Luke Lea (1783-1851)

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Luke Lea (January 21, 1783–June 17, 1851) was a two-term United States Representative from Tennessee.

Lea was born in Surry County, North Carolina and moved with his parents in 1790 into what would become Hawkins County, Tennessee. As a young man he was a clerk for the Tennessee House of Representatives (1804 – 1806). He later commanded a regiment under General Andrew Jackson in the Seminole and Creek War of 1818, and then moved to Campbells Station, Tennessee, in Knox County.

Lea was elected to the 23rd Congress and re-elected to the 24th Congress, serving from March 4, 1833 to March 3, 1837. He changed parties for his second term from Democratic to Whig. He then served as Tennessee Secretary of State from 1837 to 1839. On September 9, 1850 he was appointed Indian agent by President Millard Fillmore for Fort Leavenworth, Kansas, serving in that capacity until his death the following year. He was buried in Kansas City, Missouri.

Lea was the brother of Pryor Lea, a two-term Tennessee Congressman (1827–1831), who was later a Texas state senator and a prominent Confederate supporter in Texas. He was also the great-grandfather of Luke Lea, founder of the Nashville Tennessean newspaper and a U.S. Senator from Tennessee from 1911 to 1917.

This article incorporates facts obtained from the public domain Biographical Directory of the United States Congress.