of them, 
immediately to provide a place “as remote from inhabitants as can 
conveniently be had,” and remove such person to that place, if it could 
be safely done. If such removal was considered dangerous, the person 
was to be quarantined at home and cared for at the expense of the 
town, provided he was unable to meet the expense himself. 
It was also made the duty of the Selectmen to make regulations 
to prevent the spreading of this infection. 
During the Nineteenth century various other duties of a public 
health nature were imposed upon the Selectmen of towns. 
The announcement of Jenner’s discovery of vaccination against 
the small pox during the latter years of the Eighteenth century did 
away quite largely with the practice of inoculation. 
Small pox, however, continued to be the most serious and most 
dreaded of all infectious diseases. In fact, in pre-bacterial days it 
was about the only disease that was recognized generally as infectious. 
The survival of this popular horror of small pox is evidenced in all 
the public health acts of the State up to the establishment of the State 
Board of Health in 1886. 
During all the years up to this date the Selectmen of the town 
were recognized as having full local jurisdiction in health matters 
and the statutes specified somewhat in detail their duties. Thus, in 
addition to the care of cases of small pox, they were authorized to 
require “immediate vaccination” in the presence of this disease to pre- 
vent its spread. They had authority to control butchering and the 
care of slaughter houses and they were required to make regulations 
respecting “nuisances, sources of filth and causes of sickness.” M. G OLD SMITH. M D. THE MEDICAL PROFESSION 
623 
Natural bodies of water were safeguarded in that there was a pro- 
hibition against putting any animal or animal substance upon their 
banks, or into such bodies of water. In addition to these statutes the 
State for many years had a food and drug act, which threw certain 
safeguards around “provisions, whether for meat or for drink.” It 
prohibited the killing or sale for use as family meat of a calf less than 
four weeks old. It defined the adulteration of food and drink and pre- 
scribed a penalty for this offence. The same was true with regard to 
the adulteration of drugs and medicines. The sale of poisons was re- 
stricted and it made the forcible administration of an anesthetic or the 
commission of any crime on a person under such anesthetic an offence 
punishable by imprisonment. These laws were not always seriously 
regarded or strictly enforced. 
A law was enacted in 1856, providing for the registration of births, 
marriages and deaths. This was one of the earliest registration laws 
in this country and its results are evident in the fairly complete and 
increasingly valuable vital statistics which this State now has, dating 
back to the passage of this act. The birth and death returns under this 
law were collected by the school district clerks and the marriage records 
were returned by ministers or other persons officiating. 
Ten years later the Legislature added a provision to the registra- 
tion law providing for the tabulation and publication of statistics re- 
lating to divorce. This latter act also provided that those statistics 
should be collected for the five years preceding the date of the act. 
The Secretary of State under the Vermont registration law was author- 
ized “with such assistance as may be voluntarily rendered by any 
authorized committee appointed by the Vermont Medical Society for 
that purpose” to compile and tabulate the vital statistics of the State 
and report to the Legislature. The first record books and blanks for the 
carrying out of this law were prepared under the direction of Dr. Hiram 
F. Stevens of St. Albans and the tables and comments thereon were 
the work of Dr. Charles L. Allen, then of Middlebury. This law re- 
mained substantially the registration law of the State for forty years. 
In 1896, State and local boards of health having been legally estab- 
lished, a new registration law was enacted. Briefly, this new law pro- 
vided for the return of certificates of births and deaths by physicians, 
midwives and others in attendance and further provided that no dead 
body could be disposed of except in accordance with a burial permit 
issued by the health officer. It placed the compilation of the vital sta- 
tistics of the State in the hands of the Secretary of the State Board 
of Health. 
In 1886, the General Assembly enacted a law establishing a State 
Board of Health. This law prescribed that the Governor should ap- 
point three persons who should form the board. It further directed 
that the secretary should be “a reputable practicing physician in this 624 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
State,” and he, if not a member of the board at the time of his appoint- 
ment, became one by virtue thereof. 
This first act establishing a central health board prescribed that 
the board “should take cognizance of the life and health among the 
inhabitants of the State,” that it should make investigations respecting 
diseases and epidemics, causes of death and the effect of employment on 
health. It was required to “advise with municipal officers with regard 
to the location, drainage, water supply, heating and ventilation of pub- 
lic buildings and the drainage and sewerage of towns and cities.” 
The secretary, as executive officer of the board, was to superintend 
its work. He was required to “respond to the invitations of boards of 
Selectmen of the several towns, or the Mayor of a city, in case of epi- 
demics of contagious disease or other unusual sickness.” He was to 
render assistance to the Secretary of State in the compilation of vital 
statistics and he was required to make an annual report to the Governor. 
This first board was given authority to “promulgate and enforce 
such regulations for the better preservation of the public health in con- 
tagious and epidemic diseases as they shall judge necessary.” This 
was rather sweeping authority for the times, but it is not known that it 
was abused. 
The compensation of the board was fixed at five dollars per day 
and actual expenses, but the whole expense to the State, including 
services and expenses, was not to exceed fifteen hundred dollars a year 
“except in some extraordinary public peril,” when the Governor might 
order the board to perform services to the State to the amount of 
twenty-five hundred dollars in all in one year. 
The first State Board of Health appointed under this law consisted 
of Drs. A. H. Chesmore of Huntington, Charles L. Allen of Rutland, 
and J. H. Hamilton of Richford. These gentlemen met in Burlington 
December 7, 1886, and organized by electing Doctor Allen president. 
After some discussion it was decided to elect a secretary from their 
own number and Doctor Allen resigned as president and was elected 
secretary, whereupon Doctor Chesmore was chosen president. At this 
first meeting, the board wisely decided to enter at once upon a cam- 
paign of education, “the object being to educate the people and induce 
them to take an interest in these subjects.” 
The State Board of Health as originally constituted remained in- 
tact until the death of Doctor Allen in 1890. Dr. Charles S. Caverly of 
Rutland was appointed to succeed Doctor Allen at that time. Doctor 
Chesmore became the president of the board and Doctor Hamilton suc- 
ceeded Doctor Allen as secretary and executive officer. The death of 
Doctor Chesmore in January, 1891, left a vacancy, which was filled by 
the appointment of Dr. Orlando W. Sherwin of Woodstock. The 
board, as reorganized at this time, consisted of Dr. Charles S. Caverly THE MEDICAL PROFESSION 
625 
of Rutland, president; Dr. J. H. Hamilton of Richford, secretary, and 
Dr. O. W. Sherwin of Woodstock. 
No material change was made in the public health laws until 1892 
when the State Board of Health was given authority to appoint a health 
officer for each city, town and incorporated village. This law further 
specified in terms that the health officers, together with the Selectmen 
of the towns, Aldermen of cities and Trustees or Bailiffs of incorpor- 
ated villages should be called and act as local boards of health. The 
law specified the powers and duties of these local boards and of the 
health officer. 
In 1896, Dr.Henry D. Holton of Brattleboro was appointed to the 
board and the three members of the board, Doctors Caverly, Holton 
and Sherwin, re-elected Dr. J. H. Hamilton of Richford as secretary. 
In 1898 a law was enacted establishing and equipping a State Bacterio- 
logical Laboratory “for the chemical and bacteriological examination 
of water supplies, milk and of all food products, and the examination 
of cases and suspected cases of diphtheria, typhoid fever, tuberculosis, 
malaria and other infectious and contagious diseases.’* This important 
legislation was the result of the indefatigable labors of Dr. J. H. Linsley 
of Burlington, who had given the board the use of his private labora- 
tory for some months as an experiment along the lines on which the 
laboratory in this act was established. This was one of the first labora- 
tories of its kind to be established in the United States. 
It would be hard to overestimate the impetus which this laboratory 
immediately gave to preventive health work in Vermont. This law also 
authorized “a school of instruction for health officers of the State at 
least once a year at such time and place” as the board should direct. 
This school, which had its first session in 1899, was the first school of 
its kind held under State auspices and at State expense in the United 
States. This school was continued until 1918. An amendment to this 
laboratory act at the next session in 1900 authorized the board to issue 
a periodical for the purpose of publishing the results of the laboratory 
work and also the latest methods for the protection of the public health. 
Furthermore, the use of the laboratory, its chemist and patholo- 
gist, was placed at the disposal of the State’s Attorneys “on the order 
of a Judge of the Supreme Court” for the purpose of making autopsies 
and pathological and chemical examinations, and testifying, if neces- 
sary, in court in criminal cases. This law made the pathologist of the 
laboratory the medical examiner of the whole State. 
