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WILLIAM B.
WOODS was born on August 3, 1824, in Newark, Ohio. He
attended Western Reserve College for three years and then
transferred to Yale College, where he received an undergraduate
degree in 1845. Woods returned to Newark and read law
with a local attorney. He was admitted to the bar in 1847,
and he established a law practice with his former mentor.
In 1856, he was elected Mayor of Newark. Two years later
he was elected to the Ohio State House of Representatives
and became Speaker. Woods joined the Union Army in 1862.
He served at Shiloh and Vicksburg and with General William
Sherman. He was mustered out of service in 1866 with the
rank of Major General. He remained in the South and established
a law practice in Bentonville, Alabama. Woods was elected
Chancellor of the Middle Chancery Division of Alabama
in 1868. President Ulysses S. Grant appointed Woods to
the Circuit Court for the Fifth Circuit in 1869. President
Rutherford B. Hayes nominated Woods to the Supreme Court
of the United States on December 15, 1880. The Senate
confirmed the appointment on December 21, 1880, making
him the first Associate Justice appointed from a Confederate
state after the Civil War. He served six years on the
Supreme Court and died on May 14, 1887, at the age of
sixty-two. |
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