San Francisco County
JUDGE LEWIS D. McKISICK
JUDGE LEWIS D. McKISICK was born in Henderson county, Tennessee, March 7, 1829, his father, Dr. Wilson H. McKisick, having settled there the year previous. His grandfather, Daniel McKisick served with distinctions as a Captain in the Revolutionary war, and afterward represented in the Senate and Assembly of North Carolina the county of Lincoln. In 1800 he removed with his family to Tennessee. Judge McKisick’s mother dying in 1836, he was sent with a younger brother to his grandparents in Alabama. In 1841 they returned to Tennessee and entered the academy at Lexington. Lewis D. completed his studies there in 1850, in the meantime working for some years on a farm. He then taught school one year, devoting his spare time to the study of law; spent one year in the law office of Hon. Return J. Meigs, Nashville; in 1853 attended a term of the law school of Cumberland University, Lebanon, Tennessee; and was admitted to the bar of the Supreme Court of the State in the spring of 1854.
He first practiced at Lexington two years, removed to Paris, same State, and from there, in 1857, to Memphis, where he remained until 1879, when he came to California. During his early practice at Memphis he was in partnership with his brother-in-law, C. H. Williams. The firm did a successful business until the breaking out of the war, when both members entered the Confederate service. Colonel Williams was killed in the battle of Shiloh, and Mr. McKisick returned to Memphis and was prominently connected with the bar there during the remainder of his stay in Tennessee.
In 1875 he was appointed one of the three Judges to aid the Supreme Court in disposing of the large mass of civil business which had accumulated on its docket, and in 1877 was re-appointed, his associates at that time electing him Chief Justice. In 1879 a like appointment was tendered his which however, he declined. The Governor shortly afterward sent to him a commission as special Judge of the Supreme Court, to hear cases in which one of the regular Judges of the court was incompetent, and this he accepted.
When, on account of the yellow-fever epidemic, in 1879, Judge McKisick decided to make his home in the West, he was the recipient of many testimonial letters from eminent lawyers all over the State, expressing their regret at his departure and wishing him success on this coast.
Arriving in California, he located at San Jose. After a few years of practice there he took up his residence in San Francisco, and became an associate counsel of the Southern Pacific Railroad Company. Since that time he had been prominently connected with many important litigations here, conspicuous among which was the great case of Colton vs. Stanford.
As a lawyer Judge McKisick has won an enviable reputation, and in society he is alike popular. A lover of classic literature and a student of various branches of knowledge as well as the science of law; always unselfish, kind and true; with a stateliness of manner that repels undue familiarity, and an earnestness of character that does not invite jesting, his society is sought and his friendship warmly appreciated.
Transcribed
by Joyce and David Rugeroni.
Source: “The Bay of
San Francisco,” Vol. 2, Pages 371-372, Lewis Publishing Co, 1892.
© 2006 Joyce & David
Rugeroni.