This chemical and pathological work of course does not usually 
belong among the functions of a public health laboratory or a “Lab- 
oratory of Hygiene,” as the Vermont Laboratory was named in this act 
of 1900. It has been possible, however, to do the work without materi- 
ally increasing the laboratory force and with very material advantage to 
the State. The laboratory quickly became a busy department in the 626 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
State government and the number of specimens and objects of all kinds 
examined steadily increased until one thousand or more were frequently 
examined in a month. 
Doctor Linsley, the first director of the laboratory, was succeeded 
at his death in 1901 by Dr. M. J. Wiltse, and he in turn in August, 1904, 
by Dr. Bingham H. Stone. Upon the death of Doctor Stone in 1921, 
Dr. Charles F. Whitney was appointed his successor. 
Dr. Truman R. Stiles of St. Johnsbury had been appointed to the 
board in 1898. In 1900, on the resignation of Doctor Hamilton as sec- 
retary, Dr. H. D. Holton of Brattleboro was elected to that office. 
A quarterly bulletin was established to publish the results of lab- 
oratory work and to spread the gospel of health among the people. 
No further change occurred in the personnel of the board until 
1906, when Dr. F. Thomas Kidder of Woodstock replaced Doctor 
Stiles, whose term had expired. Dr. Henry D. Holton continued as 
secretary until December 1, 1912, when he resigned. Dr. C. F. Dalton 
of Burlington was elected in his place. In 1918 Dr. W. T. Slayton of 
Morrisville was appointed to fill the vacancy caused by the death of 
Doctor Caverly. 
Each succeeding session of the General Assembly adds new duties 
to the State Board of Health. In 1908, by act of the Legislature, the 
duties of the State Tuberculosis Commission were placed on the State 
Board of Health and the board was ordered to make a campaign of 
education throughout the State. This work has been prosecuted with 
vigor each year. Exhibits of a popular nature, dealing with the various 
phases of the tuberculosis problem, have been employed. Lectures 
illustrated by lantern slides and moving picture films recently have 
been the main features of this campaign. This work has been carried 
on in conjunction with clubs and social organizations of all kinds as 
far as the appropriation for this work would allow. 
By an act of 1910, it was made obligatory on any person, associa- 
tion or corporation seeking to establish a tuberculosis hospital or asso- 
ciation to obtain permission so to do of the State Board of Health and 
in 1912 an act was passed allowing the Governor to designate patients 
for treatment in a sanitarium and pay their bills from the State treasury 
to the extent of $5,000 annually. This appropriation was increased in 
1915 to $10,000, in 1917 to $20,000, in 1919 to $25,000 and in 1921 to 
$50,000. A resolution also was adopted in February, 1913, by the Gen- 
eral Assembly renewing a commission for the purpose of investigating 
the needs of the State for an institution for the care of advanced cases 
of tuberculosis. 
In 1919 the General Assembly passed an act authorizing the estab- 
lishment of county hospitals for the care of advanced cases of tuber- 
culosis, and in the same session an act was passed authorizing the JAMES N. JENNE 
Born in Berkshire, Vt., in 1859. He was educated in 
the public schools and graduated from the College of 
Medicine of the University of Vermont in 1881. He 
took post-graduate work in New York and Paris, 
specializing in internal medicine. He was Surgeon 
General of the Vermont militia from 1895 to 1898. 
During the war with Spain he served as Chief Surgeon 
with the rank of Major, having a very responsible posi- 
tion in the medical and surgical work of the army. 
He practiced his profession in St. Albans and later 
in Burlington. He has been president of the Vermont 
State Medical Society and Surgical Director of the 
Central Vermont Railway. He was adjunct professor 
of materia medica and therapeutics in the College of 
Medicine from 1891 to 1893, professor at the head of 
the department from 1893 to 1911 and has been pro- 
fessor of clinical medicine and therapeutics since 1911. 
He is a trustee of the University. THE MEDICAL PROFESSION 
627 
establishment of a State hospital for the same purpose. An appropria- 
tion was also made to assist these projects. 
During the years 1920-1921 a county hospital was built in Barre 
for the care of these cases. 
Since 1905 tuberculosis has been a reportable disease under the 
Statutes, the reports going directly to the State Board of Health. In 
1904 the statutes provided for the examination by school teachers of 
the eyes, ears and throats of school children. This act has been en- 
forced by the school authorities of the State in a somewhat perfunctory 
way. 
The sanitary condition of the school houses of the State has been 
delegated to the State Board of Health and an act of 1910 provides for 
the medical inspection of public and private schools wherever a town 
so elects. 
An act of 1908 provides for the free distribution by the State 
board of antitoxin for the treatment and prevention of diphtheria. 
By an act of 1910, the State Board of Health was authorized to 
make rules and regulations for the prevention of blindness due to 
ophthalmia of the new born. The same act authorized the distribution 
to physicians of prophylactic outfits against this disease. 
In 1912 an act was passed requiring physicians and heads of pub- 
lic institutions of the State to report to the State Board of Health “the 
name, sex, age, nationality, race, marital state and address” of every 
charitable patient and every private patient suffering from venereal 
diseases in any form, except that in the case of private patients, physi- 
cians are allowed to report by number rather than name and address. 
Provision was made by the same act for free diagnostic tests for these 
diseases and the furnishing of material for the specific treatment of 
these diseases by the State board at cost. 
These laws have been amended from time to time to meet the latest 
ideas in regard to the control of venereal disease. The State Board of 
Health is cooperating with the United States Government in this matter 
and is furnishing free treatment to indigent patients. Clinics for the 
treatment of venereal disease have been established in many cities. 
In 1919 a law was passed dividing the State into ten sanitary dis- 
tricts, each district to have a health officer who should devote all his 
time to this work. This abolished all local or town health officers. 
Vermont was the first State to adopt the plan of district health officers, 
and thus has maintained a leading position in progressive health 
measures. 
From this it will appear that the public health laws, relating espe- 
cially to the prevention of disease, have multiplied rapidly since the 
establishment of a State Health Board. 628 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
MEDICAL PRACTICE 
As has been noted elsewhere, the regulation of entrance to medical 
practice was one of the functions of the early medical societies, State 
and county. 
Until 1820 these societies prescribed the requirements of medical 
practice. In November of that year the first specific law dealing with 
the practice of physic and surgery was enacted. This law provided that 
no person who was not a “member of some legally constituted medical 
society, within this State, hath obtained the degree of bachelor, or 
doctor of physic, in some academy, college or university, within this 
State, or elsewhere, having authority to confer such degrees, or be 
licensed to practice in the manner hereinafter provided” could collect 
his fees legally. 
This statute further provided that each of the Judges of the Su- 
preme Court, with the assistance of two or more regular physicians, 
who were members of a legally constituted medical society could ex- 
amine and license any “person who is an inhabitant of this State of 
good moral character to practice physic and surgery.” 
That this first practice act was regarded as an experiment is evi- 
dent from the provision it contained that it was only to remain in force 
until November 1, 1821. 
In November, 1821, however, the above act was “revised and con- 
tinued in force.” This remained the law governing the practice of 
“physic and surgery” until 1838, when the same was repealed. 
For the succeeding twenty-eight years, there were no legal restric- 
tions on the practice of medicine in the State. Any person was at lib- 
erty to adopt this calling. It was simply a matter of the supply being 
regulated by the demand. Men of all “pathies” or of no “pathy” could 
pursue their calling, unhampered by qualifications or regulations, pro- 
vided only the people would employ them. These were the days of herb 
doctors, itinerants, doctors of the “old school” and the “new schools” 
and doctors of no school. 
The title of “doctor” meant nothing as to education or fitness to 
practice. In this chaotic condition of things it is not surprising that the 
profession lost caste in the eyes of the public. In 1876 an attempt was 
made by the Legislature to improve the status of the profession. A 
law was passed in that year which gave legally constituted medical 
societies authority to license practitioners of medicine, surgery and 
midwifery through a board of three censors. 
This Board of Censors was required to issue certificates without 
fee to all physicians or surgeons who furnished evidence of having a 
degree in medicine, or who furnished proof that they had been ex- 
amined and deemed qualified to practice by an authorized board. THE MEDICAL PROFESSION 
629 
The certificates issued by this Board of Censors were required to 
be recorded in the clerk’s office of the county in which the attending 
physician resided, although the certificate was valid throughout the 
State. 
Any person who practiced medicine, surgery, or midwifery in the 
State, or signed a certificate of death without having obtained a certifi- 
cate, as this law provided, was liable to a fine of at least fifty dollars 
for the first offense, and, for each subsequent offense, not less than two 
hundred dollars. No such person could collect his fees legally. The 
above law had several noteworthy exceptions. Its last section provided 
that “this chapter shall not apply to the practice of dentistry, nor to 
the practice of midwifery by women of the town or locality, in which 
they resided, nor to those practitioners of medicine who had resided 
and practiced medicine in the State five years previous to November 
28, 1876.” The practice act of 1876 was little improvement over no 
law at all, in improving the status of medical practice. Gentlemen of 
itinerant tendencies, resorting to the well known advertising methods, 
flourished as before. The acquisition of the license necessary to legalize 
their operations was easy. Some society usually could be depended 
upon to grant them the license. This law continued in force with minor 
changes until 1904, when a more modern act was passed. This act 
established a Board of Medical Registration, consisting of seven 
members. 
