US Congressman. Elected to represent Virginia's 18th District in the Twenty-First and Twenty-Second Congresses, he served from 1829 until his death in office. Doddridge was raised in Brooke County in what is now West Virginia, and was admitted to the bar in Wellsburg in 1797. He became one of Virginia's most distinguished attorneys, with a thriving practice that extended to Pennsylvania and Ohio. Politics were not ignored: he was a member of the State Senate from 1804 to 1809, served six terms in the House of Delegates between 1815 and 1829, and was a Delegate to the 1829 Virginia Constitutional Convention. Doddridge was defeated twice in runs for the US Congress (1822, 1824) before winning election in 1828 as an Anti-Jacksonian candidate. As both lawyer and Congressman he was renowned as an orator, not in eloquence but for the common sense and impeccable logic of his arguments. Daniel Webster once admitted that Doddridge was the only man he ever feared to meet in debate. He became Chairman of the House Committee on the District of Columbia, for which he was charged with establishing a new legal code; the work was still in progress when he died after a brief illness in Washington. A bizarre incident from his life accompanied him to the grave. Doddridge suffered from bouts of catalepsy, and during an extended episode in 1822 he was declared dead by a physician and nearly buried alive. As he lay dying (for real) ten years later, he begged his family to make sure this would not happen again. His funeral was postponed for 24 hours and his body closely watched until it was concluded beyond question that he had expired. President Andrew Jackson and former President John Quincy Adams attended the services. Doddridge County in West Virginia is named for him.