Draft:Daniel Newcomb

Daniel Newcomb (or Newcome; April 17, 1747 – July 14, 1818)^[1] was a New Hampshire politician and judge who served as a justice of the New Hampshire Supreme Court from 1796 to 1798.

Born in Norton, Massachusetts, to Jonathan and Elizabeth (Copeland) Newcomb, Newcomb graduated from Harvard College in 1768 and studied law in Boston to gain admission to the bar there in October 1778. He moved to Keene, New Hampshire, the same year to enter the practice of law.^[2]

In 1783 his practice was large and he "became a man of note and influence".^[2] In 1789 he was appointed solicitor of the county of Cheshire, and in 1790 a judge of the court of common pleas, from which he resigned October 2, 1793. He was a member of the convention to revise the constitution of the state in 1791 and 1792. In 1796 he was commissioned a justice of the Superior Court and served until his resignation in 1798. In 1795, 1800 and 1805 he was a member of the New Hampshire Senate.^[1]^[2]

As a lawyer, he was described as having been "better versed in the forms and proceedings than in the principles of jurisprudence".^[1]

After leaving college, he is said to have taught a Latin school in Wrentham, Massachusetts. He then studied theology and preached for a time. Not satisfied to follow the profession of divinity, he prepared himself for the bar under John Lowell of Boston, Massachusetts, and was there admitted an attorney in October, 1778. The same year he came to Keene. Benjamin West, the distinguished lawyer of Charlestown, was his classmate and friend in college, and Newcomb is understood to have induced him to come to New Hampshire, offering him his choice between Keene and Charlestown as a place of settlement.
The period of the Revolution was not favorable to lawyers, but Newcomb was an active, prudent man, and as he found himself in 1781 in a condition to marry, he must have soon secured such business as the vicinity afforded. In 1783 his practice was large, and he became a man of note and influence. He had risen into notice during the movement for uniting some of the towns on the western border of New Hampshire with Vermont, and was clerk of the convention held by the delegates from those towns at Walpole in 1780, and a delegate from Keene in the convention at Charlestown the year following. He was opposed to a union with Vermont. He was also a member of the convention to revise the Constitution of the State in 1791–92.
In 1789 he was appointed solicitor of the county of Cheshire, and in 1790 a Justice of the Inferior Court of Common Pleas, but resigned October 2, 1793. In 1796 he was commissioned a Justice of the Superior Court, and kept his seat upon the bench until his resignation in 1798. In 1795, 1800, and 1805 he was a member of the state Senate.
He accumulated a handsome fortune, and was the president of the earliest bank established in Keene. He was much interested in the advancement and prosperity of the town. As early as 1793 he established a grammar school there at his own expense, and was largely influential in the erection of the first court house in 1796.
His first marriage, in November, 1781, was with Sarah, daughter of Rev. David Stearns of Lunenburg, Massachusetts ; his second, in February, 1800, was with Hannah, daughter of Major William Dawes, and widow of Benjamin Goldthwaite of Boston, Massachusetts. He is said to have sent six sons to college, of whom two died undergraduates. One son, Seth Newcomb, followed the calling of his father.^[1]

He died at Keene at the age of 71.^[1]^[2]

References[edit]

^ ^a ^b ^c ^d ^e Charles Henry Bell, The Bench and Bar of New Hampshire (1894), p. 50.
^ ^a ^b ^c ^d Clark Bell, ed., The Medico-legal Journal, Vol. 18 (1900), Supplement, p. 109-110.