The medical societies of the State have now, as always, a voice in 
the administration of the laws dealing with the practice of medicine. 
Applicants for license to practice medicine in the State were required 
to present a diploma from a medical college recognized by the board 
and to take such examinations as the board should require in the 
various departments of medicine, license to practice being issued only 
to those who passed a satisfactory examination. 
This law probably is the most satisfactory practice act the State 
ever has had. At least it has discouraged the exploits of itinerant 
charlatans and has done something toward improving the standard of 
professional fitness. The Vermont law harmonizes quite closely with 
the practice acts of most of the States in this country at the present 
time. 
More or less closely allied with the public health and practice acts 
of the State are acts regulating the practice of osteopathy (1904), prac- 
tice of dentistry (1882), practice of pharmacy (1894), practice of em- 
balming (1902) and the practice of veterinary medicine (1912). 
The standardization of medical schools and the unification of the 
medical curriculum which is now generally adopted by the better medi- 
cal schools make the medical graduate conform more nearly to a com- 
mon standard of medical education and minimizes the importance of 
the work of the State Examining and Licensing Board. 630 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
Medical Registration 
The National Examining Board has its inception in the Council of 
Medical Education of the American Medical Association. This board 
is not authorized by legislative enactment, but the certificates of medical 
qualification issued to graduates by this board are already accepted by 
many State examining and licensing boards, and licenses to practice 
are issued without further examination. 
HOSPITALS 
Brattleboro Retreat 
Mrs. Anna Marsh of Hinsdale, N. H., in her will, dated June 3, 
1834, gave $10,000 in trust “for the purpose of erecting and sup- 
porting in the County of Windham, near the Connecticut River, a 
hospital for the relief of insane persons.” Samuel Clark, John Hol- 
brook, Epaphroditis Seymour and John C. Holbrook of Brattleboro 
and their successors were named as trustees of this fund. These 
trustees were made a self-perpetuating body under this will. 
The “Vermont Asylum for Insane” was incorporated by Act of 
the Legislature, approved November 3, 1834. 
This was the fourth institution of its kind in the New England 
States. Prior to this there were two in Massachusetts and one in Con- 
necticut. There were but ten institutions of the kind in the United 
States. 
Brattleboro was selected as the location of the proposed hospital. 
The trustees were immediately confronted with the problem of 
making $10,000 accomplish the evident intent of the testator. The 
hopelessness of this soon became apparent and petition was made to 
the General Assembly, calling attention to the inadequacy of the fund 
for the building of an institution such as was evidently needed in the 
State. The Legislature was asked to make an appropriation of $20,000 
to assist in this work. The General Assembly responded to this request 
by making an appropriation of $2,000 annually for five successive 
years—this not to become available until the buildings were erected and 
ready to receive patients. 
On November 30, 1836, the trustees announced that the institution 
was ready for the reception of patients, and the first patient was re- 
ceived December 12. The capacity of the hospital at this time was 
twenty patients. 
William H. Rockwell was the first Superintendent and the success 
in building up this institution was largely due to his intelligent and 
disinterested exertions. He was succeeded in 1872 by his son. William 
H. Rockwell, Jr., who held the position for a few months, being sue- DON D. GROUT 
Born at Morrisville, Vt., April 24, 1849; son of 
Major Luman M. and Philura J. (French) Grout. 
Educated at People’s Academy, Morrisville, Dartmouth 
College, and graduated in medicine from the University 
of Vermont in 1872. In 1873 he married Nettie A. 
Jones of Barre, who died in 1880. They had two chil- 
dren, Inez L. and Luman M.; in 1881 he married Angie 
Wilkins of Stowe. They had four children, Annie M., 
Josephine R., Benjamin Harrison, and Angie G. 
After the death of his second wife he married Ida E. 
Morse of Waterbury. Two sons were born to them, 
Don Jackson and Frank Morse. In 1872 he was ap- 
pointed assistant physician to Kings County Hospital, 
Brooklyn, N. Y., where he served one year. He began 
private practice in Wolcott, Vt., where he was super- 
intendent of schools in 1873. He removed to Stowe in 
1875, where he was in general practice until he re- 
moved to Waterbury in 1890. He was a surgeon of the 
Central Vermont Railway from 1900 until his death 
in 1920; was health officer in Waterbury for many 
years; was U. S. pension surgeon 1903 and 1905; for- 
mer consulting surgeon Fanny Allen Hospital. He was 
a Republican, represented Stowe in the Legislature in 
1888. He served on the Committee on Insane and 
had charge of the bill in the House that made the 
present State Hospital possible. He had charge of its 
construction. He was chairman of the State Tubercu- 
losis Commission, 1902-05; was delegate to the Pan- 
American Tuberculosis Congress, Baltimore, 1903. On 
(September 6, 1905, he was appointed superintendent 
and treasurer of the Vermont State Hospital of the 
Insane, which position he held until he resigned, Janu- 
ary I, 1917. He died April 19, 1920. THE MEDICAL PROFESSION 
631 
ceeded by Dr. Joseph Draper, who continued at the head of the institu- 
tion for nearly twenty years. Upon the death of Dr. Draper in 1891, 
Dr. Shaler B. Lawton became Superintendent and continued at the 
head of the institution until 1922, when he resigned. Dr. H. G. 
Ripley has been appointed to this position. 
The name “Vermont Asylum for the Insane” was changed to that 
of “Brattleboro Retreat” by Act of the Legislature in 1892. This insti- 
tution has grown constantly and from time to time has added buildings 
to meet the increasing demand for the care of its patients. The latest 
addition to the plant is a large and well appointed gymnasium and rec- 
reation building. It has acquired valuable tracts of land amounting in 
all to over two thousand acres. The total capacity of the institution is 
four hundred and fifty. 
Vermont State Hospital for Insane 
As time passed, the Brattleboro Retreat was not able to furnish 
sufficient room for the unfortunate victims of mental disease in the 
State and the demand for a State Asylum owned by the State and 
equipped for the scientific treatment of these unfortunates became 
Statewide. The matter was brought before the Legislature of 1888 in 
a bill presented by the late Dr. Don D. Grout. The General Assembly, 
with the recommendation of the Governor, authorized the purchase of a 
site and the erection of suitable hospital buildings. An appropriation 
of $100,000 was made at this time. 
After careful consideration of various locations Waterbury was 
finally selected. 
The first Board of Trustees consisted of Dr. W. H. Gidding, Dr. 
Don D. Grout and H. D. Hobson. 
The construction of the hospital buildings was begun at once and 
buildings adequate for the accommodation of two hundred patients were 
completed in August, 1891. Doctor Grout was in charge of this con- 
struction. Only part of the buildings in the general plan were com- 
pleted at this time, and in 1896 other buildings of the general plan 
were completed so that the institution would care for five hundred 
patients. 
Upon the completion of the buildings in 1891, two hundred patients 
were transported from the Brattleboro Retreat to this institution. 
Various appropriations have been made since this for the erection 
of additional buildings and the purchase of land. 
The hospital consists of a large administration building and various 
wards for male and female patients. There are separate wards for 
patients who are also afflicted with tuberculosis and criminal cases are 
in wards by themselves. The institution is admirably planned so that 
patients of different types can be isolated, giving the best opportunity 
for the care and treatment of all classes of insane cases. 632 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
The first Superintendent of the asylum was Dr. E. W. Sylvester, 
who was appointed in 1891 and served a little less than one year. He 
was succeeded by Dr. W. H. Gidding, who served something more than 
four years. Dr. Frank Page, an alienist of wide experience, succeeded 
Doctor Gidding and was in charge of the hospital for twenty-two years. 
In 1899 Dr. Morelia Hutchinson was appointed to succeed Doctor Page. 
Doctor Hutchinson was a man of wide experience in the care of mental 
cases. He had spent his entire professional life in the care and study 
of mental diseases and in the administration of hospital work. Under 
Doctor Hutchinson the medical staff of the hospital was increased and 
the systematic study of individual cases was emphasized. 
In 1905 Doctor Hutchinson resigned and Dr. Don D. Grout became 
superintendent. Doctor Grout had always been deeply interested in the 
institution and had kept in close touch with it and its administration 
since it was built, and he took a great deal of pride in developing the 
institution. His kindly interest in the patients and his desire to carry 
out scientific treatment made him an admirable administrator. 
