My Genealogy Hound

CHARLES E. ELLIOTT, postmaster and merchant of Oronogo. Mr. Elliott was born in Devon, England, Dec. 28, 1835, and spent his boyhood days in that country. John Elliott, his father, and Mary, his mother, were both natives of England. The Elliott family has lived in that shire for several hundred years. At the age of nineteen Charles E. Elliott came alone to America, and landed at Quebec, Canada; thence after a few years stay he came to Missouri, and remained for a time in St. Charles county, working at his trade, that of a shoemaker. In 1857 he came to southwestern Missouri, where he has since resided except while a Union soldier in the late war. In the autumn of 1861 he enlisted in the Sixth Kansas Cavalry, and remained in the army three years and seven months. He participated in many engagements, among them Newtonia, Prairie Grove, Ft. Gibson, Ft. Wayne, Honey Springs, Devil’s Backbone, Cave Creek, Cane Hill, Saline River, Perryville, Camden and Poison Springs. He was wounded only once. After the close of the war he kept a provision store at Springfield, and while at that place he married Maria D. Holbrook, June 6, 1866. They have one child, a daughter of about twelve years, named Lillie. In 1867 Mr. Elliott came to Minersville, now Oronogo, when there were only two buildings in the place. Mr. Elliott is now the oldest resident of the place and the oldest merchant in Jasper county who is now in business, having begun here seventeen years ago. He commenced business with a small capital, but by careful, energetic, and active watchfulness of opportunities, he increased his stock and enlarged his business until he has become one of the wealthiest and most influential men in that part of the county. In 1873 he erected his large and elegant brick store, which he has kept stocked with a complete assortment of goods and carried on a large trade. Mr. Elliott was one of the five original proprietors who first laid out Joplin, with E. R. Moffett, John B. Sergeant, Patrick Murphy, and William Davis. He has been postmaster at Oronogo for over sixteen years, an officer at various times, and a member of Mineral Lodge, No. 471, A. F. & A. M., since its organization. He was one of the seven in Newton county who voted for Abraham Lincoln in 1860, and has since the war been a staunch Republican, serving on the county central committee a portion of the time, and his name is familiar to the people of the county as a good citizen and an energetic man of business.