Philip C. Pendleton

Philip Clayton Pendleton (November 24, 1779 – April 3, 1863) was a lawyer and briefly a United States federal judge in Virginia.

Biography

A native of Berkeley County, Virginia (now West Virginia), Pendleton attended Princeton University, graduating in 1796, and Dickinson College. He read law to enter the bar around 1800, and had a private practice while also engaged in farming.

Pendleton was a member of the Board of Commissioners who met at the tavern at Rockfish Gap in 1818 and decided to locate the University of Virginia at Charlottesville - a group that included Thomas Jefferson, James Madison, James Monroe, John Marshall and among others, John G. Jackson, another future judge of the United States District Court for the Western District of Virginia. (Pendleton's vote was for Lexington).

Pendleton received a recess appointment from John Quincy Adams on May 6, 1825, to a seat on the United States District Court for the Western District of Virginia vacated by John G. Jackson. He was never formally nominated for the position - his service terminated on July 29, 1825, due to his resignation. He was succeeded by Alexander Caldwell. Pendleton then returned to his private practice. In 1829, he participated in the convention to revise the state constitution.^[1] He served for many years as chief judge of the County Court for Beckley County,.^[1] until his death there, in 1863.

Sources

• Philip C. Pendleton at the Biographical Directory of Federal Judges, a public domain publication of the Federal Judicial Center.

References