On January 1, 1916, Doctor Grout resigned as superintendent and 
his first assistant, Dr. Watson L. Wasson, was appointed superin- 
tendent. Doctor Wasson had been connected with the hospital from 
the time of his graduation in medicine—first as laboratory assistant and 
then as pathologist, and was promoted through the different positions 
as assistant until at the time of Doctor Grout’s resignation he was first 
assistant. 
Doctor Wasson was most keenly interested in the development of 
the hospital as a State center for the care and alleviation of mental dis- 
ease. Although he was superintendent but a short time (he died of in- 
fluenza in 1918) he had formulated a general plan for the development 
of the hospital with reference to its future usefulness as a State insti- 
tution. His plans were far-reaching. Some of them were already 
under way when he died. The underlying thought of his work at the 
hospital had been a deep desire to contribute to the betterment of the 
social order and especially to aid the development of greater health 
and consequently greater happiness in Vermont. 
Upon the death of Doctor Wasson, Dr. E. H. Stanley, who was 
first assistant under Doctor Wasson, was appointed superintendent. 
Doctor Stanley had been in very close touch with Doctor Wasson’s 
plans for the development of the institution, and is actively interested 
in carrying them out. 
Vermont State School for Feeble-Minded Children 
The Vermont State School for Feeble-Minded Children was 
created and established by the Acts of the Legislature of 1912 which 
provided for the care, training and education of mentally defective THE MEDICAL PROFESSION 
633 
children between the ages of five and twenty-one years. The age 
limit was raised for the admission of females by the Legislature of 
1919, which provided for the admission of this sex between the ages 
of five and forty-five. 
The institution is under the control of the Director of State Insti- 
tutions. 
The property originally known as the Forest Park Farm in the 
town of Brandon was purchased and the school located at that place. 
The first pupils were admitted to the institution December 11, 1915. 
Prior to this time mentally defective children had been cared for 
by the State of Vermont in institutions outside the State. All these 
children were brought to this institution as soon as accommodations 
were provided for them. Similar children from the State were ad- 
mitted as fast as room was available. 
At the present time (1921) the population consists of 123 
pupils, 37 boys and 86 girls. All children are committed to the 
institution by the Probate Courts. The purpose of the school is essen- 
tially educational. All types of mental defectives are received, ranging 
from the idiot to the high-grade type possessing from 70 percent to 75 
percent of intelligence. 
The education as conducted by the institution involves training in 
its broadest sense. To carry out this purpose, the institution has a 
school department, a manual training department and a large farm 
upon which the boys are profitably engaged. The laundry, kitchen, 
sewing-room and dormitory work incidental to institutional life afford 
a desirable source of training for the older girls. 
Vermont Sanatorium 
(For Incipient Tuberculosis) 
The Vermont Sanatorium, located at Pittsford, was built by the 
late Senator Redfield Proctor “for the benefit of the people of Ver- 
mont.” It was opened for the reception of patients December 16, 
1907, with accommodations for thirty-two patients. The addition of 
a shack in 1909, and the rearrangement of two cottages in 1911, have 
increased the capacity of the institution to forty-four patients. 
During the first seven years of its existence, this institution took 
care of six hundred and sixteen patients. 
It has placed within the reach of Vermont patients the only rec- 
ognized cure for this disease. Patients contribute approximately one- 
half of the running expenses of the institution. The deficit each year 
has been met by the members of Senator Proctor’s family. The insti- 
tution now has an endowment fund of $150,000, $100,000 of which 
was given by Senator Proctor, and the remainder by other members 
of the family. 634 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
Early in 1921 this institution was offered to the State, and the 
General Assembly, then in session, voted to accept the gift. This gift 
consisted of the sanatorium site, buildings and equipment, the farm, 
stock and tools, together with an endowment of $200,000. 
Caverly Preventorium 
This institution was conceived by Dr. Charles S. Caverly of Rut- 
land, in 1917. In 1918 a house was bought at Essex Center and 
opened for the care of children from poor families where tuberculosis 
existed. This institution was continued at Essex Center until 1922, 
when it was moved to the new buildings at Pittsford which were 
given to the Tuberculosis Association as a memorial to Doctor Caverly 
by Hon. Redfield Proctor and his sister, Emily Proctor. This institu- 
tion has a capacity for thirty-two children. 
Daniel Burditt gave quite a tract of land to the Preventorium prop- 
erty so that it now comprises about fifty acres, providing play-grounds, 
gardens, and pasture for the herd of cows which furnish milk for the 
children. Miss Frederica Holden has given money to build a school- 
house for the children. 
This institution is a modern and complete home where children 
can be given the best of care as regards health, and at the same time 
receive proper education. It has no endowment but is supported by 
the Vermont Tuberculosis Association. The State pays eight dollars 
per week for the care of State patients. 
Hospitals 
Prior to 1876, Vermont had no general hospitals. Such institu- 
tions were confined to the larger cities of the country and to centers of 
medical education. 
The Mary Fletcher Hospital was founded at Burlington in 1876 
by Miss Mary Fletcher of that city. This was the first general hos- 
pital in Vermont. An ideal location for a hospital and a commanding 
site on the hill in the city of Burlington was secured, and a substantial 
brick building erected. This hospital, with a capacity of twenty-seven 
patients, was opened January 22, 1879. Additions to the hospital have 
been made from time to time until it will now accommodate one hun- 
dred and fifty patients in the various departments. The interests 
of the hospital and the University of Vermont College of Medicine are 
very much in common. The physicians connected with the medical 
school give their services to the hospital and the hospital in turn fur- 
nishes opportunity for clinical teaching. The aim of each institution 
is to provide better care for the sick and better training of physicians. 
In 1896 a Nurses’ Home was built which accommodates seventy-five THE MEDICAL PROFESSION 
635 
nurses. In addition to the rooms for the nurses, there is a large as- 
sembly hall where the social functions of the nursing staff are held. 
“Hotel Dieu of St. Joseph Fanny Allen Hospital,” Winooski Park, 
Winooski, Vt., was established October 15, 1894. It is situated on 
land which was a part of the tract owned by the Onion River Land 
Co., of which Gen. Ethan Allen was a member. The present con- 
struction is the gift of Mr. and Mrs. Michael Kelley of Colchester. 
This hospital is under the direction of the Sisters of Charity of the 
order known as “The Religious Hospitalers of St. Joseph.” The hos- 
pital receives its name from the daughter of Ethan Allen and Frances 
Montresor, his wife. The number of patients originally accommo- 
dated was thirty. Additions and improvements have been made to 
the hospital so that the number now accommodated is sixty-five. 
The Fanny Allen Hospital has always cooperated with the Uni- 
versity of Vermont College of Medicine by making its wards available 
for clinical teaching. 
The St. Albans Hospital was founded in 1888 by the late Chauncey 
Warner of Cambridge. He also founded at the same time the Warner 
Home for Children in the same city. The original number of patients 
accommodated was twenty. This hospital led a desultory existence until 
1898. At this time a number of public-spirited citizens of the city, 
headed by Dr. William Stanford Stevens, became interested in reviving 
the hospital idea in connection with this institution and placing it upon 
a substantial basis. A woman superintendent, Miss McLaren, was ob- 
tained in Montreal and under her direction a Training School for 
Nurses was organized and medical and surgical staffs appointed. Since 
the resuscitation of the hospital in 1898, it has gradually grown in 
efficiency and usefulness. 
The St. Johnsbury Hospital is owned by the Roman Catholic 
Diocese of Burlington and is incorporated under the laws of the State. 
The building, of brick, was built in 1895 by the Rev. J. A. Boissonault 
out of his personal funds, but for the Diocese. The hospital has 
twenty-one beds, arranged in rooms containing one, two and three 
beds each. It is non-sectarian, only about half of the patients being 
Catholics. It maintains a visiting house system by which sick calls 
are answered about the town among the deserving poor. The hospital 
is well equipped with operating and sterilizing rooms and is centrally 
located. The hospital is under the immediate supervision of a Sister- 
hood in the church. 
The Rutland Hospital is the result of an agitation started in May, 
1891, by a group of public-spirited citizens, styling themselves a “Vol- 
untary Committee.” This agitation, fostered by the discussions held 
by this committee at various meetings during the years 1891 and 1892, 
resulted in an Act of Corporation for the hospital, approved November 
21, 1892. While these plans were under discussion and before any 636 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
active building operations were begun, the Charles H. Sheldon home- 
stead on Nichols Street was offered to the corporation at a figure that 
seemed practicable. This property was purchased and the hospital, 
with accommodations for twelve patients, was opened on September 1, 
1896. An addition, furnishing nineteen private rooms, a maternity 
ward, and a children’s ward, besides general wards for male and 
female patients, was opened September 23, 1909. Through the gen- 
erosity of Nahum P. Kingsley, a new wing, containing modern oper- 
ating rooms, a large male ward and dormitory room for nurses was 
constructed. This wing was opened for use in April, 1912. A mod- 
ern X-ray apparatus was installed in 1913 through the generosity of 
a large number of contributors. Other generous benefactions have 
come to the hospital in recent years, so that it is enabled to meet the 
increasing expenses attending the widening scope of its work. A 
Training School for Nurses has been maintained in connection with 
the hospital since 1897. The hospital has in all departments fifty-five 
beds. 
