Los Angeles County CA Archives Biographies.....Dollard, Robert 1842 - 
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Joy Fisher sdgenweb@yahoo.com December 19, 2005, 8:18 pm

Author: Luther A. Ingersoll (1908)

    MAJOR ROBERT DOLLARD, a recent acquisition to Santa Monica, with his wife
came here to make their home early in the winter of 1907. The Major was born at
Fall River, Mass., in sight of Mount Hope, on Mount Hope Bay, where the famous
Indian chief, King Philip, fell, and in view of the mouth of Taunton River,
which empties into that bay where Thor Fin, the sea-roving Norseman, wintered in
the eleventh century with one hundred and fifty men, four hundred years before
Columbus discovered America.

    Major Dollard was born on March 14th, 1842; was educated in the public
schools of Massachusetts, entered the Union army at the outbreak of the war and
served in the field with credit and distinction until its close. He rose from
the ranks to major and the command of his regiment and was one of the youngest
regimental commanders in General Grant's army in the campaign before Richmond
and Petersburg, Virginia, in 1864 and 1865. During that campaign, in a battle
before Richmond, where sixty percent of the men engaged were killed or wounded,
he was promoted on the field by order of the commanding general of the Army of
the James, the substance of which was:

    "Captain Robert Dollard, acting as field officer, and in command of the
skirmish line at New Market Heights, inspired his command by his great personal
bravery, coolness and ability, until he fell severely wounded near the enemy's
main line is hereby promoted to major."

    Major Dollard went with his regiment to the Mexican frontier at the close of
the war to join an army assembled along the Rio Grande to give the Emperor
Maximillian and the French Emperor, who was backing him, a hint that the United
States, having settled its family difficulties, was now ready to test the virtue
of the Monroe doctrine, but the withdrawal of the French army from Mexico and
the failing fortunes of Maximillian settled the question without hostilities and
the troops thus assembled were mustered out early in 1866.

    Shortly after this Major Dollard located at Galesburg, Illinois, studied law
and was admitted to the bar by the Supreme Court of that state in 1870.

    He married Miss Carrie E. Dunn, of Yates City, Illinois, in 1875. They have
no children. He continued in the general practice of the law in Knox, Peoria and
Fulton Counties, Illinois, after his admission, until 1879, when he located in
Douglas County, Dakota Territory, a frontier county, in which he was the first
settler. During the early settlement of this county a band of adventurers
secured its organization and attempted to plunder it of about two hundred
thousand dollars by the issue of fraudulent warrants on its treasury but were
met by the honest settlers with Major Dollard at their head and, in a contest in
and out of court, lasting ten years, in which was engaged some of the best legal
talent in the North-west and the effective services of a vigilance committee,
the conspirators were routed, driven from the country and the people saved from
their fruadulent schemes.

    The major was a leading member of the Constitutional Conventions of South
Dakota in 1883 and 1885, in the movement to create a state out of the south half
of Dakota Territory, the last of which framed the constitution of the present
State of South Dakota, and the work of which conventions practically resulted in
the admission into the Union of the States of both South and North Dakota.

    He was elected District Attorney in 1885, Attorney-General of the
Provisional State Government for South Dakota in the same year, a member of the
Territorial Senate in 1888, in which he was Chairman of the Joint Committee of
both Houses on the reform of the school law; was elected the first
Attorney-General of the State of South Dakota and served two terms during which
he framed legislation that lifted the state from a condition of bankruptcy and
has continued it on a cash basis ever since. He was subsequently a leading
member of the House of the State Legislature and later of its Senate in which he
was Chairman of the Judiciary Committee. He was still later successively an
anti-machine candidate for Governor and for Congress in a revolt that several
years struggle crowned with success.


Additional Comments:
Extracted from:

Ingersoll's century history, Santa Monica Bay cities: prefaced with a brief
history of the state of California, a condensed history of Los Angeles County,
1542 to 1908: supplemented with an encyclopedia of local biography and
embellished with views of historic landmarks and portraits of representative
people.

Los Angeles: Luther A. Ingersoll (1908)


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