Papers Of Abraham Lincoln

Dubois, Jesse K.

Born: 1811-01-11 Lawrence County, Illinois

Died: 1876-11-22 Springfield, Illinois

Jesse K. Dubois was a state legislator, federal government official, and state government official. Dubois received his early education in the common schools of his native Lawrence County, Illinois. After completing this basic education, Dubois attended college in Bloomington, Indiana. Having married Nancy Batterton in 1831, Dubois left school early and did not graduate. In 1834, Lawrence County voters elected him to the Illinois House of Representatives, where Dubois formed a friendship with Abraham Lincoln. He won reelection in 1836 and 1838. Nancy B. Dubois died in 1839, and in September 1840, Jesse married Adelia Morris in Lawrence County. In 1841, President William H. Harrison appointed Dubois as register of the U.S. General Land Office in Palestine, Illinois. He served in that post for one year before being elected again to the Illinois House, where he served a single term. From 1849 to 1853, Dubois was receiver of public money at the land office in Palestine. In May 1856, the Illinois Anti-Nebraska Convention nominated Dubois for state treasurer of Illinois, and he won election, as a Republican, to the office in November 1856. When Dubois moved to Springfield to assume his duties as state auditor, he and his family were neighbors of the Lincoln family. Dubois won reelection in 1860 and 1862, serving as auditor until 1865. He was not a candidate for reelection in 1864. In 1860, Dubois owned real property valued at $60,000 and had a personal estate of $20,000.

Dubois’ two marriages produced six children. He was a Mason and an Odd Fellow.

History of Sangamon County, Illinois (Chicago: Inter-State, 1881), 522-23; Joseph Wallace, Past and Present of the City of Springfield and Sangamon County Illinois (Chicago: S. J. Clarke, 1904), 1:57-58; Southern Statesman (Jackson, TN), 5 November 1831, 3:5; Illinois Statewide Marriage Index, Lawrence County, 2 September 1840, Illinois State Archives, Springfield, IL; U.S. Census Office, Seventh Census of the United States (1850) Crawford County, IL, 243; U.S. Census Office, Eighth Census of the United States (1860), Sangamon County, IL, 136; Gravestone, Nancy Dubois, Greenlawn Cemetery, Vincennes, IN; Gravestone, Oak Ridge Cemetery, Springfield, IL.