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From the Saline, Michigan Observer, Thursday, May 21, 1891:
Wells W. Leggett, the well known patent lawyer of Detroit died on Thursday at the age of 44 years. The cause of death was erysipelas.
From Wells W. Leggett House by Eric Becker for Historic Detroit:
Wells W. Leggett was born on June 8, 1847, in Ohio. At 15 years of age, he left to fight in the Civil War. In 1863, at the age of only 17, he was appointed a captain and aide-de-camp by President Abraham Lincoln and said to be one of the youngest ever to attain such a position. When the war ended, Leggett entered patent law with his brother in Washington, D.C. Shortly thereafter, he took up the position of United States commissioner of patents and later entered into business with his son and brother in Cleveland. In 1879, he came to Detroit and established his own prosperous firm. His offices, for a time, were located in the Burns Block of offices at 88 and 90 Griswold.
One of Leggett’s many accomplishments was introducing public electric lights to the city. Leggett was said by the Free Press to be of strict integrity but of a warm and genial social nature. At the time of his death, on May 14, 1891, he was president of the Brush Electric Light Co.
Captain Wells W. Leggett died at Detroit Michigan May 14th 1891. Captain Leggett was born at Farmington, Trumbull County, Ohio on June 8th 1847. Though but fifteen years of age at the outbreak of the war, he accompanied his father General M.D. Leggett to the field and performed efficient services as a volunteer aid. August 16th 1864, he was appointed by President Lincoln Captain and Aide de camp in which capacity he served until the close of the war when he was appointed by the President to a cadetship at West Point military academy. Captain Leggett at once resigned his commission as Second Lieutenant in the regular army commenced studying law, making a specialty of patent law practice in which he subsequently became very successful. His father resigned the office of United States Commissioner of Patents in 1875 and entered into partnership with his sons in the practice of patent lawyers with headquarters at Cleveland, Ohio, but subsequently removed to Detroit where the subject of our sketch entered actively into the establishment and prosecution of various important business enterprises. Besides conducting a large professional practice, he became identified with the management of the Brush Electric Light Company, The Star Iron tower Company, The Kelly Engine Works, The Malleable Works, The Spiral Tube Works and many other corporations of magnitude. Thus the little soldier whom our comrades will remember as a familiar figure about Vicksburg grew with the growth of opportunity until he became one of the most clear-sighted and successful business men of this age.
Source: Report of the Proceedings of the Society of the Army of the Tennessee: At the ... Meeting[s] ... 1866-, Volumes 21-23, The Society, 1893. [1]
Sources
- Wells W. Leggett House by Eric Becker for HISTORICDETROIT.ORG (http://historicdetroit.org/building/wells-w-leggett-house/ : accessed 28 Dec 2015).
- "United States Census, 1860", database, FamilySearch (https://familysearch.org/ark:/61903/1:1:MCGL-FBK : accessed 28 December 2015), Wells W Legget in entry for D M Legget, Zanesville, Muskingum, Ohio, 1860.
- "United States Census, 1880," database with images, FamilySearch (https://familysearch.org/ark:/61903/1:1:MW3P-XZF : accessed 29 December 2015), Wills W Leggett, Detroit, Wayne, Michigan, United States; citing enumeration district ED 280, sheet 226A, NARA microfilm publication T9 (Washington D.C.: National Archives and Records Administration, n.d.), roll 0612; FHL microfilm 1,254,612.
- "New York Passenger Lists, 1820-1891," database with images, FamilySearch (https://familysearch.org/ark:/61903/1:1:QVR3-HTD7 : accessed 29 December 2015), Wells W Leggett, 1890; citing NARA microfilm publication M237 (Washington, D.C.: National Archives and Records Administration, n.d.); FHL microfilm .
- "United States Census of Union Veterans and Widows of the Civil War, 1890," database with images, FamilySearch (https://familysearch.org/ark:/61903/1:1:K8SG-Q8N : 11 March 2018), Wells W Leggett, 1890; citing NARA microfilm publication M123 (Washington, D.C.: National Archives and Records Administration, n.d.); FHL microfilm 338,176.
- Citation from - Congressional Serial Set, U.S. Government Printing Office, 1903 [2]
