Charles Eugene Flandrau

Charles Eugene Flandrau (July 15, 1828 – September 9, 1903) was an American lawyer who became influential in the Minnesota Territory, and later state, after moving there in 1853 from New York City. He served on the Minnesota Territorial Council, in the Minnesota Constitutional Convention, and on the Minnesota territorial and state supreme courts. He was also an associate justice on the Minnesota Supreme Court. During the Dakota War, Flandrau enlisted in the Union Army and was commissioned as a captain in 1862 to raise a force to defend settlers at New Ulm. Given his success, the governor appointed him to lead the defense of southwest Minnesota, at the rank of colonel. After unsuccessfully campaigning for a couple of positions, Flandrau moved in 1870 to St. Paul, where he had a law partnership with two men until his death in 1903. Early life Flandrau was born in 1828 in New York City. His father was Thomas Hunt Flandrau of New Rochelle, New York, an attorney and law partner of Aaron Burr. His mother was Elizabeth Maria Macomb, a daughter of Alexander Macomb, the wealthy New York merchant, and his wife; and half-sister of Alexander Macomb (1782-1841). Her brother became a career officer, general and hero of the War of 1812; afterward he was appointed as head of the United States Army. The Flandraus were descendants of Jacques Flandreau, a French Huguenot who came to New Rochelle in the 1690s. The spelling of their name was influenced by successive Dutch and English settlement in the region. Flandrau was educated in Georgetown, then a separate community in the District of Columbia, until the age of 13, when he tried to enlist in the Navy. Too young to obtain an appointment, he spent three years as a common sailor under other services. In 1844, tiring of the sea, he worked for three years in the mahogany trade in New York City. He rejoined his family, then living in Whitesboro, New York, and apprenticed to "read the law" in his father's law practice. Flandrau passed the bar in 1851 and joined his father's firm as partner.