Chester A. Arthur and party, Yellowstone National Park, Wyoming, 1883 (From description at this other version: Left to right: John Schuyler Crosby, Lt. Col. Michael V. Sheridan. Lt. Gen. Philip H. Sheridan, Anson Stager, unidentified, President Arthur, unidentified, unidentified, Robert Todd Lincoln, and George G. Vest. Unidentified men may be Daniel G. Rollins, James F. Gregory, W.P. Clark, W. H. Forwood, and/or George G. Vest, Jr.)
He was the son of Daniel G. Rollins (1796–1875), Judge of Probate of Strafford Co. 1857-66, and Susan Binney (Jackson) Rollins (b. 1805). He graduated from Dartmouth College in 1860. Then he studied law at Harvard Law School, was admitted to the bar, and commenced practice in Portland, Maine.
On December 31, 1879, Rollins was the Republican candidate for Recorder of New York City, to fill the vacancy caused by the death of John K. Hackett, but the Board of Supervisors elected Tammany man Frederick Smyth. In November 1880, Rollins ran on the Republican and the German Independent tickets for Recorder of New York, but was again defeated by the incumbent Recorder Smyth.
On January 10, 1881, Rollins was appointed by Gov. Alonzo B. Cornell as D.A. of New York to fill the vacancy caused by the death of D.A. Phelps, and remained in office until the end of 1881. In November 1881, Rollins declined to run to succeed himself as D.A., and was instead elected Surrogate of New York County. He was re-elected in 1884, and remained in office until the end of 1887.
In 1884, Dartmouth College conferred an honorary degree of LL.D. on him. In November 1887, he ran for the New York Supreme Court (1st D.) but was defeated. Afterwards he resumed his private practice. One of his last cases was the defense of the owners of the American Tobacco Company who were charged with "conspiracy and violation of the Penal Code", meaning that they had formed a monopoly.
Rollins died from diabetes at the place of his birth which he used then as his summer home, on Beacon Street in Somersworth, N.H. (previously named Great Falls), and was buried in that city.
