My Genealogy Hound

Thomas Essex, one of the most prominent men of Little Rock, was born in St. Louis, Mo., December 15, 1837. His father, James C, was born in 1811, and his mother, whose maiden name was Rebecca Lee, was born in Ireland in 1818, the youngest of fifteen children. She came to America when only nine years of age with grandparents (Lee) and settled in Illinois near St. Louis, afterward moving to that city. The grandfather, Thomas Essex, was a celebrated physician in England, who came to this country and settled in Tennessee at an early day. The father of our subject left home when a boy, and settled in St. Louis, where he still resides, at the advanced age of seventy-eighty, and his estimable wife, seventy-one years old. Thomas received his primary education in the private schools at St. Louis, and at the high school at Arcadia, Mo. In 1854 he entered McKendree College, at Lebanon, Ill., where he received the degree of A. B. in the class of 1858, and degree of A. M. in 1860. After his graduation he read law in the office of Hon. Thomas C. Johnson, of St. Louis, and was honored with the degree of LL. B., in the Cincinnati Law School, in 1861. Mr. Essex then settled in Ironton, near Arcadia, Mo., where he resided for some fifteen years, part of the time teaching at the Arcadia school, and later giving his attention to the practice of law. In conjunction with W. H. Winfield, afterward a resident lawyer of Little Rock, Ark., he edited and published for some time the Iron County Register, in the interests of the Democratic party. This paper is still in existence, and is published by the editor to whom it was sold as soon as the county went Democratic. In June, 1866, Mr. Essex was married to Miss Adeline V., daughter of Benj. and Caroline (Murry) Hypes, natives of Virginia, and residents of Lebanon, Ill. To this union one child has been born, Carrie Lee, an attractive lady, who has been given every advantage of schooling, having graduated at the Little Rock University, in the class of 1888. Both the parents of Mr. and Mrs. Essex are living; the former celebrated their golden wedding in September, 1884, her parents enjoying a similar anniversary in November of the same year. Mr. Essex was elected, in 1867, to fill an unexpired term in the Missouri Senate, representing the then Twenty-fourth senatorial district, embracing the counties of Iron, Madison, Wayne, Butler, Reynolds, Shannon, Carter, Ripley and Oregon. He was re-elected in 1870, for the full term of four years, and the last two years of that service was president pro tem of that body. In December, 1875, Mr. Essex moved to Little Rock, and took charge of the land department of the St. Louis, Iron Mountain & Southern Railway, and in January, 1876, was regularly appointed land commissioner thereof. In 1881 he was made tax commissioner of the Missouri Pacific, in Arkansas, in addition to his position as land commissioner. The affairs of the land department of the Little Rock & Fort Smith were added to his charge in February, 1889. After coming to Little Rock, Mr. Essex became a member of the order of Knights of Honor, and is now Past Dictator; Little Rock Lodge No. 452; of the Royal Arcanum, now Past Regent; Quapaw Council No. 97, and of the Knights of Pythias, now Past Grand Commander and Supreme Representative of Damon Lodge No. 3, also charter member of Pioneer Division No. 1, U. R., and A. D. C, for Arkansas, Staff of Major General, with the rank of Colonel. He is President of Section 594 E. R., and was elected Grand Chancellor at the organization of the Grand Lodge of Arkansas, in 1881. In 1883 he was elected Supreme Representative and re-elected in 1887. At the Supreme Lodge, in session at Cincinnati, in 1888, he was elected a member of the board of control of the Endowment Rank for a term of two years.