Robert Lawson.

About Robert Lawson

Robert Lawson was a Virginia lawyer, planter and politician who distinguished himself in the American Revolutionary War, rising to the rank of brigadier general in the Virginia militia. After the conflict, he practiced law, held various political offices and operated a plantation in Prince Edward County, Virginia, but also suffered from alcoholism, which caused his estrangement from his family as well as being swindled. As discussed by the United States Supreme Court in Wagner v. Baird, 48 U.S. 234 (1849), although granted over 10,000 acres of land in what became the state of Ohio, Lawson transferred those rights to a swindler, so decades later his heirs unsuccessfully sought redress.