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 the United States on the use of the text. 
 
 http://www.archive.org/details/cu31924012566422 
 
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 ^he Judges/' 
 
 An Old and Interesting Sussex County Mansion. 
 
 HISTORICAL SKETCH BY HENRY C. CONRAD. 
 
 The House as it is to-day, -with Glimpses of its 
 Contents and the Present Occupant. 
 
 BY EDWARD N. VALLANDIGHAM. 
 
 Georgefo-wn, Dela-ware. 
 1920. 
 
4-^ tii^'j 
 
 F 
 
 PRESS OF HUBERT A. ROOP 
 WILMINGTON, DEL. 
 
HISTORICAL SKETCH 
 
 BY HENRY C. CONRAD. 
 
 HE traveller entering Georgetown 
 from the. southwest, by the Laurel 
 Road, is inlpressed with the four 
 modern dwellings that of recent 
 years have been erected and are 
 now occupied as homes by four of 
 the prosperous attorneys of the 
 town. Next in order comes the "tanyard lot" that 
 of late has come into the control of an enterprising 
 doctor of the town ; for years the lot was owned and 
 operated as a tanyard by Edward Wootten and Dr. 
 Richards, and both they and a former owner are 
 credited with having made money by the old time 
 method of tanning leather. 
 
 Adjoining the "tanyard lot" is the home of the 
 Resident Associate Judge of Sussex County, pos- 
 sibly as interesting a house as can be found in these 
 parts. The house is supposed to have been built by 
 Peter Robinson, just when, has not been exactly asr 
 certained. Peter Robinson, born in 1775, was a son 
 of Thomas Robinson, the Loyalist. He was reared 
 in Indian River Hundred, and after a course of law 
 study with Chancellor Ridgely, at Dover, was ad- 
 mitted to the bar in 1799. He then settled in 
 Georgetown^ where for thirty years he was actively 
 
engaged in the practice of his profession, indulging 
 as a diversion in politics, and becoming the ac- 
 knowledged leader of his party in the county. He 
 served three terms as Secretary of State, under 
 three Sussex County Governors, and on the adop- 
 tion of the new State Constitution in 1831, became 
 the first associate justice of the Court of Errors 
 and Appeals for Sussex County, serving until his 
 death in 1836. Soon after his admission to the bar, 
 he marred his cousin Arcada Robinson, and then it 
 was that he secured six or eight of the lots laid out 
 on the original town plot of Georgetown, embrac- 
 ing about three acres, and erected the house in 
 which he spent the remainder of his life. 
 
 In construction, the best of materials must have 
 been used. The sills and framing, and most of the 
 floors are of white oak, and the sheathing of heart 
 cypress shingles, fashioned by hand, and brought 
 from the Cypress swamp some twenty miles away, 
 as solid and free from decay today, as they were a 
 hundred years ago. The house is stately in design, 
 two stories and attic. I have been told by a very old 
 lady who could recall events happening prior to 
 1840, that when a little girl she remembered an at- 
 tempt to throw water over the roof of the Robinson 
 house, by a primitive hand fire engine, then the 
 pride of the town boys, it being reckoned the tallest 
 house in town. 
 
 As originally built each room had an open fire- 
 place, the kitchen fireplace being six feet in width. 
 Ample outbuildings were provided, and on the cor- 
 ner of the intersecting street, a neat office building, 
 
Peter Robinson 
 Associate Justice 
 
still standing, typical of the early Sussex County 
 law office, was erected, and here, surrounded by his 
 law books and many classical volumes, Peter Rob- 
 inson wrought and delved for thirty years. Not an 
 old man, but with three score of years completed, he 
 died, and his remains were laid at rest with his 
 Robinson ancestors in the graveyard at Saint 
 Georges Chapel in Indian River Hundred. 
 
 At his death he left to survive him, three chil- 
 dren, Thomas Robinson, Jr., who was elected to 
 Congress in 1838; Alfred P. Robinson, who was 
 Secretary of State under Governor Ross, and the 
 father of Alfred P. Robinson, the Chief Justice; 
 and a daughter Mary, who, in 1833, was married to 
 Edward Wootten. Both sons were lawyers. 
 
