Christian-Scott County KyArchives Biographies.....Stites, Henry J. 1816 - unknown ************************************************ Copyright. All rights reserved. http://www.usgwarchives.net/copyright.htm http://www.usgwarchives.net/ky/kyfiles.html ************************************************ File contributed for use in USGenWeb Archives by: Sandi Gorin http://www.genrecords.net/emailregistry/vols/00002.html#0000404 July 18, 2005, 1:11 pm Author: County of Christian, Kentucky, Historical and Biographical, Edited by William Henry Perrin Hon. HENRY J. STITES, son of Abram and Ann Stites, was born in Georgetown, Scott Co., Ky., in 1816. In infancy he was brought by his parents to Hopkinsville, where he grew up to manhood and continued to live until 1862. At an early age he was sent to school to Dr. James Buchanan, a distinguished teacher, the father of Dr. Joseph R. Buchanan, afterward distinguished as a philosopher and essayist. His next and only teacher as James D. Ramsey, who was noted as an instructor throughout the Green River country. At the age of fourteen young Stites besought his father to permit him to learn some calling whereby he could support himself and relieve his father, who was then poor and encumbered with a large family. In compliance with his request his father bound him to service for a period of four years for his victuals and clothes as a merchant's clerk to George Ward, Esq., then a merchant of large business in Hopkinsville. During this service, which was most faithfully performed, he gave every moment that he could properly spare from his duty as clerk to reading and the culture of the mind. At the end of his term he was offered a partnership by his master but preferred to enter into partnership with a fellow clerk, Leander D. cHolman, who had a small capital, for whom he entertained a strong attachment that continued until Holman's death, which occurred in 1840. For over four years he with Holman pursued successfully the mercantile business, until the great financial crash of 1837. This firm of young men having but limited capital as necessarily compelled to rely upon their credit, and was always largely indebted to Eastern merchants. They however maintained their credit and were never sued. But young Stites, always averse to debt, then resolved to adopt another calling which would enable him to live without debt. He selected the law, and at once began to study Blackstone, Kent and other elementary writers, giving all his time he could spare from his business to his law books. In 1839 he formed a partnership as merchant with one of the best men that ever lived, John Bryan, of Hopkinsville, Ky., and continued successfully with him until 1841, all the time, however, pursuing his studies when his business would allow. In 1840, and while a merchant, he obtained license as lawyer from Judge John Marshall of Louisville and Judge Shackelford of Christian. In 1841, after winding up his mercantile business, he began as a lawyer with Hiram A. Phelps, then also a young practitioner, but since a lawyer of fine repute and high standing. They soon had a fine practice, and derived great benefit in a business way from the favorable acquaintance of young Stites with the Eastern merchants with whom he had formerly had dealings. After his dissolution with Mr. Phelps, Stites continued to pursue his profession until 1851. He was induced them to become a candidate for the office of Commonwealth Attorney, but before the election was compelled by the overwhelming voice of his friends to run for the office of Circuit Judge. He was elected, and before the expiration of his term of office was reluctantly induced to become a candidate for the office of Appellate Judge as successor of Judge Elijah Hise, who had declined a re-election. In August, 1854, he was elected Judge of the Court of Appeals by a majority of nearly 6,000 votes in a district which then had a majority of more than 3,000 politically opposed to him, and having as an opponent a distinguished lawyer and politician, once a Member of Congress and also of the convention which formed the Constitution. He continued on the Appellate bench until he became Chief Justice of the State and until the summer of 1862, when, because of his sentiments as a State Rights Democrat and his opposition to the war, he was compelled to leave his home to avoid the oppression of the military on either side, which were then at one time or another alternately in control of southern Kentucky. Arrest and imprisonment, an unconstitutional oath or a departure from his section of the State were the alternatives presented, and he chose the last and went to Canada. There he remained over three years. After the termination of the war he returned to Kentucky. In 1867 he was appointed Judge of the Jefferson Court of Common Pleas, an important civil tribunal in the city of Louisville. To this office he has been three times elected without opposition, making when his present term expires over thirty years of judicial service among those who have known him during his life, his fellow-citizens of Kentucky. From 1868 to 1873 he held the position of Professor of Law in the University of Louisville as an associate of Judges Pirtle and Bullock, but was compelled to resign this place because of judicial labors. In 1841, soon after Judge Stites began the practice of law, he intermarried with Miss Mary Jane Sharp, daughter of Dr. Maxwell Sharp, of Christian County, with whom he lived most happily until her death in 1875. Afterward he married Mrs. Caroline M. Barker, a sister of his first wife and the widow of Richard H. Barker, a lawyer of New Orleans, with whom he is not living at his home near Louisville. No better testimonial to Judge Stites' worth could be given than the following editorial from the Courier-Journal of August 1, 1880. Speaking of Judge Stites' judicial service it says: "The admirers of this eminent judicial officer rejoice that he enters upon the race for the Judgeship of the Court of Common Pleas without a competitor. It would have been a very foolish thing for any one to attempt opposition to him. He is so perfectly endeared to the hearts and minds of the people; he is so devoted to the responsible duties confided to his care; he is so thoroughly equipped in all the matters that pertain to his high office; he is so upright in every principle of action, so courteous and urbane to all with whom he comes in contact, without respect to party or condition, that running against him would have been about as bootless a thing as one could have undertaken. We are gratified in knowing that for the high position of Judge of the Court of Common Pleas Louisville is able to command the services of this eminent jurist. We have often thought, when watching the exercises of his high vocation, the quick, sudden, clear rules by which he governs cases before him, of T. Arnold's appropriate limning of the high attributes belonging to such a position as that filled, and well filled, by Judge Stites. Arnold says: "To accustom a number of persons to the intelligent exercise of attending to and comparing and weighing evidence, and to the moral exercise of being placed in a high and responsible situation invested with one of God's own attributes, that of judgment, and having to determine with authority between truth and falsehood, right and wrong, is to furnish them with very high means of moral and intellectual culture; in other words, it is providing them with one of the highest kinds of education." The people of Louisville are very familiar with the perfect exhibition on the part of Judge Stites of those high and ennobling qualities. They rejoice to know that in him they have an upright, learned and incorruptible judicial officer, in whose hands all the interests committed to him are secure of sound and honest legal action. They all, one and all, join in saying to him: 'Well done, good and faithful servant of the people.' The ermine could not more appropriately fit the person of any one." File at: http://files.usgwarchives.net/ky/christian/bios/stites35bs.txt This file has been created by a form at http://www.poppet.org/kyfiles/