Charles Mackay Cotton

A man of force, experience and capacity, Charles Mackay Cotton has made for himself an enviable position at the bar of Quebec and is numbered among the most able and successful advocates of Montreal, where he is in active practice as a member of the firm of Cotton & Westover. He was born in Durham township, Missisquoi county, Quebec, February 22, 1878, and is a representative of a well known Canadian family of English extraction, being a son of Sheriff Cotton, a grandson of Dr. Cotton and a great-grandson of Rev. Charles Caleb Cotton, B. A. (Oxford), who came from England in 1799 and was one of the pioneer Anglican clergymen in the eastern townships.

Charles Mackay Cotton acquired his preliminary education at Cowansville Academy, Feller Institute, Grande Ligne, Quebec, and afterward entered McGill University, Montreal, from which he was graduated with the degree of B. A. in 1899, winning the high honor of the gold medal for general proficiency. From the same institution he was afterwards graduated B. C. L. in 1902, taking at this time the Macdonald scholarship. In his student days he gave every evidence of the ability and power upon which his present success is founded for besides the honors above mentioned he was class orator in science, arts and law. His record in McGill University is very creditable and one of which he has every reason to be proud, and its promise has been fully justified by his later accomplishments in the professional field. Mr. Cotton was called to the bar as advocate in 1902 and immediately afterwards went abroad in order to get the advantages of foreign travel and to supplement his excellent legal training by further study. He attended lectures at the law school of the University of Montpelier in 1903, thus completing an exhaustive and comprehensive legal education.

Mr. Cotton opened his first office in Sweetsburg, this province, practising in partnership with J. C. McCorkill, and proving able, farsighted and discriminating in the discharge of his professional duties. From Sweetsburg he came to Montreal, and he is today one of the representative citizens of this community, prominent in his profession and a leading factor in the promotion of those projects and measures which have for their object municipal growth, advancement and progress. The firm of Cotton & Westover is one of the strongest of its kind in the city and connected through a wide and representative patronage with a great deal of important litigation. Mr. Cotton is recognized as an able advocate, possessed of a comprehensive knowledge of the law and a practical ability in its application, and his developed powers and wide experience are bringing him constantly increasing prominence in his chosen field.

Mr. Cotton is a member of the Anglican church and was formerly a captain in the Fifteenth Shefford Field Battery. A strong liberal, he takes an intelligent interest in public affairs, opposing political corruption wherever he finds it and supporting by word and action pure and clean politics. Viewed from any standpoint his has been a useful and successful career, and the future undoubtedly holds for him further honors and continued prosperity.