Samuel Livermore (1732 - 1803)
Born at Waltham (MA); died at Holderness (NH).
Lawyer, state and national legislator; Chief Justice, NH Supreme Court.
Portrait by unknown artist, after John Trumbull original.
Presented to the State, date unknown.

Livermore graduated at twenty years of age from Princeton (NJ) University, Class of 1752. He then read law with Hon. Edward Trowbridge and was admitted to practice at the supreme judicial court of Middlesex County (NJ) in 1756.

In 1756 Livermore moved to Portsmouth (NH) and was admitted to the New Hampshire Bar. He served as a member of the New Hampshire General Court (1768/70), and for several years he was Judge Advocate of the Admiralty Court (1769/74).

In the 1770s Livermore served as Attorney General for the Royal Province of New Hampshire. His territory included the present-day counties of York and Cumberland counties, Maine, as far north as Portland (ME). Livermore was the most important advisor to Royal Governor Sir John Wentworth (1767/75), Britain's last royal governor in New Hampshire. Livermore also represented Londonderry in the New Hampshire General Assembly (1768/72).

Livermore wanted to be a major landholder in North America. He was one of the original grantees for Holderness (NH), and over time he had amassed ten thousand to twelve thousand acres of land in Holderness, Campton, and Plymouth (NH). As the threat of war moved closer, Livermore sold his Londonderry farm (to John Prentice, NH Attorney General 1787/93) and moved with his family to his Holderness wilderness lands.

During the first two years of the American Revolution, Livermore stayed out of sight at Holderness (1776/7). He began to build an estate on his lands, an estate which became substantial over time. In 1777 he became a member of the New Hampshire Assembly. With the support of Matthew Thornton and Meshech Weare, supporters of the American cause who appreciated Livermore's talents, Livermore became a principal figure in the Assembly. In 1778 Livermore was appointed New Hampshire Attorney General.

In 1780 Livermore was elected a delegate to the Provincial Congress (succeeding Josiah Bartlett), and he served with the Congress at Philadelphia (PA), 1780/82. In 1782 Livermore was named by the New Hampshire legislature to represent New Hampshire in a dispute over western land grants - grants which subsequently became Vermont.

In 1782 Livermore was also appointed Chief Justice of the New Hampshire Superior Court of Judicature (subsequently renamed the Supreme Court). Between 1782/90 Livermore was expected to attend every session of the Court, and to decide all questions of law; while in 1785 Livermore was again appointed a delegate to the Congress (now called the Congress of Confederation). He also worked on a committee (with Josiah Bartlett and John Sullivan) to revise New Hampshire's statutes, and to report on what bills were necessary to enact at the next session of the General Court.

Somehow managing to perform all these duties, Livermore was elected (at the 1788 New Hampshire Convention) to the United States House of Representatives (served 1789/93). In 1791 Livermore was President of the New Hampshire Constitutional Convention, and in 1793 he was named to fill out the unexpired United States Senate term of Paine Wingate. Livermore was subsequently elected to a full U.S. Senate term in his own name. He served as President pro tem of the Senate (1797, 1799).

In 1801 Livermore resigned his U.S. Senate seat (he was succeeded by Simeon Olcott). He returned to his lands at Holderness (NH) and died there May 18, 1803.

References: Fred Myron Colby, "Holderness and the Livermores", [Granite Monthly, vol. IV no. 5 (February 1881)]; Who Was Who in America, 1607 - 1896 (1963).