![]() Samuel Legg was born in Maryland in 1776 and, like many young men coming up in the years after the American Revolution, crossed the country’s western frontiers to make his living in a new land. He married Elizabeth Horner, with whom he raised three sons and a daughter, and living many years in Tennessee before settling on a farm in rural Cole County in the 1830s. The Legg family began to grow and became actively involved in local government while many of the young men served in the Mexican-American War and later in the Civil War. The family continued to move to the nation’s hinterlands, leaving little evidence of their contributions in the Cole County area other than worn tombstones in cemeteries in Jefferson City and the Russellville area. “The public meeting of the citizens of Cole County was held at the court house of Jefferson City … for the purpose of making arrangements for the reception of the Cole (County) Infantry, who are soon expected home from Sante Fe,” The Metropolitan (Jefferson City) reported on July 20, 1847. “The chair appointed a committee of nine, whose duty it shall be to make all necessary arrangements … to give a BARBECUE to the Cole Infantry on their return home….” Samuel Legg was one of the members appointed to the committee by Gen. Gustavus Adolphus Parsons, who was the principal clerk of the circuit and county court and also served as adjutant general for Missouri. The committee was formed to welcome back troops who had served in the Mexican-American War. Gen. Parsons’ son, Capt. Mosby Monroe Parsons, commanded the Cole County Dragoons during this conflict, leaving “Fort Kearney June 3rd (1846), becoming Company F, First Missouri Mounted Mexican Volunteers,” wrote James Ford in “A History of Jefferson City, Missouri’s State Capital, and of Cole County.” One of Samuel Legg’s sons, James W. Legg, served in a company of infantry volunteers from Missouri under the command of General Sterling Price. James Legg went on to serve as a major with Union forces years later during the Civil War, as did his younger brother, Capt. John R. Legg. Born in 1822 while his parents were still living in Tennessee, James W. Legg was the oldest of his siblings. His mother, Elizabeth died in 1843 and was laid to rest in a small cemetery near Russellville now known as the Vanpool-Legg Cemetery. Her husband, Samuel, was 80 years old when he died in 1857 and is interred in the same cemetery. James W. Legg married Mary Ann Wear on November 16, 1843. The couple settled on a farm in the Clark Township of southern Cole County, where they raised their six children. In addition to his military service during the Civil War, Legg was active in local affairs of government. During the Cole County Radical Union Convention in 1864, James Legg was a delegate to the state convention that elected Thomas Clement Fletcher as governor of Missouri. Gov. Fletcher, during his administration, “dealt with amnesty for Confederate soldiers and sympathizers, emancipation of Missouri slaves, railroad bond defaults and the reorganization of the public school system,” noted the Missouri State Archives. Another brother of James, Samuel Harrison Legg, set an example of public service that would later be followed by a nephew. He was for many years a judge for the court in Cole County and, in 1872, was appointed by the governor to fill a vacancy in the Morgan County Court. William “Henry” Legg was the oldest son of James W. and Mary Ann Legg, born in Cole County on November 11, 1859. In later years, Henry was inspired by the same wandering spirit of his grandfather, moving to McDonald County in Southwest Missouri, where he met and married Lydia Sykes, a teacher in the local schools. The couple settled near Noel, where they raised two children. Like his father, Henry Legg made his living raising livestock and farming but also had an interest in local political affairs. For many years, he served as the presiding judge of the court located in the county seat at the city of Pineville. The Pineville Herald noted, “Died at the home of his parents, Curtis Legg, age 12 years. Curtis was the oldest son of Mr. and Mrs. Henry Legg. He had been sick for some time with pneumonia.” His wife later cared for her widowed mother, bringing her to live at their home when her health began to fail. She passed away in the summer of 1919, but tragedy again befell Henry Legg the following year when his 53-year-old wife died from complications related to a kidney condition. William Henry Legg died in 1936, having reached the age of 77. He was laid to rest alongside his wife in Fairview Cemetery in McDonald County. Less than ten years later, his youngest son and only surviving child, Ivan, died after a stove he was unloading at his home fell from the back of a truck and crushed his chest. For many years, Henry Legg and his family often visited his younger brother, James “Monroe” Legg. Monroe, like Henry, had grown up in Cole County yet later married and moved to Oklahoma, where he also pursued a career as a farmer. The 82-year-old passed away in 1950 and is buried in Centralia Cemetery in Craig County, Oklahoma. In A Hat Full of Sky, Terry Pratchett wrote, “Why do you go away? So that you can come back. So that you can see the place you came from with new eyes and extra colors. Living and contributing in their respective Cole County communities for decades, the Legg family spread their wings and made their mark within other towns throughout the country. Tombstones—broken, worn and too often forgotten—remain as the tenuous signature of the stories they have written in chapters of our local history. Jeremy P. Ämick is the author of the historical compilation “Moments on the Moreau.”
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AuthorJeremy P. Ämick is an award-winning author and historian and dedicated to preserving music, military and local histories. Archives
July 2024
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