History of Oxford, (Bristol County) Massachusetts United States of America

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Richard Olney, cabinet officer, was born in Oxford, Mass., Sept. 15, 1835; son of Wilson and Eliza (Butler) Olney; descendant of Thomas Olney, who came to Salem, Mass., in 1635, from Hertfordshire, England, and was one of the founders of the Rhode Island and Providence Plantations in 1637-8, and also of Andrew Sigourney, a French Huguenot, who was one of the first settlers of Oxford, Mass., in 1687. Richard Olney was graduated at Brown university in 1856, and at Harvard Law school in 1858. He was admitted to the bar in 1859, practiced law in Boston with Benjamin F. Thomas, 1859-78, and after the death of Judge Thomas in 1878, continued by himself. He was married, March 6, 1861, to Agnes Park, daughter of Judge Thomas. He was a Democratic representative in the Massachusetts legislature of 1874; served in the cabinet of President Cleveland as attorney-general from March 6, 1893, to June 8, 1895, and as secretary of state from June 10, 1895, to March 4, 1897. In March, 1897, he resumed the practice of law in Boston. He received the honorary degree of LL.D. from Harvard in 1893, from Brown in 1894, and from Yale in 1901.

From: Twentieth Century Biographical Dictionary of Notable Americans, Johnson, Rossiter, editor

History of Oxford, (Bristol County) Massachusetts

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