Snyder, William H.

Born: 1825-07-12 Saint Clair County, Illinois

Died: 1892-12-24 Belleville, Illinois

William H. Snyder was a lawyer, postmaster, U.S. Army officer, state representative, state's attorney, and judge. After completing his studies at McKendree College, he studied law with Gustave P. Koerner, and was admitted to the Illinois bar in 1845. He served as postmaster of Belleville, Illinois from at least 1847 to 1849, and, during the Mexican War, he also served as first lieutenant and adjutant in Company E of the Fifth Illinois Volunteers. By 1850, he was doing well enough that he owned $8,000 in real estate and, from 1850 to 1854, he served as Saint Clair County's representative in the Illinois General Assembly. His prestige and standing in the community increased over the next several decades. In 1855, Illinois Governor Joel A. Matteson appointed him state's attorney, a position Snyder held for two years. He was elected judge for the Twenty-Fourth Circuit Court in 1857, and married Jane Champion in June of that year. The couple had at least two children together. In the decades after the Civil War, Snyder won election as judge for the Third Circuit Court and was reelected twice.

Newton Bateman and Paul Selby, eds., Historical Encyclopedia of Illinois and History of Mercer County, ed. by Wm. A. Lorimer (Chicago: Munsell, 1900), 1:491; Register of all Officers and Agents, Civil, Military, and Naval, in the Service of the United States, on the Thirtieth September, 1847 (Washington, DC: J. & G. S. Gideon, 1847), 406*; Register of all Officers and Agents, Civil, Military, and Naval, in the Service of the United States, on the Thirtieth September, 1849 (Washington, DC: Gideon, 1849), 468*; Isaac H. Elliott, Record of the Services of Illinois Soldiers in the Black Hawk War, 1831-32, and in the Mexican War, 1846-48 (Springfield: Journal Company, 1902), 216; U.S. Census Office, Seventh Census of the United States (1850), Belleville, St. Clair County, IL, 438; Illinois Statewide Marriage Index, St. Clair County, 23 June 1857, Illinois State Archives, Springfield, IL; U.S. Census Office, Ninth Census of the United States (1870), Belleville, St. Clair County, IL, 69.