Festus Walters (1849 – 1922) was an Ohio jurist and advocate for gubernatorial judicial independence known for the controversial decision to try an Ohio National Guard commander for murder following the Washington County Courthouse riots of 1895. Among "the Ohio Five" arriving at Cornell University when that revolutionary institution opened its doors, he was life-long friends with fellow Cornellian and fraternity brother, Senator Joseph B. Foraker.
In 1898, the official history of the Republican Party in Ohio stated that:
[t]he Republican party may well be judged by its degree of intelligence, its usefulness and safety in the management of public affairs, and its achievements during the forty years of its existence. It is a party of principle, and though its opponents may criticise its doctrines they cannot deny that it has always had the courage of its convictions. As long as it continues it will attract to its ranks men of brilliant minds and intellectual giants who give freely of their great gifts to aid the maintenance of a party that has done so much for the prosperity of the country. Ohio has in the past contributed her share of famous men, and as the years roll on the names of others are added one by one to the rapidly increasing list. One that has become prominently associated with the political history of the state is that of Judge Festus Walters . Personally, the Judge is courteous and affable, and is an excellent entertainer, though not a society man in the strict sense of the word.Joseph P. Smith, History of the Republican Party in Ohio (1898) at 821.
The Peters family Festus Walters descended from the maternal line of the Peters family of Fairfield County, Ohio. It is unknown when the Peters' ancestor landed in the United States, or from what country, but they settled in southern Ohio, in Philadelphia, married, and sired two sons born in Philadelphia, Jacob and Henry. Henry died without issue. Jacob married. He moved south to Baltimore, raising three sons and one daughter. The daughter married a man named Burns. The sons were John, Jacob, and Samuel.
Samuel, son of Jacob and the ancestor of Ohio's Judge Festus Walters, was born in Philadelphia on September 27, 1772. He died at his home in Amanda township, Fairfield County, Ohio, September 10, 1829. His wife was Mary Stevenson, daughter of Daniel Stevenson, of Baltimore County, Maryland. She was born September 28, 1773, and died in Fairfield County, February 15, 1861, aged 87 years. Their oldest son, Henry Peters, was born October 1, 1796. They trekked to the Ohio valley in April, 1812, and lived for five years on what became the Frank Stevenson farm. Daniel Stevenson was born September 21, 1737, and died September 3, 1829. Ruth, his wife, was born January 24, 1743, and died January 12, 1834. They were the parents of ten children. They came to Ohio several years before Peters and his wife.
The wife of Samuel Peters was a daughter of Daniel Stevenson, one of the early pioneers of Richland township, and on whose land the first Methodist church in the county was erected. The old homestead remained in the Stevenson family for many years. A grandson of Daniel was the landsman when Festus Walters was sitting on the Ohio bench. There were several brothers and sisters of the Stevenson family, Daniel, Jesse, Mordecai, Edward, Mrs. Peters — who was Judge Walters' grandmother — and Mrs. Hampson were those most remembered; most of them were born in Maryland and came to Ohio with their father as early as 1803.
Daniel Stevenson, the pioneer and father of this family, was a prominent man of the Republic's early days and respected for his sterling character. He was a Methodist and donated land for the first church in the county built with hewn logs. He entertained the evangelist Bishop Asbury during his visits to Fairfield County, and it was on his land where Asbury conducted the first camp meeting held in the county.
Mr. Peters and wife arrived in the Ohio valley in 1812 and settled two miles north of West Rushville, on Rush Creek, at the mouth of Snake run. The Peters remained on Rush Creek for about five years before they purchased land south of Royalton, later owned by Benjamin Haas, cut a farm and endured pioneer life. Here they spent their lives as farmers and rearing a large family of children. Mr. Peters was a man of sterling character and possessed good business sense.
