John T. Coffee

John Trousdale Coffee (December 14, 1816 – May 23, 1890) was a Missouri politician, elected to the State Senate and then to the House, where he was elected as Speaker of the House (1856–1858). During the American Civil War, he served as a Confederate officer in Missouri. In the late war, he moved to Waco, Texas, and later lived in Georgetown, where he practiced law again. He had a total of four wives and thirteen children.

Coffee was born in Smith County, Tennessee where he taught himself law and was admitted to the bar. He moved to Springfield, Missouri in 1842 following the deaths of his father and first wife.

Coffee married his first wife in Tennessee. After her death in 1842, he migrated to Missouri, where he married again.

His second wife died in 1845, two weeks after childbirth. That year in September, he married for the third time. By the end of the Civil War, when they had moved to Waco, Texas, he had a total of seven children. After his wife's death, he moved with his family to Georgetown, Texas.

There he married for the fourth time. With his young wife, he had six more children.

Coffee practiced law in Springfield and Bolivar, Missouri.

He raised an army unit to participate in the Mexican–American War (1846–1848), but the war ended while they were en route to New Orleans.

Coffee returned to Missouri in 1849, where he was elected as the circuit attorney for Dade County. He lived in Greenfield.

In 1854 he was elected to the Missouri State Senate. He resigned in 1855 to accept a captain position with the First U.S. Army Cavalry Regiment at Fort Leavenworth, Kansas. After serving only four months, he resigned the captain position due to illness and returned to Greenfield.

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