The Proctor Hospital primarily is an institution for the care of 
the sick and injured among the employees of the Vermont Marble 
Company and the families of these employees. The hospital grew out 
of the employment of trained nurses at Proctor and West Rutland, 
who attended the sick and injured among the employees from 1895. 
Fletcher D. Proctor, president of the company, was chiefly instru- 
mental in starting and carrying on this work. The first hospital was 
opened August 6, 1896, in a dwelling house that had been refitted for 
the purpose. It accommodated ten patients. The result of this experi- 
ment was so satisfactory that the Vermont Marble Company built and 
equipped a small modern hospital, which was opened for patients 
April 1, 1904. With the recent addition of a maternity ward, the hos- 
pital now has accommodations for thirty patients. Though specially 
intended for the employees of the company, to whom special rates are 
made, the Proctor Hospital is open to the general public. 
The Heaton Hospital at Montpelier was founded and built by the 
late Homer W. Heaton, for many years an attorney-at-law in that 
city. Mr. Heaton’s benefaction seems to have been the fulfillment of 
a life-long desire to place hospital facilities within his home city. In 
April, 1895, Mr. Heaton bought ten acres of land on which the hos- 
pital was built, two more acres of land being purchased in December, 
1896. In 1909, E. W. Bailey of Chicago and L. D. Taft of Montpelier, 
partners, gave the hospital a maternity ward, which was partially en- 
dowed later by L. D. Taft. Another timely benefaction which came 
to this institution in its darkest days was $10,000 from the Hon. Ira 
Calef of Washington, Vt. Mr. Heaton’s original gift to the hospital 
was approximately $35,000 and the aggregate donations of E. W. DR. SHAILER E. LAWTON 
Born in Goshen, Conn., October 3, 1853. He studied 
two years in the College of Physicians and Surgeons 
in New York City, then entered the College of Medicine 
of the University of Vermont and graduated in 1881. 
During vacations he made a close study of mental dis- 
eases at the Hartford (Conn.) Retreat. After gradua- 
tion in 1881 he became assistant physician at the Brat- 
tleboro Retreat during the temporary absence of Dr. 
Joseph Draper in Europe. He was appointed second 
assistant physician that fall and in the following winter 
became first assistant physician. He was given leave 
of absence in 1889 to study in neurological and psycho- 
logical medicine. He returned to the Retreat in 1891 
and on March 19, 1892, following the death of Doctor 
Draper, he was appointed acting superintendent and 
on April 20, 1892, was elected superintendent, serving 
until July, 1922, when he resigned on account of ill 
health. Doctor Lawton is a member of many important 
medical and allied associations, a director of the Ver- 
mont National Bank, and the Brattleboro Memorial 
Hospital, a trustee of Brooks Library and president of 
All Souls’ Church. He resides in Brattleboro. He mar- 
ried Mary I,. Upton of Roxbury, Mass., June 1, 1893. 
They have two children, Dr. Shailer U. Lawton of 
New York City and Mrs. Appleton Miles of Brattle- 
boro. THE MEDICAL PROFESSION 
637 
Bailey and Mr. and Mrs. L. D. Taft were fully $20,000. The hospital 
is incorporated. It has a Nurses’ Training School connected with it. 
Brightlook Hospital in St. Johnsbury was established in January, 
1899. The movement for the establishment of the hospital was initi- 
ated by a large group of prominent citizens, including both laymen 
and physicians, who believed that a hospital was needed in that lo- 
cality. The hospital was opened for the reception of patients early in 
the same year (1899). Like so many of our Vermont hospitals, 
Brightlook had a hard struggle to live. Finally, in January, 1905, a 
citizens’ conference was held in regard to the hospital and this meet- 
ing marked a turn in the tide of affairs: a determined effort soon 
crystallized not only to sustain the hospital, but to build a new and bet- 
ter plant. A gift of $5,000, on condition that $10,000 more be raised, 
was made by Mrs. Rebecca Fairbanks. Not only was this accom- 
plished, but the efforts of these friends for a hospital met with suffi- 
cient success so that November 26, 1906, it was voted to erect a new 
hospital building. The new building was dedicated March 14, 1908. 
The number of patients originally accommodated in the old hospital 
was eleven. The new hospital has accommodations for thirty-five 
patients. 
The Brattleboro Memorial Hospital was established from a fund 
of more than one million dollars left in trust by Thomas Thompson 
for the relief of poor seamstresses and needlewomen and shop girls of 
Brattleboro, Vt., and Rhinebeck, N. Y. 
This hospital was completed, at a cost of a little over $100,000, in 
1904. It will accommodate twenty-six patients. 
The Barre City Hospital was incorporated under the general laws 
April 7, 1904. It was opened for patients July 11, 1907. The hos- 
pital was made possible by the raising of $10,000 on a note, signed 
by thirty-four men. The original hospital building was put into shape 
for hospital purposes through generous contributions of public-spirited 
citizens. The number of patients originally accommodated was thir- 
teen. Later the building was arranged so that it would take care of 
eighteen and at times has had as large a number as twenty-six patients. 
A new hospital building was made possible through the generosity of 
Ira C. Calef of Washington, Vt., who early in 1914 offered to give 
the hospital $10,000, provided $30,000 additional was raised. Not only 
was this condition met, but before April 1, 1914, the hospital had 
$40,000 subscribed and Mr. Calef announced that he would give an 
additional $10,000 toward an endowment fund. Many individuals and 
business firms in Barre contributed liberally to this fund. The build- 
ing is two stories high with basement and a roof ward. It is of brick, 
tile and terra cotta, steel and concrete with terrazzo floors. It is of 
the most recent fire proof construction. It will accommodate forty 638 
HISTORY OF VERMONT 
patients. A Training School for Nurses is connected with the hos- 
pital. 
The Rockingham Hospital Association was incorporated Novem- 
ber 16, 1910, by twenty or more public-spirited citizens of Bellows 
Falls, who recognized the need of hospital facilities in that locality. 
A dwelling house was rented and used from June 21, 1912, for hos- 
pital purposes. The association has purchased the E. C. Fairbanks 
residence. This house was changed to meet the requirements of a 
modern hospital. 
The Springfield hospital was established in March, 1914. It was 
the result of a movement started among the townspeople of Springfield 
who have contributed liberally to its support. The town of Springfield 
has also contributed to its support. The hospital is located in a private 
house and was opened for patients March 16, 1914. It has twelve 
beds. 
The Putnam Memorial Hospital at Bennington was made possible 
by the generosity of the late Henry W. Putnam, who provided for 
the erection of a hospital in Bennington for the care of the people of 
Bennington and vicinity. Later his son, Henry W. Putnam, con- 
tributed generously towards the equipment of the hospital. He also 
has provided funds for the building of a nurses’ home. 
This is a modern hospital with modern equipment. 
