John T. Bird

Who was John T. Bird?

John Taylor Bird was an American Democratic Party politician and businessman who represented New Jersey's 3rd congressional district from 1869 to 1873.

Bird was born in Bloomsbury in Bethlehem Township, New Jersey on August 16, 1829. He attended the public schools, and a classical academy at Hackettstown, New Jersey. He studied law, was admitted to the bar in 1855 and commenced practice in Bloomsbury, New Jersey. He moved to Clinton, New Jersey in 1858. He was prosecutor of the pleas for Hunterdon County from 1862-1867. He moved to Flemington, New Jersey in 1865.

Bird was elected as a Democrat to the Forty-first and Forty-second Congresses, serving in office from March 4, 1869-March 3, 1873, but was not a candidate for renomination in 1872.

After leaving Congress, he resumed the practice of law in Flemington. He was a member of the New Jersey constitutional convention in 1876. He moved to Trenton, New Jersey, in 1882. Bird was vice chancellor of New Jersey from 1882–1896 and master in chancery from 1900-1909. He died in Trenton on May 6, 1911, and was interred there in Riverview Cemetery.