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HISTORY OF
INDIANAPOLIS & MARION CO.,
INDIANA
By
B. R. SULGROVE -
ILLUSTRATED.
PHILADELPHIA
L. H. EVERTS & CO.
1884
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HORATIO
C. NEWCOMB is entitled to all respect as one of the
best lawyers, ablest publicists, and truest men that ever
honored Indianapolis with a residence. He was born in
Tioga County, Pa., in 1821, and removed by his parents when
a child to Cortland County, N. Y., and thence to Jennings
County, in this State, in 1836. He learned the
saddler's trade there, as did Judge Martindale and
Senator McDonald in their outset of life, but in two or
three years ill health compelled him to quit it, and in 1841
he began the study of the law with Mr. Bullock, the
first lawyer in Jennings County. He practiced there
till 1846, when he came to Indianapolis and formed a
partnership with Mr. Ovid Butler. The
impression made by his abilities may be judged by the fact
that in 1849 he was elected the second mayor of the city in
his twenty-eighth year. In 8154 he was elected to the
Legislature and in 1860 was elected to the Senate, which he
left after one session to take the presidency of the Sinking
Fund Board. He was superseded there in 1863 by the
late W. H. Talbott. In the summer of 1864,
after the retirement of Mr. Sulgrove, he became
political editor of the Journal, and so continued
till 1868, serving two sessions in the Legislature in that
time. He went back to the law practice in 1869, and
continued till he was appointed one of the first three
judges of the Superior Court in March, 1871. This term
expired in 1874, when he was elected to the same place by a
popular and unanimous vote, being put on both party tickets,
as was Judge Perkins, his associate, who had
succeeded Judge Rand on the resignation of the
latter. Soon after President Grant tendered him
the assistant Secretaryship of the Interior, but he declined
it. In 1876 he was nominated by the Republicans for
the Supreme Bench, but beaten. Under the act
authorizing commissioners of the Supreme Court to assist the
judges in clearing off the accumulations of the docket, he
was made one, and died while in that duty. He was all
his life here a constant and devoted member of the
Presbyterian Church, and one of the ruling elders. As
editor of the Journal he showed a versatility of
power with which he had not been credited, as well as a
sagacity and sound judgment in party management that were
badly needed to supplement the efforts of Governor
Morton. He died in May, 1882, at his residence on
North Tennessee Street.
Source: History of Indianapolis & Marion County,
Indiana - Published by B. R. Sulgrove - Philadelphia:
L. H. Everts & Co.
1884 ~ Page |
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