Henry Keeling Ellyson (July 11, 1823 – November 27, 1890) was Virginia journalist, businessman, politician, and Baptist layman.

He also was corresponding secretary of the State Mission Board of Virginia for 45 years (where he encouraged in particular Baptist associations west of the Blue Ridge Mountains and would be succeeded by his fourth son William Ellyson, who served another three decades).

[11] In 1857, Henrico County voters elected Ellyson sheriff, a position he continued during the American Civil War until late 1865.

His second son James Taylor Ellyson enlisted in the Confederate artillery (Second Company of Richmond Howitzers) upon reaching legal age in 1863.

[12] Ellyson acquired a half-interest in the Richmond Dispatch after departing Confederate troops lit a fire during their evacuation on the night of April 2–3, which also destroyed the former newspaper's office.

In 1867 Ellyson helped found the Conservative Party and by December sat on its state central committee, which opposed the Virginia Constitutional Convention of 1868.

After Congressional Reconstruction ended, the Virginia General Assembly allowed Governor Gilbert C. Walker (elected in July 1869) to appoint a new city council for Richmond.

The General Assembly had also passed an Enabling Act allowing Walker to replace incumbent officials (elected as well as militarily-appointed).

Ellyson created a new police force led by his ally John S. Poe, Jr.,[13] He deputized firemen and other citizens and started what became known as the "Municipal War".

[14] The gasworks and waterworks superintendents sided with Ellyson and cut off service to the barricaded main police station.

A few nights later, black Republicans ambushed a German Catholic baker who had been deputized by Ellyson (although news reports never identified either of the two fatalities).

Initial reports speculated that 75 had been killed and over 500 injured, but when the dust settled, the death toll stood at 62 men (no women had attended the event).

One Virginia state senator was among the dead, and the 215 injured included both Ellyson and Chahoon, former military governor H. H. Wells and house speaker Thomas S.

[18][19] Another election was then called, and while the Republicans complained of further skullduggery, the Conservative candidate, New Jersey-born Confederate veteran and editor Anthony M. Kieley was declared the winner over Chahoon.

Conservatives then sent Chahoon to prison on a forgery charge, but Governor Walker pardoned him, reputedly on the condition that he leave the state.

Continuing to boost his home town, Ellyson also promoted the Virginia railway companies that merged during the 1870s came under the overall management of the Pennsylvania Railroad.

Ellyson survived his wife, but died of heart failure at his son's house in Richmond on November 27, 1890, aged 67.