HARRY BINGHAM.

A BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH.

HARRY BINGHAM, like many other eminent lawyers and distinguished citizens of New Hampshire, was a native of the state of Vermont. Born in the town of Concord, Essex County, March 30, 1821, he was the third son of Warner and Lucy (Wheeler) Bingham. Two brothers, older than himself, were John, a farmer, who died in Wisconsin in 1849, and Lorenzo, a merchant of Lower Waterford, Vt., who passed away seven years later. Lucy A., a sister next younger than Harry, was the wife of C. S. S. Hill, a California merchant. Two younger brothers were Hon. George A. Bingham of Littleton and Hon. Edward F. Bingham of Ohio, subsequently chief justice of the Supreme Court of the District of Columbia.t A sister, still younger, was Edith C., wife of Ira H. Ballou, of Ira H. Ballou & Co., wholesale produce dealers of South Market Street, Boston.

But, notwithstanding the fact of his Vermont birth, Mr. Bingham was really of New Hampshire origin, inasmuch as his father,

*Among Vermont born men who have attained prominence at the bar in New Hampshire and become otherwise distinguished in public affairs may be named, aside from Harry Bingham and his brother, George A., Edmund Burke, Harry Hibbard, Henry A. Bellows, William L. Foster, William Heywood, Jacob Benton, Ellery A. Hibbard, Albert S. Wait, Ossian Ray, Henry B. Atherton, Charles F. Stone, William H. Mitchell, Frank S. Streeter and Daniel C. and James W. Remick.

†George Azro, eldest brother of Harry Bingham, was born in Concord, Vt., April 25, 1826, and died at Littleton, January 22, 1895. He was educated in Vermont schools and academies, studied law and was admitted to the bar in 1848. He practised four years at Lyndon, Vt., removing to Littleton in 1852, where he continued until death. He was twice elected to the House of Representatives in the State Legislature, and twice to the Senate. He was a delegate to the Democratic National Convention in 1860, and the Democratic candidate for Congress in the old Third District in 1880. He was appointed an associate justice of the Supreme Court in 1876, serving until October, 1880, and was again appointed in December, 1884, continuing until March, 1891. He had served as a member of the Littleton Board of Education, as a trustee of

Warner Bingham, had removed in early childhood from Cornish, N. H., where he was born in 1789, to Concord, Vt., with his parents, who were among the early settlers of the latter town; while his mother was a daughter of the Granite State-a native of the town of Chesterfield. Warner Bingham was a substantial farmer, a man of sterling character and strong influence in the community. A Democrat in politics, he was with the minority in town as well as state; but the people of Essex County demonstrated their esteem for his character and confidence in his ability by electing him as their representative in the State Senate in 1842 and 1843, and as a judge of the county court in 1844. His wife, Lucy Wheeler, daughter of John and Lucy (Holmes) Wheeler, who had also removed to Concord, was a woman of rare mental endowments and remarkable strength of character, from whom her son, Harry, inherited many of his characteristics. She died in the autumn of 1839 and he afterward married Laura Rankin of Danville, Vt., by whom he had three more childrentwo sons and a daughter. He died in Bethlehem, N. H., where he had removed some years previously, February 12, 1872.

The early life of Harry Bingham was passed in about the same manner as that of most sons of New England farmers of

the State Normal School, as a director of the Littleton National Bank, and president of the Littleton Savings Bank.

Edward Franklin Bingham was born in Concord, Vt., August 13, 1828, and died at Union, W. Va., September 3, 1907. He was educated in the public schools, at Peacham (Vt.) Academy, and Marietta College, Ohio. He read law with Joseph Miller at Chilicothe, O., and with his brother, Harry, being with the latter at Littleton from May, 1848, till September, 1849. He was admitted to the bar in Ohio, in 1850, and located in practice at McArthur, Vinton County, where he continued eleven years. He was prosecuting attorney for Vinton County for three terms, and served in the State Legislature in 1856 and 1857. Removing to Columbus, he served as city solicitor from 1867 till 1871, and was also a member of the Board of Education from 1863 to 1868. In the latter year he was chairman of the Ohio Democratic State Committee, and a delegate to the Democratic National Convention, as he also had been in 1860. He was again a delegate in the St. Louis convention of 1876. In 1873 he was chosen a judge of the Court of Common Pleas for the Fifth Judicial District of Ohio, and reëlected, serving till 1887, when he was appointed by President Cleveland chief justice of the Supreme Court of the District of Columbia, which position he held until his resignation in 1903. It is safe to say that no family in the country has ever produced three brothers equal in eminence and ability, as members of the legal profession, to Harry, George A. and Edward F. Bingham.

that day, in moderate circumstances, except that he developed a strong inclination for study and made the most of the limited advantages of the district school. At an early age he determined to secure a college education; and he had so diligently applied himself to his studies during the brief terms of the common school, with a few weeks at select school on one or two occasions, that when he was seventeen years of age it required but a year's academic training to fit him for entrance at Dartmouth, which he secured at the well-known Lyndon, Vt., Academy. Entering college with the class graduating in 1843,* he applied himself to the solid work laid out for the student in those days, when intellectual training was the main thing sought, and "athletic culture" was no essential part of the curriculum. It may be added that his college life was characterized rather by that substantial attainment which furnished the groundwork for success in his future professional career, than that brilliant leadership in the class room, which seldom materializes in future intellectual triumphs. By the ordinary tests of scholarship his class standing was good; while among classmates he won regard for that honesty, sincerity, contempt for hypocrisy and sham and that unswerving courage of conviction which characterized his entire after life. Dartmouth College was at this time under the administration of President Nathan Lord, and the strong character and sterling precepts of that eminent and virile educator, theologian and publicist, whose impress upon the minds of the young men generally who came under his instruction was no less marked than that of any of his compeers or successors, became a vital and lasting force in the life of Mr. Bingham.

