Husband Hon. John Trunkey 1 2
Born: 26 Oct 1828 - Trumbull Co, OH 1
Christened:
Died: 24 Jun 1888 - London, England 3
Buried:
Father: Francis Trunkey (1803-1875) 4
Mother: Rachel Fell (1807-Aft 1888) 4
Marriage: 29 Sep 1853 5
• Additional Image: John Trunkey.
Wife Agnes Swan Garvin 6
Born:
Christened:
Died: Aft 1888
Buried:
Father: Hon. William Swan Garvin (1806- ) 6
Mother: Annie Hoyt Lockwood ( - ) 7
Children
1 M William Garvin Trunkey 5
Born:
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Died:
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General Notes: Husband - Hon. John Trunkey
His father's farm was partly in Mercer County, PA, and partly in Ohio. Here he grew up a quiet, silent young man, not giving himself much to social pleasure, but intent on doing his duty in the home and in the community. Feeling within himself that there was some better thing in store for him than cultivating the soil, honorable and dignified though that employment may be, he sought and obtained what preparation was within his reach for professional life.
In the year 1849 he entered the office of Samuel Griffith, Esq., in Mercer, and commenced the study of the law. Here the same quietness and peace characterized him as in the home. He did not mingle much with society, but gave diligent attention to study, striving to master the principles of law, and make himself familiar with the rules of practice. He was admitted to the bar in 1851, and became associated with Mr. Griffith, his preceptor, in the practice of the law. But his reading and study continued. He was very careful in the preparation of his cases. No matter what the case was, before a justice of the peace or the court of common pleas; whether there was involved the matter of a few dollars or thousands, or the liberty and life of his client, every case was most carefully and conscientiously prepared.
In 1866 Mr. Trunkey was elected to the office of president judge of the Twenty-eighth Judicial District, then composed of Mercer and Venango Counties. In 1876 he was re-elected to the same office. Venango County, to which he had in the meantime removed, then, and since 1874, constituted the twenty-eighth district. In 1877 he was elected a justice of the supreme court of this commonwealth, and entered upon its duties in January, 1878. On the common pleas bench he was most patient and generous, listening to the tedious details of business, hearing the arguments of counsel, giving every possible opportunity to the parties in controversy, and saturating his own mind with the spirit of the case, and striving to deal truly and impartially with all parties involved. At the time of Judge Trunkey's elevation to the bench business had greatly increased in the courts, growing out of the great impetus given to trade by the oil discoveries. The number of cases entered on the appearance docket, at the August term 1866, being more than ten times greater than the number entered at the corresponding term this year, 1888, and the business of the criminal courts was correspondingly larger. The result of this increase of business was the accumulation of cases awaiting trial when the new judge came upon the bench. A herculean task was before him, for the statute required that all actions should be reached and have a fair opportunity of trial at least within one year after they had been commenced. But the Judge girded himself for the work, opening the courts at 8 o'clock in the morning, and sitting until six in the evening, and often holding night sessions. The amount of work performed therefore was prodigious. During his first year on the bench he tried in Venango County no less than 120 indictments in the Quarter Sessions and Oyer and Terminer, and 136 cases in the Common Pleas, and he heard and decided 244 cases at argument courts, besides doing a vast amount of work at Chambers, and keeping the business of the populous and important county of Mercer well in hand. With all this pressure of business there was no undue haste. Every man who had business with the courts felt that he was fully heard, and his cause carefully considered. Such was the confidence of the bar and of the people in both his disposition and ability to mete out exact justice between litigant parties, that but few writs of error were taken to his judgments, and such was the correctness of his rulings in the main, that, notwithstanding the great number of novel and difficult questions which grew out of the mining industries of Mercer County in the earlier years of his service in the Common Pleas, but eight of his judgments were reversed during the eleven years that he sat in that court. As a justice of the supreme court he manifested the same patient care and industry that had characterized his work in the court below, listening to the arguments of counsel, making himself familiar with the entire case, reading the “paper books,” and then carefully, thoughtfully and conscientiously preparing the opinions assigned him, in good, terse English, that have been a monument of his judicial acumen ever after. He did not so much seek rhetorical ornament, or strive to embellish his style by tropes and figures, as to set forth the truth and get at the gist of the matter in hand. He did not even seek to parade his knowledge of books, but to set forth the principles of the law and their application to the matter in hand. He loved justice and truth and righteousness, and brought them to bear in all his official work. But the last two or three years of his labors on the bench were years of suffering and affliction. An insidious disease was sapping the foundations of health and life, and causing the strong man to feel the burden of his daily toil. This disease was developed in the nasal passages, and soon approached the citadel of life, with most dangerous complications. Yet the gravity of the situation was known to but few, even of his friends. He worked on, yet never complained, not a murmur ever escaped his lips. On the bench hearing arguments, or in his study preparing opinions, there seemed to be the same close mental application, although physical suffering was wearing out his life's energy.
