George Western Thompson was a nineteenth-century Virginia politician, lawyer and judge. He served one term in the U.S. House of Representatives, resigning to become a state judge. During the American Civil War Judge Thompson resigned that position as because he believed the creation of West Virginia illegal.
Born in St. Clairsville, Ohio, Thompson graduated from Jefferson College in 1824, then studied law in Richmond, Virginia. He married Elizabeth Steenrod. They had four sons, none of whom survived their mother, and two daughters. Their sons included Confederate Col. William P. Thompson ; Lewis Thompson ; George Western Thompson ; and Daniel Steenrod Thompson. His daughter Anna Gaither Thompson married Johnson Newlon Camden who became a prominent industrialist, banker and railroad organizer in West Virginia and U.S. Senator, although both his gubernatorial runs failed.
Career
After admission to the Ohio bar in 1826, Thompson began his legal practice in St. Clairsville in 1828. He moved across the Ohio River to what was Virginia in 1837 and became deputy postmaster of Wheeling, Virginia in 1838. He was later appointed to a commission to settle jurisdiction of the Ohio River between Virginia and Ohio. President James K. Polk appointed Thompson United States Attorney for the western district of Virginia, and he served as from 1848 to 1850. A Democrat, Thompson won election to the United States House of Representatives in 1850, serving from 1851 until his resignation in 1852 when the Virginia General Assembly elected him judge of the circuit court. As both Congressman and state judge, he was involved in cases involving the Wheeling Suspension Bridge and a nearby railroad bridge which helped Wheeling become an important gateway city between the Ohio River valley and Eastern and international markets. As Congressman, Thompson introduced documents supporting the bridge, which impeded large steamboats to Pittsburgh. Congress passed a law declaring it a post road, so it was not torn down despite the United States Supreme Court finding it impeded Ohio River navigation. Virginia's General Assembly reelected Thompson as circuit judge in 1860. However, after Virginia voters in May 1861 approved the ordinance of secession which had bee passed by the Virginia Secession Convention of 1861 despite the Unionist stance of most delegates from northwestern Virginia, Unionists attended the Wheeling Convention which established the Restored Government of Virginia. Thompson left office in 1861, refusing to take the oath of office to support what he believed was an unconstitutional action to set up the present State of West Virginia. Ralph Lazier Berkshire, whom he had defeated in the judicial contest and who supported West Virginia's statehood, would be elected his successor and later first Chief Justice of the West Virginia Supreme Court of Appeals. His son William P. Thompson, who had become a lawyer in Virginia in 1857, recruited the "Marion Greys" and became a colonel of the 19th Virginia Infantry. Another son, George Western Thompson, became involved with the Ohio River Railroad and served as president until his death in 1895. After the war, William Thompson joined with his brother-in-law and another man and became president of the Camden Consolidated Oil Company, which in 1881 merged into Standard Oil Company, of which Thompson became vice-president and moved to Cleveland, Ohio.
Death and legacy
Meanwhile, Judge Thompson retired to his estate near Wheeling, West Virginia where he eventually died on February 24, 1888. He was interred there in Stone Church cemetery in Elm Grove.
