Home County: Lafayette
Terms of service at the Supreme Court of Missouri: March 1849 - August 1851, August 1851 -March 1857
Judge John Ferguson Ryland was born November 2, 1797, in King and Queen County, Virginia.[i] In 1811, his family relocated to Richmond County, Kentucky, where Ryland received a classical education at the Forest Hill Academy.[ii] After he studied law and was admitted to the bar, Ryland moved to Missouri. He settled in Franklin, in Howard County, where he first practiced law.[iii] In 1831, he was appointed as circuit judge of the Sixth Judicial Circuit, which comprised the western portion of the state.[iv]
To fulfill his duties as a circuit judge, Judge Ryland moved to Lexington, Missouri.[v] He served as a circuit judge until March 1849, when he was appointed to the Supreme Court of Missouri.[vi] Judge Ryland served on the Supreme Court of Missouri from March 19, 1849, was reelected in August 1851,[vii] and served until the March term of 1857,[viii] when he retired from the Court and returned to private practice.[ix] During his time on the bench, he was one of the judges who heard the Dred Scott Case.[x]
Ryland was elected to the state legislature in 1866.[xi] He served one session in the legislature.[xii] He then returned to his law practice in Lexington.[xiii]
Ryland died September 10, 1873.[xiv]
[i] William Van Ness Bay, “John F. Ryland,” Reminiscences of the Bench and Bar of Missouri, (St. Louis, MO: F.H. Thomas and Co., 1878.), 271.
[ii] William Van Ness Bay, Reminiscences of the Bench and Bar of Missouri, 271.
[iii] William Van Ness Bay, Reminiscences of the Bench and Bar of Missouri, 272.
[iv] William Van Ness Bay, Reminiscences of the Bench and Bar of Missouri, 272.
[v] William Van Ness Bay, Reminiscences of the Bench and Bar of Missouri, 273.
[vi] William A. Robards, Reports of Cases Argued and Decided in the Supreme Court of the State of Missouri, Vol. XII (Jefferson City, MO: James Lusk, Public Printer, 1849), 2. See also “Judges Supreme Court,” Liberty Weekly Tribune, Liberty, Missouri, Friday, February 2, 1849, page 2, column 6. Information courtesy of the State Historical Society of Missouri Newspaper Database, accessed July 2017. See also L.C. Krauthoff, “The Supreme Court of Missouri,” Horace W. Fuller, ed. The Green Bag, Vol. III (Boston, MA: The Boston Book Co., 1891), 175.
[vii] Columbia Statesman, Friday, March 21, 1851, page 2, column 3. Information courtesy of the State Historical Society of Missouri Newspaper Database, accessed July 2017.
[viii] Horatio M. Jones, Reports of Cases Argued and Determined in the Supreme Court of the State of Missouri Vol. XXIV (St. Louis, MO: George Knapp & CO., 1857), 1-654.
[ix] Supreme Court of Missouri Special Session, In the Matter of the Presentation of the Portrait of the Honorable James Harvey Birch (Jefferson City, MO: Supreme Court of Missouri, 1961), 7. See also Horace W. Fuller, ed. The Green Bag, 175.
[x] Perry McCandless, William E. Parrish, ed. A History of Missouri Vol. II (1820-1860) Columbia, MO: University of Missouri Press, 2000), 260.
[xi] William Van Ness Bay, Reminiscences of the Bench and Bar of Missouri, 273.
[xii] William Van Ness Bay, Reminiscences of the Bench and Bar of Missouri, 273.
[xiii] Horace W. Fuller, ed. The Green Bag, 175.
[xiv] Horace W. Fuller, ed. The Green Bag, 175. See also Xenophon Ryland, Biographical Sketch of Judge John F. Ryland and Family with an Autobiography by His Son Xenophon Ryland (Lexington, MO: 1920), 33.
Biographical information authored by Matt Orf, 2017, University of Missouri-Columbia.