Draft:John Walton (Rhode Island judge)

John Walton (1694 – 1764) was a Connecticut-born preacher and politician who ultimately served as a justice of the Colonial Rhode Island Supreme Court from May 1749 to May 1751.

Born in New London, Connecticut, to Laurence and Margaret (Smith) Walton, early settlers of Preston, Connecticut, Walton moved with his family to Norwich, Connecticut, in 1710. He entered Yale College in 1716, and there was "baptized and admitted to membership in the Congregational Church of Preston, North Parish", before he graduated in 1720, making him "the only Baptist minister to graduate from Yale" in that period.

"Walton studied for the ministry. He preached in various places, and also practised as a physician, besides serving in the General Assembly of Rhode Island. The dates of his birth and death are not known. See Dexter's Biographical Sketches of Graduates of Yale College, pp. 232-235."

"Walton... studied for the ministry, preached as Presbyterian at Freehold, N. J., later as a Baptist at Providence, R. I., 1730. He became a physician and settled in Gloucester, R. I., 1743, where he died, 1764.”—H. Ruth Cooke in Newport Mercury, March 15, 1902."

He worked as a teacher and a minister, though in 1722 he was censured for "lustful carriage to some young women".

"He had been preaching at Crosswicks; and the Presbytery of Philadelphia, in his absence, took the testimony, suspended him, and published the sentence from the pulpit in which he had preached. Subsequently the charges against him were regularly adjudicated and proved. His conduct to the presbytery, and his mode of speaking of them, were abusive and unbecoming. The synod had a conference with him privately, and allowed him several days to consider and prepare a written acknowledgment of his misdemeanours. His paper was accepted pro tanto, and he was suspended for three Sabbaths.* His confession was to be read on the third Sabbath after the sentence, from the pulpit in Newark, in part, so far as related to his offences there. He was to own the confession publicly, and then to be absolved. On the day appointed, no minister being present, he read his confession and absolved himself. The synod refused to acknowledge such a proceeding, and remitted the case to Long Island Presbytery, with Dickinson, Morgan, and Pierson as correspondents. Regardless of the synod, he preached at East Chester. The committee, in October, 1723, were informed (by letter and otherwise) of several scandalous allegations against him, and continued his suspension. When Morgan rose to give him an exhortation, he exclaimed against their conclusion, renounced all subjection to them, told them he wanted no exhortation from them, and rushed away in an angry manner.

Immediately he advertised that he would teach in New York, on Broad Street, near the Exchange, Latin, Greek, and Hebrew; and that during the winter he would keep an evening school.

In 1725, he requested the synod to leave his case to the Presbytery of Long Island; but they consigned it to the same committee as before. He went to West Chester county, and preached at Rye and White Plains."

"He fought against the religious taxes levied by the Anglicans on dissenters in Rye, New York, in 1725–1728. He departed from Rye still under a cloud in 1728 and turned up next as a Baptist, preaching to the First Baptist Church of Newport".

Walton also appears to have served one term in 1725 as a deputy to the Connecticut General Assembly.

From 1741 to 1742, he served as King's Attorney in Providence County. He threafter served for periods as a justice of the Peace and as a deputy for Gloucester in the Rhode Island General Assembly in 1743.

In 1749, he became an associate justice of the Rhode Island Supreme Court.

"Walton very nearly put an end to his legal career in 1738 when he appeared in the case of John Mason et al. vs. Connecticut Colony. ... Walton probably knew the Masons and perhaps had a personal interest in the land involved, but he appeared, not as the lawyer for the Mason side but as a supposedly disinterested clerk."

Of Newport.