Greenbrier County, West Virginia Biography of HOMER A. HOLT This biography was submitted by Sandy Spradling, E-mail address: This file may be freely copied by individuals and non-profit organizations for their private use. All other rights reserved. Any other use, including publication, storage in a retrieval system, or transmission by electronic, mechanical, or other means requires the written approval of the file's author. This file is part of the WVGenWeb Archives. If you arrived here inside a frame or from a link from somewhere else, our front door is at http://www.usgwarchives.net/wv/wvfiles.htm History of Greenbrier County J. R. Cole Lewisburg, WV 1917 p. 147-149 HOMER A. HOLT. Homer A., son of Jonathan and Eliza (Wilson) Holt, was born on April 27, 1831, at Parkersburg, then Virginia. His father, one of the pioneer ministers of the Methodist Episcopal church, located his home at Weston, Lewis county, in 1831, and resided there for a number of years. The Holt family, coming from England in early colonial days, had settled neat Norfolk, and there was born Mr. Holt's grandfather, John Holt, who, in 1794, moved to and settled in the valley of the Monongahela river. Mr. Holt's maternal ancestors came from the northern part of Ireland and from New England and settled at Fort Pitt (now Pittsburgh) and, immediately after the Revolutionary war, also below that point on the Ohio river. In his youth, Mr. Holt was privileged to attend the best schools that existed at the time. For three years, under the tutelage of Dr. Charles Wheeler, a distant kinsman of his mother, he attended Rector College; then he completed his academic work at the University of Virginia during the sessions of 1849-'50 and of 1850-51. During the years of 1850 and 1852 he taught school at Weston and studied law with Col. B. W. Byrne, his brother-in-law. Having completed his study of law, he was, in the fall of 1853, examined by Judges Summers, Edminston and Camden and granted license to practice his profession. He located his office at Braxton Court House and was taken into partnership by Colonel Byrne. From 1854 to 1856 he was deputy surveyor of the counties of Braxton and Nicholas, and thus became thoroughly familiar with that region of the country lying between the Great and Little Kanawba rivers. Arrested in 1862 as a Confederate sympathizer, Mr. Holt was sent to Camp Chase. In January, 1863, he was sent down the Ohio and Mississippi rivers to be exchanged at Vicksburg, but before that point was reached the exchange of prisoners was stopped, the steamboats were turned back up the river to St. Louis and the prisoners sent to Camp Douglas at Chicago. In April of the same year Mr. Folt, with many others, was taken east to Baltimore, down Chesapeake Bay and up James river to City Point, at which place he was exchanged. He immediately joined Jenkins' Brigade, then at Salem, Va., and remained with his command until the surrender at Appomattox, when he returned to his home at Braxton Court House. As the Braxton county delegate to the West Virginia Constitutional Convention of 1872, Mr. Holt served on the Judiciary Committee and on the Committee on Land Titles, and represented the chairman of the Committee on General Revision. In 1872 he was elected, for a term of eight years, beginning January 1, 1873, judge of the Eighth Judicial circuit, which was comprised of the counties of Greenbrier, Pocohontas, Monroe, Summers, Fayette, Nicholas, Braxton and Clay, in all, a territory of more than 5,000 square miles, having two terms of court a year in each county. A new circuit having been formed by taking off the counties of Braxton, Nicholas and Clay, Judge Holt was again elected for a terln of eight years, in the circuit composed of the remaining five counties. In 1890, to fill a vacancy, he was appointed to the Supreme Court by Governor Fleming, and in 1892 he was elected to the same office. On January 27, 1857, Judge Holt married Mary Ann, daughter of John Byrne, Esquire, by whom he had four children: John H. Holt, a lawyer, residing in Huntington, W. Va..; Fannie D., wife of W. 0. Wiatt, also of Huntington; Robert Byrne, of Lewisburg, W. Va.; and Nina, wife of Judge Charles S. Dice, who lives in Lewisburg. Judge Holt retained his position on the Supreme Court bench of West Virginia until within a year of his death, which occurred in January, 1898. He is buried in Lewisburg, Greenbrier county, his home during the latter part of his life.