Preston County, West Virginia Biography of PATRICK JOSEPH CROGAN This file was submitted by Valerie Crook, E-mail address: The submitter does not have a connection to the subject of this sketch. 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 The History of West Virginia, Old and New Published 1923, The American Historical Society, Inc., Chicago and New York, Volume III, pg. 614 PATRICK JOSEPH CROGAN has been a Kingwood lawyer just forty years. He gained his early practice slowly but steadily, and now for many years his reputation as an able lawyer has been widely extended over the state. The Crogans have been in Preston County since prior to the Civil war, when his parents, James and Rose (Doyle) Crogan, settled here on coming from Mount Savage, Mary- land, where they were married. Both were natives of County Roscommon, Ireland. They settled on a farm near Newburg, where James Crogan died in 1858. The widowed mother survived to the ripe old age of eighty. They had four children: John F., who occupies the old farm at Newburg; James C., who was a railroad man and died at Cumberland, Maryland, where he left a family; Hubert A., a railroad man who died unmarried in Texas; and Patrick J. Patrick J. Crogan was born June 17, 1856, in Preston County, and as a youth lived on the farm with his mother. He acquired a high school education at Newburg, and at the age of seventeen became a country schoolmaster. Later he taught in graded schools, and for the last two years was principal of the Newburg School. While teaching he studied law in the office of the late John W. Mason, of Grafton, West Virginia, and in 1881 was admitted to the bar at Kingwood. His examination committee consisted of three distinguished judges, A. F. Haymond, judge of the Supreme Court of Appeals; C. P. T. Moore, judge of the Supreme Court; and William T. Ice, judge of the Circuit Court of Preston County. Mr. Crogan was just twenty-five years of age when he opened his law office at Kingwood in October, 1881. He was an infant when his father died, and he had early learned self reliance and industry, and these qualities, plus a sound intelligence and good character, brought him to the real work of his profession at a comparatively early age. He practiced alone, and for many years his practice was of a general nature, but in late years he has handled a great deal of work for corporations. Many times he has appeared in defense of men charged with crime. As one of the able lawyers of the state he was elected president of the West Virginia Bar Association in 1897, and is also a member of the American Bar Association. In addition to his law practice Mr. Crogan is president of the Bank of Kingwood. Unlike many lawyers, he has avoided politics as an incident of his profession, being satisfied to east his vote intelligently. He first voted for General Hancock as a democratic presidential candidate, and is nominally democratic, though he did not agree with financial policies of Mr. Bryan when he was a candidate. On September IS, 1886, Mr. Crogan married Miss Ella M. Fawcett. She was born in Preston County, daughter of Charles W. and Margaret (Herndon) Fawcett, also natives of Preston County. Her father was a Kingwood merchant Besides Mrs. Crogan his children were: Mrs. Mallie F. Parkhurst, of Charleston; Miss Mamie, of Kingwood; Mrs. Bess F. Shaffer, of Kingwood; and J. William, who died at Wheeling and left a family. Of Mr. Crogan's attainments as a lawyer, one who has watched his course for a quarter of a century estimates him as one of the strong and able men of the Preston County bar, with a high reputation in the State and Federal courts, in which he has enjoyed and still enjoys an extensive prac- tice. Undoubtedly he is one of the ablest lawyers of the state, and has made an enviable reputation both in the crim- inal and civil branches and by his ability as a corporation lawyer. He is a clear, cogent and convincing debater both orally and by written brief, and his sound and thorough knowledge of the law extends to practically all its branches.