The Vermont watchman. [volume] (Montpelier, Vt.) 1883-1911, 1909-12-09

had exceptionally endowed him. None
of these traits, however, seemed
specially manifested in his early
boyhood, for he was then in no way
distinguished from many of his
school-mates in proficiency of schol-
arship or otherwise. However, we
find him a successful school teacher
at the age of eighteen--reading his
Blackstone when others were asleep
at highland a year later, seriously
engaged in the trial of justice law
suits throughout many of the towns
in southern Vermont. These cases
were often sharply contested, and as
general thing he was called upon
to meet as an antagonist some law
yer of long experience and recognized
standing at the bar, and to hold his
own against him. AS the same prin-
ciples of law were necessarily involv-
ed as were applicable to the more i'm
portant cases in the higher courts,
this early experience was one of inf
hiNO NuiuV w MN III HIS SUBSEQUENT
practice. So we see that it may be
said of him that he practically grew
up in a law office.
John Henry Flagg was born in Will
mington, Windham county, July II,
1S43, being son of Stephen P. and
Lucinda (Brown) Flagg of that town,
to which many descendants of the
original English families of that name
migrated at the close of the Revo-
luton, from their earlier settlement
in Worcester county, Mass.
| 1t is a remarkable fact that he can
trace his lineage back over ten CEN
turtles to Rawl Flegge, Danish vik-
ing, who ravaged the east coast of Eng
land, and there made settlement in
the year SOS. His first American an
cestor, Thomas Flagg, emigrated to
America from the Hundred of East
Flegge," Norfolk county, England, in
1887, in company with Sir Richard
| Carver, and settled and became a
land owner in Watertown, Mass. De-
scendants of Thomas, served in vari-
Gus Massachusetts regiments through
the Revolutionary war. General Flagg
the father of John H., was also born
in Wilmington, VT, where he became
leading lawyer and man of affairs,
repeatedly serving in both branches
of the Legislature, Constitutional Con-
ventions, etc.
John Henry was educated in the
public schools of his native town; at
| the Wesleyan Academy, Wilbraham,
Mass, and by private tutor. Without
availing himself of a college course,
he plunged at once into his Black
stone and Chitty, at the early age of
eighteen, studying for the first two
years in his fathers office, subse-
quently entering the Albany Law
School, from which he graduated in
1864. Thereafter and until his ad-
mission to the bar, he continued his
studies in the office of Flagg e Tyler
lat Wilmington, this firm then being
composed of his father and the Hon.
James M. Tyler, who subsequently
and for upwards of twenty years and
up to the present year, was a Judge
on the bench of the Supreme Court
! of Vermont. Having completed his
preparatory course of study, he was
admitted to the Vermont bar, in Wind
ham county, at the September term,
1864, at once beginning practice, sue
ceeding Mr.. Tyler in his fathers firm,
but two years thereafter removing 20
The historic old town III I'ouninpton
where he Immediately became con-
spicuous at the bar, building up a
large and lucrative practice. This
came to him not only from clients in
southern Vermont. but with these in
the adjacent parts of New York and
Massachusetts also. During his five
years practice at Bennington, it is
said that of the cases taken on ap-
peal to the Supreme Court, he never
lost one-this fact appearing by the
dockets and reported decisions of the
court for that period. 1t need hardly
be, remarked that single handed and
alone, having no partner, and without
the aid of associate counsel, this was
an unusual achievement with a prac-
titioner so young as he then was, be-
ing, as will be seen, under 23 years Of
age at the commencement of this pc.
riod.
But impaired in health by over
work, and being thus early in life af-
ficted by pronounced rheumatic
tendency, his doctors advised a radi-
cal change of climate in order to
avoid the rigors of the Vermont win
ter. At this time-the fall of 1865
while contemplating a winters So
journ in the South, he was offered
through the Vermont Senators, Ed
munds and Morrill,, but wholly unso-
licited and unexpected, the position
OF principal legislative clerk of the
United States Senate-these Senators
acting in behalf of the Republican
majority of the chamber-which prof
fer, not without hesitation, he ac-
cepted, feeling that the change even
to the milder climate of Washington