Nicholas Ridgely

Nicholas Ridgely (September 30, 1762 – April 1, 1830) was a Delaware lawyer, politician, and judge who served as Attorney General of Delaware and as the second Chancellor of Delaware. Early life, education, and career Born in Dover, Delaware, Ridgely belonged to a family of public and social prominence which "for many successive generations in Delaware has furnished judges and lawyers of marked ability". He was the eldest son of John Charles Greensburg Ridgely and Mary Wynkoop Ridgeley, the father being an accomplished physician of Kent County, Delaware, who was himself the son of the earlier Judge Nicholas Ridgely and a descendant of Colonel Henry Ridgley. Ridgeley read law under Judge Robert Goldsborough at Cambridge, Maryland, and was admitted to the Delaware bar at Newcastle in 1787. He quickly "attained a conspicuous standing at the bar even among such distinguished members as the elder James A. Bayard, Caesar Augustus Rodney, and Nicholas Van Dyke Jr." and "was repeatedly elected a member of the general assembly, and drafted the principal legislation required by the changes wrought" by the American Revolution and the recently adopted Constitution of the United States. In 1791, Ridgeley was appointed attorney general of Delaware and held that office for 10 years. He was leading member of the state constitutional convention of 1791–92, Chancellor of Delaware In December 1801, Chancellor William Killen resigned his office, and Ridgely was appointed to succeed him on December 6, 1801. This development marked a substantial evolution of the office: