Alexander Wells (California)

Alexander Wells (October 7, 1819 – October 31, 1854) was an Associate Justice of the Supreme Court of California.

Wells was born on October 7, 1819 in New York City.

He was admitted to the bar about 1842, and practiced law in New York City. He also entered politics as a Democrat, and was a member of the New York State Assembly in 1846.

About 1850, they moved to California and on April 1852, was appointed a Temporary Associate Justice of the California Supreme Court, to serve during the absence of Justice Solomon Heydenfeldt, and remained on the bench until October.

He won the Democratic nomination for a seat as Associate Justice of the Supreme Court of California in 1852, defeating the incumbent Alexander O. Anderson who had been appointed to the vacancy caused by the resignation of H. A. Lyons. On November 2, 1852, Wells was elected for the remainder of the term, which expired at the end of 1854. He was to be re-elected in 1854 for a full term, but died shortly thereafter. One historian summed up his judicial career as follows: "The sixth associate justice, Alexander Wells, who came to the bench in 1853 at the age of 59,[sic] died a year later, leaving no published legal mark on the court".

On October 7, 1846, he married Annie Van Rensselaer Van Wyck (1822–1919). Together they had:

• Ann Van Cortlandt Wells (1848–1848)
• Gertrude Van Cortlandt Wells (1849–1944), who married Schuyler Hamilton (1853–1907), the son of Schuyler Hamilton and grandson of Alexander Hamilton in 1877. They divorced in 1884 and in 1901, she married the Baron Raoul Nicholas de Graffenried. He was the son of Baron Emanuel de Graffenried, Ambassador from Switzerland to Austria, and his wife, Baroness Gabrielle de Barco, lady-in-waiting to the Empress of Austria, assassinated at Geneva, while traveling the Swiss Alps. They divorced in 1908.
• Grady Wells (1852–1854)

He died suddenly on October 31, 1854, at his home in San Jose, California.