A dry goods wholesale business, S. C. Davis and Company was located in St. Louis, Missouri. David Griggs, J. R. Stanford, and Samuel C. Davis created the business on January 19, 1835. On June 15, 1853, Henry T. Tomlinson, Matthew Moody, and Nathan W. Perkins became partners in the company. S. C. Davis and Company hired Abraham Lincoln as their lawyer to recover debts from the company's customers in Illinois.