Hall, Junius

Born: 1811-06-08 Connecticut

Died: 1851-08-14 Boston, Massachusetts

Flourished:

A graduate of Yale College, class of 1831, Hall read law with his first cousin, John H. Brockway, and attended Yale Law School from 1835 to 1836. He earned admission to the Connecticut bar in the spring of 1836. Instead of practicing in Connecticut, Hall moved to Illinois, settling in Alton, where he commenced the practice of law in partnership with Newton D. Strong. Hall was among the attorneys that defended those charged with inciting the riot that resulted in the death of Elijah J. Lovejoy in November 1837. Hall was opposing counsel in several cases involving Abraham Lincoln. Discouraged by the impact of the Panic of 1837 and the riot on Alton and Illinois, he left Alton in 1843, moving to St. Louis. Finding the climate unsuitable, Hall moved from St. Louis to Boston in 1846. Opening his own law practice, he soon became prominent in the Boston bar and a much sought after defense attorney. In November 1849, he married Emily Baldwin, daughter of esteemed Boston attorney Aaron Baldwin. In 1851, Massachusetts voters elected him to the Massachusetts House of Representatives, where he participated in reforming the court system. The rigors of life in the legislature damaged his health, causing his premature death.

Gravestone, Ellington Center Cemetery, Ellington, CT; W. T. Norton, ed., Centennial History of Madison County, Illinois and Its People 1812 to 1912 (Chicago: Lewis, 1912), 71, 74; Franklin Bowditch Dexter, Biographical Notices of Graduates of Yale College (New Haven: n.p. 1913), 222-23; David D. Field, Brief Memoirs of the Members of the Class Graduated at Yale College in September, 1802 (1863), 71; For Lincoln's cases in which Hall was a participant, search "Hall, Junius," Martha L. Benner and Cullom Davis et al., eds., The Law Practice of Abraham Lincoln: Complete Documentary Edition, 2d edition (Springfield: Illinois Historic Preservation Agency, 2009), http://www.lawpracticeofabrahamlincoln.org.