Christopher Pegues Ellerbe

b. 1 March 1846, d. 17 September 1908
  • Christopher Pegues Ellerbe was born on 1 March 1846 in Dallas County, Alabama.
  • Alexander William Ellerbe and Catherine Bedgegood Pegues appeared in the US federal census of 1 June 1850 in Cahawba, Dallas County, Alabama, enumerated next the household of Robert J. and Georgia Ann Speight English.. Other members of the household included Christopher Pegues Ellerbe, John Alexander Ellerbe, Eliza Evans Ellerbe, Edward Ellerbe, Clarence Heber Ellerbe and Nicholas Cobbs Ellerbe.
  • Alexander William Ellerbe and Catherine Bedgegood Pegues appeared in the US federal census of 1 June 1860 in Cahaba Beat, Moseley Grove PO, Dallas County, Alabama. Other members of the household included Christopher Pegues Ellerbe, Edward Ellerbe, Clarence Heber Ellerbe, Nicholas Cobbs Ellerbe, Josiah Evans Ellerbe, Katherine Pegues Ellerbe, George Herbert Ellerbe, John Alexander Ellerbe and Martha Smith Cobbs. Also in the household was teacher A. F. Dobb (age 21.)
  • George Evans Pegues and Christopher Pegues Ellerbe appeared in the US federal census of 1 June 1870 in St. Louis, Missouri, enumerated in the household of Lawyer Alex Martin. George Pegues and Christopher Ellerbe were first cousins.
  • He was a lawyer, according to the 1870 census.
  • He married Mary Virginia Wash on 17 June 1873 in St. Louis, Missouri.
  • Christopher Pegues Ellerbe and Mary Virginia Wash appeared in the US federal census of 1 June 1880 in St. Ferdinand Township, St. Louis County, Missouri. Other members of the household included Alexander W. Ellerbe and Christopher Pegues Ellerbe Jr. Also in the household were one female domestic servant, and one female boarder.
  • He was an attorney, according to the 1880 census.
  • Christopher Pegues Ellerbe became a widower at the circa 1884 death of his wife Mary Virginia Wash.
  • He married Mary B. Francis on 29 April 1891 in St. Louis, Missouri.
  • The following appeared on 5 May 1891 in The Sedalia Weekly Bazoo: (St. Louis, April 27) Yesterday, Colonel Christopher P. Ellerbe, State Superintendent of Insurance, went out to Clayton, accompanied by his partner, Frank Hicks, and procured a license to marry Miss Mary B. Francis, a sister of Governor Francis. The wedding will take place to-morrow afternoon at 4 o'clock, at the residence of the lady's father, near Normandy. The attendants will be Misses Mamie and Nettie Boyd, nieces of the bride, and David and Chass Francis, sons of Governor Francis. The wedding is to be quiet, no persons having been invited but the family of Colonel Ellerbe and the relatives of Miss Francis. After the ceremony, which is to be performed by Bishop Tuttle of the Episcopal church, the bride and groom will take a trip to Virginia to visit Colonel Ellerbe's relatives. After a two weeks' sojourn they will return to Ferguson, their future home.
  • Christopher Pegues Ellerbe and Mary B. Francis appeared in the US federal census of 1 June 1900 in Ferguson, St. Louis County, Missouri. Other members of the household included Christopher Pegues Ellerbe Jr. Also in the household was one female domestic servant.
  • He was a lawyer, according to the 1900 census.
  • Christopher Pegues Ellerbe died on 17 September 1908 at age 62 in Ferguson, St. Louis County, Missouri.
  • He was interred at Bellefontaine Cemetery, St. Louis, Missouri.
  • A short biographical sketch of Christopher Pegues Ellerbe appeared in the January 1909 Alumni Bulletin of the University of Virginia: Christopher Pegues Ellerbe, LL. B. '68, was born in Dallas County, Alabama, March 1, 1846, and died in Ferguson, Missouri, September 17, 1908. After attending a private school at Green Springs, Alabama, he entered the University of Alabma at the beginning of the war, but almost immediately enlisted in an Alabama company of infantry. Afterwards he became captain of a troop of cavalry in Gen. Wheeler's division and for a time was an aid on the latter's staff. After the war he again attended the school at Green Springs, where he prepared for the law department of the University of Virginia. After graduating he was prevented for a time from practicing his profession by reason