Andrew Kershner SYESTER

                      DOCUMENTATION: Attorney General of Maryland  --  Assistant Judge of the Circuit Court  -- Member
                               of the house of Delegates -- Judge of the 4th Judicial District of MD

BIOGRAPHY:
Andrew K. Syester (1828-1891)

BIOGRAPHY: Born Andrew Kershner Syester on March 11, 1828 in BerkeleyCounty, Virginia.
Son of Daniel Syester and Sarah (Moudy) Syester.  Attended HagerstownAcademy,
1842-43; Marshall College, Mercersburg, Pennsylvania, 1844-49, graduated1849.
Studied law under Jervis Spencer, James Dixon Roman and ZachariahClaggett.
Admitted to the Washington County bar, 1853.  Married Catharine G. Harry(born
c. 1831) on November 17, 1852.  Children:  Elizabeth ("Lillie;" m. FrankBaush,
d. 1879), Andrew K. (born c. 1857), Nesbit (born c. 1859), Mollie K.(born c.
1863, m. Joseph  Coxe), Lewis Duffield (b. 1869), and Louise D. (born c.1874).
Resided on Prospect Street, Hagerstown, Washington County.  Died inHagerstown,
March 25, 1891.  Buried in Rose Hill Cemetery, Hagerstown.
Syester was appointed a committee clerk of the Maryland House ofDelegates in
January 1850 and served during that legislative session.  He became alawyer and
was a law partner of A. C. Bond of Westminster, Maryland.  He was amember and
speaker pro tem in the Maryland House of Delegates for Washington Countyas a
member of the Whig party in 1854.  He changed political parties to theAmerican
or Know-Nothing party and was elected state's attorney for WashingtonCounty and
served in 1854.  At the outbreak of the Civil War, he again changedpolitical
parties and became a Democrat.  In 1867 he was a delegate for WashingtonCounty
to the Constitutional Convention of Maryland, and in the following yearhe again
represented Washington County in the Maryland House of Delegates.  He wasalso a
delegate to the 1868 Democratic National Convention.  From 1871 to 1875he
served as attorney general of Maryland.  He last professional positionwas that
of associate judge of the Fourth Judicial Circuit (Allegany, Garrett and
Washington counties), where he sat from 1882 to 1889, when ill healthforced his
retirement.
As attorney general of Maryland in 1871, Governor Oden Bowie called uponSyester
to assist in the prosecution of Mrs. Elizabeth (or Ellen) G. Wharton.  A
resident of Baltimore, Mrs. Wharton was on trial in Annapolis in December1871
and January 1872 for the murder by tartar emetic poisoning of retiredU.S. Army
General W. S. (William Scott) Ketchum and of the attempted murder bypoisoning
of Mr. Eugene Van Ness, a bookkeeper for Alexander Brown and Sons.  In acase
that drew nation-wide attention, the prosecution presented an array of
conflicting medical evidence and attempted to show a financialrelationship
between Mrs. Wharton and General Ketchum in which he owed her money.  The
defense argued that General Ketchum died of natural causes and that thecase
against Mrs. Wharton was purely circumstantial.  A jury found Mrs.Wharton not
guilty.

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