Judicial Notice

The World through the Eyes of Chief Justice Robert Peaslee

 Judicial Notice
The World through the Eyes of Chief Justice Robert Peaslee

May 15th, 2008 – October 15th, 2008

The John W. King New Hampshire Law Library

at the New Hampshire Supreme Court

New Hampshire Supreme Court Society Board of Trustees

Loretta Kenison
Honorary Chair

Ellen L. Arnold
Dorcas H. Deans
Charles G. Douglas, III
Susan V. Duprey
Sylvio Dupuis
Thomas Galligan
Hon. Sherman D. Horton, Jr.
John D. Hutson
Mary Susan Leahy
Susan Leidy
Michael Lewis
Mary McGowan
Hon. Kathleen A. McGuire
Jack B. Middleton
Hon. Joseph Nadeau
David L. Nixon
John C. Ransmeier
Tara Reardon
Rick Schubart
Mary Searles
Gregory H. Smith
Jay Surdukowski
Sherilynn A. B. Young

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 Robert J. Peaslee

Chief Justice of the New Hampshire Supreme Court 1924-1934

Associate Justice of the New Hampshire Supreme Court 1898-1901, 1907-1924
Associate Justice of the New Hampshire Superior Court 1901-1907

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 Z Introductory Essay

By JAY SURDUKOWSKI AND MIKE LEWIS

In 2007, Mary Searles of the John W. King New Hampshire Law Library discovered a thick
envelope in the basement. This tan colored envelope bulged with an unusual discovery: fifty-five
drawings of litigants and lawyers from the dusk of the Victorian era, sketched by Robert J. Peaslee.
Peaslee would go on to be Chief Justice of the New Hampshire Supreme Court. He is known to
many lawyers and school children who tour the court, at least in a subconscious way, as the
gentlemen whose name is engraved on the silver pitcher the five justices of the Court fish their cases
out of to decide who will write opinions. The pitcher was a gift from the Court in 1917 on the
occasion of Peaslee’s second marriage. In time it made its way back to the gifter.
Many of the drawings include captions which identify the people or situations depicted. In
this essay we provide a little context about the man and his art. We have consulted scraps of
biography and contemporary accounts of the trials we have been able to identify.
This essay will also appraise Peaslee’s art. On the surface some of these caricatures may
seem almost child-like, but they actually fit into an artistic tradition of sorts, and deserve to be
recognized as doing so.

I. Who is Robert Peaslee?

Peaslee is more than a man who gave his name to a time-honored antique.
Born in Weare, New Hampshire in 1864, Robert James Peaslee had a lengthy career as an
attorney and judge. His service as a judge spanned an era during which the creation of our superior
courts relieved the Supeme Court of the responsibility of riding circuit and hearing trials. Peaslee
served two stints on the Supreme Court of New Hampshire, the first from 1898 to 1901 and the
second from 1907 to 1934, the last ten years as Chief Justice. Between these periods of service on
the high court he also served as a superior court judge after the court was established. All told, his
time as a trial and appellate judge ran almost parallel to the second half of the judicial career of
Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr. who sat on the U.S. Supreme Court from 1902-1932.
The drawings in this show coincidentally date from the time of Peaslee’s “demotion” to the
superior court: 1900-1902.
Early on, Peaslee was adverse to “book learning” and wanted nothing more than a quiet
farming life in Weare. This choice of career evaporated after a brief stint of hard farm labor. After
secondary and post-secondary studies in Massachusetts, Peaslee attended the Boston University Law
School – legal alma mater of two current Justices: Richard Galway and Gary E. Hicks. Peaslee
graduated second in his class after completing all three years of legal study in a single year. After
practicing for a time first in Massacusetts and then in partnership with another Manchester lawyer,
Peaslee was elevated to the bench.
Peaslee taught courses at both Boston University and Dartmouth College after he became a
judge. He was also active in his community – among his many accomplishments are two which
relate to this show: he was a president of the Currier Gallery of Art and a Trustee of the Manchester
Institute of Arts and Sciences.

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 After Peaslee stepped down from the bench he served until his death as Counsel to the firm
of Demond, Woodworth, Sulloway & Rogers – now known as Sulloway & Hollis.