There are many private hospitals and sanatoria in the State 
which are doing splendid work not only in general hospital service, 
but also in special lines of institutional care. INDEX INDEX 
Abbott, Charles F., 212 
Adams, Charles, 258 
Adams, Charles B., 411 
Adams, Herbert, 573 
Addison County, 193-215 
Admissions to Bar in 1922, 473 
Advent Christian Church, 516 
Agel, George L., 279 
Agriculture, 598-602 
Aikens, Asa, 91-92 
Aldis, Asa, 82 
Aldis, Asa O., 118-119 
Alexander, Marshall H., 307-308 
Allbe, Albert M., 435-436 
Amey, Harry B., 296 
Annis, Orien S., 359 
Archibald, Frank C., 224 
Architects, 570-571 
Artists, 566-569 
Asbestos, 595 
Ashland, Ezekiel A., 280 
Atwell, William A., 385-386 
Austin, Chauncey G., 308 
Austin, Roswell M., 308 
Austin, Warren R., 279-280 
Authors, 538-553 
Avery, John M., 411-412 
Ayers, Eugene A., 308 
Bailey, Burton E., 412 
Bailey, Guy W., 280-281 
Bailey, Henry A., 281 
Baker, Joel C., 373-374 
Baker, Oscar M., 445 
Baldwin, Frederick W., 349-350 
Ballard, George A., 302-303 
Ballard, Henry, 275-276 
Banks, 588-589 
Baptist Church, 506-508 
Bar by Counties, 193-473 
Barber, Ernest D., 231 
Barber, Frank E., 445 
Barber, Herbert G., 445 
Barber, Orion M., 222-223 
Barrett, James, 123-125 
Barrett, James C., 379-380 
Bartlett, Thomas, Jr., 242-245 
Batchelder, James K., 221-222 
Bates, Edward L., 231-232 
Bates, Henry C., 245-246 
Bates, Robert B., 202 
Baxter. William, 343 
Baylies, Nicholas, 99 
Beardsley, Herman R., 130-131 
Beckwith, Lyle R., 339 
Bell, James, 237-239 
Bennett, Edward C., 232 
Bennett, Milo L., 109-110 
Bennington County, 216-235 
Benton, Josiah H., 295-296 
Bicknell, Fred G., 467 
Bisbee, Edward W., 412 
Bisbee, Lewis H., 352-353 
Bissell, W. H. A., 487-488 
Black, Charles F., 281 
Black, Harry A., 350 
Blanchard, Herbert H., 467 
Bliss, George Y., 483 
Bliss, Sylvia, 549 
Bliss, William H., 207-208 
Blodgett, Harry, 251 
Bloomer, Asa S., 386 
Board of Health, 622-627 
Bolles, Almon I., 445 
Boorn, Trial of Jesse and Stephen, 
224-231 
Boston and Maine Railroad, 581-583 
Bosworth, Wayne C., 212 
Botsford, William H„ 386 
Boyden, Nelson L., 339 
Bradley, Jonathan D., 429-430 
Bradley, Stephen R., 15, 61-63 
Bradley, William C., 427-428 
Brattleboro Retreat, 630-631 
Bray ton, William, 87 
Briggs, Clark C., 280 
Briggs, George, 412 
Brigham, George A., 387 
Brigham, Waldo, 321-322 
Brown, Brian, 251 
Brown, Rufus E., 276-278 
Brown, Thomas H., 386 
Brownell, Chauncey W., 281-282 
Brush, Crean, 10 
Buckham, James, 548 
Bullard, Vernon A., 282 
Bump, Oscar H., 387 
Burbank, Harvey, 251 
Burbank, Peter, 328-329 
Burgess, Charles R., 387 
Burleson, George S., 308 
Burnam, John, 218-219 
Burnap, Wilder L., 274-275 
Butler, Albert W., 445-446 
Butler, Fred M., 187 
Butler, John E., 433 
Butterfield, Don O., 446 
Butterfield, Ora E„ 444-445 
Butterfield, Oscar E., 446 
Buttles, John S., 386-387 
Button, Charles I., 212-213 
Cady, Daniel L., 549 
Cady, Frank W., 527 
Caledonia County, 236-256 
Cameron, Oliver H., 296 
Campbell, James B., 251-252 
Campbell, Murdock A., 413 
Carpenter, Arthur P., 446 
Carpenter, Heman, 401-402 
Carver, J. Ward, 412 
Castleton Medical College, 614-616 
Catholic Church, 491-505 
Caverly, Charles S., 603, 624 
Caverly Preventorium, 634 
Central Vermont Railway, 577-579 
Chandler, Thomas, Jr., 50-51 
Chase, Charles S., 446 
Chase, Dudley, 86-87 
Chase, Harrie B., 190 
Chase, Henry, 232 
Cheney, Thomas C., 324 
Chipman, Daniel, 195-196 
Chipman, Nathaniel, 30-32, 58-59 
Chittenden County, 257-290 
Chittenden, Lucius E., 269-270 Christian Church, 516 
Circuit Judges, 191-192 
Clark, Frank H., 467-468 
Clark, Henry L., 387-388 
Clark, James A., 387 
Clark, Osman D., 412-413 
Clawson, Neil B., 446-447 
Cleary, Walter H., 350 
Cleghorn, Sarah N., 552 
Coan, Charles A., 308-309 
Colby, Stoddard B., 345-346 
Coleman, Patrick H., 309 
Collamer, Jacob, 102-104 
Colleges, 521-537 
Collins, James L., 316 
Conant, David S., 252 
Conant, Harrison J., 413 
Congregational Church, 474-482 
Conlin, Henry, 282 
Converse, Julius, 458-459 
Cook, Edwin A., 360-361 
Cooledge, Ashbel G., 388 
Coo ledge, Omeron H., 388 
Cooper, Jesse, 343-344 
Cornwall, Ellsworth B., 213 
Courts, State, 6-28 
Cox, Albert G., 468 
Cowles, Clarence P., 282-283 
Crane, Walter D., 349-350 
Cudworth, Addison E., 447 
Cushman, Henry B., 361 
Cushman, Isaac N., 347-348 
Cushman, Judson E., 279 
Cushman, Gen. Seth, 292 
Cushing, Stephen S., 309 
Dairying, 598-599 
Dale, George H., 413 
Dale, George N., 292-294 
Dale, Porter H., 296 
Daley, William R., 447 
Dalton, C. F., 626 
Dana, Edward, 388 
Darling, Charles H., 283 
Darling, Hale K., 339-340 
Darling, Joseph G., 338-339 
Darling, Sumner E., Jr., 252 
Davenport, Charles N., 438-440 
Davenport, Edgar H., 447 
Davis, Bliss N., 241-242 
Davis, Charles, 114 
Davis, Charles M., 413-414 
Davis, Earl L., 413 
Davis, Fred C., 468 
Davis, Gilbert A., 462-463 
Davis, Gilbert F., 468 
Davis, Hermon G., 468 
Daye, Stephen, 554 
Deane, John F., 461-462 
Deavitt, Edward H., 414 
DeBoer, Joseph A., 591 
DeGoesbriand, Louis, 496-500 
Delany, C. C., 491 
Dent, R. Ward, 468 
Dever, William E„ 389 
Dickens, Albert W., 213 
Dickerman, Jerry E., 350-351 
Dillingham, Paul, 399-400 
Dillingham, William P., 406-408 
Diseases, 603-609 
Donoway, James B., 186 
Doolittle, Joel, 87 
Dorr, Julia C. R., 547-548 
Dorsey, John S., 388 
Dufficy, Edward C., 414 
Dunn, William H., 388-389 
Dunnett, Alexander, 247-251 
Dunton, Walter G., 145 
Dutton, Walter A., 185-186 
Eastman, Charles G., 545 
Eclectic Society, 613 
Eddy, Charles B., 436-438 
Edgerton, Edward H., 469 
Edgerton, Lawrence F., 469 
Edgerton, William B., 232 
Edmond, David, 197-201 
Edmunds, George F., 271-272 
Education, 518-539 
Education, Board of, 519-520 
Edwards, John L., 346-347 
Electric Railroads, 585-587 
Elmer, Rachel Robinson, 569 
Emery, Curtis S., 361 
Enright, John J., 283 
Episcopal Church, 483-490 
Essex County, 291-297 
Evans, Harlow G., 470 
Fairchild, William H., 309 
Farman, Albert W., 361 
Farnham, Roswell, 332-333 
Farnsworth, Walter K., 389 
Farrand, Daniel, 80-81 
Fassett, John, Jr., 49-50 
Fay, Alland C., 414 
Fay, David, 79-80 
Fay, Jonas, 54 
Fenton, Walter S., 389 
Ferguson, Clarence J., 283 
Field, Charles K., 430-431 
Field, Gen. Martin, 426-427 
Field, Roswell M., 431-432 
Fifield, Benjamin F., 402-405 
Fish, Frank L„ 1, 5, 187-189 
Fisher, Dorothy Canfield, 552 
Fisk, Henry C., 324 
Fisk, James, 84 
Fitts, Clarke C., 442-444 