 At the death of Peter Robinson, by an allotment 
 among his children the homestead went to the son, 
 Alfred P. Robinson, but afterwards, by agreement, 
 it was conveyed to the daughter, Mary, and thus 
 became the home of Judge and Mrs. Edward Woot- 
 ten. There are people who remember that when it 
 came into their control that considerable repair, 
 and possibly some alterations, were then made in 
 the mansion. Two handsome mantle pieces of gray 
 marble, that still remain, one in the parlor, and one 
 in the library, were likely installed at that time. 
 The date 1845 on the corner piece of the spouting 
 on the house would indicate that it was about that 
 time that the improvements were added to the 
 premises. 
 
 Edward Wootten became Peter Robinson's suc- 
 cessor in the little law office on the corner, as well 
 
as in the homestead. Wootten was the son of Peter 
 G. Wootten who had made a competency as a store- 
 keeper at Laurel, had served more than once in the 
 General Assembly, and who doubtless took pride in 
 so educating his son, Edward, as that he was sent to 
 Georgetown as a law student under Thomas 
 Cooper, then the leading lawyer in Sussex County, 
 and who had served a term in Congress. As an 
 evidence that the father was a man of decided opin- 
 ions, and not afraid to express them, I have in my 
 possession a copy of "The Doctrine and Discipline 
 of the Methodist Episcopal Church," published in 
 1804, in which is written "I, Peter G. Wootten left 
 the Methodist Church first of January, 1812, and 
 on the same day left off the use of strong liquor." 
 
 Edward Wootten became a prominent and im- 
 portant factor in public affairs in Sussex County, 
 soon after his admission to the bar in 1830. He 
 was the recognized county leader of the Democratic 
 party for thirty years, was offered a unanimous 
 nomination by his party for Congress when only 
 thirty-five years of age but declined ; and two years 
 later accepted the appointment as Associate Justice 
 for Sussex County, which position he held for a 
 term of forty years. He was recognized as a sound 
 and learned lawyer, and he rendered the State a 
 most valuable service in the years he occupied a seat 
 on the bench, holding the full regard and respect of 
 the bar throughout the State. 
 
 The Robinson house became known as the Woot- 
 ten house, by reason of its occupancy for forty 
 years, and more, by Judge Wootten and his accom- 
 
plished wife. A cordial hospitality was dispensed 
 and many are the stories of the beauty of Mrs. 
 Wootten, of her accomplishments, the grace and 
 ease of her entertainment, and the old time charm 
 of manner with which she presided over her house- 
 hold, and gave cordial welcome to her guests. 
 
 In this house was born the only child of the 
 Wootten marriage, Alfred Robinson Wootten, the 
 pride of his parents, a brilliant, dashing young 
 man, who studying law with Greorge M. Dallas, of 
 Philadelphia, entered the bar with great promise of 
 an unusual career. His marriage to Rhoda Burton, 
 the only daughter of Governor William Burton, 
 was the social event of the time, followed shortly 
 after by his appointment as Attorney General of 
 the State. His promising career was brought to an 
 early close by his death when only thirty years of 
 age. His sole survivor was a daughter, Mary Rob- 
 inson Wootten, to whom, by will of .the grand- 
 father. Judge Wootten, the premises were devised, 
 and who as owner cherishes the memories of the 
 past, and shows the warmest attachment for the 
 home of her girlhood, and seeks to maintain its dig- 
 nity and traditions. The house has been appropri- 
 ately named "The Judges." 
 
 When the writer came to Georgetown in 1909, to 
 take up his residence as Associate Judge of Sussex, 
 this old house became his home. It was the home 
 in town that most attracted me. It had been my 
 habit when coming to Georgetown, during the life- 
 time of Judge Wootten, to call on him and pay my 
 respects. He was always most kind and courteous 
 
to me. Here I have lived for eleven years in quiet 
 and content; the house has sheltered me comfort- 
 ably and I have been able to give rein to some of my 
 fads and fancies, and to bid welcome to friends and 
 neighbors beneath my roof. My neighbors have 
 been cordial and friendly. 
 
 The boxwood that was, doubtless, planted by 
 Judge Robinson, in what was the prize flower 
 garden of the town, in the old days, still flourishes ; 
 and attracts much attention from the passing auto- 
 mobilists of today. The stately pine tree that tow- 
 ers above the sturdy maples and the gaunt walnut, 
 its near neighbor; and the spreading silver leaf 
 poplar, not far away, all hold sweet communion 
 with each other, and give promise of standing sen- 
 tinel over the old house in the years to come, just as 
 they have sheltered and befriended the judges and 
 their loved ones in the past. 
 

