Maxwell, William

Maxwell, William LL. D. an American educator, celebrated also in the department of jurisprudence, was born at Norfolk, Va., Feb. 27, 1784; was educated at Yale College, 1802; practiced in his native city, and attained great eminence; assumed the editor's chair in the literary department of the N. Y. Journal of Commerce in 1827; resumed the practice of jurisprudence, however, in the following year; was a member of the Virginia House of Delegates in 1830, and of the State Senate from 1831 to 1837, during which time he was made secretary of the Historical Society of Virginia. He next accepted the presidency of the Hampden Sidney College in 1838, which he retained until 1844, and then edited the Virginia Historical Register from 1848 to 1853 (6 vols. in 3, 12mo). He died January 9, 1857, at Richmond, Va. He wrote Memoir of the Rev. John H. Rice, D.D. (Phila. 1835, 12mo). See Drake, Dict. Amer. Biog. s.v.