Lipscomb, Abner Smith (1789–1856)

Abner Smith Lipscomb, lawyer, justice, and secretary of state during the Mirabeau B. Lamar administration, the son of Joel and Elizabeth (Chiles) Lipscomb, was born on February 10, 1789, in Abbeville District, South Carolina. He studied law in the office of John C. Calhoun, was admitted to the bar in 1810, and began practice at St. Stephens, Alabama. In 1819 he was appointed a circuit judge of Alabama and from 1823 to 1835 was chief justice of the Alabama Supreme Court. He was a member of the Alabama legislature in 1838. In 1839 he moved to Texas and established a law practice. He was secretary of state under Lamar from January 31 to December 13, 1840. Lipscomb was a member of the Convention of 1845 and served that year on the select committee that drew up a report on the General Land Office. He was appointed an associate justice of the Texas Supreme Court in 1846 by Governor James Pinckney Henderson and was elected to the same position in 1851 and 1856. Lipscomb married Elizabeth Gains in 1813. She died in 1841, and he married Mary P. Bullock of Austin in 1843. Lipscomb died in Austin on December 8, 1856, and was buried in the State Cemetery. Lipscomb County, established in 1876, was named in his honor.