Henry C. McDowell, Jr.

Who was Henry C. McDowell, Jr.?

Henry Clay McDowell, Jr., was a Virginia lawyer and federal judge. He was the son of Henry Clay McDowell, proprietor of Ashland Farm and one of Kentucky's most notable citizens, and Anne Clay, daughter of Henry Clay, Jr. One of seven children, he was a brother of social reformer, Madeline McDowell Breckinridge and of Thomas Clay McDowell, renowned Thoroughbred racehorse owner/breeder and trainer who won the 1902 Kentucky Derby.

Born in Louisville, Kentucky, McDowell graduated from Yale University in 1881, and from the University of Virginia School of Law in 1887. That same year, McDowell began a law practice in Big Stone Gap, Virginia, setting up a partnership with Joshua Fry Bullitt, Jr., that continued to 1894. McDowell and Bullitt organized the Police Guard of Big Stone Gap.

The New York Times reported in 1901 that the author John Fox, Jr., also from Big Stone Gap, based a character in his book Blue-grass and Rhododendron: Outdoors in Old Kentucky on McDowell. The book is dedicated to McDowell, Bullitt, and Horace Ethelbert Cox, as "The First Three Captains of the Guard."