Immediately after graduation from college, having previously determined to enter the legal profession, he commenced the study of law in his native town, taking books for that purpose from the

*Among Mr. Bingham's associates in the class of 1843, at Dartmouth, were the late James O. Adams, Secretary of the State Board of Agriculture, Col. John B. Clarke, of the Manchester Mirror, Augustus O. Brewster and Robert I. Burbank, well known Boston lawyers; Col. Francis S. Fiske of the Second N. H. Vols.; Judge Thomas W. Freelon of San Francisco; the late Congressman Daniel W. Gooch of Massachusetts; Brig.-Gen. Joshua J. Guppey of Wisconsin; Hon. Lyman D. Stevens of Concord, and three sons of President Lord-Henry C., Samuel A., and William H., who all became prominent in professional life.

office of David Hibbard, Esq., father of Hon. Harry Hibbard, who was a resident of that town. He subsequently pursued his studies for some time in the office of George C. and Edward Cahoon at Lyndon, Vt., and completed the same with Harry Hibbard at Bath.

During the time of his college course, as well as his preparatory training and his subsequent professional study, Mr. Bingham was engaged winters in the customary avocation of the ambitious young New Englander of that generation who had his own way to make in the world-teaching school. He commenced this work, in fact, in the winter of his sixteenth year, and continued each winter, until his admission to the bar, teaching with success in his native town of Concord, in Burke, East St. Johnsbury, Woodstock, Waterford, Wells River and other places.

He was admitted to the bar at Lancaster at the May term of court, in 1846, after a rigorous examination, having then just passed his twenty-fifth birthday. Littleton, then as now a leading northern New Hampshire town, was regarded as a promising professional field. Moreover the leading Democrats of the town were on the lookout for a lawyer of their own political faith, and had applied to Harry Hibbard, then a recognized leader of the party in that section, who had already been honored with election as speaker of the State House of Representatives, to recommend some promising Democratic lawyer of ability and integrity to settle in the town. Mr. Hibbard, aware as he was of Mr. Bingham's talent and ability and the ample equipment which he possessed, notwithstanding his comparative youth, and knowing very well from his acquaintance with the town and its people what manner of man was wanted, unhesitatingly recommended him to the Littleton inquirers as just the man of whom they were in search; and so it came about that he located there, to the ultimate complete satisfaction of those who were looking for a Democratic lawyer of character and ability, if not to his own. personal advantage. As for the latter it is sufficient to say that he was himself content with his situation and environment, and for more than half a century gave the best that was in him to his profession, his party, the community and the state.

It was in September, 1846, that Mr. Bingham took up his resi

dence in Littleton and opened an office for the practice of his profession. Unlike some young men, upon admission to the bar he did not sit down in idleness, awaiting the arrival of clients, but continued his studies, extending his researches into every department of legal science, familiarizing himself thoroughly with the principles of law, in the abstract and in their application to cases, as set forth in the reported decisions, with the forms of practice and the rules of procedure, so that, when called upon to grapple with any case arising, he was well equipped for the occasion and ready to carry it through to a successful result, if, under the circumstances, success was fairly attainable. So thorough and complete was his preparation, secured in the early years of his practice, when business was not always pressing and opportunity for study and consideration was presented, that it was said by the late Chief Justice Perley, toward the close of the life of that eminent jurist, that there was no other man at the bar, in New Hampshire, who when suddenly called upon to deal with an intricate question of law, or to sustain a position with no authorities in reach, could so readily master the situation, from his own resources, upon the basis of principle and analogy, as could Mr. Bingham.

When Mr. Bingham commenced practice in Littleton, the Grafton County bar, as well as that of Coös with which he was also brought into close relationship, was remarkable for its strength. Its membership included such men as Leonard Wilcox of Orford, Josiah Quincy of Rumney, Jonathan Kittredge of Canaan, and Ira Goodall of Bath, then in the fullness of their power. Andrew S. Woods, of Bath, had gone upon the bench, but Harry Hibbard of that town had but fairly entered upon his brilliant career. Charles R. Morrison was in practice at Haverhill, and Jonathan E. Sargent at Canaan, soon removing to Wentworth. In Littleton, as his chief competitor he found the late Chief Justice Henry A. Bellows, then in full practice, while in Coos County, John S. Wells, then at Lancaster, the most brilliant orator, save Franklin Pierce, known in the state in the middle of the last century, stood at the front, with Hiram A. Fletcher, William Burns and Jacob Benton well settled in practice. Associated with and pitted against such men as these, Mr.