Wayne County Biographies



Part of the Indiana Biographies Project



John F. Kibbey

The name of Judge Kibbey is enduringly inscribed on the pages of Indiana's history in connection with the records of her jurisprudence. After many years of activity in the legal profession, however, he is now living retired at his pleasant home in Richmond. His superior ability won him marked success; he was crowned with high judicial honors; and in business and private life he won that good name which is rather to be chosen than great riches. He is one of the native sons of Wayne county, his birth having occurred May 4, 1826, his parents being John Crane and Mary (Espy) Kibbey. The Kibbey family is of Welsh extraction, and was founded in America about 1700, the original American ancestors locating midway between Trenton and Newark, New Jersey. There Ephraim Kibbey, the grandfather of the Judge, was born and reared. In 1777 he enlisted as a private in Captain Jacob Martin's company, Fourth Battalion New Jersey Continental line, and served during the continuance of the Revolutionary war. He then returned to New Jersey, where he remained until his removal to Ohio. He was a surveyor, and in that capacity started westward with a party of emigrants. They located on the Ohio river, just below the mouth of the Little Miami river, on a tract of land known as the Symmes Purchase, and there founded the town of Columbia. Mr. Kibbey assisted in the survey of that tract of land. On the 1st of January, 1790, General St. Clair arrived in Columbia and on the following day appointed Ephraim Kibbey an ensign in the army. The latter also commanded a company under General Wayne, known as "Mad Anthony" by reason of his great daring in battle. He served with the rank of major. He died in 1807. His wife was, before her marriage, a Miss Crane, and to them were born six children, three sons and three daughters.

To this family belonged John Crane Kibbey, who was born in New Jersey, March 17, 1783, and in 1788 was taken by his parents to Columbia, Ohio, where he was reared to manhood. He acquired his education under the direction of his father, who had been a teacher in early manhood, and pursued his studies at night in books borrowed from Governor Morrow, of Ohio. With his uncle, Mr. Crane, he learned the tanner's and currier's trade, and at the time of his marriage was the owner of a half-section of land in Warren county, Ohio. In 1812 he purchased seven hundred acres of land near Salisbury, Wayne county, Indiana, and one hundred and sixty acres two miles west of that place, and the following year removed to Salisbury, then the county-seat. He established a tan yard, and for some years was prominently connected with the business and public life of the community. In 1814 he was appointed justice of the peace and did a large business in the justice court. In the early ‘20s he came to Richmond, then a mere hamlet. Here he continued to serve as justice of the peace, and also built and conducted a tavern in the town. He soon relinquished that business, however, but for some years continued to hold the office of justice of the peace, and owned large property interests in Richmond, Salisbury and Wayne county. He was a Democrat of the old school and cast his first presidential vote for Jefferson, in 1804. He continued to support the Democracy until 1854, when the Kansas-Nebraska bill was passed, and he left the party. In 1850 he removed to Illinois, where he died in 1856, the year of the inception of the Republican party, whose principles and faith he endorsed. He married Miss Mary Espy and to them were born ten children, nine daughters and a son.

The last named, and the youngest of the family is Judge John F. Kibbey, the honored subject of this review. He was born May 4, 1826, in Wayne county, Indiana, in which he has always lived. He remained in Richmond until the age of fourteen years, then removed to Centerville, at that time the county-seat, and in 1874 returned to Richmond, where he has resided continuously since. He acquired his preliminary education in the common schools, later attended the Wayne County Seminary, in Centerville, and afterward became a student in Miami University, in Oxford, Ohio. In 1850 he entered upon the study of law, his preceptor being Governor O. P. Morton, of Centerville. His preparation was thorough and comprehensive, and in 1852 he was admitted to the bar. While studying he engaged in teaching in the country schools and in Hagerstown. In 1851 he was appointed county surveyor, and in 1852, 1854 and 1856 was elected to that office, which he filled most acceptably until 1857, when he resigned.

In 1853 Judge Kibbey formed a law partnership with Governor Morton, which connection was continued until 1860, when the latter was elected chief executive of the state. In March, 1862, Judge Kibbey was appointed attorney-general of Indiana, and continued to fill that position until November, when the regular election occurred. During the two years following he engaged in the private practice of law to some extent, but his time was largely taken up with military duties. In 1863 he was appointed a commandant, with the rank of colonel, of the congressional district in which Wayne county is located, his duty being to procure enlistments for the army. He enlisted sixteen companies, of which he was commander while they were in Richmond. The greater part of these constituted the One Hundred and Twenty-fourth Indiana Infantry, and a portion were in the Ninth Indiana Cavalry.

In March, 1865, he was appointed judge of the sixth common-pleas judicial district, composed of Wayne, Fayette, Union and Franklin counties, and in the autumn of that year was elected to that office, being re-elected in 1868 and 1872. In March, 1873, the common-pleas court was abolished, and Wayne county was made the seventeenth judicial circuit, of which Mr. Kibbey was elected judge, at a special election, in October, 1873. In 1878 he was re- elected, his term expiring October 21, 1885, when he resumed the practice of law, continuing therein until his retirement from the profession, in 1898. As a lawyer he soon won rank among the distinguished members of the bar of Indiana. The favorable judgment which the world passed upon him in his early years was never set aside or in any degree modified during his long career at the bar and on the bench. It was, on the contrary, emphasized by his careful conduct of important litigation, his candor and fairness in the presentation of cases, and his zeal and earnestness as an advocate. His contemporaries unite in bearing testimony to his high character and superior mind. What higher testimonial of his able service on the bench could be given than the fact of his long continuance thereon? A clear insight into the legal problems presented, combined with absolute fairness and a high sense of justice, made his decisions particularly free from bias, and won him high encomiums from the public and the bar.

On the 5th of May, 1852, was celebrated the marriage of Judge Kibbey and Miss Caroline E. Conningham, daughter of Daniel C. Conningham, of Centerville. They had five children, as follows: Joseph H., an attorney-at-law of Phoenix, Arizona, who went to that place in 1888 and was United States judge from 1889 until 1893, under the Harrison administration; Mary E., who became the wife of Rev. William E. Jordan, a Methodist Episcopal minister, who died in 1890, while her death occurred in 1883; John C., who is in the employ of the Pittsburg, Cincinnati, Chicago & St. Louis Railroad at St. Louis, Missouri; Frank C., a member of the Thirty-second Michigan Regiment, located at Grand Rapids, Michigan, who prior to entering the service was clerk of the court in Florence, Arizona; and Walter P., who died in 1876, at the age of ten years.

In his political associations Judge Kibbey was a Democrat until 1854, when, on account of the attitude of the party on the slavery question he left its ranks. When the Republican party was organized, in 1856, he became one of its supporters and has since been most earnest in his advocacy of its principles. In 1871 he became a member of the Presbyterian church in Centerville and three years later transferred his membership to the Presbyterian church in Richmond. A prominent and exemplary Mason, he belongs to the blue lodge, chapter and commandery of Richmond. He has drawn about him a circle of devoted friends, and has at all times commanded the respect and esteem of his fellow men by his superior intellectual attainments and his upright life. Professional eminence is an indication of individual merit, for in professional life advancement cannot depend upon outside influences or the aid of wealthy friends; it comes as the reward of earnest, persistent labor, and the exercise of natural talents, and is therefore the fitting reward of labor. For years Judge Kibbey was accorded a prominent position at the Indiana bar and his professional career was an honor to the district which so honored him.

Source:
Biographical and Genealogical History of Wayne, Fayette, Union and Franklin Counties, Indiana, Volume 1, The Lewis Publishing Company, Chicago, 1899