Clark County IL Archives History - Books .....Chapter V - Bar Of Clark County 1907
************************************************
Copyright.  All rights reserved.
http://www.usgwarchives.net/copyright.htm
http://www.usgwarchives.net/il/ilfiles.htm
************************************************

File contributed for use in USGenWeb Archives by:
Joy Fisher http://www.genrecords.net/emailregistry/vols/00001.html#0000031 July 13, 2008, 2:29 am

Book Title: Historical Encyclopedia Of Illinois And History Of Clark County

CHAPTER V.

THE BAR OF CLARK COUNTY-COUNTY OFFICIALS- APPOINTEES FBOM CLARK COUNTY, AND
INCIDENTS, COMMENTS, ETC., THEREON.

   Clark County has had a long line of competent and distinguished State's
Attorneys. Of John M. Robinson, the first, Edwin B. Webb, the second, and O. B.
Ficklin, the third, only the last is well remembered today. His first appearance
here appears to have been in September, 1830, when he rode into Darwin, the
county seat, on a day memorable, not so much for the arrival of the future
Prosecuting Attorney of Clark County as for the discovery of an immense den of
snakes, "as large as a bale of hay," as Mr. Ficklin afterwards declared. 
These snakes, on being uncovered, started out in every direction through the
town, and the whole population seemed to be busily engaged in the killing. O. B.
Ficklin was born in Scott County, Ky., December 16, 1808, and hence was only
twenty-two years old when he reached Darwin. He had come from Missouri to Mt.
Carmel, Ill., where he became a member of the Wabash bar. He was a member of the
Illinois Legislature in 1834, when the State capital was at Vandalia, and there
met Lincoln, Douglas, John T. Stewart, Dubois and many others who afterwards
achieved State and National fame. Of this bright galaxy, Ficklin regarded
Stewart as the superior, both intellectually and physically; but Stewart was a
Whig, and as that party did not suit the people of Illinois he was never so much
heard of in after years as Lincoln, Douglas and Dubois. In 1835 Mr. Ficklin was
chosen State's Attorney of the Wabash County District, which included Clark
County. In 1837 he removed to Charleston, Coles County, where he lived and
practiced his profession until his death. In 1843 he was elected to Congress
from the Coles County District, and in this capacity was associated with
Douglas, John A. McClernand and Wentworth. He was re-elected in 1846, and found
an associate representative from Illinois in the renowned Lincoln, whom he had
first met at Vandalia in 1834, twelve years before. He was a delegate to the
Democratic National Convention in 1856, when Buchanan was nominated, and was
also a delegate to the Charleston Convention in 1860. He was again elected a
member of the Illinois Legislature in 1876. In 1846, while a member of Congress
from Illinois, he married Elizabeth H. Colquitt, a daughter of United States
Senator Walter T. Colquitt, of Georgia. Alfred Colquitt, the brother of Mrs.
Ficklin, was afterwards a United States Senator from Georgia. At his death, Mr.
Ficklin was the father of the Illinois bar. He was present on the platform with
Lincoln and Douglas at the time of their renowned debate at Charleston, on which
occasion Lincoln adroitly and effectively used Mr. Ficklin, who was a Democrat,
and had been with him in Congress at the time of the beginning of the Mexican
War, to repel the charge made by Douglas that Lincoln had voted against some
measure looking to the vigorous prosecution of the Mexican War. Of the two
earlier State's Attorneys of Clark County, John M. Robinson was afterwards a
soldier in the Mexican War, served four consecutive terms in Congress, to which
he was first elected in 1858, was the successful Democratic nominee for Governor
in 1864, and died at Springfield, Ill., November 3, 1886. Edwin B. Webb, the
second, was State's Attorney of White County as well as of Clark, a member of
the Legislature of Illinois from 1834 to 1842, and State Senator from 1842 to
1846. He was a Whig Presidential Elector in 1844, and when nominated by the Whig
party for Governor in 1852 was beaten by Joel A. Matteson, his Democratic
opponent. He was also an unsuccessful candidate for Supreme Judge against Judge
Scotes. He died October 14, 1858, in the fifty-sixth year of his age. His
immediate official successor, Augustus C. French, was a resident of Crawford
County, and afterwards member of the Illinois Legislature, Receiver of the Land
Office at Palestine, Democratic Governor of Illinois for two terms, being
elected to that office in 1846 and again in 1848, Bank Commissioner of Illinois,
and professor of law in McKendree College at Lebanon. He was nominated by the
Douglas wing of the Democratic party in 1858 and defeated for Superintendent of
Public Instruction, was a member of the Constitutional Convention from St. Clair
County in 1862, and died at his nome in Lebanon, September 4, 1864. Of Gardner
B. Shellady, the fifth State's Attorney of Clark County, history is silent; but
Aaron Shaw, the sixth to hold that office, was a Democratic member of Congress
in 1856 and 1882, and also served as Circuit Judge. He was born in New York in
1811, and died at his home in Olney, 111. He was one of the ablest and most
remorseless Prosecuting Attorneys that Eastern Illinois ever saw, being
surpassed only by John Scholfield. Alfred Kitchel was the seventh State's
Attorney, John Scholfield the eighth and James R. Cunningham, of Charleston,
Ill., was the ninth.