of his service in the Confederate army, but was admitted to the bar in St. Louis after the removal of the disability oath. His special field was insurance law, in which he became an expert of national reputation. In 1889 he was made the head of the State Department of Insurance. At the expiration of his term of office he became president of the American Casualty and Surity Copany, but afterwards resumed his practice in St. Louis, in which he was actively engaged at the time of his death. He was greatly esteemed as a citizen and as a Christian gentleman by all who knew him. Of distinguished bearing and kindly manners, he won and held his many friends in all ranks of life. For forty years he was a member of the St. Louis chapter of University of Virginia alumni and showed his devotion to his alma mater at all times in every way within his power.
  • The following appeared in the Obituary Record of Graduates of Yale University (deceased during the Year Ending July 1, 1918):
         Christopher Pegues Ellerbe, the son of Colonel Christopher Pegues Ellerbe and Mary Virginia (Wash) Ellerbe, was born December 15, 1878, in St. Louis, Mo. His father, who was a graduate of the University of Virginia in the Class of 1868, was a lawyer practicing as the senior member of the firm of Ellerbe & Ellerbe. His mother died when he was five years old. He was prepared for college at the Smith Academy in St. Louis.
         After graduation from Yale he studied law in Washington University, St. Louis, and in 1901 was admitted to the bar; in 1902 he received the degree of LL.B. from Washington University. He then became associated with the firm of Ellerbe, Waddell & Hereford. In 1903 the firm name was changed to Ellerbe & Ellerbe, and, after the death of Colonel Ellerbe in 1908, was changed again to Ellerbe & Brokaw, the junior member being Linn R. Brokaw (B.A. Princeton 1901, LL.B. Washington University 1903). In May, 1903, he purchased the Ferris Wheel in Chicago, and promoted a company which brought the wheel to the St. Louis World's Fair in 1904. In November, 1904, his health being undermined, he went to the Southwest. From November, 1904, until January, 1906, he worked as a cowhand in Arizona. From January, 1906, until November, 1906, he was special attorney for the banking house of Adams-Phillips Company, of Los Angeles, living in Pasadena, Calif. In November, 1906, he returned to Arizona, and was elected secretary of the Arizona Cattle Growers Association, at the same time having a law office in Tombstone, Ariz., where he spent one month out of every six. He was also deputy sheriff of Cochise County, Ariz. In 1908 he returned to St. Louis and in 1916 became a member of the firm of Jones, Hocker, Sullivan & Angert. From 1913 to 1917 he held an appointment as professor of medical jurisprudence at St. Louis University.
         Mr. Ellerbe died in Santa Monica, Calif., August 5, 1917, after an illness of seven months due to tuberculosis. Interment was in Bellefontaine Cemetery, St. Loouis.
    [:TAB;] He was unmarried and left no near relatives.
  • The following appeared on 19 September 1918 in The Daily Picayune: (St. Louis, Mo., Sept. 18) Colonel Christopher Ellerbe, one of the leading members of the St. Louis bar, and a brother-in-law of former Secretary of the Interior David R. Francis, died last night. While Mr. Francis was Governor of Missouri, Mr. Ellerbe was Superintendent of Insurance. He was a colonel in the Confederate Army, was 63 years old.
  • The following appeared on 19 September 1918 in The Daily Picayune: (Montgomery, Ala., Sept. 18) Colonel Christopher Pegues Ellerbe was born near Selma, Ala., March 1, 1846, and was in the service of the Confederacy as Sergeant Major of the Eighth Alabama Cavalry. He attended the University of Alabama, but left to enter the army in 1863, without graduating. Later he took the degree of bachelor of laws at the University of Virginia. He went to Missouri in 1868, where he was a teacher and a lawyer. In 1891 he married Mary Francis, a sister of former Governor Francis.
  • Last Edited: 11 Sep 2015

Family 1: Mary Virginia Wash b. circa 1861, d. circa 1884

Family 2: Mary B. Francis b. December 1852