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Peter Townsend Barlow (July 21, 1857 – May 9, 1921) was an American jurist who served as a New York City Magistrate for nearly two decades.

Early life

Peter T. Barlow was born at New York City to Samuel Latham Mitchell Barlow (1826–1889) and the former Alice Cornell Townsend (1833–1889). His father was a prominent New York Wall Street attorney who frequently represented the interest of the American railroad industry. Barlow’s grandfather was Samuel Bancroft Barlow, a noted American physician. Barlow's sister, Alice Wadsworth Barlow, was married to Stephen Henry Olin, a lawyer who served as the acting president of Wesleyan University. Barlow's niece, Julia Lynch Olin, was married to Lewis Stuyvesant Chanler, the former Lt. Gov. of New York.

Barlow attended Harvard College and graduated with the Class of 1879; receiving his law degree two years later from Columbia Law School.

Career

After his admittance to the New York Bar, Barlow became managing clerk for his father's law firm, Shipman, Barlow, Larocque & Choate. Barlow left the firm not long after the death of his father in 1889.

In 1895, Barlow was elected to the Board of Directors of the Sterling Mountain Railway Co. and in 1902 was chosen by New York Mayor Seth Low to fill out the term of City Magistrate Willard H. Olmstead after the latter’s appointed to the Court of Special Sessions. Though he still had some years left on his appointment, the following year, Mayor Low named Barlow to a full ten-year term as magistrate. Barlow went on to be reappointed to a second ten-year term by Mayor William Jay Gaynor and serve as president of the Board of City Magistrates for three terms. For a number of years Barlow presided over the Women’s Night Court located in Lower Manhattan, and as president of the Florence Crittenton League, a reformatory primarily for prostitutes and unwed mothers. Peter T. Barlow often chose to sentence women convicted of prostitution or petty thefts to workhouses or reformatories in the belief that it would weaken their ties with the men who controlled them.

Poillon sisters

Katherine and Charlotte Poillon were sisters from Troy, New York who over several decades made headlines with their frequent lawsuits against wealthy men or fending off charges of failing to pay their debts. In 1902, Katherine Poillon filled a $250,000 breach of promise lawsuit against wealthy sportsman William Gould Brokaw, a cousin of Irving Brokaw and later settled out of court for $17,500. Peter Barlow fell into their web in 1908 when the sisters were arrested for failing to pay several New York City hotels bills amounting to over $500. During the trial Katherine made the claim that Judge Barlow borrowed $25,000 from her and had promised to pay her hotel bills as partial payment. Later Barlow took the stand and denied her allegations, but did admit that some years earlier he had been introduced to the sisters. In an outburst during court Katherine declared their relationship had been personal and ongoing for a number of years. The Poillon sisters were eventually found guilty by the court and sent to a jail on Blackwell Island for three months.

Personal life

On May 6, 1886, Barlow married Virginia Louise Matthews (1858–1905) at ceremony performed in Paris, France. She was the daughter of Edward Mathews, a prominent merchant, and a sister of author Brander Matthews. Over the years of their marriage, Peter and Virginia's names frequently made the society pages in New York newspapers. The couple went on to be the parents of two sons:

• Edward Matthews Barlow (1889–1901), who died at the age of thirteen on April 21, 1901
• Samuel Latham Mitchell Barlow II (1892–1982), a Harvard educated pianist and composer.

Barlow’s health began to decline about midway through his second full term in office; he spent most of 1918 on paid medical leave. After a brief recovery he went back on medical leave that December, never to return to the bench again. Peter Barlow spent the winter of 1920–21 under the care of a nurse at Coronado, California and took ill on their train ride home; dying some ten days later on May 9, 1921, at St. Luke’s Hospital in Chicago, Illinois. Virginia Barlow preceded her husband in death on April 24, 1905, after struggling with heart disease. Peter and his wife are both interred at the Green-Wood Cemetery in Brooklyn, New York.

References

1. ^ "PETER T. BARLOW DIES IN CHICAGO HOSPITAL Ex-Police Magistrate, Long Ill, Was Returning Home From California When Stricken" (PDF). The New York Times. May 10, 1921. Retrieved January 8, 2019.
2. "OBITUARY | Samuel L. M. Barlow" (PDF). The New York Times. July 11, 1889. Retrieved January 8, 2019.
3. "OBITUARY | MRS. S. L. M. BARLOW" (PDF). The New York Times. October 22, 1889. Retrieved January 8, 2019.
4. ^ America's successful men of affairs: An encyclopedia of contemporaneous ... edited by Henry Hall (1895)
5. "Obituary -- OLIN". The New York Times. November 9, 1882. Retrieved August 25, 2017.
6. "S. H. OLIN DIES AT 78; 50 YEARS A LAWYER; Specialized on Copyright Law and Represented Foremost Publishing Houses. ACTING HEAD OF WESLEYAN For 30 Years He Was Trustee of the New York Public Library -- A Founder of Players Club" (PDF). The New York Times. August 7, 1925. Retrieved January 7, 2019.
7. "Mrs. Lewis S. Chanler, 78, Dies; Headed Reform Bahai Movement; Widow of Former Lieutenant Governor Formed Society in '29 -- Wrote Several Books" (PDF). The New York Times. March 12, 1961. p. 86. Retrieved August 25, 2017.
8. "LEWIS S. CHANLER WEDS MRS. BENKARD; Ex-Lieut. Governor of New York Marries Divorced Wife of J. Philip Benkard in Paris. GUARDED WITH SECRECY Mr. Chanler Was Divorced in Paris From His First Wife, Who Was Alice Chamberlain" (PDF). The New York Times. May 25, 1921. Retrieved August 25, 2017.
9. "L.S. CHANLER DIES; STATE EX-OFFICIAL; Lieutenant Governor, 1906-08, Defeated in Gubernatorial Race by Hughes in 1908 WAS A CRIMINAL LAWYER Defended Clients Who Could Not Pay -- Toured Ireland for Parnellites in '90's" (PDF). The New York Times. March 2, 1942. Retrieved August 25, 2017.
10. ^ The Harvard graduates' magazine, Volume 30 By William Roscoe Thayer, William Richards Castle, Mark Antony De Wolfe Howe, Arthur Stanwood Pier, Bernard Augustine De Voto, Theodore Morrison (1922)
11. The National Cyclopaedia of American Biography: (1893)
12. The Lawyer and banker and Bench and Bar Review (1913) by Charles E. George
13. Brooklyn daily eagle almanac, Volume 32 By American Almanac Collection (Library of Congress) - 1917
14. City Club Bulletin; Issued by the City Club of Philadelphia: Volume 5 - Page 171 (1913)
15. The New York Times – July 2, 1903
16. The New York Times - June 6, 1908 pg.4
17. The New York Times – February 15, 1908
18. ^ "MAGISTRATE'S WIFE DEAD. Mrs. Louisa Barlow Had Been Ill for Two Months" (PDF). The New York Times. April 26, 1905. Retrieved January 8, 2019.
19. The New York Times - November 15, 1891
20. The New York Times May 20, 1894
21. "Samuel L.M. Barlow, 90, Dies; Composer, Writer and Liberal". The New York Times. September 21, 1982. Retrieved January 8, 2019.
22. The New York Times - January 5, 1930
23. Green-Wood: A National Historic Landmark

External links

• Peter Townsend Barlow at Find a Grave

• 1857 births
• 1921 deaths
• Columbia Law School alumni
• Harvard College alumni
• Lawyers from New York City
• 19th-century American lawyers