   Silas S. Whitehead, the tenth State's Attorney, was born in Putnam County,
Ill., June 18, 1829, and came to Clark County with his parents in 1830. He was
educated in the common schools, studied law with Judge Scholfield, his boyhood
companion and friend, at Marshall, and was admitted to the bar in 1862. He was
School Commissioner five terms, and was elected State's Attorney in 1864 and
1868. He possessed great force of character, and at one time was a leading
practitioner at the bar of Clark County. He was a man of intense prejudice, not
always well placed, and in his capacity as editor of various publications was
bitter and unrelenting in his pursuit of his enemies, real or imaginary, often
attacking those who had been his most devoted and self-sacrificing friends. He
had the misfortune to shoot and kill John L. Ryan, who succeeded him as the
eleventh State's Attorney of Clark County, in Marshall, on June 9, 1877. This
act was bitterly resented by a large portion of-the people of the county,
especially the party associates of Ryan, as he was the first Republican State's
Attorney Clark County had ever had, and it darkened and embittered all of Mr.
Whitehead's subsequent life. In the first trial, at Marshall, in November, 1877,
he was vigorously prosecuted by T. J. Golden and H. C. Bell, of Clark County,
and by E. Callahan, of Crawford County, and ably defended by Jacob W. Wilkin,
James C. Robinson, of Springfield, and others. Judge Oliver L. Davis presided,
and Whitehead was convicted and sentenced to the penitentiary for one year. A
new trial was allowed by Judge Davis, the case was taken to Crawford County on a
change of venue and in a subsequent trial in Robinson, before Judge John H.
Halley, of Jasper County, Whitehead was acquitted. The killing took place in the
law office of the writer, which was also the office of Benson Martin, Justice of
the Peace, in the room over the postoffice, on the east side of the Public
Square, now occupied by B. F. Johnson as a loan and real-estate office. One
Austin Fitzsimmons had cut Ryan in the head with a knife. The City Attorney,
Ralph W. Love, assisted by the writer, was prosecuting Fitzsimmons, and
Whitehead was defending him. Ryan was being cross-examined as a witness for the
prosecution by Whitehead when the trouble arose which culminated in a fight
between Whitehead and Ryan, during which Whitehead shot Ryan, the ball passing
through his bowels and lodging in his spinal column and resulting in his death
the following day, which was Sunday, June 10, 1877, at about 8 o'clock in the
morning. It is proper to say that Ryan struck the first blow. No homicide in
Clark County ever provoked so much angry feeling and bad blood as this. It made
enemies out of life-long friends, and the bad effect of it did not die away for
years afterwards. A subscription of over $800 was subscribed to aid in the
prosecution of Whitehead, and the feelings of the people, already wrought up to
the highest and bitterest pitch of excitement and fury, were still further
intensified and embittered by the conduct and action of Whitehead himself, who
constantly, through his newspaper, the "Eastern Illinoisian," attacked in the
bitterest and most unjust way the attorneys for the people, the witnesses who
testified against him and the jury that convicted him; and finally Wilkin, who
had defended him in the courts, as well as Edwin Harlan, T. L. Orndorff, D.
Le-Gore and others, who had stood by him manfully in his troubles. Many people
did not consider that Whitehead was justified in shooting Ryan, although the
latter was not a man of good personal habits, was a giant in strength, and at
times exceedingly quarrelsome and dangerous, and many who knew him feared him
greatly. A bitter feeling had existed between himself and Whitehead for some
time, and as Ryan had undoubtedly made threats of personal violence, Whitehead
may really have believed, as he swore at his trials, that he was actually in
danger of losing his life or of receiving great bodily harm. John L. Ryan, the
eleventh Prosecuting Attorney of Clark County, who succeeded Silas Whitehead in
1872, held the office until 1876, a period of four years. He was a man of great
physical and mental strength, over six feet high, weighed about 250 pounds, and
for a man of his proportions was remarkably active. He had a fine legal mind,
and with perhaps the exception of Scholfield and Whitehead was one of the
strongest and most successful men who have presided over the State's Attorney's
office in Clark County. Competent judges had great confidence in his ability to
make his mark in his profession, but his sad death, in the very zenith of his
career, put an end to bright prophecies and deprived the community of an able
and many-sided citizen.

   Thomas L. Orndorff, who succeeded John L. Ryan, was born in Guernsey County,
Ohio, March 24,1839, and came to Clark County with his parents in the early fall
of 1854, his mother dying soon afterward. He was educated, principally, at
Zanesville, Ohio. In our Civil War he was a First-Lieutenant of Company G, One
Hundred and Fifty-second Illinois Infantry. In 1874 he came to Marshall and read
law with James C. Robinson, and was admitted to the bar in 1877, one year after
he had been elected State's Attorney. In all Mr. Orndorff was State's Attorney
for sixteen years and was a candidate for the fifth term in 1900, receiving his
first defeat at the hands of M. B. Davison. He was first elected in November,
1876, and again in 1880. In 1884 he was succeeded by Newton Tibbs, who served
until 1888, when Mr. Orndorff was again elected, and re-elected in 1892, finally
retiring from the office in December, 1896, making, as before stated, four full
terms of four years each, the longest term of service in that office of any man
in Clark County. While not a profound lawyer, especially in pleadings, Mr.
Orndorff was a man of fine common sense and one of the best examiners of
witnesses the county has ever had. He was an exceedingly forcible advocate
before a jury, and an exceedingly dangerous one for his opponents, as when he
had the closing speech it was a difficult matter to keep him from either winning
his case or hanging the jury. He was a splendid mixer among the common people,
conciliatory, winning, generous, forgiving and popular, and was liked by even
those whom his position compelled him to prosecute. He seldom made enemies of
defendants in criminal cases, and, as was said by the most eloquent orator
America has ever produced, on a certain notable occasion: "Were every one for
whom Thomas L. Orndorff did some generous and loving act to drop a blossom on
his grave, he would sleep tonight beneath a wilderness of flowers." After life's
fitful fever he sleeps well. Requieseat in pace.

