Seth Wallace Cobb (December 5, 1838 – May 22, 1909) was a
U.S. Representative
The United States House of Representatives, often referred to as the House of Representatives, the U.S. House, or simply the House, is the lower chamber of the United States Congress, with the Senate being the upper chamber. Together they c ...
from
Missouri
Missouri is a U.S. state, state in the Midwestern United States, Midwestern region of the United States. Ranking List of U.S. states and territories by area, 21st in land area, it is bordered by eight states (tied for the most with Tennessee ...
.
Biography
Born near
Petersburg, Virginia
Petersburg is an independent city in the Commonwealth of Virginia in the United States. As of the 2020 census, the population was 33,458. The Bureau of Economic Analysis combines Petersburg (along with the city of Colonial Heights) with Din ...
, Cobb attended the
common school A common school was a public school in the United States during the 19th century. Horace Mann (1796–1859) was a strong advocate for public education and the common school. In 1837, the state of Massachusetts appointed Mann as the first secretary ...
s. He joined a volunteer company from his native county in 1861 and served throughout the
Civil War
A civil war or intrastate war is a war between organized groups within the same state (or country).
The aim of one side may be to take control of the country or a region, to achieve independence for a region, or to change government polic ...
in the Army of Northern Virginia.
After the war, he moved to St. Louis, Missouri in 1867 and was employed as a clerk in a grain commission house. By 1870, Cobb opened his own grain business. Active in the local business community, he served as president of the Merchants' Exchange in 1886, and as president of the corporation which built the Merchants' Bridge across the
Mississippi River
The Mississippi River is the second-longest river and chief river of the second-largest drainage system in North America, second only to the Hudson Bay drainage system. From its traditional source of Lake Itasca in northern Minnesota, it ...
.
Seth Cobb was married to socialite Zoe Cynthian Desloge, daughter of
Firmin Rene Desloge. The marriage produced one child, a daughter named Josephine.
Cobb was elected as a
Democrat to the Fifty-second, Fifty-third, and Fifty-fourth Congresses (March 4, 1891 – March 3, 1897). He was not a candidate for renomination in 1896, and he resumed the grain commission business in St. Louis. In 1904, he served as vice president of the
Louisiana Purchase Exposition
The Louisiana Purchase Exposition, informally known as the St. Louis World's Fair, was an international exposition held in St. Louis, Missouri, United States, from April 30 to December 1, 1904. Local, state, and federal funds totaling $15 mil ...
at St. Louis.
Cobb died in St. Louis, Missouri, May 22, 1909, and was interred in Calvary Cemetery.
Notes
References
{{DEFAULTSORT:Cobb, Seth Wallace
1838 births
1909 deaths
Politicians from Petersburg, Virginia
Confederate States Army personnel
Democratic Party members of the United States House of Representatives from Missouri
19th-century American politicians