Algernon Sydney Sullivan

Algernon Sydney Sullivan (1826–1887) was a New York lawyer. Sullivan, together with William Nelson Cromwell, founded Sullivan & Cromwell in 1879.

Algernon Sydney Sullivan was born at Madison, Indiana on April 5, 1826, son of Jeremiah Sullivan (1794–1870) and Charlotte Rudesel (Cutler) Sullivan. He was named in honor of the British politician, Algernon Sidney. His father was a lawyer, a major in the War of 1812, a member of the Indiana legislature in 1821, and judge of the criminal court of Jefferson County, Indiana, and a judge of the Indiana Supreme Court from 1837 to 1846. His grandfather, Thomas Littleton Sullivan, the son of an Irish barrister, emigrated from Charleville, County Cork, Ireland, in 1791, to Augusta County, Virginia. He also had a younger brother named Jeremiah C. Sullivan who, in addition to his legal career, also had a successful military career in both the U.S. Navy and then the U.S. Army.

Algernon Sullivan was educated at Hanover College and Miami University graduating in 1845. While a law student, about the age of twenty, he made a tour of Indiana, speaking with marked success in advocacy of taxation for the maintenance of public schools. After studying law in his father's office, he was admitted to the bar in 1848, and for eight years practiced in Cincinnati, Ohio.

In 1857. he moved to New York city, and soon took a prominent position as a lawyer and public spirited citizen. He was retained to defend the officers and crew of the Confederate schooner Savannah, the first vessel to be captured during the Civil War, who were on trial for their lives on the charge of piracy. Owing to some inimical reports about him, he was arrested and imprisoned, but soon released. After the trial began, public feeling ran so high that his life was threatened if he should appear in their defense. He nevertheless did so, telling his friends that, having been appealed to as a lawyer, he could consider no other course, and the ultimate result of the trial was that the men were exchanged as prisoners of war. From 1870-73 Mr. Sullivan was assistant district attorney for New York city, and upon leaving that office he formed a partnership with Hermann Kobbe and Ludlow Fowler. In 1875, he was appointed public administrator, during which he instituted many reforms, reducing the charges upon estates administered, and, in spite of pressure, retaining in his service efficient assistants of a political party different from his own. In 1878 the firm of Sullivan, Kobbe & Fowler was dissolved and he formed a partnership with William Nelson Cromwell, under the name of Sullivan & Cromwell, which firm name is still retained by the successors to his business. Mr. Sullivan was recognized as one of the strongest, readiest and most successful jury lawyers in New York, and he was admired and revered by both bench and bar. His kindness, candor and fairness, even during the heat of a trial, were always the subject of remark. Judge Bookstaver, of New York, in speaking of him, said: "He was always welcomed by the court in any case in which he appeared, because it was felt that his learning, ability and absolute truthfulness would assist the court in the trial of any question of law and fact with which it had to deal." He was noted for seeking opportunities for helping and encouraging younger lawyers.

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