Williams, Isaiah Thornton, 1819-1886.

Isaiah Thornton Williams (1819-1886) was an attorney in New York City and Westchester County, N.Y. He was involved in state and national politics and was acquainted with prominent literary and political figures.

From the description of Isaiah Thornton Williams papers, ca. 1833-ca. 1921, bulk (1850-1880). (New York Public Library). WorldCat record id: 122615933

Isaiah Thornton Williams (1819-86) was born at New Ipswich, N.H. He was descended on his father's side from one of the Pilgrims who arrived in the New World on the "Mayflower." His maternal uncle (Judge Tenney) was a jurist and member of the Louisiana Supreme Court. Williams received his early education at the Academy at Exeter (N.H.) where he became acquainted with Ralph Waldo Emerson and through Emerson with A. Bronson Alcott and Henry D. Thoreau with whom he established friendships. In 1836 he was apparently briefly employed as "an assistant in the counting room" of the Hampshire Manufacturing Company at Ware (Mass.). Afterwards he began the study of law in the in the offices of Henry K. Smith and Millard Fillmore at Buffalo (N.Y.). By 1844 he had begun to practice law in Buffalo as an attorney and counselor of the Supreme Court of Erie County. During the presidency of Millard Fillmore he was often a guest at the White House where he was introduced to many prominent political figures. In 1854, with the help of Millard Fillmore who recommended Williams to his New York friends, he went to New York City where he quickly established his reputation as one of the outstanding members of the New York bar.

In the 1850's Williams conducted his legal practice in partnership with Henry M. Barnard (Williams & Barnard) and also with an attorney named Hyde (Williams, Hyde & Barnard). In 1867, his health broken by overwork, he retired from his practice to become register in bankruptcy for New York County. In 1877 he returned to his law practice, entering into partnership with Minott M. Silliman at White Plains (Westchester County). In 1881, his partnership with Silliman dissolved, he reopened his law office in New York City where his son, Elliot Williams, also an attorney, collaborated with him. His practice, which was various in scope, included maritime law, domestic relations, adultery, libel and slander, negligence, personal injury, landlord-tenant relations and bankruptcy. Horace Greeley, with whom he had developed a close friendship, retained him as counsel in several libel cases involving the New York Tribune.

In politics Williams supported the Whig, and later, the Republican Party. In the presidential campaign of 1864 he defended in public speeches Lincoln's conduct of the war urging his reelection. Earlier, during the gubernatorial campaign of 1862, he denounced what he regarded as the moral and political bankruptcy of the state's Democratic Party and its gubernatorial nominee, Horatio Seymour.

In religious matters Williams was a disciple of Emanuel Swedenborg. He became, however, disillusioned with the leadership of the New Church while attending its national convention held at Philadelphia in 1870, and abruptly resigned his membership in it although he apparently continued to accept its teachings. He remained in close friendship with the prominent Swedenborgian, Benjamin Fisk Barrett. In the 1860's Williams frequented the seances of a spiritualist medium who, supposedly, placed him in contact with a deceased sister. In his later years he experienced a spiritual crisis which plunged him into despondency and despair.

In 1849 Williams married Ellen E. White, daughter of Ferdinand Elliot White of Boston. She died in 1877 after a long illness. In 1860 Williams and his family settled at Fordham (then in Westchester Co.) where he remained until 1869 when he purchased a farm at Chappaqua (Westchester Co.) near the residence of his friend, Horace Greeley. He died there on April 5, 1886. He had three sons, Elliot, Kenneth and Reginald; and two daughters, Elizabeth Williams (Girod) and Josephine Williams (Bumstead).

From the guide to the Isaiah Thornton Williams papers, ca. 1833-ca. 1921, 1850-1880, (The New York Public Library. Manuscripts and Archives Division.)