[1]: 1  He was educated at Boston Latin School, then graduated from Harvard College in 1812, where he was a member of Phi Beta Kappa.

[2] In 1851, Loring served, along with Robert Rantoul Jr. and Samuel Edmund Sewall, as defense counsel for Thomas Sims,[3] an African American from Georgia who had escaped to Boston.

Arrested under the Fugitive Slave Act of 1850, Sims was ordered back to enslavement, despite vigorous efforts by his lawyers.

In 1854, Loring became an actuary for the Massachusetts Hospital Life Insurance Company, giving up most of his law practice.

[1]: 166  In 1850, he married Cornelia Goddard (née Amory; she was a founder of the New England Hospital for Women and Children) of Boston; she died after Loring, in 1875.