Robert Carter Nicholas was a Virginia lawyer and political figure.
Background
Nicholas was the son of Doctor George Nicholas and Elizabeth Carter Burwell Nicholas (widow of Nathaniel Burwell) of Williamsburg, Virginia. His father was a British convict, transported for forgery. His mother was the daughter of wealthy Virginia landowner, Robert "King" Carter of Corotoman.
Education
He studied law at the College of William and Mary and practiced in the general court under the royal government.
Career
He served in the Virginia House of Burgesses, the General Assembly, and the Court of Appeals, predecessor of the Supreme Court of Virginia. Born January 28, 1728/9, both parents were dead by 1734. He served in the House of Burgesses, 1755-1761 as the representative from York County, and from 1766-1775 as the representative of James City County, and was Treasurer for the colony of Virginia, 1766-1775.
From 1761 to 1774, Robert Carter Nicholas was one of the trustees of the Bray school - a charity school for black children - in Williamsburg, Virginia.
He was the principal correspondent with Doctor Bray"s Associates in England, who financed the school. In October 1765 along with John Randolph and George Wythe was part of committee that heard Thomas Jefferson"s bar examinations.
Later when he became Treasurer of Virginia, he stopped taking new cases and turned over many of his existing cases to Thomas Jefferson. When in 1769 Peyton Randolph speaker of the House of Burgesses chose Jefferson to write a response to Royal Governor Botetourt"s opening remarks to the House, his motions although accepted and passed were felt in committee to be "lean and tepid" requiring rewrite by Nicholas.
Jefferson never forgot this humiliation.
In fact, in 1774 Jefferson had to rewrite a motion written by Nicholas objecting to Governor Dunmore"s land proclamation. Judge Nicholas died in 1780, so only served one year. But he appeared to many who did not thoroughly understand him, to be haughty and austere.
Because they could not appreciate the preference of gravity for levity, when in conversation the sacredness of religion was involved in ridicule or language forgot its chastity.".
Membership
Nicholas opposed the adoption of the Declaration of Independence, but he was a member of the committee appointed to draft a declaration of rights and a new form of government for Virginia. He was a member of the Virginia General Assembly from 1776 to 1778 and in 1779 was appointed to the high court of chancery. Consequently he became a member of the first Court of Appeals, predecessor of the Supreme Court of Virginia.