Alphonso G. Kellam

Who was Alphonso G. Kellam?

Alphonso George Kellam was an officer in the American Civil War, a lawyer, a politician, and one of the original justices of the South Dakota Supreme Court.

After being educated at Genesee Wesleyan Seminary in Lima, New York, Kellam arrived in Wisconsin about 1857 and studied law with a firm in Elkhorn, Wisconsin. Admitted to the bar in 1859, he practiced in Delavan until 1862, when he raised a company of infantry and became its captain. He was captured at the Battle of Thompson's Station in March 1863 and spent time as a prisoner of war in Libby Prison. In 1864 he was commissioned as a major and served as a staff officer during the Atlanta Campaign and Sherman's March to the Sea. Mustered out in June 1865, he resumed practice in Delavan. He served in the Wisconsin State Assembly 1868-1870. In 1871 he moved to Hampton, Iowa, where he practiced law and became president of a local bank. In 1881 he moved to Chamberlain in the Dakota Territory, where he founded a bank and practiced law. After serving in the constitutional conventions of 1883, 1885, and 1889, he was elected to the South Dakota Supreme Court in 1889 and again in 1893.