Chittenden

BRIGGS, William Penn

Vermont Historical Magazine, No XI, October 1867, pp 849-850

The late William Penn BRIGGS was born 14 March 1793 at Adams [Berkshire 
County], Massachusetts. His father, Benjamin BRIGGS, a farmer, of the old 
Rhode Island stock of Friends [Society of Friends, aka Quakers], married 
Naomi WELLS, of the same faith, at Windsor [Berkshire County], Massachusetts, 
10 December 1776. The subject of this sketch [William Penn BRIGGS] was the 
youngest of eleven children, and his parents gave him a name most dear to 
their hearts, William Penn. Although in comfortable circumstances, they did 
not feel able to give him a collegiate education, but furnished him the best 
academic instruction within their reach. This education was widely improved 
upon by him in after years, and in those branches of learning which he most 
loved there were few better scholars. He was a cousin of the late lamented 
George N. BRIGGS, ex-governor of Massachusetts, in company with whom he 
studied law in the office of Mr. ROBERTSON, of Adams. They maintained 
through life the most tender affection for each other, and died but a week 
apart.

In 1819 at the age of twenty-six, he [William Penn BRIGGS] married at New 
Lebanon [Columbia County], New York, [Miss?] Melinda BROWN, formerly of old 
Windsor [Hartford County], Connecticut, latterly of Cheshire [Berkshire 
County], Massachusetts, a woman remarkable for graces of person and 
character. She was an invalid for thirty years before her death, which took 
place on 15 March 1849. To them [William Penn and Melinda BRIGGS] were born 
three children: (1) Josephine Melinda, at Adams [Berkshire County], 
Massachusetts, in 1822; (2) John William, at Hancock [Berkshire County], 
Massachusetts, 02 April 1826; and (3) Catharine Naomi, at Richmond 
[Chittenden County], Vermont, 20 November 1831.

The eldest daughter [Josephine Melinda BRIGGS], a most estimable lady, 
married, in 1840, Edward Augustus STANSBURY, of New York, at the time a law 
student of her father's, and they [Edward Augustus and Josephine Melinda 
STANSBURY] now reside with their children: (1) Cordelia Agnes, and (2) 
Caroline Kirkland STANSBURY, in Holedon [Haledon in Passaic County?], New 
Jersey. Their only son, (3) Hamilton, died in Burlington [Chittenden 
County], Vermont, 20 January 1849.

John William BRIGGS was remarkable, the last days of his life, for his 
beautiful Christian spirit, which led him, at the age of twenty-six, to 
relinquish home and the society of his friends to labor as a missionary in 
Jamaica [West Indies]. He arrived at Kingston [Jamaica], on 10 February 
1853, and died of fever on the 17th of the same month [17 February 1853?]. 
His remains now rest at that place.

Catherine Naomi [earlier in the text spelled "Catharine" Naomi BRIGGS] 
married at Johnson [Lamoille County], Vermont, 06 November 1854, Charles 
Crawford CARTER, of Marion [Linn County], Iowa, formerly of Montpelier 
[Washington County, Vermont]. Unto them was born, in 1855, a daughter, Cora 
Blanche. On the 25th of the following December [25 December 1855?], Mr. 
[Charles Crawford] CARTER died, and in 1857 his widow [Mrs. Catharine Naomi 
(BRIGGS) CARTER] married Edward LeRoy SAMSON, of Marion [Iowa], by whom she 
has [i. e., Edward LeRoy and Catharine Naomi SAMSON have] a son, Charles 
Edward [SAMSON].

While quite a young man, Mr. [William Penn] BRIGGS was elected to the 
legislature of the commonwealth [of Vermont], from Adams [Berkshire County], 
Massachusetts, and he served with much ability in that capacity, manifesting 
talent, political foresight and wisdom that seldom characterizes so young a 
man. He lived in Hancock [Berkshire County], Massachusetts, in the practice 
of law several years, acting in the minor offices of postmaster, justice of 
the peace, etc., and removed to Richmond [Chittenden County], Vermont, in 
1826, where he resided until the autumn of 1841. During this time he acted 
as merchant and farmer, in addition to a very extensive law practice, and in 
1829, 1832, and 1834, was chosen Judge of Probate for the District of 
Chittenden. In 1841 he received from President HARRISON the appointment of 
Collector of Customs for the District of Vermont, and Burlington being the 
principal port, he removed his family to that place in October 1841, and 
continued to reside there until May 1848, when he returned to his farm in 
Richmond. On the death of his wife [Melinda BRIGGS, whose date of death, 
given above, was 15 March 1849] he remained unmarried until autumn 1849, when 
he [William Penn BRIGGS] a Mrs. Amy RICHMOND, a widow, of Adams [Berkshire 
County], Massachusetts, whom he had known from his boyhood. By her he had no 
children, and she survives him. The late Andrew A. RICHMOND, well known in 
Massachusetts, was her youngest son.

Judge [William Penn] BRIGGS was remarkable, and noted for his strong sense, 
his extensive acquaintance with English literature, and extraordinary powers 
of persuasion as a jury advocate. To his last days this great gift survived 
with scarcely diminished force, and gave him the well-deserved reputation of 
being one of the ablest jury lawyers of Vermont. His energy was exhaustless, 
and his tenacity of purpose such that obstacles seemed rather to stimulate 
than to discourage him. His familiarity with the Scriptures and the poets, 
especially Shakespeare, supplied him with apt quotations, which he used 
freely and with great effect. His sense of honor and of the ludicrous was 
remarkable, and his merciless ridicule of his opponents often carried court, 
bar, and jury with him in spite of themselves. He possessed, to an uncommon 
degree, the faculty to which so much of the sense of President LINCOLN as a 
lawyer is attributed, the faculty of condensing an argument in a pithy story, 
which made the point too plain to be missed by the dullest hearer. And in 
this he did not fall into that great error of coarseness and vulgarity, as 
many poor lawyers do, but borrowed his illustrations from refined sources; 
and whenever a rough subject must be considered, he gave it such a polish 
that the most delicate ear would delight to hear him.

Although industrious, temperate, and able, his want of system in the conduct 
of his affairs, and his deprecated accommodation in signing with other men, 
deprived him of the rewards he had so richly earned, and gave rise to 
controversies which embittered his declining years. But in spite of the 
industrious efforts of enemies, his genial spirit and earnest friendliness of 
nature always won for him, wherever he lived, the good will and respect of 
the best people around him. In person he was tall and commanding, of noble 
aspect, and conciliatory manners, and in fluency of utterance, he had few 
equals. He was several times prominently before the public for high 
political positions; but party exigencies seeming to require the postponement 
of his claims, he never received the political advancement to which his 
friends deemed him justly entitled.

He never allied himself to any church organization, but his respect for 
religion and all sacred things was profound and sincere, and he always 
attended on its ministrations when he was able. He was never a profane man, 
but was always pure in morals, and was possessed of a fine poetic temperament 
that always thrilled with the beautiful, the eloquent, and the sublime. His 
last days were marked by the meek serenity of a spirit at peace with God and 
man, and he passed on in the undoubting faith of a happy hereafter. He 
[William Penn BRIGGS] died at Montpelier [Washington County, Vermont], 20 
September 1861, in the sixty-ninth year of his age, and is buried beside his 
first wife [Melinda BRIGGS] at Richmond [Chittenden County, Vermont].

Submitted by Cathy Kubly