Robert Alexander Richardson, January 1, 1883-December 31, 1894

Portrait of Robert A. Richardson.

Oil on canvas, 30 x 24 in., by Julia B. Mahood, 1941, circa. Location: Hearing Room B.

Born June 16, 1827 in Charlotte County, Virginia.
Died October 16, 1895 in Marion, Virginia.

Elected by the General Assembly on February 25, 1882 to a 12-year term beginning January 1, 1883. Service terminated by the unanimous unopposed election of five new judges for the term beginning January 1, 1895.

Education:

Read law in Monroe County.

Professional career:

Teacher, Monroe County, circa 1850.
Deputy clerk, Supreme Court of Appeals, Lewisburg, circa 1850-1860.
Private practice of law in Mercer County (circa 1860-1865) and Smyth County (1865-1882, 1895).
Virginia state delegate, 1861-1865.

Military service:

Mexican War (U.S. Army).
Civil War (Confederate).

Further reading/Research collections

Sources:

Elected, Supreme Court: Lewis, Richardson, Fauntleroy, and Hinton to Succeed Moncure, Staples, Christian, Anderson, and Burks, col. 3, The Daily Dispatch, (Richmond, Va.), February 26, 1882, retrieved on March 7, 2014; service terminated, Journal of the Senate of Virginia, 1893-1894 Session, 132-134, cited in Samuel N. Pincus, “The Virginia Supreme Court, Blacks, and the Law, 1870-1902,” (Ph.D. diss., University of Virginia, 1978), 42; biography, portrait presentation on April 14, 1941, published in 183 Va., lxvii-lxx, and Seargent S.P. Patteson, “The Supreme Court of Appeals of Virginia,” Green Bag, v. 5 (1893), 419; date and location of death, Virginia News col. 4, Alexandria Gazette (Alexandria, Va.), October 18, 1895, retrieved on February 24, 2014; See also the obituary published in the Richmond Dispatch, re-printed in the Virginia Law Register, v. I (Nov. 1895), 544-545. Portrait, Ray O. Hummel, Jr., and Katherine M. Smith, Portraits and Statuary of Virginians Owned by the Virginia State Library, the Medical College of Virginia, the Virginia Museum of Fine Arts, and Other State Agencies (Richmond, Va.: The Virginia State Library, 1977), 102. Richardson’s portrait was commissioned posthumously by his family at the request of the Virginia State Bar Association and donated to the court in 1941; see Proceedings of the Fifty-First Annual Meeting of the Virginia State Bar Association, August 1940 (Richmond: Richmond Press Printers, Inc.), 77 and Proceedings, . . . August 1941, 108.