Richard Handy Chittenden

Richard Handy Chittenden had a law practice at 27 Wall Street, New York, New York. He was highly educated. He obtained his law degree from Yale, and he studied in Germany. My mother said that he was a tutor to the son of King Wilhelm. Mother also said Richard Handy was a prominent mathematician.

9/15/2013: Following is a link to a short biographical sketch (with photo) that I found that contains some interesting info about Richard, and confirms some of what Mother told me, however, unless Richard Handy's life paralleled that of my great grandfather, Newton Henry Chittenden, some of the facts are mixed up with Newton's history. Anyway: http://www.rahs.org/illustrated/individuals/ChittendenRH.htm

Seems the link may not work, copied text below: http://www.rahs.org/illustrated/Photos/ChittendenRH.op.jpg "Richard Handy Chittenden, aged 61, is a native of Westbrook, Conn. His ancestors settled in that state in 1636 and furnished Vermont her first colonial governor. His grandfather served in the war of the Revolution. In 1859 he graduated from Yale Law School, and then pursued the study of civil law in the University of Heidelberg, Germany. Returning to New York and beginning the practice of his profession, when the news of the attack on Fort Sumpter was received he closed his law office, and on the 19th of April, 1861, enlisted as a private in the Seventy-first New York Regiment, and at the battle of Bull Run, his captain having been shot, led his company in a charge upon the enemy. At the expiration of his term of service he organized Company E, First Regiment Wisconsin Cavalry, and was commissioned its captain, serving in Southeastern Missouri until disability compelled him to resign. Proceeding northward, upon reaching St. Paul the Sioux Indian outbreak led him to take the field again, commanding the corps of mounted men who raised the siege of Fort Ripley, August 27, 1862. At the close of that campaign he returned east, and from 1864 to 1883 was engaged to law practice in New York city and Brooklyn. He also took an active part in politic and was secretary of the Brooklyn Reform Committee of Fifty from 1870 to 1873. He published in 1864, an exposition of Faust, and later a translation of the same, a book of poems, and many literary and scientific papers. In 1883 astmatic difficulties forced him to leave the East. After a residence of about two years in Marshall, Minn., he removed to Santa Barbara, Cal., where he was stricken down by typhoid fever. He then went to Colorado, built a log cabin in Boulder canon, and there alone continued his studies. In 1889, he discovered that the surface of the earth and moon are proportional to their sidereal periods, and, having been appointed United States Volunteer Observer, first noted and reported the oscillation of the magnetic needle on the approach of a cyclone. In 1891, he returned to Santa Barbara, and removed to Redlands in 1895, where he has continued the practice of law and astronomical researches. Among his later discoveries and contributions are the "Septiform Polygon," Wonderful Harmonies," "The Last Days of the Age," and "The Surface Period Relation.""

(Source: Illustrated Redlands, 1897, p. 56.)

From Obituary Record of Graduates of Yale University by Yale University: RICHARD HANDY CHITTENDEN, one of the seven children of Rev. Albert Cornelius and Patience Lavinia (Jones) Chittenden, was born May 17, 1836, at Westbrook, Conn. He took his preparatory course at Williston Seminary, Easthampton, Mass., and Fort Edward Institute, N.Y., and then taught in district schools for four years before entering the Law School in 1857. He completed his course in 1859 and was admitted to the New Haven bar in October of that year, then went at once to Heidelberg, Germany, where he studied civil law. On his return to the United States he was admitted to the New York bar, and opened an office, but soon enlisted as a private in the Seventy-first New York Regiment for three months, and was in the first battle of Bull Run. Then he organized Company E, first Regiment of Wisconsin Cavalry, of which he was captain until compelled to resign on account of asthma and malaria. After this in Minnesota he was acting major of the force that relieved Fort Ridgely from siege by Sioux Indians, and later was admitted to the bar in St. Paul. In the fall of 1863 he returned to New York City and was engaged in the practice of law there and in Brooklyn for twenty years. In 1866 he received the degree of Bachelor of Laws from Yale. On account of trouble from asthma he sought change of climate, first at Santa Barbara, Cal., where he practiced law, then at Boulder, Colo., where he lived alone in a cabin at an elevation of nine thousand fee, and afterwards at Urbita Village, Cal. He was an abolitionist, and during the Presidential campaigns of 1856, 1860, and 1864, made many speeches in behalf of Fremont and Lincoln. He organized a Reform Club in 1870, and from 1873 to 1876 was secretary of the Brooklyn Committee of Fifty. Besides his speeches he published many legal astronomical and matematical articles including a pamphlet on squaring the circle called "The Nearest Approximation," also poems, translations, and a novel, "The Owls of the Always Open." He was a fine linguist, speaking seven languages. Mr. Chittenden died at a hospital in New York City, November 15, 1911, at the age of 75 years, and was buried in Westbrook, Conn. He married at Milford, Conn., November 14, 1861, Lucy Lee Brace, daughter of Rev. Jonathan Brace, D.D. (B.A. Amherst 1831) and Sarah Elizabeth (Finch) Brace. Mrs. Chittenden and their two sons, Richard Percy (B.A. Harvard 1888) and Jonathan Brace (B.A. Harvard 1889), survive him. Two of his brothers, Rev. Albert Jerome Chittenden and Rev. Ezra Porter Chittenden, graduated from Ripon College in 1868 and 1874, respectively, and another, Lieutenant Newton Henry Chittenden, received the degree of Bachelor of Laws from Columbia University in 1888.