John McReynolds Gaut. A distinguished Nashville attorney and
official of the Presbyterian church, Mr. Gaut is one of the seniors of the
Tennessee bar, having begun practice forty-five years ago, soon after the
war. His father before him ranked a peer among the most eminent
Tennessee lawyers of his generation. Few families have contributed so
many sterling qualities of mind and character to the life and citizenship



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TENNESSEE AND'TENNESSEANS 1505

of Tennessee during the last century as the Gauts. John McReynolds
Gaut was born at Cleveland, Bradley county, Tennessee, October 1, 1841,
a son of John C. and Sarah (McReynolds) Gaut. The Gaut family is of
Scotch-Irish descent, th<e first member of which immigrated to the colony
of Pennsylvania, and thence to Virginia, finally coming over the moun-
tains to Tennessee. Grandfather James Gaut came to Tennessee early
in the last century, and lived for some time in Jefferson county, where
his son, John C. Gaut, was born in 1813. The late John C. Gaut, who
died in 1895, was educated at Maryville College and at the University
of Tennessee, took up the law as his profession, and began his practice
at Cleveland. Not only as a practitioner, but also in a financial way- he
was unusually successful. For twelve years be served as judge of the
fourth judicial circuit, resigning in 1865 and moving to Nashville, in
which city he began his practice and continued with few interruptions
until his death. In 1866 and 1867 he served as chairman of the state
executive committee of the Conservative party, and was a member of
the constitutional convention of 1865, which reorganized the state gov-
ernment. Several times his ability resulted in his appointment as special
judge of supreme court. He had begun practice in Cleveland only the
year following the removal of the Cherokee Indians from Tennessee. In
politics he adhered to the old-line Whig party and stood strongly for the
Union before and during the war. Late in life he became a member of
the Cumberland Presbyterian church, and was also afiSliated with the
Masonic order. His wife, Sarah McReynolds, who was born in Tennes-
see, was a daughter of an early settler in McMinn county. She died in
1873, her death occurring from cholera in the epidemic in Nashville.
