Nathaniel Shipman

Who was Nathaniel Shipman?

Nathaniel Shipman was a longtime federal judge in the United States.

A native of Connecticut, Shipman attended Yale Law School and Yale College before "reading law" for admission to the Connecticut bar. He practiced as a lawyer in New Haven, Connecticut and spent five years as executive secretary to the Governor of Connecticut. He also served in the of Connecticut House of Representatives in 1857.

In 1873, President Ulysses S. Grant named Shipman as a judge of the United States District Court for the District of Connecticut. Shipman served on that court until 1892, when on nomination of President Benjamin Harrison, Shipman was created to a seat on the newly created United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit.

Shipman served on the Court of Appeals for ten years. He retired in 1902, and died four years later; he was interred at Cedar Hill Cemetery in Hartford, Connecticut.