Biography

Peter Hansborough Bell (May 12, 1812 – March 8, 1898) was the third Governor of Texas from 1849 to 1853.

He also served two terms as a United States Representative from Texas' 2nd Congressional District.

Bell County is named in his honor. There is a Peter Bell statue at the county courthouse in Belton, Texas, near Temple.

His brother-in-law was the two-time Governor of Virginia, five-term U.S. Congressman, and Confederate Civil War general William "Extra Billy" Smith.

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BELL, PETER HANSBOROUGH (1812–1898). Peter Hansborough Bell, governor of Texas, was born on May 12, 1812, in Spotsylvania County, Virginia. He engaged in business in Petersburg until he left Virginia to fight for the independence of Texas. As a private in the cavalry company of Henry W. Karnes, he fought in the battle of San Jacinto, for which service, on June 6, 1838, he was issued a donation certificate for 640 acres of land. For serving in the army from May 1, 1836, to January 23, 1839, he was granted another 1,080 acres. He was also issued a headright certificate, dated June 7, 1838, for one-third league of land for army service before May 1, 1836.

Bell was appointed assistant adjutant general on May 10, 1837, and inspector general on January 30, 1839. He joined the Texas Rangers under John C. (Jack) Hays in 1840 and held the rank of major in the Somervell expedition of 1842. In 1845 Bell was captain of a company of rangers but resigned that commission to enter the United States Army at the outbreak of the Mexican War.

Under the command of Gen. Zachary Taylor, Bell won distinction at the battle of Buena Vista. As lieutenant colonel he commanded the part of Hays's regiment designated for service in Texas on the Rio Grande. He was experienced in frontier affairs, and the operations of his battalion inspired confidence in the people so that the line of settlement pushed southwestward rapidly.

Bell was elected governor of Texas in 1849 and again in 1851. A few months before the expiration of his second term in 1853 he resigned to fill the vacancy in the United States Congress caused by the death of David S. Kaufman. He remained in Congress from 1853 to 1857.

On March 3, 1857, Bell married Mrs. Ella Reeves Eaton Dickens, the daughter of a wealthy North Carolina planter, William Eaton, and the widow of Benjamin Dickens. Bell moved to her home at Littleton, North Carolina.

At the outbreak of the Civil War he was offered a commission as colonel of Confederate forces by Jefferson Davis, but he refused to serve and spent the war years on his wife's plantation. In 1891 the Texas legislature voted Bell a donation and a pension in appreciation for his services to the republic and the state. Bell County was named in his honor.

Bell died on March 8, 1898, and was buried in the cemetery at Littleton. His and his wife's remains were removed to Texas in 1930 and reinterred in the State Cemetery at Austin. In 1936 the state of Texas erected a memorial to Bell, which stands at the southwest corner of the courthouse grounds in Belton.

Origins

Bell, Peter Hansbrough - San Jacinto Monument, San Jacinto Museum and Battlefield. https://www.sanjacinto-museum.org › < PDF >

• Father: James Miller Bell [otherwise seen as James Madison Bell]
• Mother: Amelia (Hansbrough) Bell
• Peter Hansborough Bell was born in Culpeper County, Virginia, May 18, 1812
  • Various sources give multiple dates in May 1810 and May 1812 for Bell's birth. Bell's gravestone uses a May 1812 date.
• His siblings were Elizabeth, Hansbrough, Ellen, Amelia, Judge John W., William, Marcellus and Dr. James Madison Bell

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References

1. The Bell family in America being an account of the founders and first colonial families, an official list of the heads of families of the name resident in the United States in 1790 and a bibliography. by Weeks, Lyman Horace. (1913) < Archive.org >
2. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peter_Hansborough_Bell (1810-1898) married Ella Rives Eaton
3. Coyner, C. Luther (July 1899). "Peter Hansborough Bell". The Quarterly of the Texas State Historical Association. 3 (1). Texas State Historical Association: 49–53. https://www.jstor.org/stable/30242699
4. http://www.findagrave.com/cgi-bin/fg.cgi?page=gr&GRid=83834843&ref=wvr
5. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peter_Hansbrough_Bell
6. Anne W. Hooker, “Bell, Peter Hansborough,” Handbook of Texas Online, accessed April 09, 2025, https://www.tshaonline.org/handbook/entries/bell-peter-hansborough.
7. Sobel, Robert, and John Raimo, eds. Biographical Directory of the Governors of the United States, 1789-1978, Vol. 4. Westport, CT: Meckler Books, 1978. 4 vols.
8. The National Cyclopaedia of American Biography, Vol. 9. New York: James T. White & Company.
9. Peter Hansborough Bell, other Texas leaders ID’d as slave owners (Updated Apr 28, 2022) < tdtnews.com > Nearly 124 years after his death, Peter Hansborough Bell — namesake for the county — made national news earlier this month when he was identified as one of many members of U.S. Congress who was once a slave owner.