   Newton Tibbs, of Martinsville Township, the successor of Thomas L. Orndorff
in 1884, was a man of indefatigable industry, strict integrity and a good
knowledge of the fundamental principles of the law. His devotion to duty, strict
integrity, impartiality and vigor of his prosecutions soon made him one of the
best Prosecutors Clark County has ever had. He was born in Kentucky and came to
Clark County in 1860, where his mother died in 1864. He attended the common
schools, taught school and studied law at night, Saturdays and Sundays. In 1860
he went to Kansas, completed his law readings with Elihu Davis, of that State,
and was admitted to the Kansas bar in 1880. After his retirement from office he
practiced alone in Marshall for a time, then formed a partnership with James W.
Graham, which continued until his death, September 15, 1899. Mr. Tibbs left a
stainless reputation, both as a lawyer and man, and his death was distinctly a
loss to the legal profession of Clark County. Samuel M. Scholfield, the fifth
son of Judge John Scholfield, and who succeeded Mr. Tibbs, was born in Marshall,
August 21, 1872, was educated in the common schools of Clark County, at Notre
Dame, Ind., and at Ann Arbor, Mich., read law with W. B. Scholfield, his
brother, and was admitted to practice by the Supreme Court of Illinois in 1895.
He was elected State's Attorney in November, 1896, and retired from office in
December to make way for his successor, M. B. Davison, who had given Thomas L.
Orndorff his first defeat, and who was, up to that time, with the exception of
John L. Ryan, the only Republican State's Attorney ever elected in Clark County.
Mr. Scholfield made a clean, vigorous and successful State's Attorney, and
retired from office with the respect and esteem of all. He next opened a law
office in Marshall, and upon the retirement of Judge Fenton W. Booth from the
law firm of Golden, Scholfield & Booth became a member of the new firm of
Golden, Scholfield & Scholfield, with which he since has been connected. Mr.
Scholfield is an honest and industrious young man, and the firm has the best
paying law practice in the county.

   M. B. Davison, who succeeded Mr. Scholfield, is a product of Clark County,
having been born in Wabash Township, February 17, 1872, and was therefore
thirty-four years old on the 18th of February, 1906. He was elected in November,
1900, and retired from office in December, 1904, to be succeeded by Arthur
Poorman, the present State's Attorney. Mr. Davison was educated in the common
schools of Clark County and at the State Normal, at Terre Haute, Ind. He taught
school for several years, read law with W. B. Scholfield, in Marshall, and was
admitted to the practice in 1896. He is a member of the Law and Ritual Committee
of the Court of Honor, and is now serving his second term in that capacity. Mr.
Davison is a young man of pleasing address, honest, energetic, pushing and
popular; is a good all-round lawyer and made a capable and successful State's
Attorney. Since his retirement from office he has been senior member of the firm
of Davison & Bartlett, which firm has a good paying practice and has the respect
and confidence of the entire community.

   Arthur Poorman, the present State's Attorney of Clark County, was born in
Harper County, Kan., where his parents then temporarily resided, August 2, 1880,
and is therefore but about twenty-six years of age, and was only a little past
twenty-four years of age at the time of his election in November, 1904. With the
exception of John Scholfield, he is the youngest man and third Republican ever
elected State's Attorney in Clark County. He was brought up in West Union, York
Township, Clark County, and educated in its common schools and at Merom College,
of Merom, Ind., and graduated from the law department of Michigan University, at
Ann Arbor, in the class of 1903. Mr. Poorman is a clean, honest, intelligent,
genial and popular young man, and liked by all who know him. He is devoted to
his duties, looks carefully and impartially after violations of the criminal
statutes of the State, and has run his own affairs as State's Attorney without
dictation or improper influences from any one. There never has been any scandal
connected with the State's Attorney's office in Clark County under Mr. Poorman's
administration. Mr. Porman has a good heart as well as a good head, and,
inasmuch as the office of State's Attorney is essentially a judicial one, and
the public prosecutor is often called upon to temper justice with mercy, a good
heart as well as a cool head is needed.

