Edward was born on February 11, 1750 at Wye, Queen Anne Co. , Md. He was the second son of Edward and Elizabeth (Chew) Tilghman. He was the cousin of William and Tench Tilghman, and the great-grandson of Richard Tilghman, a physician who emigrated to Maryland in 1661 from Kent County, England, on the Elizabeth and Mary.
His father was high sheriff of his county, member of the provincial assembly for many years and one time speaker, officer in the Maryland militia, and a member of the Stamp Act Congress.
Education
In 1767 he graduated from the College, Academy, and Charitable School of Philadelphia, now the University of Pennsylvania.
On June 24, 1772, he was admitted to study at the Middle Temple in London. During his two years abroad he attended regularly the courts of Westminster Hall, taking extensive notes of the arguments in chancery before the leading jurists, which he later used to advantage before courts as a lawyer.
His days in London were spent in serious study and hard work.
Career
In 1774 he was admitted to the Philadelphia bar, where he continued to practise until his death. Although the Tilghman family in colonial days enjoyed many favors from the Crown, at the outbreak of the Revolution Edward, like his father, threw his lot with the colonials.
In 1776 he enlisted as a private soldier with the Philadelphia associators and later the same year at the battle of Long Island was a brigade major attached to Lord Sterling. However, he soon returned to Philadelphia to continue his practice as a lawyer.
It was in the field of law that he gained distinction. A biographer, also a leading lawyer, credits him with having possessed "the most accurate legal judgment of any man of his day" at the Philadelphia bar.
His severe and rigid training so imbued him with legal principles that he seemed to seize the true result on some perplexing legal question before he had time to prove it. In the field of contingent remainders and executory devices he was recognized as an authority.
In addition to being well versed in the law, he was also an advocate of surpassing powers. There was little ornament in his speech; he commanded attention rather by the weight of what he said than how he said it. A wary tactician in managing a case, eloquent in language, a faultless logician, he was highly feared by opposing lawyers. Judges had deep confidence in his opinions and respected his plain and direct reasoning. Before juries his sense of shrewdness, occasional pleasantry, and constant air of sincerity were almost indomitable. He had a persistent aversion to authorship and public office.
In 1806 he was proffered the chief justiceship of the supreme court of Pennsylvania by Governor McKean, but he declined the honor and recommended his cousin, William Tilghman, for the post.
His last years of life were darkened by lack of health and the loss of all of his property.
Achievements
Tilghman is remembered as a trustee of the University of Pennsylvania from 1794 until his resignation in 1807.
Personality
He was rather short in stature, spare of flesh and delicate, but well proportioned. Possessed of a buoyant spirit and a sharp wit, his cheerfulness invariably brought a luminous circle about him on all occasions. Neither jester nor satirist, he quoted English and Latin poetry frequently and with ease, and he demonstrated the utmost simplicity in dress and manner. Unlike his colleagues he never wore black at the bar nor powdered his hair.
Connections
Upon his return to America he married on May 26, 1774, his first cousin, Elizabeth, the daughter of Benjamin Chew. The youngest of their four children became the mother of William Henry Rawle.
