The Vol. XIX.
Green
No. 7
Bag
BOSTON
THOMAS
F.
July, 1907
MARSHALL
By Charles Fennell THOMAS F. MARSHALL was the most brilliant and accomplished orator and advocate that Kentucky has ever pro duced, although the state has been justly noted for both. In the words of the schol arly Judge Donovan of the Detroit Bar, author of the famous "Tact in Court" and "Modern Jury Trials," Marshall's "work ranked with the best lawyers in America, like Webster, O'Connor, Choate, Ryan, Car penter, Jere. Black and Reverdy Johnson — the highest class of advocates." He was to the South and West what Erskine was to England, Curran to Ireland, and Choate to New England. His original genius, early training, natural tastes, and studious habits all fitted him preeminently for the Bar and public life. He was born at Frankfort, Ky., June 7, 1 80 1, being the eldest child of Dr. Lewis Marshall, himself the youngest brother of the great chief justice, and a man of emi nent ability who, after having served as the fourth president of Washington Col lege (now Washington and Lee University) removed to Kentucky and built his country home, Buck Pond, in Woodford County near Versailles. In his early life Thomas was taught by his mother, Agatha, a woman of strong mind and character. Later, in company with Robert J. Breckinridge, afterward the famous divine, who was living with Dr. Marshall, he began the study of the classics under a private tutor, and became so pro ficient in these studies as to be able, during the remainder of his life, to read the classics with fluency and ease. At the age of twenty he was sent to Virginia to study his
tory as the basis of jurisprudence and moral and political philosophy. These studies he pursued under his uncle, James Marshall, a recluse student of great erudition. He re mained with this relative two years, when, returning home, he pursued the course of study marked out for him by his uncle so diligently, it is said, that he became pros trated by disease. He was twenty-five years of age when he began the study of law under that master orator and advo cate, John J. Crittenden, whose name was already a synonym for eloquence, and who at that time, as the reports show, was employed in practically all of the cases before the Court of Appeals at Frankfort. After two years of study under Critten den he was admitted to the Bar of Ken tucky and settled down to practice in the little village of Versailles. In about a year he gave up his office and went to Richmond, Va., to attend the debates of the Constitu tional Convention then sitting in that city. For five months he attended the sittings of the convention with even more regularity, it is said, than any of its members, and listened to the arguments of such giants as his uncle, John Marshall (with whom he resided), Randolph, Madison, Monroe, Leigh, C. Johnson and Tazewell. Returning home by way of Washington, he stopped over there to hear the speeches of Hayne and Webster on Foote's Resolution. The ex citement produced by the great debate is sometimes said to have awakened in him that love of political discussion and public controversy which later became so emi nently his characteristic. The truth is, however, that he had several years before
