Lawyers and Lawmakers of Kentucky, by H. Levin, editor, 1897. Published
by Lewis Publishing Company, Chicago.  Reprinted by Southern Historical
Press.  p. 239.  Jefferson County.

HENRY PIRTLE, of Louisville, lawyer and jurist, was born near Springfield,
Washington county, Kentucky, November 5, 1798, the son of John and Amelia
(Fitzpatrick) Pirtle.  His father was a native of Berkeley county,
Virginia, where he was born in 1772, and when still a youth moved to
southwestern Virginia, near Abingdon.  Here at the age of twenty he married
and at once came to Kentucky and settled in Washington county, which was
his home until his death.  At twenty-one he became a Methodist preacher,
and was one of the pioneers of that church who zealously advocated its
cause.  To the duties of a minister he added also those of a teacher and
surveyor.  He was a man of strong intellect, improved by study, and he
early implanted in his son a love of knowledge which never flagged.
     Supplementing the instruction given him by his father with the
opportunities afforded by the schools of the neighborhood, Henry Pirtle
succeeded in obtaining a good education, combined with habits of patient
study and investigation.  The latter acquirements were especially
developed and fostered by his father, who was a skilled mathematician, as
evidenced by a manuscript work on mathematics as applied to surveying,
containing a full table of logarithms calculated by himself for his own
use.  His mother was a gentle, amiable woman, with all the courage of a
pioneer matron, who braved the dangers of the wilderness to found a home
in the infant state of Kentucky.  Blessed with such parents and reared in
the atmosphere of a pious and hospitable home, where all the leading
Methodist preachers and men of intellect found a hearty welcome, young
Pirtle grew up under influences which left an indelible impress upon his
character and formed the key-note of his afterlife in his strong ambition
to excel in all things.
     When eighteen years of age, John Rowan--then one of the most prominent
members of the Kentucky bar--invited him to make his home with him at his
residence, near Bardstown, and study law.  Accepting this generous
proposition, he pursued his studies for three years, enjoying at the same
time the advantages of a large classical library and the companionship
and counsel of a profound scholar and enlightened statesman.  When, in
1819, he left the roof of his friend and patron and received his license
to practice law, Judge Rowan pronounced him the best equipped lawyer of
his age he had ever seen.  His first experience in practice was in
Hartford, Ohio county, Kentucky, where he early took rank with the leading
members of the bar and soon acquired a business not limited to his county
or judicial district.  While thus engaged he was attracted to Louisville
by the growing prominence of the city, and in 1825 he moved there, and it
became his residence for the remainder of his life.
     Although but twenty-seven years of age, Mr. Pirtle was, shortly after
becoming a member of the bar of Louisville, appointed by Governor Desha
judge of the circuit court, a position which he filled for seven years with
acceptability to the profession and honor to himself.  Although the
appointment was during good behavior and practically a life office, he felt
impelled to resign, on account of meagerness of its salary, for in 1829 he
had married, and his pay was inadequate for his support.  He resumed his
profession and soon had a large and valuable practice, adhering to it
strictly until 1850, except for a short interval in 1846, when he served as
circuit judge under a commission pending a permanent appointment, and two
terms in the legislature,--form 1840 to 1842.  His first law partner was
Larz Anderson, brother of General Robert Anderson, of the United States
Army; but upon the latter's removal to Cincinnati in 1835 he formed a
partnership with James Speed, afterward United States attorney-general in
the cabinets of Lincoln and Johnson.  This association--marked by the
largest success as well as the strongest friendship, indicated by each
naming a son after the other--continued until 1850, when Judge Pirtle was
appointed chancellor, and then elected at the first election under the new
constitution.  After serving six years on the bench, he resumed practice,
with Bland Ballard, until 1860, when Judge Ballard became United States
district judge.  Judge Pirtle then entered into partnership with John
Roberts.  In 1862 he was again elected chancellor, and served until 1868.
He had served on the bench twenty years and had reached the age of seventy,
but was still vigorous in mind and body, though for the remaining years
of his active life he confined his legal practice to office consultation,
and gave his attention chiefly to his duties as a professor of law.
     In 1846, upon the organization of the law department of the University
of Louisville, he was chosen profession of equity and constitutional law
and commercial law, his colleagues being Preston S. Loughborough and
Garnett Duncan.  He continued to discharge the duties of a patient, honored