   The Circuit Clerks of Clark County have been as follows: William B. Archer,
1819 to 1820, first term, one year; Jacob Harlan, 1823 to 1836, thirteen years;
Jonathan Rathbone, 1836 to 1837, one year; Uri Manley, 1837 to 1842, five years;
Newton Harlan, 1842 to 1848, six years; William B. Archer, second term, 1848 to
1852, four years; William P. Bennett, 1852 to 1860, eight years; Thomas W. Cole,
1860 to 1872, twelve years; Daniel J. Davidson, 1872 to 1880, eight years;
William B. Hodge, Jr., 1880 to 1888, eight years; Joshua Montgomery, 1888 to
1892, four years; Harry Redman, 1892 to 1896, four years; J. Q. Snedeker, 1896
to 1900, four years; John A. Sweet, 1900 to 1904, four years; and Daniel
Emerson, who was elected in November, 1904, and whose term of four years will
expire in December, 1908. Of the fourteen Circuit Clerks of Clark County, none
but William B. Archer achieved a State or National reputation. He was a member
of the Illinois Legislature in 1824, State Senator in 1832, Captain in the Black
Hawk War, candidate for Lieutenant-Governor in 1834, member of the Board of
Commissioners of the Illinois and Michigan Canal in 1835, again a Representative
in the Illinois Legislature from 1840 to 1846, and candidate for Congress in
1854 against James C. Allen. When Allen got the certificate of election and
Archer contested, the office was declared vacant, and in 1856 he again ran
against Allen, but was defeated. He was a delegate from Illinois to the first
Republican National Convention at Philadelphia, Pa., in 1856, where he
vigorously supported Abraham Lincoln for Vice-President, and was one of the
founders of the county seat at Marshall. He died in Clark County, August 9,
1870, in the seventy-ninth year of his age. Thomas W. Cole was next best known
to the people of Clark County, and during his life enjoyed a greater measure of
personal popularity than any other Circuit Clerk of Clark County. He was a man
whose great and tender heart beat sympathetically for every son and daughter of
Adam who was in distress and in need of help. He gave away more money to the
poor and unfortunate than any other man who has ever lived in Clark County. He
was unfortunate as County Treasurer, and this and the troubles that came
afterwards to his idolized son, who succeeded him as County Treasurer, in his
efforts to save from blame his father, whom he loved with singular devotion,
broke this good man's heart and darkened all of his future life. But no man who
knew Thomas W. Cole can ever believe that he maliciously and purposely was a
defaulter as County Treasurer. He simply could not resist the cry of the poor
and distressed for help, nor the pleadings of those who got receipts for taxes
on promise of future payment to him, and his friends made a mistake when they
virtually forced this office upon him. He gave away in charity, and lost in
advancements to others, more than $20,000 during the days of his popularity, his
strength and his early and middle manhood. He had a long and lingering illness,
but bore it like a martyr, and finally passed away like a philosopher, in firm
reliance upon the goodness and mercy of his God, and in the reality of a
conscious life beyond the grave. He was rich in saving common sense, and, as
only the wiser are, sublime in his simplicity. This life is measured not by the
opinions of men, but by the soul's advance, the enlargement of the powers of
heart and mind that God has given us; the expanded field wherein it ranges,
until it burns and glows with heavenly joy, and with high and heavenly hope.
Thus lived and thus died one of the best-hearted, most forgiving and charitable
of men, and it seems certain that he passed away in the joyful assurance that he
had nothing to fear in the other life at the hands of Him who doth all things well.

The good die not. This heritage they have, 
The record of a life in goodness spent; 
For our own loss at parting though we grieve, 
Lives such as theirs build their own monument.

   William B. Hodge, Jr., was the first Republican elected Clerk of the Circuit
Court of Clark County. He was born in York, Clark County, April 27, 1853, and is
a grandson of James C. Hillebert, one of the early and prominent citizens of the
county. Educated in the common schools and in a commercial college at Terre
Haute, Ind., he has served as County Clerk of Clark County, Postmaster at
Marshall, in the §tate service in Springfield, and is now Receiver of the
Government Land Office at Guthrie, Okla. He was a popular, faithful and
satisfactory Circuit Clerk, and has filled all positions with ability and
credit. The Circuit Clerks of Clark County have usually been men of character
and fitness, and the office has never suffered or the work been ill done at
their hands.

   In 1836 the Circuit and County Clerks were separated, and on September 5,
1836, Jonathan Rathbone was chosen as the first County Clerk. He served one
year, or until 1837, when Joshua P. Cooper was appointed to fill the vacancy. He
served only from March to September, 1837, when Darius Phillips was elected and
held the office until 1851, when he resigned. Mr. Phillips was a competent
officer, who, though accidentally crippled in his right hand and had to learn to
write with his left, was nevertheless an accomplished scribe. He was very
popular for a time, and possessed the unlimited confidence of the people, but
was finally suspicioned of giving information to the notorious band of "Banditti
of the Prairies," composed of Bob Birch, the Longs, William Fox, the Hodges, and
others, some of whom murdered old Colonel George Davenport near Rock Island,
Ill., on July 4, 1845, and committed other deviltry in this and other States to
enable them to escape arrest. Phillips always maintained his innocence, and
there was little real evidence against him; but one day in 1851, together with
his son, Tom Phillips, he was unmercifully whipped by a posse with whom he was
hunting for the Birches on Mill Creek, west of Marshall, his shirt being cut
into ribbons and saturated with his blood. As soon as the whipping had ended,
Phillips mounted a stump, and in a brief but affecting speech to his torturers,
declared his innocence, resigned his office, fled the county and was seen in
Marshall and Clark County no more. Howard Harlan, Sr., filled the vacancy until
1852, when John Stockwell came in and held the office until December, 1853.

