Richard Henry Cardwell (August 1, 1845 – March 19, 1931) was an American politician and jurist. He was Speaker of the Virginia House of Delegates 1887–1895, and a justice of the state Supreme Court of Appeals 1895–1916. Cardwell was born in Madison, North Carolina. His father, Richard Perrin Caldwell, died when he was an infant, and he had great difficulty in obtaining an education. As a youth, he attended public school and worked on the family farm in the summer and fall. He attended, for brief sessions, the Beulah Male Institute and the Madison Male Academy.