college at Upper Alton, arid during the next year combined hard
physical labor with the prosecution of his studies. In the spring
of 1835 he planned to go South and join the Revolutionists in
Texas, but was prevented by being served with a summons for a
debt which he owed and which he had arranged with his cousin
to pay, but the arrest caused his detention so that he was unable
to embark upon the steamboat and thus he remained in Illinois
instead of becoming a soldier of fortune in the far Southwest.
In September, 1836, he again entered school at Upper Alton, and
paid his board by employment in a private family of the town.
In December, 1838, he began a term of school teaching in Fulton
County, and while in that school began the reading of Blackstone's
Commentaries and McNally on Evidence. The following spring
he entered the office of John S. Greathouse as a student. Mr.
Greathouse was one of the leading lawyers of Carlinville, and his
office contained a considerable law library for the time, containing
such treatises as Coke on Littleton, and the Reports of the Supreme
Court of Illinois, which at that time embraced only one volume.
Of his methods of law study General Palmer wrote: "It may
be useful to students to state for their benefit my methods of study.
I read carefully, with a glossary of law terms, and made full
notes ; I did not, in my notes, as a rule, merely quote the language
of the author, but my effort was to grasp the subject and state it
in my own language. My conceptions of the meaning of what I
read were often inaccurate, but I think, on the whole, the method
was preferable to any other. It promoted brevity and terseness
and aided in systematizing the knowledge acquired, and I think
my experience justifies me in saying that knowledge of the law,
acquired by the method I refer to, is much longer retained and
more easily and intelligently applied to practical use than it can
be when the student merely masters the words of his author or
instructor. * * * I was aided in my studies by that great
COURTS AND LAWYERS OF ILLINOIS 443
promoter of diligence, poverty ; I was compelled to earn something,
and as there was some sales of land, and the volumes of the
record were few, I examined titles and prepared deeds, and soon
found some employment before justices of the peace. It was not
long before I found myself able to meet my expenses, which, with
board at one dollar or one dollar and a quarter per week, did not
exceed one hundred dollars a year. The only interruption of my
studies was that my friends insisted that I should become candidate
for county clerk, and I now know that the leaders of my party
(democratic) when they insisted upon my candidacy, had no ex-
pectation that I would succeed. After the election I pursued my
studies with great industry and made great progress in the acquisi-
tion of the mysteries of the law, so that in December, 1839, I bor-
rowed five dollars from a friend to pay my expenses," and went to
Springfield to obtain admission to the bar. He found a friend in
need at Springfield in the person of Stephen A. Douglas, who with
J. Young Scammon obtained appointment from the court as exam-
iners for the young applicant, and he was soon afterwards enrolled
among the lawyers of the state. General Palmer first met Mr.
Douglas in 1838 while traveling in Hancock County. At an inn
at Carthage he was aroused from his sleep by the landlord, who
compelled him to share his room with a fellow traveler, and on
the following morning found that his bedfellow was "the little
giant of the West." The acquaintance and friendship between
these two men continued uninterrupted until Senator Douglas cham-
pioned the Kansas-Nebraska bill in 1854, refusing to support Gen-
eral Shields for the United States senate, General Palmer, who
was then a member of the Illinois Legislature, came into open
rupture with Douglas, and their friendship was not renewed until
1861.
Following his admission to the bar General Palmer was soon
busied with a comfortable practice and his successful handling of
cases soon gave him a distinction in the circuit where most of his
work as a lawyer was performed. On December 20, 1842, he
married Miss Malinda Ann Neeley. Though he was already a suc-
cessful lawyer according to the standards of the time, he and his
young wife began housekeeping with what seems now the utmost
simplicity, and it is said that the entire cost of furniture and every-
thing necessary for the household was less than fifty dollars.
In 1888, (after the death of his first wife in 1885), he married
Mrs. Hannah Lamb Kimball, who survives him.