   Allen B. Briscoe, the next County Clerk, held the office continuously until
December, 1877, a period of twenty-four years, the longest term of official
service ever given to any man in this part of Illinois, with the single
exception of Benson Martin, Marshall's competent, faithful, trusted and beloved
Justice of the Peace, who has held this office continuously for more than thirty
years. Mr. Briscoe was defeated after six successive elections, by Captain
Harrison Black, in November, 1877. No man in Clark County was ever more
universally liked, personally, than Allen B. Briscoe, and no man has ever had a
more dominating power in Clark County politics than he had for more than a
quarter of a century. Never was there a more kind-hearted, genial, generous and
clever man than he, and his common sense and knowledge of men was conclusively
demonstrated by his long and continuous service. Allen B. Briscoe was born near
Louisville, Ky., February 14, 1832, and came to Clark County with his parents in
1835, locating near Westfield. He was regarded as a most excellent officer in
his day, but his methods of doing business would hardly pass as satisfactory
today. He knew just where to put his hand upon any document, record or paper any
person might want, but it is needless to say that no one else could find them
unassisted. Under the improved methods of doing business of Harrison Black, his
successor, and, by the way, the first Republican that was ever elected to this
office, the people soon saw the difference between a methodical, systematic,
business way of conducting the office, and that which had existed prior to that
time. Mr. Black held the office until 1885, again defeating Mr. Briscoe in 1881.
Captain Black, aided by Thomas W. Cole as his deputy, than whom no more
competent man or one of better clerical ability ever held office in the county*
made one of the most competent and satisfactory officers the county has ever
known. Harrison Black was born July 17, 1838, in Westfield Township, Clark
County. He was educated in the common schools of the county, and is a man of
fine common sense, large knowledge of men and things, and splendid clerical
ability, which was still further demonstrated by his long and thoroughly
satisfactory service as a clerk in the office of the State Auditor at
Springfield, Ill., where he now resides. He was a Captain in the Twenty-first
Illinois Volunteers, Grant's old regiment, during the War of the Rebellion, and
was known as the bravest of the brave. In 1885 he was succeeded by John Brooks,
of Casey Township, who served the people acceptably as County Clerk until
December, 1889. Thomas Hamilton Sutton, of Marshall, the next County Clerk, was
in many respects the most remarkable man that ever held the office, or Clark
County ever produced. He had fine legal and clerical ability, was an excellent
linguist, a strong and elegant writer, and a poet of no mean ability. He it was
who wrote Part Second of the History of Clark County published by O. L. Baskin &
Co. in 1883, and no more competent man for this work could have been found in
the county. He was born in Wabash County, Ind., November 6, 1843, and came to
Clark County with his parents in 1851. He was educated in the common schools and
at Marshall College, kept by Rev. Silas D. Wilkin. While getting his education
he worked as an office boy Saturdays and Sundays in the "Eastern Illinoisian," a
paper published in Marshall by Silas S. Whitehead. He was a soldier in the Union
Army, was Clerk of the Military Examining Board at Memphis, Tenn., and at one
time had charge of the Bureau of Health of that city. After his return from the
army he worked as a compositor in the office of the "Marshall Messenger." He was
Deputy County Clerk from 1867 to 1873, and together with Thomas W. Cole
commenced the abstract of titles to the lands of Clark County. For one year, in
connection with Eth Sutton, he published the "Marshall Messenger." He was a
writer for the "Terre Haute Express" for some years, his contributions being
entitled "Marshall Splinters." He was four times Mayor of Marshall in
succession, and was often the Secretary of Democratic State and Congressional
Conventions. He was a well-reared, genial, witty and popular man, and made a
most excellent County Clerk. Mr. Sutton died in office and William S. Lowry, of
Casey Township, was appointed to fill the vacancy, and he in turn was elected
for a full term of four years as County Clerk. He made a .very good officer, and
was succeeded by William B. Hodge, Jr., who was followed by Charles H. Thatcher,
of Wabash Township, and he by John W. Fredenberger, of Auburn Township, the
present occupant of the office, and a candidate for re-election on the
Republican ticket. Mr. Fredenberger is faithful in the discharge of his duties,
in genial, pleasant, accommodating, moral and popular. He is not only a good
officer himself, as he is a good man, but he has had the good sense to retain as
his deputy William T. Martin, a popular and competent county officer.

   Clark County has had twenty-five Sheriffs during its history. The first was
Isaac Parker, 1819 to 1820, one year; John Welsh, 1820 to 1823, three years;
Joseph A. Morrison, 1823 to 1824, one year; James P. Jones, 1824 to 1831, seven
years; John Stockwell, 1831 to 1838, seven years; James Lockard, 1838 to 1842,
four years; William P. Bennett, 1842 to 1848, six years; Samuel McClure, 1848 to
1850, two years; Thomas Handy, 1850 to 1852, two years; Samuel McClure, second
term, 1852 to 1854, two years; Horace E. Ritchie, 1854 to 1856, two years;
Morrison Spenny, 1856 to 1858, two years; John B. Briscoe, 1858 to 1860, two
years; Nicholas Hurst, 1860 to 1862, two years; Andrew J. Smith, 1862 to 1864,
two years; Timothy H. Connelly, 1864 to 1866, two years; Joseph A. Howe, 1866 to
1868, two years; Timothy H. Connelly, 1868 to 1870, two years; Samuel Lacy, 1870
to 1872, two years; Warren Bartlett, 1872 to 1876, four years; William T. Flood,
1876 to 1878, two years; William H. Beadle, 1878 to 1880, two years; Henry
Sherman, 1880 to 1882, two years; Jacob N. Farr, 1882 to 1886, four years; Henry
Sherman, 1886 to 1890, four years; Allen Hurst, 1890 to 1894, four years; John
W. Lewis, 1894 to 1898, four years; Allen Hurst, second term, 1898 to 1902, four
years; and Millard Hedrick, 1902 to 1906, four years; John H. Davison, the
present Sheriff, whose term expires in 1910. Not many of these Sheriffs have
been given more than one term. The office of Sheriff of Clark County has been
generally well filled, and with very few exceptions they have been clean,
honorable, conscientious men, and have left office carrying with them the
respect and esteem of their fellow-citizens. John W. Lewis, after he ceased to
be Sheriff, served one term as a Representative in the Illinois Legislature from
Clark County, has been Mayor of Marshall, and is now the Republican candidate
for County Treasurer. He is a man of fine business sense, is proprietor of the
Marshall House, the leading hotel of Clark County, a man of considerable means,
obtained by his industry and thrift, and well liked by all. He was born in
Wabash Township, January 25, 1860.

