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Quitman County Georgia
Biographies
Hon. Robert
Cochran Ellis, a leading member of the bar of Southern Georgia, now in
practice at Tifton in Tift County, is a former member of the Georgia
State Legislature, and has found and utilized many opportunities to
serve the public welfare.
He was born in Quitman County, Georgia, December 15, 1872, a sou of
Thomas J. and Rebecca (Gay) Ellis. His father was born in Houston
County, Georgia, in 1831, but his parents soon thereafter moved to the
neighborhood of Union Church in then Lee, later Randolph and now
Quitman County, Georgia. He was educated there and was engaged in
farming when the war broke out. Offering his services to the
Confederacy, he was soon taken out of the ranks and sent to Savannah
where he was made a military conductor on the Central Railway with the
rank of lieutenant and brevet colonel. His run extended from Savannah
to Macon, Georgia, a time, and then from Macon to Georgetown. At the
close of the war he resumed farming in Quitman County and for many
years was a prominent and prosperous planter of that locality. He had a
keen interest in the public welfare, was active in politics, and for
many years held the office of tax collector of Quitman County. He
gained and held the complete confidence of all people with whom he
associated. When he died in Quitman County in 1912, he was eighty-one
years of age. His wife passed away in 1871 at the age of thirty-six,
leaving nine children, of whom Robert was sixth. The other children now
living are: James L. Ellis, M. D., Dothan, Alabama; George R. Ellis,
attorney at law, Americus, Georgia; Rev. Thomas D. Ellis, D. D., now
presiding elder Americus District, Methodist Episcopal Church, South,
and Mrs. William M. Bryan, Thomasville, Georgia.
Robert Cochran Ellis gained his early training in the country schools
of Quitman County, and developed a good constitution by assisting his
father on the home farm. He attended Emory College, from which he was
graduated with the degree of A. B. in 1897. After two years of school
teaching, having decided to become a lawyer, he entered the office of
his brother, Col. George R. Ellis, of Americus in Sumter County, with
whom he remained two years as a student. Admitted to the bar in 1901 he
began practice at Americus, but in the same year removed to Tifton,
where he has built up his practice and local reputation as a member of
the bar. In the meantime other connections have been formed with the
business and civic life of his state. He is a director of the National
Bank of Tifton, is vice president of the Empire Loan and Trust Company
of Americus, and he has some extensive farming property in Tift County.
His service in the Legislature of Georgia ran from 1911 to 1914. He was
not a candidate for re-election in 1914, but has recently been elected
again and is a member of the Legislature for 1917-18. During his
earlier terms he was a member of the General Judiciary, Ways and Means,
Agricultural and other committees. In 1914 he fathered the important
measure known as the Public Health Bill, which is now the law of the
state and represents some of the most advanced thought and standards of
the public health movement. Mr. Ellis is a member of the Georgia State
Bar Association, the Tift County Bar Association, belongs to the Alpha
Tau Omega college fraternity, the Independent Order of Odd Fellows, and
is a member of the Methodist Episcopal Church, South. He is unmarried.
Source:
A standard history of Georgia and Georgians, Volume 6 By Lucian Lamar
Knight
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