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Vol. X.

No. 6.

BOSTON.

June, 1898.

JOHN POTTER STOCKTON. JOHN POTTER STOCKTON, who has long been recognized as the leading member of the New Jersey bar, is a greatgrandson of a signer of the Declaration of Independence — who was high in Colonial and Revolutionary Councils — and a son of Commodore Richard Stockton, who during the Mexican war acquired for his country the State of California and was known Unionwide as brave commander of the frigate "Princeton." He was born at the threecentury-old family seat in Trenton, seventytwo years ago; although neither his face nor carriage, nor unshaken mental vigor as ob served in this year of our Lord attest him to have reached the scriptural span of three score and ten. Inheriting ancestral intellect, bodily vigor, pluck, executive ability, persistence and ambition, young Stockton passed through school life with promise and prestige, and entered Princeton College where he took honors in English literature, composition, logic and oratory. His tutor, Addison Alex ander, one of the famous family of theolo gians of Princeton, predicted greatness for him of some kind; "If" (as he added) "family pride and social success do not interfere with his intellectual aspirations." Tutor Alexander's reference to family pride was appropriate; for if any American is en titled to boast of ancestry, that boaster would preeminently be this John Potter Stockton. His great-great-grandfather, John Richard Stockton of ancient lineage, emigrated from England in 1 680, and settling in the south of the then province of New Jersey, purchased a tract of land containing six thousand and

four hundred acres. He became a judge of the Royal Court of Common Pleas of Somer set County. He built a large mansion in Trenton, portions of which still stand as the Stockton homestead. A print of this colo nial house can be seen at page 694 of the " Appleton Cyclopaedia of Biography." Richard Stockton, who was a son of this dis tinguished land-owning settler and signer of the Declaration of Independence, became a judge in the colonial supreme court and afterwards declined the royal commission of chief-justice. He was the great-grandfather of the subject of our sketch, and his oldest son, also named Richard, chose the profes sion of the law and became the. head of the New Jersey bar. The latter died when his grandson John was only two years old; and even at that early age the boy heard so much praise of this immediate ancestor that while learning his alphabet he was heard to lisp, that "he too would be a lawyer like grand-dad." During the Mexican war Richard Stock ton the third, as Captain, was commissioned to command the frigate " Congress " which sailed around Cape Horn in order to capture the then Mexican province of California. His naval tact, finesse and courage succeeded in driving out the Mexican soldiers, Colonel Fremont and a detachment of soldiers giving substantial aid. By this victory Stockton became a commodore, Fremont, first gov ernor and first Federal senator of the new State; and the commodore, resigning from the navy when peace came, was elected Fed eral senator from New Jersey. His son's first trend on graduating in 229