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AN UP-TO-DATE CHAT OF THE OLD HOUSE 
 AND ITS PRESENT OCCUPANT. 
 
 BY EDWARD N. VALLANDIGHAM. 
 
 JOT the oldest of the shingled houses 
 in Georgetown, but perhaps the 
 most charming, is "The Judges," 
 a two-and-a-half-story structure 
 with hooded chimneys, and deep 
 dormers of beautiful proportion 
 and detail. The whole house in its 
 placid silvery gray looks like a dream dwelling come 
 to reality. One judge built this house a century 
 or more ago, and long occupied it ; a second was its 
 tenant far into his own old age ; today it has for oc- 
 cupant a third Sussex judge, the man whom it fits 
 as if it had been made solely to express his taste, 
 temper and whole personality, the Honorable 
 Henry C. Conrad, long an active lawyer and public 
 man at Wilmington, but now perhaps for the first 
 time truly at home in this serene retreat in the heart 
 of Sussex. 
 
 An "office," also old and shingled, is included 
 within the grounds of "The Judges," not an uncom- 
 mon adjunct to the homes of country lawyers, and 
 perhaps quite as much a domestic safety valve as a 
 
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 true "den" or sanctum. When the man of law quit- 
 ted the breakfast table he commonly betook himself 
 to the "office," where, in cool or cold weather, a wel- 
 coming hearth fire awaited his coming. No doubt 
 domestic tradition represented the husband and 
 father as immediately immersed in his deeper legal 
 studies, but there was usually a hospitable shabbi- 
 ness of dusty window panes and worn but thickly 
 upholstered armchairs that wooed to the pipe and at 
 least an hour's indulgence in the morning paper. 
 After these soothing exercises might come a half- 
 hour or so with "Benton's Thirty Years' View" or 
 some such delightful volume of political gossip, or 
 eyen Warren's now neglected "Ten Thousand a 
 Year," before the claims of cases and clients en- 
 gaged the legal mind. Senator Bayard, returning 
 from a visit to a remote county seat more than 
 thirty years ago, said that a man of intellect re- 
 stricted to such a place was apt to take to omniver- 
 ous reading or to strong drink. It is suspected that 
 a black bottle often found its place on the shelves 
 among the law books in some of these detached of- 
 fices. Judge Conrad's office has the agreeable dingi- 
 ness of such retreats, but one suspects that he pre- 
 fers most of the time the more spacious rooms of 
 "The Judges" itself. The condition of the old for- 
 mal garden of box attached to the place justifies the 
 suspicion that horticulture is not Judge Conrad's 
 favorite avocation. 
 
 As a matter of fact, the interior of "The Judges" 
 can leave one in no doubt as to its tenant's life-long 
 devotion to antiquarian research and illustrative 
 collection. "The Judges" is a museum of old furni- 
 
II 
 
 ture, rarely interesting pottery of the greatest va- 
 riety, significant prints relating to persons and 
 places Delawarean, portraits, photographs and, 
 best of all, scores of silhouettes, many of them 
 showing "dear dead women" with that clear loveli- 
 ness of outline and splendid distinction of carriage 
 that seem to have been characteristic of our ances- 
 tresses from the early nineteenth century backward 
 to the political infancy of the emancipated thirteen 
 states. Among the books that Judge Conrad cher- 
 ishes is a collection of volumes about Delaware per- 
 sons and things, written by Delawareans or pub- 
 lished in Delaware, a collection that will probably 
 go to the Delaware Historical Society when the 
 present owner shall have ceased to concern himself 
 with sublunary things, old or new. Another valu- 
 able collection of books is made up entirely of vol- 
 umes dealing with the history of American Method- 
 ism, a fitting collection for a Delawarean to have 
 made, since Methodism had so early and distin- 
 guished a beginning on this peninsula. Many of 
 Judge Conrad's treasures have their story attached, 
 and it is delightful to see the big, quiet man wander 
 from point to point along the wall as he tells you in 
 that deep, rich voice of this or that adventure dear 
 to the ear of a collector. Devotion to the antique 
 has not dulled Judge Conrad's sympathies with the 
 issues and the struggles of today. 
 
Cornell University Library 
 F 174.G35J92 
 
 The Judges :an old and interesting Susse 
 
 3 1924 012 566 422