Fitts, Robert L., 448 
Fleetwood, Frederick G., 324 
Fletcher, Governor, 25-28 
Fletcher, Isaac, 241 
Follett, Timothy, 258-259 
Foot, Solomon, 368-369 
Forestry, 601-602 
Fortier, George F., 513 
Foster, David J., 278 
Foster, John G., 361 
Fowler, Joseph W., 232 
Franklin County, 298-313 
Frattini, Joseph J., 414 
French, Jeremiah, 273-274 
Furman, Daniel G., 309 
Frye, George C., 252 
Gale, John E., 447 
Galusha, Jonas, 79 
Gallup, Joseph, 616 
Gardner, Abraham B., 220-221 
Gates, Benjamin, 414-415 
George, Alva A., 309 
Gibson, Ernest W., 448 
Giudici, Lena, 415 
Gleason, Fred E., 415 
Gleason, Joseph R., 252 
Gleed, Philip K„ 322-323 
Gleed, Thomas, 320-321 
Goddard, George M., 389 
Goodrich, J. E., 521 
Gordon, John W., 415 
Graham, Horace F., 362 
2 Graham, John A., 356-357 
Graham, Warner A., 448 
Grand Isle County, 314-316 
Grandy, George W., 210-212 
Granite, 594-595 
Graves, Arthur L., 252-253 
Graves, Collins M., 232-233 
Greeley, Horace, 556 
Gridley, Selah, 614 
Griffin, Philip, 469 
Griffith, Edward, 233 
Griswold, Alexander V., 485 
Griswold, William A., 257-258 
Grout, Aaron H., 362 
Grout, Josiah, 353-354 
Grout, William W., 351-352 
Hale, Franklin D., 296-297 
Hall, Alfred A., 182-183 
Hall, A. C. A., 489 
Hall, Hiland, 112-113 
Hall, Lot, 67-68 
Hard, Eleazer R., 270 
Hardie, Robert Gordon, 568 
Harman, George N., 389 
Harrington, Theophilus, 77-78 
Harris, Charles P., 389-390 
Harvey, John N., 449 
Hartley, Fred S., 449 
Harvey, Erwin M„ 415-416 
Harvey, Roney M., 416 
Haskins, Kittredge, 440 
Haselton, Seneca, 171-174 
Hastings, Hugh W., 340 
Haswell, Anthony, 555 
Hawkins, E. W. J., 284 
Healy, Robert E., 174-175 
Heaton, Clifton M„ 416 
Hebard, William, 110-111 
Hebrew Church, 516 
Henry, Hugh H„ 469 
Hewitt, A. W., 549 
Hill, Guy W„ 253 
Historians, 542-544 
Hinckley, Lyman G., 335-338 
Hitchcock, Samuel, 32 
Hoar, Helen M. M., 416 
Hogan, George M„ 310 
Holden, Edward H., 233 
Holton, Henry D., 625-626 
Homeopathic Society, 613 
Hope, Robert D., 213 
Hopkins, John H„ 486-487 
Hopkins, Theodore E., 284 
Horses, 600-601 
Horton, Ezra M„ 284 
Horton, Guy B., 416 
Hospitals, 630-638 
Hospitals, Local, 634-638 
Houghton, Frederick L., 448-449 
Howard. Harry S., 284 
Howe, Charles L., 390 
Howe, Harland B., 45-46 
Howland, Fred A., 410-411 
Howland, Glenn C., 469-470 
Hubbard, Jonathan H., 81 
Hughes, Orrin B., 449 
Hulburd, Roger W., 324-325 
Hull, Clarence A., 310 
Hunt, Edwin G., 213 
Hunt, George L., 417 
Hunt, Richard M., 570 
Hunt, William Morris, 566-567 
Hunton, Augustus P., 460-461 
Huse, Hiram A., 405-406 
Hutchinson, Titus, 93-94 
Ide, Henry C., 246-247 
Industries, 593-597 
Insurance, 590-592 
Isham, Pierpoint, 118 
Isle La Motte Murder, 315-316 
Jacob, Stephen, 75-76 
Jackson, S. Hollister, 417 
Jewish Church, 516 
Johnson, Elbridge G., 345 
Johnson, William E., 463-464 
Jones, Edward S., 449 
Jones, Joseph C., 390 
Jones, Lawrence C., 390 
Joyce, Charles H., 370-371 
Judges, Circuit, 191-192 
Judges, Federal, 29-46 
Judges, Superior Courts, 180-191 
Judges, Supreme and Other State 
Courts, 47-179 
Kellogg, Daniel, 111 
Kellogg, Loyal C., 125-126 
Keyes, Wade, 470 
Kimball, Alphonzo D., 253 
King, Addison H., 310 
Kingsley, Harvey R., 390 
Kinney, Clayton H., 390-391 
Kipling, Rudyard, 553 
Kittredge, William C., 192 
Knight, Samuel, 11, 65-66 
Knowlton, Luke, 60-66 
Laboratory of Hygiene, 625-626 
Ladd, Gaylord F., 310 
Ladd, Jed P., 284 
Ladd, Jed P. (Jr.), 316 
La Fleur, Ira H„ 213-214 
Lafountain, Dean A., 325 
Laird, Fred L., 417 
Lamoille County, 317-326 
Latham, Leon D., 285 
Laughton, Frank H., 450 
Lawrence, Edwin W., 384-385 
Lawrence, George E., 375-376 
Lawrence, George F., 233 
Lawrence, Robert A., 383-384 
Law School, 299-300 
Leamy, James P., 391 
Leary, Matthew G., 285 
Levin, Reuben, 233 
Libraries, 574-576 
Lindsay, William C., 362 
Lindsay, Charles, 201-203 
Linsley, J. H., 625-626 
Locklin, Wallace B., 310 
Lockwood, Edward J., 285 
Longmoore, Jutten A., 253 
Lord, William A., 417 
Lund, Henry W., 297 
Macomber, James H., 285 
Maeck, Jacob, 259 
Mallary, Rollin C., 357 
Mansur, Zophar M., 294-295 
Marble, 593-594 
Marsh, Charles, 456 
Marsh, Edward S., 391 
Marsh, George P., 260 
Martin, Allen, 285-286 
Martin, Frank J., 418 
Martin, James L., 43-45 
Martin, Joseph G., 449-450 
Mason, Charles H., 234 
Mason, Jeremiah, 425 
Mathers, George A., 234 
3 Mattocks, John, 104-105, 240-241 
Maurer, Charles A., 234 
Maurice, Melville P., 450 
McCuen, Robert W., 214 
McFarland, Fred H., 326 
McFarland, Henry M., 325 
McFarland, Raymond, 553 
McFeeters, Emmett, 311 
McFeeters, W. R., 311 
McGettrick, Felix W„ 304-305 
McNamara, Joseph A., 285 
Mead, Larkin G., 572-573 
Meagher, William J., 234 
Medical Education, 613-622 
Medical Practice, 628-631 
Medical Profession, 603-638 
Medical Registration, 630 
Medical Societies, 609-613 
Meldon, Patrick M„ 391 
Merino Sheep, 599-600 
Merrill, C. H„ 474 
Merrill, James A., 391 
Merrill, John V. D. S„ 234 
Methodist Episcopal Church, 509-511 
Michaud, John S., 500-501 
Middlebury College, 527-531 
Miles, Frank E„ 362 
Miles, Willard W„ 178-179 
Miller, C. Menzies, 450 
Miller, Samuel, 195 
Miller, Webster E„ 418 
Mimms, John H., 286 
Miner, Ahiman L., 219-220 
Moloney, Thomas W„ 381 
Moody, Lewis C., 418 
Moore, Ernest E., 470 
Moore, Hugh, 470 
Morgan Horses, 600-601 
Mormon Church, 516 
Morse, Claude L., 418 
Morse, George E., 391-392 
Morse, Melvin G„ 253-254 
Morton, John, 286 
Moseley, Increase, 52-53 
Moulton, Sherman R., 189-190 
Mower, Edmund C., 286-287 
Munson, Loveland, 161-163 
Newspapers, 554-565 
Nichols, Albro F., 254 
Niles, Albert A., 325 
Niles, Nathaniel, 56-57 
Noble, Learned R., 392 
Normal Schools, 519-520 
Norton, Nathan A., 254 
Norwich University, 531-536 
Novak, Charles E., 392 
Novelists. 550-553 
Noyes, Harry A., 325 
O’Brien, Thomas E., 450-451 
Olcott, Peter, 56 
Olcott, Simeon, 12, 54 
Orange County, 327-341 
Organs, 596 
Orleans County, 342-364 
Ormsbee, Ebenezer J., 371-372 
Ormsbee, Edgar L., 370 
Ormsby, Robert M., 330 
Paddock, Ephraim, 98 
Page, Frank M., 254 
Page, Guy M., 287 
Page, Jasper G., 214 
Page, Joel W., 287 
Page, P. Marrs, 287 
Paine, Elijah, 32-34, 66 
Palmer, William A., 84-85 
Parker, Wallace H., 326 
Partridge, Frank C., 393 
Pattridge, Loren E., 254 
Payne, Elisha, 53-54 
Peach, A. W„ 531, 549 
Peck, Asahel, 126-130 
Peck, Hamilton S., 287 
Peck, Lucius B., 400-401 
Peck, Theodora A., 553 
Phelps, Charles, 7, 24 
Phelps, Edward J., 263-268 