In August, 1843, General: Palmer was elected to the office of
probate justice of the peace, with jurisdiction in probate cases as
well as the work of the ordinary justice of the peace. He was
defeated for this office in 1847, but was again elected in the spring
of 1848, and the following November resigned to take the office
of county judge of Macoupin County. In 1852 he was elected to
fill a vacancy in the state senate, and was re-elected in 1854 as an
444 COURTS AND LAWYERS OF ILLINOIS
anti-Nebraska democrat. Up to that time General Palmer had
been a firm adherent of the democratic party, but was a strong
anti-slavery man, and in the realignment of political parties during
the middle '505 found himself naturally working with the republican
party after its organization in 1856. In that year he resigned his
seat in the state senate, and was president of the first republican
convention which assembled in Illinois. In 1859 he was an unsuc-
cessful candidate for Congress, and in 1860 was one of the electors
at large pledged to vote for Mr. Lincoln.
Early in the year 1861 he was a member of the peace confer-
ence which assembled at Washington, but about three months later
he raised the Fourteenth Regiment of Illinois Infantry at Jack-
sonville, and by unanimous vote of the men was elected its colonel.
He went into the services of the United States for three years,
and remained with the armies of the Union until he resigned as
major-general of volunteers September i, 1866. His gallant con-
duct as a soldier and his efficiency as a leader brought him one
promotion after the other, and for a time he commanded an army
. corps, and in February, 1865, President Lincoln assigned him to
the command of the department of Kentucky. He afterwards
declined an appointment as brigadier-general in the regular army,
and on resigning his commission as major-general soon afterwards
returned to Illinois to take up the practice of law. In 1867 Gen-
eral Palmer removed his family to Springfield, and that city was
his home thereafter until his death.
In the political annals of the state he is best remembered for
his term as governor, to which office he was elected in November,
1868, and he served four years with marked ability. He was a
strong and independent executive, and his administration is per-
haps most notable for the many vetoes which he placed upon bills
that he regarded as unjust or in violation of the constitution.
The present constitution of the State of Illinois was adopted
during General Palmer's term of office. As governor, while the
constitutional convention was in session, he took the greatest inter-
est in its work, scrutinized every provision and was in constant
consultation with the framers of the organic law.
After the war General Palmer had returned to the ranks of the
democratic party, and in 1888 was again its candidate for governor.
In 1890 his name was prominently suggested as a candidate for
United States senator, and the election involved one of the memor-
able contests in the Illinois Legislature. He was finally elected on
the 1 54th ballot in 1891. During his six years in the service he
was one of the most distinguished members of that body. Over
the nation at large General Palmer's name is probably most famil-
iarly associated with the "Palmer and Buckner Sound Money
Ticket" during the memorable campaign of 1896, when the con-
servative element in the democratic party chose General Palmer as
the presidential candidate to express the views of that large body
445
of democrats devoted to the principles of sound finance. In the
intervals of these political activities General Palmer was for a
great many years devoted to his practice as a lawyer at Springfield
and for some time before his death was senior member of the firm
of Palmer, Shutt, and Graham.
His widow and three daughters survive him. The daughters
are Mrs. Elizabeth A. Matthews, Carlinville, Illinois ; r Mrs. Harriet
Palmer Crabbe, Corpus Christi, Texas; and Mrs. Jessie Palmer
Weber, Springfield, Illinois, secretary of the Illinois State Histor-
ical Society.
JOHN MAYO PALMER. The oldest son of Gen. John M. Palmer
and Malinda A. (Neely) Palmer, the late John Mayo Palmer like-
wise realized some of the highest possibilities in the legal profession.
He was active in the law and in public affairs for nearly thirty
years.
Born at Carlinville, Illinois, March 10, 1848, he died in the
sanitarium at Battle Creek, Michigan, July 10, 1903. On the break-
ing of the Civil war, though a lad of but thirteen years, he made
several visits to his father at the front, and although of course not
an enlisted soldier what he saw of army life gave him an appreciation
of the courage and self-sacrifice of the soldiers. His enthusiasm
and interest in military affairs were almost a matter of heritage, as
were also his brilliant talents in the law. He was a great-grand-
son of Isaac Palmer, who served with distinction with the Virginia
troops in the American Revolution and was at the siege of York-
town. He was also a grandson of Louis D. Palmer, who served in
the War of 1812, as a member of the Kentucky Volunteers, and was
at the battle of River Raisin. His father, as is well known, was
distinguished as a soldier during the Civil war, having raised the
Fourteenth Regiment of Illinois Infantry in 1861, was promoted
from colonel to brigadier general, to major general, and during
1865-66 was commander of the Fourteenth Army Corps, Department
of Kentucky.
