Judge moses chapin.jpg
Portrait of Moses Chapin
Colby Kimble (active 1835-1867)

Moses Chapin

Gender:
Male
Born:
May 2, 1791
Died:
October 8, 1865
Home Town:
West Springfield, MA
Later Residences:
Rochester, NY
Marriage(s):
Esther Ward Chapin (September 1818)
Lucy Kibbe Chapin (October 31, 1826)
Biographical Notes:
Moses Chapin was the son of Moses Augustus and Lucina (Graves) Chapin. He was born the second child of ten siblings. Chapin was prepared for college by his pastor Rev. Dr. Joseph Lathrop, a Yale graduate of 1754. After briefly studying law with Augustine G. Monroe in Virginia, Chapin attended the Litchfield Law School. Chapin then moved to Albany, NY to complete his legal studies and in September of 1815 served as a tutor at the newly founded Albany Academy. In August of 1816 he was admitted to the bar in Albany but relocated that same year to Rochester, NY; then only a village with a population of 600. Chapin became deeply involved in his growing community and he established the first church in Rochester. He had two surviving daughters with his first wife who died only five years after they ...
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Education
Years at LLS:
1813
Other Education:
Attended Williams College for two years, and later graduated from Yale College in 1811.
Profession / Service
Profession:
Lawyer; Political Office
Admitted To Bar:
Albany, NY in 1816
Local Posts:
Justice of the Peace (Rochester, NY)
Judge of the County Court (Monroe County, NY)
Related Objects and Documents
In the Ledger:
help The Citation of Attendance provides primary source documentation of the student’s attendance at the Litchfield Female Academy and/or the Litchfield Law School. If a citation is absent, the student is thought to have attended but currently lacks primary source confirmation.

Records for the schools were sporadic, especially in the formative years of both institutions. If instructors kept comprehensive records for the Litchfield Female Academy or the Litchfield Law School, they do not survive. Researchers and staff have identified students through letters, diaries, family histories and genealogies, and town histories as well as catalogues of students printed in various years. Art and needlework have provided further identification of Female Academy Students, and Litchfield County Bar records document a number of Law School students. The history of both schools and the identification of the students who attended them owe credit to the early 20th century research and documentation efforts of Emily Noyes Vanderpoel and Samuel Fisher, and the late 20th century research and documentation efforts of Lynne Templeton Brickley and the Litchfield Historical Society staff.
CITATION OF ATTENDANCE:
Ledger. "Journals of the Barr - Litchfield County." Litchfield Historical Society.; Catalogue of the Litchfield Law School (Hartford, CT: Press of Case, Tiffany and Company, 1849), 11.

Litchfield County Bar Association Records, 1813, Litchfield Historical Society, Helga J. Ingraham Memorial Library.
Secondary Sources:
Chapin, Gilbert Warren. The Chapin Book of Genealogical Data, Vol. 1. Hartford, CT: Chapin Family Assoc., 1924; Ward, Douglas Whitney. The Ward Family Genealogy. D.W. Ward, 1985; Chapin, Orange. The Chapin Genealogy. Read Books, 2008.; Kelsey, John. Lives and Reminiscences of the Pioneers of Rochester and Western New York. Rochester: J. Kelsey, 1854.; Dr. Albert G. Hall. Memorial of Moses Chapin. 1865; Dexter, Franklin Bowditch. Biographical Sketches of the Graduates of Yale College with Annals of College History, Vol. 6. New Haven: Yale University Press, 1912.
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