The Robert H. Jackson Center (image from www.jamestownupclose.com)
WASHINGTON – The last of Robert H. Jackson’s law clerks has passed away at the age of 91.
The Post-Journal says that E. Barrett Prettyman Jr. died at a hospital in Washington, D.C. on Nov. 4, due to a respiratory ailment. Prettyman was the law clerk for three Supreme Court Justices, serving for Justice Jackson in 1953-54.
Prettyman served on the Robert H. Jackson Center board prior to becoming ill and was one of the key reasons the Jackson Center – based in Jamestown – was able to make connections with the District of Columbia Bar Association and the Supreme Court Historical Society, which led to several joint programs between the center and the U.S. Supreme Court.
The Robert H. Jackson center in Jamestown is dedicated to preserving the work and writing of Justice Robert H. Jackson, who graduated from Frewsburg and practiced law in Jamestown prior to advancing his career to eventually become a justice on the U.S. Supreme Court and the chief prosecutor of the Nuremberg War Crimes trials.
He was a giant, and a connection to Justice Jackson, and to Jamestown — from his first visit there, on the Oct. 1954 sad occasion of Jackson’s funeral, to his visit to the Jackson Center wiuth his friend and former law firm colleague, now Chief Justice John G. Roberts, Jr., in May 2013, Barrett Prettyman was a great friend to and believer in this community.