Richard Watson Arnold (14 February 1843–27 September 1911), attorney, businessman, and politician, was born in Berlin, Southampton County, the eldest of two sons and three daughters of Isaac M. Arnold, a Methodist minister, and his second wife, Margaret Ann Anderson Arnold. Arnold was a private in Company D, 3d Virginia Infantry, from May 1861 until his capture in Richmond on 3 April 1865. From June 1863 to February 1864 he was detached to the provost guard of George E. Pickett's division. Arnold served in the Peninsula campaign, at the Second Battle of Manassas (Bull Run), at Fredericksburg, at Gettysburg, and during the siege of Petersburg. After the war Arnold read law in Petersburg and was admitted to the bar. He settled in Waverly in Sussex County and began his law practice. He also operated a livery stable and drayage company and a hotel, and as the founder of the Old Dominion Peanut Company he was credited with introducing the first peanut-cleaning machines and pioneering in large-scale peanut warehousing and marketing. On 14 January 1871 he married Ida Prince, of Sussex County. They had eight sons and four daughters.

Arnold entered public life as commonwealth's attorney for Sussex County from May 1870 through December 1873. When Waverly was incorporated in 1879, he was one of the five trustees who composed the town council until the first regular election. From January 1880 to December 1885 Arnold served as judge of the county courts of Sussex and Greensville Counties. Judge Arnold, as he was thereafter known, was a close political ally of his former commander, General William Mahone. He followed Mahone into the Readjuster Party and then into the Republican Party, campaigned vigorously in many counties in each election, advised Mahone on political strategy and patronage, and soon established himself as one of the leading Readjusters, and later one of the leading Republicans, in the Fourth Congressional District.

Arnold considered running for Congress in 1880 and in 1886, but his business interests and the needs of his large family prevented him from doing so. In 1888, however, when John Mercer Langston, the superintendent of the Virginia Normal and Collegiate Institute (later Virginia State University), ran for the Republican nomination, Arnold strongly opposed nominating an African American and, with Mahone's support, became a candidate himself. After a bitter contest in which Arnold's supporters used the party machinery against Langston, Arnold won the nomination at the district convention in Farmville. Langston promptly bolted the party and ran as an independent against Arnold and the Democratic Party nominee, Edward Carrington Venable. Langston received solid support from the district's African Americans, who formed the backbone of the Republican Party. Arnold canvassed the district tirelessly, but he received only eleven percent of the vote. Venable narrowly defeated Langston, although the Republican majority in the House of Representatives seated Langston because of widespread electoral fraud by the Democrats.

Following his defeat Arnold resumed his law practice and business interests. In 1889 he moved his peanut factory, by then named the Standard Peanut Company, to Portsmouth and then in 1892 to Norfolk. He resided in Norfolk from 1892 until the peanut company failed in 1898, after which he returned to Waverly and resumed the practice of law. Richard Watson Arnold was elected mayor of Waverly in June 1900, took office on 1 July, and was still serving when he died while on a visit to Norfolk on 27 September 1911. He was buried in Waverly.

Sources Consulted:
Birth date on gravestone and in Thomas St. John Arnold, The Arnold Family of Waverly, Virginia (1981; portrait, 6); variant birth date of Feb. 1845 in United States Census Schedules, Sussex Co., 1900, Records of the Bureau of the Census, Record Group 29, National Archives and Records Administration (NARA), Washington, D.C.; Compiled Service Records of Confederate Soldiers (1861–1865), War Department Collection of Confederate Records, Record Group 109, NARA; Marriage Register, Sussex Co., Bureau of Vital Statistics, Commonwealth of Virginia Department of Health, Record Group 36, Library of Virginia; numerous Arnold letters in William Mahone Papers, David M. Rubenstein Rare Book and Manuscript Library, Duke University, Durham, N.C.; Committee on Elections, John M. Langston v. E. C. Venable, 51st Cong., 1st sess., 1890, House Rept. 2462, serial 2814; Norfolk Chamber of Commerce, Norfolk, Va.: Port and City (1893), 108–109; obituaries in Petersburg Daily Progress, 27 Sept. 1911, and Norfolk Virginian-Pilot and Petersburg Daily Index-Appeal, both 28 Sept. 1911.

Written for the Dictionary of Virginia Biography by Alan B. Bromberg.

How to cite this page:
Alan B. Bromberg, "Richard Watson Arnold (1843–1911)," Dictionary of Virginia Biography, Library of Virginia (1998– ), published 2024 (http://www.lva.virginia.gov/public/dvb/bio.asp?b=Arnold_Richard_Watson, accessed [today's date]).

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