John Mayo Palmer was educated at Blackburn University in
Carlinville, at Shurtleff College at Alton, and in 1868 graduated
from the law school of Harvard University with the degree LL. B.
He was a natural lawyer, his excellent education and training re-
enforcing his native talent, so that he was recognized as one of the
best equipped lawyers in the West, and was so considered by his
colleagues at the Springfield bar, where he practiced for more than
twenty years as the partner of his father. Admitted to the bar in
1868 at the age of twenty, he practiced at Carlinville until 1873,
and in 1870 was elected city attorney. In 1873 he formed the law
partnership with his father, Governor Palmer, upon the latter's
retirement from the executive office. The firm was first John M.
and John Mayo Palmer, and later became Palmers, Robinson &
Shutt, when Hon. James C. Robinson and Hon. William E. Shutt
446 COURTS AND LAWYERS OF ILLINOIS
became members of the firm. John Mayo Palmer practiced in
that partnership until 1889, when for the benefit of his health he
went to the State of Washington, spending two years on the
Pacific Coast. At Tacoma, Washington, he was associated in prac-
tice with James Wickersnam, who is now delegate in Congress
from Alaska Territory. His health being practically restored Mr.
Palmer returned to Illinois and resumed practice at Chicago, as
a member of the law firm of Doolittle, Palmer & Tollman. In
1893 Carter Harrison the elder appointed him assistant corpor-
ation counsel of the City of Chicago, and a year later Mayor John
P. Hopkins appointed him corporation counsel. His record of
public service in Illinois was as city attorney of Carlinville from
1870 to 1872; member of the general assembly of Illinois from
1875 t J ^77 "> alderman of Springfield and corporation counsel of
Chicago from 1893 to 1895. As a lawyer he was engaged in many
famous cases, among which may be mentioned the Macoupin County
bond cases, the so-called Pekin Whiskey Ring case, and the Snycarte
Levee cases.
Like his father, he was a sturdy democrat, and belonged to the
Methodist Church. At Carlinville, Illinois, July 7, 1869, John
Mayo Palmer married Ellen Clark Robertson, daughter of Dr. Wil-
liam R. and Nancy (Holliday) Robertson. Of this union there were
three children. The oldest Major John Me Auley Palmer of the
United States Army, who was married in 1893 to Maude Laning,
daughter of C. B. Laning of Petersburg, Illinois, and they have
a child named Mary Laning Palmer. Robertson Palmer, the sec-
ond son, is an attorney at law at Ocean Springs, Mississippi, and
married Nettie Colby of Chicago. The third son is Dr. George
Thomas Palmer of Springfield, who married in 1898 Maude Gregg
of Alton, Illinois.
Louis JAMES PALMER. One of the younger children of Gen.
eral John M. and Malinda A. (Neely) Palmer, the late Louis
James Palmer, who died at Springfield December 28, 1901, was
identified with the Illinois bar as a practicing lawyer for a number
of years, though most of his professional career was spent in the
West.
Born at Carlinville, Illinois, June 25, 1865, he possessed many
of the talents and capabilities which have made his ancestry famous.
He was educated in the Springfield grammar and high schools,
under private tutors, and at Blackburn University at Carlinville.
Before old enough to be admitted to the bar, he passed brilliant
examination in the law and at the age of twenty-one went West to
Cheyenne, Wyoming. He was youngest member of the constitu-
tional convention which drafted the constitution for the new State
of Wyoming. From 1887 to 1893 he practiced law at Rock Springs,
Wyoming, and then returned to Springfield and was engaged in
active practice there until his death in 1901.
He served as a member of the Fifth Regiment, Illinois National
COURTS AND LAWYERS OF ILLINOIS 447
Guard, and later was a member of the Engineer Corps until his
death. In politics he was always a democrat and a Baptist in
church affiliations. At Springfield on January 19, 1901, he married
Josephine La Bonte.
ALONZO K. VICKERS. During his service on the Supreme Bench
of Illinois from 1906 until his death on January 21, 1915, the pro-
found learning and broad experience of Judge Vickers were read
into a majority of the decisions of the Supreme Court. Judge
Vickers was identified with the Illinois bar and bench for more than
thirty years, came up to professional prominence from a boyhood
spent on a farm and with many struggles to secure an education. He
possessed the experienced judgment of one who knew all sorts of
men, was discriminating observer of character and motives, and had
that qualification so essential to the good judge the judicial tem-
perament. His death was a distinct loss to the profession and the
state which he had served so loyally and with such integrity for
many years.