II. Peaslee as Artist

The most apt characterization of Peaslee’s drawings so far has been made by Attorney Martin
Gross. On seeing “the Gentleman from Claremont and His Stout Client,” Attorney Gross said the
work resembled an “Up-country Daumier.” This is an apt description because more than anything
the drawings appear to be in line with the tradition of social commentary embodied by French artist
Honore Daumier (1808-1879).
Daumier’s satiric bite was sharpened by a stint in prison at the age of 24 for insulting the
King of France with a likeness. His attention was turned to lawyers and their clients in a famous
series of lithographs called Les Gens de Justice – “The People of Justice.” See Figure 1.

Fig. 1

While the pictures in this series have a similarity in subject matter – lots of people pointing in court
– and an emphasis on the pointy-nosed features of his subjects, see figures 2 and 3, Peaslee’s works
are not as fleshy – they are simpler. They also do not seem to be as mean-spirited. His humor is
lighter and he does not attempt to portray the entire legal system as corrupt, as does Daumier.
Rather, Peaslee retained a little humor – and a lot of humanity – while “riding circuit.”

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 Fig. 2 Fig. 3

Active in Democratic politics until his appointment to the bench, Peaslee most certainly
would have been aware of the political satires that were very popular in the time he lived – chiefly
Thomas Nast of Harper’s Weekly. There is some suggestion in his work of an affinity for the
political caricatures of the late Victorian period. See fig. 4 (President Theodore Roosevelt and “Boss
Platt”).

Fig. 4

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 Edward Gory (see Fig. 5), another artist whose work Peaslee’s drawings evoke was predated
by Peaslee. Gorey’s Victorian gothic figures enjoy a cult following and were made famous when
depicted alongside the titles to the long-running public television series “Mystery.”
In Gorey and Peaslee’s drawings, there appears an affinity for the attention to Victorian
outfits and carefully though sparely rendered facial features which still manage to capture
personality despite the use of few lines. “The Birth of the Perfume” most closely resembles Gorey’s
work. See figures 5 and 6. Note the similarities in the small head and long Victorian coat with
delicate footwear poking out below.

Fig. 5 Fig. 6

Despite fitting Peaslee’s works into the tradition of Daumier and the American political
cartoonists of the late-Victorian era, and finding some likeness to Edward Gorey’s drawings, large
questions are left unresolved. Why did Peaslee create these drawings? And to whom were they
shown in his lifetime – if anyone? Also, why did they stop at 1902? Or are these works only a hint
at his entire oeuvre which may sit in a dusty attic or basement somewhere? For the moment, these
questions are unanswered. The drawings in the cache nonetheless are of ample historical interest.

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 Among the fifty-five drawings are pictorial accounts of at least six trials. We have done
some digging on four we selected for the show, and, in a few instances, uncovered some of the back
stories of the trials, as well as the lives behind some of the portraits.

III. Tales Behind the Trial Drawings

Ossippee, New Hampshire - 1902

The two drawings from a murder trial in Ossippee yield a great deal of interesting material.
County Solicitor Hobbs appears in a portrait, as does an elderly witness who testified both at this
Ossippee trial and the Parker Murder Trial in 1845 – meaning that this witnesses’ life corresponded
closely to the majority of the Victorian era (1837-1901).
Carroll County Solicitor Josiah Hobbs must have been among the more familiar figures to
haunt Chief Justice Peaslee’s courtroom. Hobbs is respectfully portrayed in profile, spectacles
adorned, with a serious and scholarly, if not weary, affect.
The caption of the sketch refers to Solicitor Hobbs’ October 23, 1902 questioning of a
“seventh witness” regarding the “five chambers” of a “revolver lying on the table.” An October 25,
1902 edition of the Granite State News (a Wolfeboro weekly newspaper) described a case in which
this testimony may well have occurred. The report describes the single-day murder trial of David
Little for the shooting of Mrs. Annie M. Drew. According to the report, justice was imposed in a
summary fashion. With Gideon v. Wainwright many decades from publication, Little proceeded
without counsel and was indicted, arraigned and tried for murder in a single day. The jurors
received the case just after lunch, deliberated for an hour and returned a verdict of guilt. There is no
mention of the imposition of a sentence.
Like many respected attorneys before and after him, Hobbs graduated from Dartmouth
College, where he shared the classroom with Governor Benjamin Prescott. He then also graduated
from the Albany Law School, which later produced President William McKinley and Justice Robert
Jackson of the United States Supreme Court. He commenced practice in Madison, New Hampshire
in 1859 and was appointed by the Governor to the position of County Solicitor in 1864. He returned
to private practice in 1875, and was counsel of record in many prominent cases. By dint of
reputation, he was elected president of the Carroll County Bar Association, and later returned to the
position of County Solicitor where he apparently became the momentary object of the Chief
Justice’s focus.
For a short time, Hobbs also notably enjoyed the fruits of what must have been an
uncommonly intellectual marriage. His wife, Mary E. Hobbs, is described by Hobbs’ biographer as
a “woman of liberal education and marked literary ability.” Eleven years after her untimely death
from “apoplexy” in 1880, Hobbs paid tribute to her by publishing a book of her poetry that remains
in circulation (and at least one copy can be purchased through Amazon.com!).