Phelps, Philip M. M., 392 
Phelps, Samuel S., 99-102 
Phelps, Solomon, 7, 11 
Phillips, Timothy R., 421 
Picknell, William L., 566 
Pierce, Hubert S„ 362 
Pierce, Loren R., 471 
Pierpoint, John, 119-123 
Pierpoint, Robert, 191-192, 368 
Pingree, David A., 471 
Pingree, Fred B., 451 
Pingree, William S., 471 
Piper, A. V. D„ 451 
Plumley, Frank, 408-409 
Plumley, Charles A., 418 
Poets, 545-549 
Poland, Luke P., 114-118 
Porter, David E., 254-255 
Pomeroy, John, 618 
Porter, Thomas, 56 
Post, Nathan N., 311 
Poulin, Camille V., 393 
Powell, Clare R., 297 
Powell, Max L., 287-288 
Powers, George M., 177 
Powers, H. Henry, 143-145 
Powers, Hiram, 572 
Pratt, Leo E., 392-393 
Prentiss, John H., 344 
Prentiss, Samuel, 34-36, 92-93 
Presbyterian Church, 516 
Preston, William H., 393 
Prout, John, 133-134 
Prouty, Charles A., 356-358 
Prouty, Ward, 362-363 
Public Health, 622-627 
Randall, Carroll F., 326 
Raymond, Edward D„ 393-394 
Read, Lavant M., 440-441 
Redfield, Isaac F., 105-109 
Redfield, Timothy P.. 135-138 
Redmond, John W., 358-359 
Reirden, William W„ 363 
Religious Denominations, 474-517 
Reports of Decisions, 21, 22 
Rice, John J., 501 
Richardson, Samuel E., 255 
Riordan, Martin P., 394 
Robb, Charles H„ 441-442 
Roberts, Daniel, 260-262 
Roberts, Robert, 288 
Robinson, Jonathan, 71 
Robinson, Moses, 47-48 
Robinson, Rowland E., 551-552 
Robinson, Theodore, 568 
Rogers, D. Allen, 333-335 
Rogers, Frank S., 363 
Ross, Jonathan, 138-143 
Ross. Willis M., 394 
Rowell, John W., 152-155 
Rowland, William H„ 394 
Rowley, Arthur B., 311 
4 Rowley, Thomas, 538 
Royce, H. Charles, 306-307 
Royce, Heman S., 301-302 
Royce, Homer E., 134-135 
Royce, Stephen, 94-97 
Royce, Stephen E., 311-312 
Russell, Charles J., 288 
Russell, Leroy C., 214-215 
Rustedt, Henry E., 303-304 
Rustedt, Henry F., 312 
Rutland County, 365-396 
Rutland Railroad, 579-581 
Ryder, Herbert D„ 451 
St. Michael’s College, 536-537 
Sargent, Albert A., 419 
Sargent, John G., 465-467 
Sawyer, Joshua, 318-319 
Saxe, John G., 545-546 
Scales, 595-596 
School for Feeble-Minded, 632-633 
Schwenk, Anthony F., 451 
Scott, Elwin L., 419 
Scott, H. William, 419 
Scott, Julian, 568 
Sculptors, 572-573 
Searles, J. Rolf, 255 
Sennett, James E., 395 
Senter, John H., 410 
Seventh Day Adventist Church, 516 
Seymour, Horatio, 196-197 
Shackshober, Jacob J., 234-235 
Shatter, Oscar L., 434-435 
Shaw, Henry B., 288-289 
Sheep, 599-600 
Sheldon. William B„ 235 
Shepard, Oscar L., 255 
Shepardson, John, 48-49 
Sherburne, John C., 340 
Sherburne, L. O., 511 
Sherman, Alfred L„ 289 
Shields, Charles A., 255-256 
Shurtleff, Harry C., 419 
Simays, Adrian J., 289 
Simpson, James G., 363 
Skeels, Homer L., 471 
Skinner, Richard, 83 
Slack, Leighton P., 179 
Slade, William, 201-202 
Slate, 595 
Smalley, DaVid A., 37-38 
Smith, Edward C., 312 
Smith, Ephraim J., 363 
Smith, Fuller C., 312 
Smith, Israel, 70-71 
Smith, John, 300-301 
Smith, Levi P., 289 
Smith, Noah, 15, 63-64 
Smith, Preston A., 256 
Southgate, Frederick C., 471-472 
Spalding, Fred E., 472 
Spooner, Paul, 51-52 
Sprague, William H., 340 
Squires, Lindley S., 394 
Stafford, Bert L., 394 
Stafford, Wendell P„ 169-171, 548 
Stanton, Zed S., 183-185 
Start, Frank A., 312 
Start, Henry R., 164-166 
State Hospital for Insane, 631-632 
Steele, Benjamin H., 132-133 
Steele, Daniel W., 312-313 
Stevens, George C., 313 
Stevens, Hiram F., 305-306 
Stevens, Orlando, 301 
Stevens, Roland E., 472 
Stewart, John W., 203-205 
Stewart, William D„ 313 
Stickney, Bert H., 395 
Stickney, William B. C., 376-379 
Stickney, William W., 464 
Stone, Bingham H., 626 
Stone, George W., 215 
Stone, John H., 419 
Stow, George L., 340-341 
Stowe, Frank D. E., 451-452 
Sturges, Wesley A., 289 
Sturtevant, Allen R., 215 
Sunday Schools, 517 
Superior Court Judges, 180-191 
Supreme Court Judges, 47-179 
Supreme Court Room, 179 
Susena, Robert E., 419 
Swinnerton, Frederic G., 395 
Taft, Alphonso, 433-434 
Taft, Elihu B., 289 
Taft, Millward C„ 341 
Taft, Russell S., 148-152 
Talc, 595 
Tarbell, Charles R., 472 
Taylor, William H„ 177-178 
Teacher Training, 519-520 
Thayer, Samuel W., 620 
Theriault, Arthur C., 420 
Theriault, William N., 420 
Thomas, Aimer B., 256 
Thomas, Fred B., 420-421 
Thompson, Daniel P., 550-551 
Thompson, Frank D., 363-364 
Thompson, George H., 452 
Thompson, John C., 98-99 
Thompson, Laforrest H., 166-169 
Thompson, Zadock, 541-542 
Throop, John, 51 
Tichenor, Isaac, 66-67 
Tinkham, Henry C., 603, 621 
Tobin, George T., 568 
Tracey, William E„ 326 
Tracy, Andrew, 456-457 
Trainor, Raymond, 472-473 
Transportation, 577-587 
Tucker, Philip C., 208-209 
Tupper, Herbert G., 472 
Turner, Bates, 97-98 
Tuttle, Frank W„ 215 
Twitchell, Robert R., 452 
Tyler, James M., 156-161 
Tyler, Royall, 71-75, 538-540 
Underwood, Abel, 192 
Underwood, Levi, 262-263 
Unitarian Church, 512 
Universalist Church, 513-515 
University of Vermont, 521-527 
University College of Medicine, 525, 
618-622 
Upham, William, 398 
Van Ness, Cornelius P., 88-89 
Veazey, Wheelock G., 146-148 
Vergennes Lawyers, 208-212 
Vermont (Tuberculosis) Sanatorium, 
633-634 
Vilas, Levi B., 329-330 
Vilas, Martin S., 289-290 
Walker, Aldace F., 374-375 
Walker, William H., 155-156 
Washburn, Peter T., 459-460 
Washington County, 397-422 
Waterman, Eleazer L., 180-182 
5 Waterman, George L., 323-324 
Watson, Charles D., 313 
Watson, John H., 176 
Webber, Marvelle C., 381-383 
Webster, Fred G., 290 
Webster, Fred L., 313 
Wesley, Walter W., 256 
Weston, George A., 452 
Wheeler, H. Elmer, 313 
Wheeler, Hoyt H., 38-42 
White, Clarence R„ 290 
White, Frank D., 395 
White, William C., 421 
Whitham, Arthur G., 473 
Whitney, Harold E., 453 
Wilbur, Lafayette, 272-273 
Wilds, Charles M„ 205-207 
Wilkins, George, 319-320 
Willcox, Julius A., 190 
Williams, Charles K„ 90-91 
Williams, Elijah, 11 
Williams, Frank C., 364 
Williams, Frank S., 341 
Williams, Frank W., 395 
Williams, Samuel, 540-541 
Wilson, Guy, 473 
Wilson, Henderson C., 348-349 
Wilson, John J., 473 
Wilson, March M., 341 
Wilson, Stanley C., 189 
Wilson, William C., 131 
Windham County, 423-453 
Windsor County, 454-473 
Wing, George W., 422-423 
Wing, Leonard F„ 395-396 
Wishart, William, 422 
Witters, Harry W., 256 
Wolcott, Howard F., 290 
Wood, Thomas Waterman, 567 
Woodbridge, Enoch, 69-70 
Woodbridge, Frederick E., 209-210 
Woodward, Theodore, 614 
Wright, Rebecca W., 574 
Woodstock Medical College, 616-618 
Wright, Willard M., 364 
Young, George B., 422 
Young, John, 354-356 
6