A. B. Richmond    

A. B. RICHMOND, attorney, Meadville, was born in Switzerland County, Ind., April 26, 1825, son of Lawton and Sarah (Townsend) Richmond, natives of New England, of English descent, and is a direct descendant of John Richmond, the Puritan, who came over in the “Mayflower.” His grandfather, William Richmond, was a soldier in the Revolutionary war. Lawton Richmond, subject’s father, was a practicing physician and surgeon in the war of 1812. After the war he followed his profession in Indiana until 1834, when he removed to this county and practiced medicine until his death, which occurred in 1843. He was also a local preacher in the Methodist Episcopal Church, and preached the first Methodist sermon in Chautauqua County, N.Y. He was parent of three daughters, who died young, and two sons, H. L., a prominent lawyer of Meadville, and A. B. Our subject attended Allegheny College, and then took a medical course and practiced for three years in Meadville, during which time he studied law, and was admitted to the bar in 1851. He has found his medical knowledge of much service in his law practice. Mr. Richmond is one of the most noted criminal lawyers in this State, having been employed in over 4,000 criminal cases, sixty-five being homicides. He is also an expert mechanic, and can make a clock or steam engine. In 1853 he was appointed Assistant Director of machinery at the Crystal Palace. Mr. Richmond has delivered many scientific lectures on philosophy, physiology and chemistry, making his own apparatus for illustrating his subjects. He has been a prominent temperance lecturer and author for many years; was State Commissioner for Pennsylvania at the World’s Fair, 1866. He is author of the great temperance work, “Leaves From the Diary of an Old Lawyer,” which contains “Intemperance and Crime” and “Court and Prison;” also a tem­perance novel, “A Hawk in an Eagle’s Nest," which have received the highest commendation from the press, and an extensive circulation. Our subject was married September 7, 1848, to Mary Jane, daughter of Levi Morris, of this county, and by this union were born three sons: Louis L., jeweler in Meadville, married to Miss Winnie Day, of Ohio (have two children, May W. and George D.); Hiram M., deceased, married to Miss Margaret, daughter of Daniel Fowler, of Meadville (had one daughter, Margueritee F.); and Maj. Charles E., on the Governor’s staff, now reading law with his father.

History of Crawford County, Pennsylvania: containing a history of the county, its townships, towns, villages, schools, churches, industries, etc., portraits of early settlers and prominent men, biographies, history of Pennsylvania, statistical and miscellaneous matter, Chicago: Warner, Beers & Co., 1885, pages 765-766. View image of this page of the book on line at ancestry.com.  Free access  More Crawford County History Books  Search Hundreds of 1880s-1890s Pennsylvania County History Books for biographies and historical information on your ancestors.  View the book page images on line and print them out for your genealogy file!  Free Access to the old history books - plus birth & death records, census images and ALL other records at ancestry.com

.