Mark Pierce and the Parker Murder Trial

Chief Justice Peaslee’s sketch of Mark W. Pierce makes note that his subject served as a
witness in two trials, one occurring before Peaslee himself after the turn of the century, and still
another occurring in the 1840s which Peaslee refers to in the caption as the “Parker Murder Trial.”

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The historical record with respect to the latter proved far more yielding than with respect to the
former.

Mark W. Pierce – witness at Ossippee in 1902 and at the Parker murder trial in 1845.

The Parker Murder Trial understandably left an impression on Chief Justice Peaslee, though
it is unknown what role Mark Pierce played in it. The victim in the Parker Trial, one Jonas L.
Parker, had emigrated from Lowell, Massachusetts to Manchester, New Hampshire, where he
promptly opened a saloon and bowling alley on the north side of Manchester between Elm and
Chestnut Streets. One history of Manchester editorializes that the saloon was “the resort of the
sporting element, and a certain class of politicians.” It must also, then, have been popular. Possibly
through the goodwill of his patrons, Parker obtained the office of town tax collector, a station that
prompted him to frequently carry on his person large sums of money. Many believed that it was this
responsibility that led to his doom.
On March 26, 1845, Parker’s body was found murdered and lying in a forested section of
Manchester, his throat cut and the $7,000 then believed to be in his possession missing. A
“vigilance committee” comprised of prominent town elders directed the investigation, and their
suspicions came to rest on Horace and Asa Wentworth of Saco, Maine. Eye witness testimony
claimed that Parker was last seen with a broad-shouldered, whiskered man who loosely fit Horace
Wentworth’s description. The vigilance committee concluded that a second man also observed on
the night in question was Horace’s brother, Asa, and the committee proceeded to invoke the legal
process against the two brothers.

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 The Wentworths wisely hired two soon-to-be famous men to conduct their legal defense:
Franklin Pierce of New Hampshire and Benjamin Butler of Massachusetts. The two persuasively
pointed out that the very eye witness who claimed to have seen Horace Wentworth on the evening of
the murder, also initially claimed that Horace and Parker acted as friendly acquaintances toward
each other. After testimony established that Horace and Parker had never met, the eye witness
changed his story on the stand, casting serious doubt on the State’s case. Pierce then also established
through witness testimony that Horace was quite small compared to Parker and not likely to have
been capable of subduing him. The jury acquitted both defendants of the charges.
In an interesting twist, it was later revealed that Butler, who went on to become a famous
Civil War general and the Governor of Massachusetts, subsequently represented a man named
Pierson after the Parker Murder Trial who turned out to be the actual Parker murderer. Pierson, who
had been convicted of murdering his wife and child, and confessed the Parker murder to Butler on
the eve of his execution, as well. In his confession, Pierson admitted that he and his brother had
killed Parker as an act of revenge. According to the Pierson, Parker had refused to turn over $2,000
in proceeds from a robbery that Person’s brother had entrusted to Parker’s care. It was believed that
Parker used the $2,000 to open his saloon.
Butler revealed all of this in a letter to Horace Wentworth’s nephew in 1885. The
Wentworth brothers were nonetheless financially ruined by the case and never recovered their
reputation. Their prosecution has been viewed by historians as an act of regrettable prosecutorial
irresponsibility.

