David Aiken Hall was born on 16 October 1795 in Grafton, Vermont. After graduating from Middlebury College, he moved to Washington, D.C., to study law. Hall overcame health problems to have a successful legal career, highlighted by his management of the James Greenleaf estate. Among his close friends were Daniel Webster (a fellow Whig) and Stephen A. Douglas. Hall married three times: to Susan Apthorp Bulfinch (1790–1829) in 1821, Martha Maria Condict (1807–1836) in 1834, and Abigail Wolcott Ellsworth (1814–1874) in 1838.