   The County Treasurers of Clark County, so far as we have been able to
ascertain their names and terms of service, are as follows: William Lockard was,
of course, the first, and Hathaway Linton and Nicholas Hurst also served a term
of terms as County Treasurer. The first we find named in the records of the
county was William H. Coons, 1863 to 1869, six years; George W. Lanigor, 1869 to
1873, four years; re-elected in 1873, failed to qualify and Burns Archer was
elected to fill the vacancy and the office until 1882, nine years; John
Coughlan, 1882 to 1883, died in office, and ' Thomas W. Cole was appointed and
elected in 1883 and served until 1886, three years; Aaron Cole, 1886 to 1890,
four years; John Brookes, elected in 1890, but refused to qualify, and Thompson
R. Cornwall, elected and served until 1894, four years; Doit Young, 1894 to
1898, four years; Henry H. Knipe, 1898 to 1902, four years; and Wallace Young,
1902 to 1906, four years. John W. Lewis, of Marshall, is now County Treasurer.
Of all the County Treasurers, Burns Archer was the first to thoroughly
systematize the work of the office.

   Edwin Harlan, though never having held any county office in Clark County, yet
he has been Mayor of Marshall, Representative from Clark County in the Illinois
Legislature and State Senator. He is one of the oldest and most prominent and
well known citizens of Clark County. He was born in Clark County, February 15,
1838, and is therefore in his seventieth year. He read law with John Scholfield,
his brother-in-law, attended law school at Cincinnati, and has a license to
practice law, though he has never availed himself of it. He was a Captain in
Company H in the Twenty-first Illinois Infantry, Grant's old regiment, and was
one of the fifteen men who signed the petition to Governor Yates by which Grant
was advanced to the rank of Colonel. He was desperately wounded at the battle of
Chickamauga. Mr. Harlan was a member of the Chicago Convention that nominated
George B. McClelland for President. He is a man of note in Clark County and
perhaps can claim acquaintance with as many public men in the State as any man
in it. He is a zealous Grand Army man, and is noted for his timely speeches at
Decoration exercises, campfires and soldiers' meetings generally.

   Charles A. Purdunn is another Marshall citizen who has acquired a State
reputation. He has been Mayor and City Treasurer of Marshall, member of the
Illinois Legislature for three terms, and is now President of the State Board of
Prison Industries of Illinois and Secretary of the Clark County Building and
Loan Association. He is a man whose intelligence, force of character,
progressiveness and business ability would make him a controlling factor for
good in any community in which his preference or his fortune might locate him.
He has strong and unshakable convictions, is remarkably faithful and true to his
friends, and loyal in every relation of life. He was born at Trenton, N. J.,
June 27, 1854, came to Illinois in 1857, and to Clark County in March, 1880,
where he has since resided.

   The nestor of the Clark County bar, though not now in the active practice, is
Thomas J. Golden. Mr. Golden is one of the best read and scholarly men Clark
County has ever contained, and with the single exception of Judge John
Scholfield, the greatest lawyer the Clark County bar has ever had. Judge
Scholfield was often heard to express profound respect for the legal ability of
Mr. Golden, and no man was more capable of giving a correct opinion on such
matters than he. He is of Irish parentage, and was born in Wayne County, Ind.,
December 21, 1841, and is therefore approaching sixty-five years of age. He came
with his parents to Clark County in 1857, when young Thomas was sixteen years of
age. His father died in 1868, but his mother still survives. He received the
rudiments of his education at Madison, Ind., where he, with his parents, once
lived, and at Marshall, though he is essentially a self-educated man, having
been a voracious reader of law and of general literature all his life, as well
as an intense student along many and varied lines of thought. He was a
First-Lieutenant in Company F, First Missouri Cavalry, and was regimental and
brigade and division Quartermaster. He was at the battles of Pea Ridge, Cross
Hollows, Jenkins Ferry, as well as other engagements. He read law with Jacob W.
Wilkin, now Supreme Judge Wilkin, attended law school at Ann Arbor, and was
admitted for practice in 1867. He was a member of the Illinois Legislature in
1872, a delegate to the Republican National Convention at Cincinnati, Ohio, from
Illinois, in 1876, and stood firmly by Bristow for President against the "plumed
knight" from Maine, despite the surpassing torrent of eloquence poured out upon
the convention for Blaine by Colonel Robert G. Ingersoll, one of the greatest
orators the world has seen. He was on the military staff of Governor (now
Senator) Cullom, with the rank of Colonel. For many years he was the attorney
for Illinois for the Indianapolis & Terre Haute Railroad Company, and for a time
was general counsel for that corporation. John G. Williams, the general counsel
of that railroad, and who is himself a great lawyer, has a high opinion of Mr.
Golden's legal genius and ability. Mr. Golden is, with perhaps the exception of
two or three men, the wealthiest man in the county. He is a man who would do
honor for his honesty and ability to any community.

   At the present time James W. Graham is one of the leading lawyers at the
Clark County bar. He was born in Hocking County, Ohio, April 8, 1849, and is
past fifty-seven years of age. Mr. Graham was educated in the common schools of
Clark County, taught school at sixteen and finished his education at the
Illinois State Normal, at Normal, Ill. But it must not be understood that his
education ended here, for he has been a constant student of law and general
literature for more than forty years. He read law with Scholfield & Wilkin, and
was admitted to practice after an examination before the Supreme Court of
Illinois, at Mt. Vernon, Ill., June 17, 1875. He represented this district in
the Illinois Legislature in 1878-79. Mr. Graham is a lawyer of much more than
average ability, and one of the finest advocates and trial lawyers the Clark
County bar has produced. He is exceedingly successful with court and jury,
ranking up with Wilkin, Golden, Hamill and other noted trial lawyers who have
adorned the bar of Clark County. When any lawyer gets through the trial of a
case with James W. Graham, whether probate, chancery, common law or criminal
case, he will know he has been in a legal fight, and he will be lucky, unless he
has an exceedingly good case, if he does not get defeated. He is quick-witted,
swift to take instant advantage of any weak point in his adversary's side of the
case, as well as of the strong and unexpected ones that show up on his side.
Besides all this, he is thoroughly honest in his profession, and in his private
and business relations, and is a good citizen in the largest and best sense of
that term.