Peters was beloved in his neighborhood, and exerted an influence in the community with a success in rearing a large family to honorable and useful lives. His sons were Henry, Nathan, Robinson J., Ebenezer, Wesley, Gideon, Stevenson, Lewis, and Andrew, most of whom lived to old age and all business men. Nine brothers, successful in business, most of them of a commanding presence. As a commentator stated three generations later, "Take this family, the Stevenson family, the Beery family, where can you find such large families of stalwart, robust long-lived men? Where can we find such men, even in small families? Are we degenerating?"C.M.L. Wiseman, Pioneer Period and Pioneer People of Fairfield County, Ohio (1901)
These men were the uncles of Judge Festus Walters. Henry Peters at an early day moved to Marion County. When the Wyandotte Indians transferred their lands, he moved to Wyandot County. He was a sagacious man who prospered and made good investments. He died in Upper Sandusky, and left to his heirs an ample estate. Upon the death of his brother Gideon, he took charge of his children and reared them, and at his death they were well remembered. Brother Nathan Peters moved to Marion County at an early date. He engaged in farming for a number of years and was successful. His old age was spent in Marion where he owned a fine home. Nathan's son Harvey was for many years a Marion leading pharmacist. Ebenezer Peters moved at an early day to Marion County where he was a prosperous farmer and stock dealer. Like all of his brothers he was a good business man and respected and honored by his neighbors. He died at an advanced age. In middle age he resided in Marion where he took an active part in politics and assisted in electing Samuel A. Griswold county auditor. The Peters name is prevalent in Marion and Upper Sandusky. Stevenson and Lewis became farmers and located in Pickaway County, near Nebraska P. O. Like their brothers they were successful in business, accumulated property and lived in good style. They were among the prominent members of the Methodist Episcopal Church in that vicinity. Lewis Peters was an unusually intelligent man, of good social qualities and a man of influence and highly esteemed. One of his sons married a daughter of Rev. John W. White of Lancaster, Ohio, and resided in Upper Sandusky.
A son of Lewis Peters, and cousin to Judge Festus Walters, was the Honorable S. R. Peters, of Newton, Kansas, an old Pickaway County boy, born in Walnut township in 1842, seven years before Judge Walters. S.R. Peters was a graduate of Delaware University (Ohio Wesleyan), and served through the war as a member of the Seventy-third regiment, Ohio Volunteer Infantry, mustering out of the service as captain. He went to Kansas following the war, and in a little over a year after arriving he began his political career. He was a member of the Kansas State Senate, judge of the Ninth Judicial District, a trying region to hold court. Judge S.R. Peters was three times elected to •the difficult position without opposition. In 1883 he was elected at large to the Forty-Eighth United States Congress. In 1890, he declined further congressional honors, preferring to practice his profession. Judge Peters became the postmaster at Newton, Kansas, and editor of the Kansas Republican, published in that city. He also practiced law. Judge Peters' wife was Amelia C. Doan, daughter of Rev. John Doan, and they were married in Circleville in April, 1867. Mrs. Peters was a universal favorite in Washington, D.C., society during their residence in that city.
Judge Peter's great aunt, Mary Peters married Daniel Walters and they spent their lives upon a farm in Amanda township. Judge Festus Walters of the Common Pleas Court of Circleville, was their son. He has attained quite a prominent position at the bar.C.M.L. Wiseman, Pioneer Period and Pioneer People of Fairfield County, Ohio (1901).
Early life Walters was born in Fairfield County, Ohio, September 30, 1849, the son of Daniel and Mary (Peters) Walters. Dan Walters was of German descent and Mary Peters was of English descent. Walters' father was a farmer by occupation and in politics he voted the Whig ticket. His death occurred in 1855, when Walters was six years old. Walters spent his boyhood days mostly as an assistant to his father, working on the farm and attending the district school two months in the year. He remained at home until age sixteen, when he entered the Ohio University at Athens, to prepare for college. After finishing the preparatory course he attended the Ohio Wesleyan University at Delaware, studying there until 1868, when he transferred as a junior to Cornell University, from which he graduated in 1870.
Walters pursued his Cornell studies with the definite purpose of taking up the profession of law. He was among "the Ohio men" founding the Cornell chapter of the Phi Kappa Psi fraternity, the first Chapter north of the Susquehanna and east of the Ohio rivers. He was a member, Irving Literary Society. Immediately after leaving Cornell University he began a course in the law department of the University of Michigan at Ann Arbor. Walters was graduated from University of Michigan Law School in 1872. The next year he passed examination and was admitted to the bar at Columbus, Ohio, and at once went to Circleville, where he began the practice of his profession. Fresh out of Michigan law, Walter challenged Michigan classmate J.P. Winstead '72 in the election for Pickaway County, Ohio's prosecuting attorney position. He lost.University of Michigan, The Chronicle (1884) at 33. Walters was married December 21, 1876, to Miss May E. Wilkes, of Circleville, and they had seven children.
Walters practiced law in the 1870s and 1880s. The habits of industry formed in his youth he carried with him in his mature years, and when he entered into a case he gave it time, labor and the best efforts of his well trained mind. Being a man of prepossessing appearance and easy manners, having a strong, logical mind and being a fluent and concise speaker, he early in his career took a position in the front rank of Ohio's Pickaway County bar. His whole time and attention was given to his profession and during the last ten years of his practice there was but little important litigation in the local courts in which he did not actively participate on one side or the other. His practice was general and extended into the county, state and federal courts. In referring to the professional side of his life, one of the oldest and ablest members of the Pickaway County bar has this to say of Judge Walters: