admin SETH ELY SILL, Justice of the Supreme Court, who died September 15, 1851, in his forty-third year, during a relatively brief career attained distinguished honors as a lawyer. Judge and citizen.
Judge Sill was born in Moreau, Saratoga County, N. Y., June 3, 1809. After finishing his lay education he began reading law with the Hon. Orville Clark of Sandy Hill, N. Y. Later he came to Buffalo and entered the office of Sherwood and Hawley, with whom he completed his law studies, being admitted to the bar in 1836. Immediately afterward he engaged in practice as a member of the firm of Hawley & Sill, to whose personnel was afterward added the Hon. George P. Barker, subsequently Attorney General and later Justice of the Supreme Court, the firm style becoming Barker, Hawley & Sill, and finally Barker & Sill. After Mr. Barker was elected Attorney General, Mr. Sill continued the practice of law alone, until he himself was elected Supreme Court Justice of the Eighth Judicial District, in 1849. The death of Judge Sill limited his career on the bench to two years, but he gained in this time a notable name as a jurist. In erudition he was recognized as ranking with the first of New York Judges, and this at an epoch when the bench of the Empire State ‘was adorned by many illustrious men.
In 1840 Judge Sill married Harriet E. Allen, daughter of Ethan B. Allen and Harriet Seymour of Batavia, N. Y. The children of Judge Sill were: Fanny Sill of Buffalo; Charles B. Sill, who died in 1888; Henry S. Sill of Buffalo; Florence, who died in infancy, and Mary, who became Mrs. Frank Dorr of Buffalo, and who died in 1873.
SOURCE: Memorial and Family History of Erie County New York; Volume I