   William B. Scholfield, a son of the late Judge Scholfield, and law partner of
his brother, Samuel M. Scholfield, is another able and successful lawyer of the
Clark County bar. He was born at Marshall, June 21, 1869, and is therefore about
thirty-seven years of age. He was educated in the common schools of Clark County
and at Notre Dame, Ind., read law with his father, Judge Scholfield, and was
admitted for practice in 1891. Mr. Scholfield is a man of strong personality and
fine legal discernment. The Scholfield boys have one of the largest law
libraries in Eastern Illinois, and William B. has acquired considerable
property, through his own labors and good business sense.

   Harry M. Janney, another prominent and respected member of the present Clark
County bar, is a son of Eldridge S. Janney, a native of Virginia, and who came
to Illinois in 1827. Harry M. was born in Marshall, June 15, 1855, and is about
fifty-one years of age. He was educated in the public schools of Marshall, read
law with Wilkin & Wilkin, and was admitted to practice September 16, 1879. He
has been Mayor and City Attorney of Marshall and filled these and other
positions with credit to himself and honor to his friends. Mr. Janney is a much
better lawyer than he has ever gotten credit for being, especially in chancery
and probate law, and he also ranks well as a trial lawyer. He is clean,
temperate, moral and honest, and a man whom you know where to find seven days in
each week and twenty-four hours in each day. Mr. Janney has always been a hard
student of good books, and possesses a general literary knowledge of no mean order.

   Edwin D. Jones, another member of the Clark County bar, was born in Coshocton
county, Ohio, August 15, 1852, was educated in the common schools of Clark
County and at Lee's Academy at Stockton, Ill.; taught school in Clark, Douglas
and Champaign Counties, read law in the meantime with Whitehead & Jones, at
Marshall, and with J. W. Langley, at Champaign, Ill., and finally, after
surmounting many financial and other difficulties that often accompany young men
of humble means who are anxious to advance in the world, passed a successful
examination before the Supreme Court of Illinois, at Springfield, in 1878. He
practiced law at Terre Haute, Ind., for about two years, and then came to
Marshall and formed a partnership with Silas S. Whitehead, under the firm name
of Whitehead & Jones, with whom he remained until establishing his present
independent practice. Mr. Jones has been City Attorney of Marshall for fourteen
years, the longest term of any incumbent of that office, and the only man who
has held it for more than two years. Mr. Jones is an honest, temperate,
industrious, well read attorney, and liked by all who know him for his many
sterling qualities of head and heart.

   Fred J. Bartlett, a cousin of the Scholfield boys and a nephew of Judge
Scholfield, was born in Marshall, September 28, 1867. He was educated in the
common schools of Marshall and graduated from the high school in 1885. He read
law with Golden & Wilkin, and also with Golden & Hamill, and was admitted for
practice in 1888. He has been City Attorney and Alderman of Marshall, and Master
in Chancery, and is a man of good, steady, moral habits, and is honest, popular
and well liked by all who know him. Mr. Bartlett is well read and well grounded
in the fundamental principles of the law, and is especially strong in pleadings
and practice, and in marshalling authorities, sustaining the positions he may
take before court and jury. He is now the junior member of the law firm of
Davison & Bartlett, which has a good practice.

   Herschel V. Snavely, youngest member of the present Clark County bar, was
born at Martinsville, February 2, 1882, and hence was twenty-four years old last
February. He is a graduate of the Martinsville High School, graduated from the
law department of Ann Arbor in 1903, and was admitted for the practice of law by
the Supreme Court of Illinois in September of the same year. He is the Assistant
State's Attorney of Clark County. He was elected County Judge in November, 1906,
and is making a fine official.

   Henry Clinton Bell, the writer, was born about a mile west of York, in Clark
County, in the house now owned and occupied by James Nicol, January 5, 1849. He
was educated in the common schools of Clark County, at Westfield College, and at
Carbondale, Ill. He was a soldier in the Union Army, having enlisted as a
private in Company K, Twenty-ninth Indiana Volunteer Infantry, when not yet
sixteen years of age, served out his term of enlistment and was honorably
discharged. At this date he is the youngest living Union soldier in Clark
County, and, so far as he knows, in Southeastern Illinois. He read law with
Scholfield & Wilkin and Dulaney & Golden at Marshall, and was admitted for
practice, after examination before the Supreme Court of Illinois, at Mr. Vernon,
Ill., June 17, 1875. He has been Superintendent of Schools of Clark County, City
Attorney of Marshall, and was for twelve years, from July, 1885, to April, 1897,
an employe of the Pension Bureau at Washington, D. C, the first four years as
Chief of the Finance Division, the next four years as Chief of the Criminal Law
and Prosecuting Section of the Law Department, and member of the Board of
Review, the highest court of the Pension Bureau; and the last four years as
Deputy Commissioner of Pensions by appointment of President Cleveland. He
resigned the latter position March 4, 1897, and his resignation was accepted by
President McKinley April 5, 1897. He then went to Indianapolis, where he engaged
in the practice of law for a few months, then went to Springfield, Ill., where
he practiced his profession for two years. In the meantime he was defeated for
the Democratic nomination for State's Attorney of Sangamon County, and returned
to Marshall, his old home, in June, 1900, and since has remained there
continuously in the practice of his profession. He is the son of Wiley O. and
Sarah E. Bell, of West York, Clark County, Ill., near which place he was born
and raised, and where his mother, brother and sisters and other relatives
reside. While reading law he alternated his labors in that direction with school
teaching in order to make both ends meet. His parents were comparatively poor
people, unable to assist him in his general or professional education, and he is
the architect of whatever success in life has come to him. He was married, July
22, 1895, at Hutsonville, Crawford County, Ill., to Miss Stella Irene Wilhite,
the daughter of James and Nancy C. (Cox) Wilhite, who was born August 18, 1855,
and whom he first met when a girl of fifteen while she was his pupil and he the
schoolmaster at that place. This union has been blessed with two children, Edna
and Roscoe C. Bell, and with more than thirty-one years of undisturbed and
continuous married happiness. With the writer, distinctively, marriage has not
been a failure.

   Few counties in the State of the size and population of Clark County can show
a better or more honorable professional record. Within the last forty or fifty
years there have gone forth from the bar of the county three Circuit Judges,
Harlan, Constable and Jacob W. Wilkin; two Supreme Judges, Scholfield and Jacob
W. Wilkin; one Judge of the Court of Claims at Washington, D. C, Fenton W.
Booth; three general counsels of three important railroad systems, Scholfield,
Golden and Robert E. Hamill; and one Deputy Commissioner of Pensions at
Washington, D. C., Henry Clinton Bell. The record of Marshall and Clark County
above set forth would seem distinctly creditable for a city of but 2,500 people,
and a county of perhaps less than 25,000 people.

   But we cannot leave this branch of our subject without mentioning the names
of Robert E. Hamill, William A. Wilkin, Perry A. Mc-Kain, Samuel Kimblin and
Andrew McClure. These five brilliant young attorneys of Clark County passed
away, all of them except Hamill, while their feet rested on the lower rung of
the ladder of professional usefulness and renown. All were young men of enormous
capacity and promise. Robert E. Hamill was one of the best all-around lawyers
that the bar of Marshall ever developed, and at his death was general counsel
for the Big Four Railroad System, with headquarters at Cincinnati, Ohio. He and
the lamented Will Wilkin, as he was affectionately called by his associates and
friends, may be said to have literally worked themselves to death, and died
fighting manfully to the last for the interests of their clients. Wilkin was the
youngest brother of Judge Jacob W. Wilkin and Hamill had been the law partner of
Hon. T. J. Golden, at Marshall, and of Palmer, Lester & Shutt, of Springfield, Ill.

   Perry A. McKain is spoken of by those who knew him best as an exceptionally
gentle, conscientious, studious, courteous and lovable man, and the recollection
of his painful death, on that May morning in 1875, amid the crash of thunder,
the vivid flash of lightning, the darkness of the heavens and the downpour of
rain, as the brave and gentle spirit took its flight to regions fair, have left
a sad but vivid impression upon the mind and heart of more than one who loved
and hoped for him. No gentler, purer, nobler, finer spirit ever left the scenes
of earth and changed for the regions of bliss than that of hard-working, honest,
manly and brilliant Perry A. McKain.

   In the estimation of many, Samuel Kimlin had in his soul and mind the
philosophy, keenness, goodness, and the general all-round intellectual genius to
have become, had the opportunity presented itself, the equal of the immortal
Lincoln, whom Kimlin resembled, not only physically, but in wit, depth of
thought and general mental characteristics.

   Andrew McClure was also a young man of splendid parts, who had first
introduced the system and methods of normal teaching in Clark County, who was
studying law, and who would undoubtedly have made a brilliant lawyer. His moral
character was also, like those of Kimlin, Will Wilkin, Perry A. McKain and
Robert E. Hamill, as spotless as a star.

   Robert L. Dulaney, the founder of Dulaney's National Bank, also practiced law
in Marshall for many years, but was living in retirement at the time of his
death at an advanced age. For many years he was the law partner of Hon. T. J.
Golden, under the firm name of Dulaney & Golden. He excelled in chancery and
probate law, and was an excellent cross-examiner of witnesses. He was a
far-sighted business man, and the richest in the county, his possessions being
in the neighborhood of $300,000. He was originally from Kentucky, was one of the
earliest settlers of York, and was the brother-in-law of Judge John Scholfield
and Hon. Edwin Harlan, of Marshall.


Additional Comments:
HISTORICAL ENCYCLOPEDIA OF ILLINOIS
EDITED BY
NEWTON BATEMAN, LL.D.
PAUL SELBY, A. M.

PUBLISHED BY MUNSELL PUBLISHING CO., FOR MIDDLE WEST PUBLISHING CO.

AND HISTORY OF CLARK COUNTY

EDITED BY
HON. H. C. BELL

ILLUSTRATED
CHICAGO
MIDDLE WEST PUBLISHING CO.
PUBLISHERS
1907

Entered according to act of Congress in the years 1894, 1899, 1900, and 1905 by
WILLIAM W. MUNSELL
in the office of the Librarian of Congress at Washington


File at: http://files.usgwarchives.net/il/clark/history/1907/historic/chapterv241gms.txt

This file has been created by a form at http://www.genrecords.org/ilfiles/

File size: 48.6 Kb