Blue, Richard Whiting, jurist and a member of Congress, was born in Wood county, Va., Sept. 8, 1841, and was raised on a mountain farm near the present city of Grafton. During the summer he worked on the farm and in the winter attended such private schools as the locality afforded, for Virginia had no free common schools in that period. In 1859 he entered Monongalia Academy at Morgantown, Va., then under the supervision of Rev. J. R. Moore. He remained at this institution several years, first as pupil and later as teacher. Subsequently he entered Washington College, Pa., and remained there until he enlisted in the Third West Virginia infantry, at the opening of the Civil war. Mr. Blue was wounded in the battle of Rocky Gap, in southwestern Virginia, and promoted to second lieutenant, for gallantry in action. Within a short time he was commissioned captain. In one of the engagements he was captured and held as a prisoner of war at Libby prison and also at Danville, Va. The regiment was mounted and after the Salem raid was changed, by order of the secretary of war, to the Sixth West Virgina[sic] cavalry. Its final service was in a campaign on the plains against the Indians at the close of the war. The regiment was mustered out at Fort Leavenworth, so that Mr. Blue was in Kansas during the early '60s. After his discharge from the army he returned to Virginia, taught school, read law and was admitted to the bar of that state in 1870. In 1871 he came to Kansas to locate permanently, and settled in Linn county, but in 1898 he removed to Labette county, and finally located in Cherokee county. Mr. Blue took rank among the prominent lawyers of Kansas; was twice chosen probate judge of his county; twice elected county attorney, and twice chosen state senator. In 1894 he was elected Congressman-at-large from Kansas; was renominated by acclamation in 1896, but was defeated by the wave of Populism that swept over the country that year. After leaving Congress Mr. Blue resumed his law practice, in which he was actively engaged until his death on Jan. 27, 1907, at Bartles, Kan.