Page:Confederate Military History - 1899 - Volume 1.djvu/786

734 he removed to Galveston and there served three terms as city treasurer. Subsequently he was for four terms, beginning in 1878, elected State treasurer. Of late years, having reached an advanced age, he has with drawn himself from public affairs.

Pendleton Murrah, governor of Texas, 1863 to 1865, was a native of South Carolina, and a lawyer by profession. In early life he went to Alabama, and thence removed to the State of Texas, making his home in Harrison county. His evident ability and capacity for public affairs were manifested in 1857 as a representative of his county in the legislature, and he continued to rise in prominence until in 1863 he was honored with the highest office in the gift of the people of the State, as the successor of Francis R. Lubbock. In the midst of many perplexities, and confronted by many serious problems, he performed with honor the duties of chief executive until the State was occupied by the armed forces of the United States. He then left the capitol and crossed into Mexico, making his home at Monterey, where he died in July, 1866.

John Letcher, governor of Virginia at the outbreak and through the major part of the civil war, was born at Lexington, Va., March 29, 1813. By his own labor, begun at the age of fifteen years, he won an education, attend ing Washington college and Randolph-Macon college. He was licensed to practice law in 1839, and in the midst of his profession gave attention also to politics, and particularly to political journalism. In the campaign of 1840 he took an active part. Having established the Lexington Valley Star in 1839, he resumed control of it in 1844, and zealously advocated the interests of the South. In was a member of the constitutional convention; and in 1851 was elected to Congress, where he remained four