Ephraim Brevard Ewing

Born in Todd County, Kentucky, in 1819, Ewing was the son of Rev. Finis Ewing, a distinguished divine.[1][2] Ewing was educated at Cumberland College, and was admitted to the bar in 1842.[1][2] Ewing served as Missouri Secretary of State from 1849 to 1853,[1][2] having been elected as a Democrat from Ray County, Missouri. In 1857, he became Missouri Attorney General.[1][2]

In 1859, Ewing he was elected to the Missouri Supreme Court.[1][2] He was removed from the bench in 1861, along with William Barclay Napton and William Scott, for refusing to sign a loyalty oath swearing allegiance to the Union in the American Civil War.[3][4] Two months earlier a strongly pro-Union provisional government seized control of the state after Federal forces occupied Jefferson City, exiling Claiborne Jackson and pro-Confederate members of the state legislature. The provisional government then set about securing the loyalty oaths of those remaining.[5] The removed judges were replaced by the appointments of Barton Bates William Van Ness Bay, and John D. S. Dryden; all three appointees were elected to their seats in 1863.[6]

Ewing returned to the bench in 1870, when he was elected as a judge of the St. Louis Circuit Court,[1][2] and in the election of 1872, Ewing received 155,911 votes to win election as a Liberal candidate to one of two new seats established on the court.[7] Ewing assumed office in January 1973, but died suddenly in June of that year.[1][2] In the term prior to his death, he delivered a number of noted opinions, including Newmeyer v. Missouri, etc., R. R. Co., 52 Mo. 81; Pier v. Heinrichoffen, 52 Mo. 333; Ketchum v. American Express Co., 52 Mo. 390; Pacific Railroad Co. v. Cass County, 53 Mo. 17; and Straub v. Soderer, 53 Mo. 38.[1]

Described as "tall and exceedingly spare", Ewing had "a large family, a number of whom [became] well known in public life".[1] In July 1873, shortly after Ewing's death, his eldest daughter, Anna, married Francis Cockrell, who would go on to become a United States Senator.[8]