Judge A. M. Peterson, attorney at law, Charleston; was born in Westmoreland Co., Penn., Jan. 15, 1825; leaving there in 1845, he went to Canton, Ohio, and began the study of medicine, attending a course of lectures at the Cleveland Medical College. He came to Illinois in 1849, and began practice as a physician in Edgar Co., and the following year removed to Newton, Jasper Co., Ill. On the 18th of April, the same year, he married Miss Nancy Whalen, of Edgar Co., a native of Nelson Co., Ky. The practice of medicine proving distasteful to him, and having a natural preference for the law, in 1853, he abandoned the former and engaged in the practice of the latter profession, which he continued till May, 1861. He then entered the Union army, as Captain of Co. K, 218t I. V. I., of which Gen. Grant was then Colonel; he served until November, 1862, when, owing to ill health, he resigned. In the spring of 1863 he located in Charleston, and resumed the practice of the law. He was elected a member of the City Council in the spring of 1864, and again in the spring of 1866; the same year he was elected Mayor of Charleston, but the duties of the office being uncongenial, he soon afterward resigned. In 1869, he was elected County Judge, and held that office four years, since which time he has confined his attention to the practice of his profession.