It was on a farm in Massac County, Illinois, that Alonzo Knox
Vickers was born September 25, 1853, a son of James I. and Celia
(Smith) Vickers, the former a native of Tennessee and the latter of
Alabama. His father came to Illinois in 1840, settled on Govern-
ment land in Massac County, and that land continued in the owner-
ship of the Vickers family until recent years. The father died in
1 86 1 at the age of forty-five and the mother in 1874 at the age of
seventy- four.
The second of four children, Judge Vickers as a boy attended the
country schools of Massac County, and led by a vision of better
things later secured some training in the city high school and in the
summer normal, and after being qualified taught school for several
terms. His studies in law were pursued during his work as a
teacher, and gave him admittance to the bar in 1882. Judge Vickers
throughout his active practice as a lawyer was located at Vienna in
Johnson County.
His first public service was as a member of the Illinois House
of Representatives, to which he was elected in 1886. In 1891 he was
elected circuit judge of the first judicial circuit, re-elected in 1897
and again in 1903, and finally resigned after fifteen years of work
on the circuit bench. During that time he also served on the appellate
bench at Ottawa. In 1906 Judge Vickers was elected judge of the
Supreme Court from the first district, and thereafter kept his resi-
dence in East St. Louis. Judge Vickers was a republican, a member
of the East St. Louis, Illinois State and American Bar associations,
was affiliated with the Masonic Order up to and including the Knight
Templar degrees, with the Independent Order of Odd Fellows, the
Knights of Pythias and t,he Benevolent and Protective Order of Elks,
and was a member of the Missouri Athletic Club of St. Louis and
the Country Club of East St. Louis. He was a trustee of the
Methodist Episcopal Church.
448 COURTS AND LAWYERS OF ILLINOIS
Judge Vickers was married at Metropolis, Illinois, November 18,
1880, to Miss Leora E. Armstrong, daughter of William and Anna
Armstrong, now deceased. There are three children : Jay F. Vickers,
born in 1885, and now a rising yoimg attorney at East St. Louis ;
Hazel, who lives at Carbondale, Illinois ; and Louise Vickers, born
in 1893, and living with her mother at East St. Louis.
EDWARD O. BROWN. First elected a judge of the Circuit Court
of Cook County in 1903, Judge Brown has served by appointment
as justice of the Appellate Court of the First Illinois District since
1904. Judge Brown has been an active member of the Illinois bar
more than fo.rty years, and an extensive experience as a prominent
lawyer and the qualities of a splendid mind have enabled him to
adorn and dignify the high judicial office he has held for over ten
years.
Edward Osgood Brown was born in the historic city of Salem,
Massachusetts, August 5, 1847. His family is of English origin,
was settled in Massachusetts about the middle of the seventeenth
century, and several of its members, including his grandfather and
his father, contributed to the fame of Salem as one of the most
important centers of the early American merchant marine. Judge
Brown is a son of Edward and Eliza Osgood (Dalton) Brown. He
attended the Salem public schools, and graduated A. B. from Brown
University in 1867. The following year was spent as a teacher in
Southboro, Massachusetts, and he began his law studies with a firm
at Salem, and in 1869 was graduated from the law department of
Harvard University, winning first prize for an essay on Punitive
Damages. He was admitted to the bar in 1870, and during 1870-71
was assistant clerk to the Supreme Court of Rhode Island, and was
in practice at Providence until April, 1872.
Judge Brown came to Chicago with a college classmate, Orville
Peckham, and the associations of these two prominent Chicago law-
yers were maintained until the elevation of Judge Brown to the
bench. The partners began their practice in Chicago the year fol-
lowing the great Chicago fire, and their exceptional ability soon
gave their services a wide demand. Much of their practice was in
the field of corporation and commercial law, and for a number of
years they were attorneys for the First National Bank of Chicago.
