PRICE, Sterling

1809–1867

Concise Biography

PRICE, Sterling, a Representative from Missouri; was born near Farmville, Prince Edward County, Va., on September 20, 1809; completed preparatory studies and attended Hampden-Sydney College, Virginia; studied law; was admitted to the bar and practiced; moved to Fayette and later to Keytesville, Mo.; member of the State house of representatives 1840-1844 and served as speaker; elected as a Democrat to the Twenty-ninth Congress and served from March 4, 1845, to August 12, 1846, when he resigned to participate in the Mexican War; appointed colonel of the Second Regiment, Missouri Infantry, August 12, 1846; promoted to brigadier general of Volunteers July 20, 1847, and was honorably discharged November 25, 1848; returned to Missouri and engaged in agricultural pursuits on the Bowling Green prairie; Governor of Missouri 1853-1857; State bank commissioner 1857-1861; elected presiding officer, Missouri State convention, February 28, 1861; during the Civil War served in the Confederate Army as a major general; after the war went to Mexico but later returned to Missouri; died in St. Louis, Mo., September 29, 1867; interment in Bellefontaine Cemetery.

View Record in the Biographical Directory of the U.S. Congress

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External Research Collections

Alabama Department of Archives and History

Montgomery, AL
Papers: In the Confederate Officers Photograph Album, n.d., 0.33 cubic foot. Subjects include Sterling Price.

Battle of Lexington State Historic Site

Lexington, MO
Papers: In the John Wallace Collection, 1851-1968, 15 items. The papers contain an official report by Gen. Sterling Price of the Battle of Lexington, Missouri.

Duke University
Manuscripts, Special Collections Library

Durham, NC
Papers: 1856, 2 items. The collection consists of two certificates of appointment for C.S. Yancey to the circuit court of Missouri signed by Sterling Price as governor.

The Morgan Library
Department of Literary and Historical Manuscripts

New York, NY
Papers: 1853, 1 item. A letter from Sterling Price written to President Pierce on November 27, 1853. The letter is also signed by sixteen officials of the Missouri state government and members of Congress. The letter recommends W. Claude Jones as a Justice of the Supreme Court of the Nebraska Territory.

Yale University
Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library

New Haven, CT
Papers: 1846-1850, 1 volume. A diary of Daniel J. Winslow, who was a member of the Second Missouri Volunteers under the command of Sterling Price.
Papers: 1846-1847, 253 pages. A journal of Susan Shelby Magoffin. Subjects in the journal include Sterling Price.
Papers: 1846-1847, 170 pages. The papers contain letters of the United States War Department. Subjects include Sterling Price.
Papers: 1847, 3 pages. A deposition of Diego Esquival against Colonel Price and his troops for plundering the house of Manuel Alvarez.
Papers: 1847, 3 pages. A deposition of James M. Giddings concerning the plundering of goods in the house of Manuel Alvarez by the forces under Colonel Price.
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Bibliography / Further Reading

Castel, Albert. General Sterling Price and the Civil War in the West. Baton Rouge: Louisiana State University Press, 1968.

Ponder, Jerry. General Sterling Price's 1864 Invasion of Missouri . Mason, Tex: : Ponder Books, 1999.

Rea, Ralph R. Sterling Price, the Lee of the West. Little Rock, Ark.: Pioneer Press, [1959].

Shalhope, Robert E. Sterling Price, Portrait of a Southerner. Columbia: University of Missouri Press, 1971.

Suderow, Bryce A. Thunder in Arcadia Valley: Price's Defeat, September 27, 1864. Cape Girardeau, Mo.: Center for Regional History and Cultural Heritage, Southeast Missouri State University, 1986.

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