and beloved instructor until 1873, when he was made emeritus professor,
continuing as such until his death.  As a lecturer and teacher of law
Judge Pirtle had few superiors in any country; and thousands of lawyers in
Kentucky and other states, who have brought honor to their profession, in
words as in practical results, have borne testimony to his influence in
storing their minds with sound precepts of law and impressing upon them the
lofty responsibilities attaching to their profession.  The very presence
of the distinguished Judge inspired all with his own sense of the sacred
dignity of the law, while his benevolent and kindly disposition invited the
fullest confidence in approaching him for explanation of any abstruse
points.  He taught, not to display his own learning, which was thorough and
profound; he lectured, not to excite the wonder of his class at the depth
of his wisdom and the intricacies of the law, incomprehensible to a novice,
but in all forms of communication with his class he strove to make the
principles of law plain, and their application easy of understanding.  Long
familiarity with the law, its enactment, its practice and its
interpretation had fitted him with admirable equipment as a teacher,
although it was to his experience and ability as a judge, bothof common law
and equity, that he was chiefly indebted for his greatsuccess as an
instructor.
     As a jurist Judge Pirtle early evinced the highest capacity for
original investigation and interpretation of the law.  His mind was early
skilled in logical reasoning, which enabled him to solve a legal
complexity as easily as a problem in Euclid.  As a lawyer he was not one
who relied upon antecedent cases but went down to the fundamental
principles and applied them to the case in hand, whether similar questions
had been adjudicated adversely or not.  This element of his judicial mind
was well illustrated in his decision in a Meade county case, in 1827, when
he held that upon the arrest of judgment for defect in the indictment the
prisoner should not be discharged but he held to await a new indictment.
Prior to that time, in such cases, the accused had been set free, under the
constitutional clause that no man should be twice placed in jeopardy for
the same offense, and thus many vicious men were discharged upon a
technicality.  Judge Pirtle maintained that the party was not put in
jeopardy on a bad indictment, and, although there was temporary opposition
to the new ruling, it has remained the undisputed law of criminal practice
in Kentucky ever since.  In 1833 Judge Pirtle published a digest of the
decisions of the court of appeals from its organization to date, which was
a valuable compilation for the bar.
     In all matters affecting the welfare of society and the advancement
of knowledge and religion, Judge Pirtle took an active and leading part.
He was president of the old Kentucky Historical Society, incorporated in
1838, of which his friend, Judge Rowan, was the first president; and,
through his great care and interest in its objects, was preserved and
ultimately published the autograph letter of George Rogers Clark to George
Mason, of Virginia, giving a detailed account of the capture of Kaskaskia
and Vincennes,--written shortly after the event,--being a complete history
of the campaign and an exceedingly valuable addition to the historical
archives of the country.
     A man of such character as is portrayed in this sketch could not have
have been other than a good Christian.  One who knew him well has said
of him that "he studied theology as he did law, and was deeply learned in
the history of Christianity.  For several years he taught a class of
young men in the Sunday-school with the same ample learning and research
with which he taught his law students.  The teachings of his pious parents
have been engrafted on a nature inherently inclined to religious thought
and devotion, and he accepted, after deliberate examination for himself,
the truth of revealed religion.  Unobtrusive in his views and conscious of
the difficulties of belief, he was charitable toward the doubts of others
and liberal toward those who differed with him in faith."  He was a
Unitarian in religious faith and a member of the church of the Messiah.
     On the 28th of March, 1880, full of years and honor, Judge Pirtle
sank for rest, universally honored and beloved.  For more than half a
century he had dwelt among his people and had seen Louisville of a few
thousand inhabitants expand into a great city, with all the adjuncts and
appliances of advanced civilization; and while he contributed largely to
every element of this greatness, the monument which will long commemorate
his name is the admirable judicial system and equity jurisprudence which
he contributed so greatly to build up and adorn.  At his death there was
every becoming manifestation of respect on the part of the bar, the bench,
the civil authorities and the community at large, and his memory is still
cherished as a grateful inheritance.

Pirtle Fitzpatrick Rowan Anderson Loughborough Duncan Speed Roberts Ballard
=
Bardstown-Nelson-KY Washington-KY Berkeley-VA

http://www.rootsweb.com/~kygenweb/kybiog/jefferson/pirtle.h2.txt