In the month of June, 1887, by the advice of his medical counsel, he went to London, England, to be treated by a medical expert. The time spent in London was a period of great suffering, yet he was patient, resigned and trustful, feeling that he was in the hands of a wise and kind Providence, and that all would be well. But the time came when he felt and knew that the end was near. He did not fear the change. Placing his hand in that of his life partner, he spoke kindly of distant friends, and then engaged in prayer for loved ones on that side the water, and on this side; for the church in Franklin, the church of his love; thanked God for the gift of his Son, and his hope of eternal life through him, and for the forgiveness of all his sins. A little later he folded his hands on his bosom; closed his eyes for the last sleep; a little while and the change came; the angels escorted him up to the home, and he passed in to “see the King in his beauty.” “Softly as the shadow of a summer cloud death fell on him.” As a religious man Judge Trunkey was eminently careful and conscientious. To him there was a yet higher duty he owed to the church and to its great Head, than to all secular affairs. Religion was an active principle in his life, and all he said or did was influenced by it. After his removal to Franklin he was elected a ruling elder in the Presbyterian Church, and at once entered upon the active duties of that office. He delighted in visiting the poor and the afflicted, and was generous, almost to a fault, in alleviating the wants of the destitute. At that great convocation, the Pan Presbyterian Council, representing 20,000,000 of adherents, which opened its sessions in London in July, and in which Judge Trunkey was to have sat as a representative from the New World, Rev. Dr. Blakie, of Edinburgh, arose in his place, and, in a feeling announcement, declared that “the death of Judge Trunkey is a great loss to Presbyterianism in America.” He was a successful Sabbath-school superintendent. During the two years of his incumbency of that office, he never entered the school without the most thorough preparation of the lesson of the day. Indeed, the secret of his success in life was, that he made a point of being thoroughly prepared for the matter before him by careful reading and patient thinking.
In person Judge Trunkey was about six feet tall, slender, erect in his carriage, and deliberate yet quick in his movements. In manner he was always courteous, and as approachable as a child. He had a wonderful amount of charity and good feeling toward others. No words of bitterness or quick censure ever escaped his lips, but, on the contrary, he always had words of apology and excuse for the evil words and deeds of those around him. There is this crowning fact in his life: from his boyhood until he laid him down to die, in a strange land, he led a pure, sweet and virtuous life. No one ever heard him utter a word, or a sentence, that might not have been uttered in the presence of any company. With all the high positions to which he had attained and adorned, there were, in the judgment of his friends, still greater possibilities before him. But these possibilities were not to be realized in this life, but they are and will be in the blessed life on which he has entered, where the redeemed of the Lord shall be made kings and priests unto God. Such a man was John Trunkey. As a star rises to the zenith without haste, without rest, he rose to a high and higher manhood. He strove for the best thought, the truest speech, the sincerest action. He dealt justly, loved mercy, and walked humbly with God. Surely his life was a successful and happy one. He was happy, too, in his death. It came in the fullness of his mental vigor, before his clear sight was darkened, or his natural force abated. To him it could not come amiss. He lived in the knowledge that life here is a part of life hereafter, and death a transition. Immortality was not with him a theory, but a fact, of which he was conscious. He strove to live as an immortal, and death has consummated his life. [HMC 1888, 1201]