Title: Alexander Wolcott Stow Papers
Inclusive Dates: 1811-1849

Creator:

• Stow, Alexander Wolcott, 1804-1854

Call Number: Mss 305

Quantity: 0.2 c.f. (1 archives box)

Repository:

Wisconsin Historical Society, Division of Library, Archives, and Museum Collections

Archival Locations:

Wisconsin Historical Society (Map)

COLLECTION MAY BE STORED OFF-SITE: see catalog entry to request materials and for additional information.

Abstract:

Papers of Alexander Wolcott Stow, Wisconsin's first Chief Justice of the Supreme Court, primarily containing information on his personal activities while living in New York and travelling in Europe, prior to his arrival in Wisconsin. Included are fragmentary correspondence, diaries, poetry and other writings, and financial and miscellaneous materials.

Language: English

URL to cite for this finding aid: http://digital.library.wisc.edu/1711.dl/wiarchives.uw-whs-mss00305

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Alexander W. Stow, lawyer, jurist, and businessman, was born February 5, 1805 in Louisville, Lewis County, New York. Not much is known of his early life. He attended West Point for one year, but did not like it and resigned. Stow then studied law, and later established a legal practice in Lewis County. In the early 1830's he practiced law in Rochester, New York. During much of 1837-1839, Stow traveled through France, Spain, Portugal, and Italy. In 1841 he came to Wisconsin and settled on land he had purchased in Taycheedah Township, Fond du Lac County. From 1841 to 1848, Stow practiced law and dabbled in business in Fond du Lac and Milwaukee.

When Wisconsin became a state in 1848, Stow was elected circuit judge of the 4th Judicial District. Under the provisions of the Wisconsin Constitution, circuit judges served ex-officio as Justices on the state's Supreme Court. Stow's colleagues on the court elected him the first Chief Justice of the Supreme Court of Wisconsin. When his term expired in 1851, Stow retired to private life, and to his law and business practices.

Stow's character had diverse facets. An early love of poetry stayed with him throughout his life; some poems he himself wrote remain. His journals of his travels through Europe reveal a highly developed sensibility. Yet he was also a rough, often abrasive, and independent man who offended many. He never married, but had a Chippewa squaw as a common law wife. He was thought of as eccentric--for example, he rarely signed his letters.

Justice Stow died on September 14, 1854 in Wisconsin.

Following his death, Stow's papers went to a relative. In 1854 Lyman C. Draper, the recording secretary of the State Historical Society of Wisconsin, wrote to the relative, who implied that the papers might be of interest to the Society. However, there was no follow-up by either Draper or the relative, and there is no record of the papers for the next eight decades. In 1936 a box containing the records, some old tintypes, and a gold tooth, was bought for fifty cents at a storage warehouse auction in Aberdeen, South Dakota by Delmar H. Plank, a policeman in Aberdeen. He did not open it, however, until early 1974, when he gave the papers and tintypes to the State Historical Society of Wisconsin.

The collection is composed of journals kept by Stow, letters written by and to Stow, various other of his writings, and financial records and miscellaneous material.

The correspondence may be grouped as follows: a) letters to Stow from his father (1811-1812), b) letters by Stow and to Stow (1820-1824), c) three letters from the years 1829-1835, d) fourteen letters Stow wrote from Europe, mainly to his brothers and sisters (1837-1839), and e) a few letters Stow received in the late 1840's, mainly replies to invitations.

Stow's journals cover the period July 1833 to March 1834, when he was in Rochester, and from December 1837 to October 1838, when he was in Europe. There are also fragments of a journal written when Stow was in Ohio, probably in 1840. The journals describe what Stow did, and record his impressions. Like his letters, they are revealing, but cover only brief segments of his life. There is almost nothing on the years which Stow spent in Wisconsin or on his childhood.

The folder of writings does not fill the gaps mentioned above, as it contains only some poetry, random notes, and a speech (probably from the late 1840's) on the Bar's “rights and privileges and...duties and obligations.”

The folder of financial and miscellaneous material is exiguous.

Acquisition Information

Presented by Delmar H. Plank, Aberdeen, South Dakota, June 10, 1974. Accession Number: M74-235

Processing Information

Processed by R. Fullerton (Intern) and Joanne Hohler, June 11, 1974.

	Correspondence
Box   1 Folder   1	Letters to Stow from his father, 1811-1812
Box   1 Folder   1	Letters to Stow and by Stow, 1820-1824, 1829-1835
Box   1 Folder   1	Letters written by Stow from Europe, 1837-1839
Box   1 Folder   1	Letters to Stow, 1848-1849
	Journals (Diaries)
Box   1 Folder   2	Rochester, New York, 1833, July 9 - 1834, March 31
Box   1 Folder   2	Ohio, 1840 (?)
Box   1 Folder   3	Europe, 1837, December 31 - 1838, October 1
	Writings, Notes, Speeches
Box   1 Folder   4	Poems, undated
Box   1 Folder   4	Quotations, undated
Box   1 Folder   4	Speech to the Bar, circa 1848
	Financial and Miscellaneous
Box   1 Folder   5	Receipts, 1834, 1838
Box   1 Folder   5	Notes on voting returns in New York counties, 1830, 1832, 1834
Box   1 Folder   5	Newspaper clippings, undated