[1] Ridgeley read law under Judge Robert Goldsborough at Cambridge, Maryland, and was admitted to the Delaware bar at Newcastle in 1787.
He quickly "attained a conspicuous standing at the bar even among such distinguished members as the elder James A. Bayard, Caesar Augustus Rodney, and Nicholas Van Dyke Jr." and "was repeatedly elected a member of the general assembly, and drafted the principal legislation required by the changes wrought" by the American Revolution and the recently adopted Constitution of the United States.
[4] This development marked a substantial evolution of the office: Prior to his appointment there had been very little business in the court of Chancery and there were few precedents for his guidance.
The rules of court, forms of practice and general principles adopted by him [were, as of 1899] still in use, and he is justly considered the founder of the chancery Jurisprudence in Delaware.
He died of heart disease at the age of 67, within a half hour after he had adjourned his court at Georgetown,[1][2][3] and was buried in the Episcopal churchyard at Dover.