KILBURN H. ROBY,   ONE of the oldest members of the Macon county bar, was born at Mont Vernon, in Hillsborough county, New Hampshire, on the 2d of September, 1837.  The ancestors both of his father and mother were early settlers of Massachusetts, emigrating to that colony from England.  Soon after the Revolutionary war his great grandfather, John Roby, moved from Chelmsford, Massachusetts, to Hillsborough county, New Hampshire, then a wild and frontier country.  Members of the family have resided in that part of New Hampshire ever since.  John Roby, the grandfather of the subject of this sketch, was born in New Hampshire, where he lived till his death, at the age of eighty.  He was a man of some peculiar traits of character, and had a remarkable memory.  He could repeat from memory a great portion of the Bible.  Mr. Roby’s father, Clinton Roby, was born in New Hampshire in 1808; in 1834 he married Miss Lois Harwood, who was born in the year 1811, in Hillsborough county, New Hampshire, and was descended from an old New England family of English origin, which had settled early in Massachusetts.  A branch of the Harwood family removed to New Hampshire on the first settlement of that state.
     Kilburn H. Roby was the youngest of two children.  The farm on which he was born was his home until he was twenty years of age.  His education was principally obtained at the Appleton Academy in his native town of Mont Vernon, and at the Northfield Seminary, an institution under the care of the Methodist church at Northfield (now Tilton), New Hampshire.  These schools were thorough and efficient, and gave educational advantages of a superior character.  Having determined on making his home in the West, he left New Hampshire in the spring of 1858, and came to this state.  He spent the succeeding summer at Quincy, and in the fall secured a position as teacher of a school in Marion county.  During the two years he lived in Marion county he was chiefly engaged in teaching school, though in 1859 he began the study of law, at first under the direction of John P. Reynolds, formerly an able member of the Cincinnati bar and now a resident of Chicago.  Mr. Roby was afterward in the office of Bryan & Schaeffer, at Salem, Illinois.
     In September, 1860, he came to Decatur and entered the law office of Tupper & Nelson.  In August, 1861, he enlisted in company A, 40th Regiment Illinois Infantry.  During his four months’ service he was stationed at St. Louis, Cairo and Paducah, and at the latter place was discharged on account of sickness.  Returning to Decatur he resumed the study of the law, and was admitted to the bar in the spring of 1862. Mr. Tupper, of the firm of Tupper & Nelson, soon afterward entered the army, and Mr. Roby went into partnership with William E. Nelson, with whom he was associated about fifteen years.  The partnership was terminated by the election of Judge Nelson to the bench in 1877.  He is now senior member of the firm of Roby, Outten & Vail, one of the best known and most successful of the legal copartnerships of Decatur.  He began practice at Decatur with nothing on which to rely except his own energies.  His thorough knowledge of the law and a sound and comprehensive judgment on legal questions, have given him the reputation of a safe adviser and an able counsellor.
     He was married on the 1st of December, 1863, to Miss Annie Haworth, a native of Clinton county, Ohio.  By this marriage there have been seven children, of whom six are now living.  In his political sympathies he has favored the Republican party.  His first vote for President was cast for Lincoln in 1860.  Though sincere in his convictions as a Republican, he has taken little active part in politics.  The only public office he ever held was that of clerk and attorney of the city of Decatur, a position which he occupied for two years.
Source:  History of Macon County, Illinois, Published 1880 - Page 139