Davis Elkins

Who was Davis Elkins?

Davis Elkins was a United States Senator from West Virginia. Born in Washington, D.C., he attended the Lawrenceville School, Phillips Academy in Andover, Massachusetts and Harvard University. During the Spanish-American War he enlisted as a private in the First West Virginia Volunteer Infantry, becoming assistant adjutant general in 1898.

Elkins was an industrialist with interests in railroads, banking, utilities, and coal mining; he was appointed as a Republican to the U.S. Senate to fill the vacancy caused by the death of his father, Stephen B. Elkins, and served from January 9 to January 31, 1911, when a successor was elected. During the First World War he served in the United States Army in France, 1917-1918. He was then elected to the U.S. Senate and served from March 4, 1919, to March 4, 1925; he was not a candidate for renomination in 1924. While in the Senate he was chairman of the Committee on Expenditures in the Department of Commerce.

From 1936 to 1956 he was owner of the Washington and Old Dominion Railroad Company. Davis Elkins died in Richmond, Virginia in 1959; interment was in Maplewood Cemetery, Elkins, West Virginia.