Some of the cases in which Mr. Brown won his reputation as a
lawyer may be briefly mentioned: He was an attorney in People
vs. Knickerbocker, called the Probate-Court Case, involving the
constitutionality of that court; in the Sanitary District cases, in-
volving the constitutionality of the Sanitary District laws; in Zirn-
gibl vs. Calumet Company, involving a large amount of real estate
on the Calumet River; and from 1894 to 1897 was counsel of the
Xincoln Park commissioners, and among other matters represented
the commissioners in the McKee scrip matter, where claimants
under congressional scrip undertook to locate their warrant on mil-
COURTS AND LAWYERS OF ILLINOIS 449
lions of dollars' worth of property along the lake shore on the north
side of Chicago.
Judge Brown in 1893 was candidate for judge of the Superior
Court. In 1903 he was elected a judge of the Cook County Circuit
Court, his first term covering the years from 1903 to 1909, and was
reelected in 1910. In 1904 he was appointed a justice of the Appel-
late Court in the First District, and was reappointed in 1910, the
office which he now holds. Judge Brown has long been active in
the democratic party, and is well known both at home and in the
nation for his prominence in the single tax movement, and was a
personal friend of the late Henry George. Judge Brown possesses
a distinctive literary style, and it has been impressed not only in his
decisions found in the reports of the Appellate Court, but in numer-
ous articles on the single tax and other political and economic
themes, and is also found in articles on medico-legal subjects, and
in several monographs on the early history of Michigan and Illinois.
Judge Brown is a member of the University, the City, the Chicago
Literary, the Mid-Day, the Press and Iroquois clubs. He is also
held in high esteem in the Chicago Bar Association, and the Chicago
Law Club. On June 25, 1884, Judge Brown married Helen Ger-
trude Eagle, of an old Detroit family. To their marriage were born
five children : Edward Eagle, Helen Dalton, Walter Elliott, Robert
Osgood, and Mary Wilmarth. Judge Brown became a convert to
the Catholic faith in his early % youth. In 1893 ne served as presi-
dent of the Massachusetts Society in Chicago.
CHARLES ADLAI EWING. Distinguished for his intellectual
attainments, for his profound knowledge of the law, for his business
acumen and social gifts, the late Charles Adlai Ewing was no less
noted for his solidity of character that made his public services,
at different times, of inestimable value to his fellow citizens. In his
death, while yet in the prime of life, the Decatur bar lost one of its
distinguished members and Macon County a man hard to replace.
He was one of a family of four children born to Fielding N. and
Sarah Ann (Powers) Ewing, and was ever a dutiful son.
Charles Adlai Ewing became a resident of Decatur in 1864 and
this city remained his home throughout life. He was a student in
the old Chicago University and later entered Princeton University,
from which he carried off the honors of his class in 1867, subse-
quently attending the Albany Law School, where he was graduated
in the class of 1870. He entered into practice at Decatur and it was
in the courts of Macon County that he pleaded and won his first
case. As an exponent of the law he stood very high, natural ability
combined with thorough preparation bringing professional success
early in his career, and his first legal victories but presaged the later
triumphs which brought about his recognition as a great lawyer. He
continued in active practice until his death, which occurred Novem-
ber 6, 1896. As a thoughtful and conscientious citizen he became
interested in politics but never as an office seeker nor for financial
450 COURTS AND LAWYERS OF ILLINOIS
gain. The basic principles of the democratic party appealed to his
reason and he was willing to make personal sacrifices when he saw
indications of his party turning aside from these principles. In
1894 he became identified with that branch of the party known as
sound money democrats and took an active part in a conference held
at Chicago in August, 1895, the object of which was to establish a
literary bureau for the education of the voters. He was subse-
quently made chairman of the Democratic State Committee, in
which position he toiled night and day, and when the campaign was
at its height volunteered his services and took the stump and through
his splendid oratory and convincing arguments rendered invaluable
service. His many talents and his sterling character served to
bring him before the public in several important and responsible
capacities. During the last administration of Governor Oglesby he
was honored by appointment as a member of a commission to revise
the revenue laws of the State of Illinois, his associates on this board
being some of the oldest and ablest public men of the state.
On June 15, 1871, Mr. Ewing was united in marriage with Miss
Mary Giselle Palmer, a member of an exceedingly prominent family
of New York. Mrs. Ewing is a daughter of Ambrose Wells and
Mary (Bradley) Palmer, and a niece of Hon. Joseph P. Bradley,
who was a United States Supreme Court judge from New Jersey.
The father of Mrs. Ewing was born in New York, October 2, 1814,
for many years was a prosperous merchant in Albany, and died