The Charles H. Stockton Chair of International Law at the United States Naval War College has its origins in the Naval War College's oldest civilian academic post. The first civilian academic at the College, James R. Soley was appointed in 1885 to lecture on international law. Dr. Freeman Snow of Harvard University gave lectures on the subject in 1894, his death in the midst of the academic program led to the appointment then Commander Charles Stockton to complete his lectures and to publish them for the use of the Navy. Stockton prepared a new edition in 1898, teaching classes in the subject. In 1901, Professoe John Bassett Moore lectured on international law and recommended that the college appoint Harvard University Law professor George Grafton Wilson as the visiting professor. Wilson lectured annually from 1901 to 1937. From 1946 to 1953, Professor Manley Hudson of Harvard regularly came from Cambridge to give the College's International Law lectures.
On 11 July 1951, the Chief of Naval Personnel approved the formal establishment of a full-time professorship to replace the part-time position. On 6 October 1967, the Secretary of the Navy designated the academic post as the Charles H. Stockton Chair of International Law in honor of Rear Admiral Charles Stockton, President of the Naval War College (1891 and 1898-1900), who had been the US Navy's first uniformed expert in international law.[1]
The Stockton Chair was filled by distinguished visiting professors from its establishment until 2014, when the Chairperson of the Stockton Center for International Law was designated as the Stockton Professor. At that time, the Naval War College established the position of Charles H. Stockton Distinguished Scholar-in-Residence, to be held by visiting scholars of the international academic distinction.