Newport, New Hampshire - May, 1901

In May of 1901 Peaslee sat for trial term in Newport, New Hampshire, County Seat for
Sullivan County. In 1901 there were only fifteen attorneys in Sullivan County, and the same
attorneys appeared in case after case.
The drawings include depictions of at least two trials, including the first one: Hoyt v.
Simonds. Jesse M. Barton appeared for the plaintiff and H.W. Parker for the defendant. This case
was a “dispute about alleged deceit over the boundary of a piece of land.” Peaslee has drawn the
unfortunate defendant “Simonds of Washington who got sued on a line case.” We also have a
picture of the bespectacled surveyor holding his hand to his head, his beard reaching down to mid-
chest level. For reasons unknown, Peaslee also drew a juror from Unity named Solon Anderson.
The second Newport trial Peaslee drew was Taylor v. Burnap, “an action to recover money
for repairing real estate.” “The widow Taylor” who got excited, as Peaslee drew her, won this case
with damages of $103.63, or about $3,200 in today’s money.

Shirley Hill – July, 1900

One set of drawings which has eluded explanation are pictures from a trial or trials at Shirley
Hill – a part of present-day Goffstown. Consultation with area newspapers of the time has not
turned up any clues. A picture of a young boy with the caption “one of the terrors,” a demure
woman called Mary Anne, and a gentleman simply called “the pool champion” make this inability to
find more information all the more frustrating. What information we do have comes courtesy of
Attorney James Q. Shirley of Sheehan, Phinney, Bass + Green. Attorney Shirley is a direct
descendant of the Shirleys for whom the neighborhood is named. He relates that the area was a
popular resort with a hotel that catered to wealthy Bostonians. There was also a trolley service from

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Manchester up to “the Hill.” This could explain the origins of the “pool champion.” But what
course of events at this pleasure dome brought the pool champion, “one of the terrors,” and the polite
Mary Anne together at trial remains a mystery for now.

The hotel at Shirley Hill – a locality in present-day Goffstown.

IV. Personalities

The Colbys of Claremont: Ira Colby and Ira G. Colby

Peaslee’s pen appears to have captured two generations of the Colby family – lawyers in the
Claremont area. “The Gentleman from Claremont” has an unmistakable beaked nose and large ears
which match a contemporary photograph of Ira Colby, father and law partner to Ira G. Colby. See
fig. 7.

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 Fig. 7 Fig. 8

The portrait of Colby the Younger is an especially delicate and almost gentle likeness. See fig. 8.
Unlike some of the other drawings, this one has a quality of having been sat for by the subject. The
father was about seventy years old at the time of this drawing. The son would have been about thirty
at the time of his portrait.

Jason Dudley appears on the far left of this photo of three

Colebrook town officers. He is either in the background
or the gentleman in the middle is exceptionally gigantic.

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“Dudley of Colebrook” – Jason Dudley

Jason Dudley was a prominent North Country lawyer and politician descended from Ethan
Allen, the Revolutionary war hero, whom his grandmother would tell stories about from personal
recollection. Dudley’s wife was a direct descendent of Governor Bradford of Massachusetts. His
biography calls him “a peacemaker rather than a promoter of strife.” Among other activities, Dudley
had a longtime relationship with Colebrook Academy – the alma mater of present-day Justice Gary
Hicks. Dudley served as principal three years while studying to be a lawyer. After a brief stint in
Vermont he returned to serve more than a quarter century as a trustee of the Academy. Dudley was
approximately sixty years old at the time of Peaslee’s sketch.

“Squire Tuttle”

The bow-tied Tuttle. The rather intense reader: Hening of Berlin

Hon. James P. Tuttle, was born in New Boston, New Hampshire, received his law degree
from Boston University, and was admitted to practice law in New Hampshire in 1885. Upon
appointment by Gov. Robert P. Bass, he served as New Hampshire’s Attorney General from 1912-
1918.

“Hening of Berlin”

Crawford Dawes Hening, a native Philadelphian, graduated from the University of

Pennsylvania before moving to Lancaster, New Hampshire in 1894. After a brief period, he returned
to Philadelphia to teach law at Temple and the University of Pennsylvania. In 1914, he took up
residence in Lancaster, New Hampshire where he prepared a digest of the New Hampshire law
reports. This work led to his appointment in 1916 as the official reporter for the New Hampshire
Supreme Court. In the 1920s, he was appointed a municipal judge by Governor Fred Brown.

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V. Conclusion

We hope this brief introductory essay brings Peaslee and some of his drawings to life. This
show is a rare instance of viewing historical figures through a judge’s keenly observant eyes.
Though Peaslee may be mortified to know his drawings would be seen more than a century later, we
are glad for this unique contribution to the historical record.

Mike Lewis is an Attorney at the New Hampshire Attorney General’s Office. Jay Surdukowski is an
Associate at Sulloway & Hollis.

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