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SC 976.4 B81i v.2 1752958
REYNOLDS HISTORICAL GENEALOGY COLLECTION
ALLEN COUNTY PUBLIC LIBRARY 3 1833 02289 9212
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Digitized by the Internet Archive in 2016
https://archive.org/details/indianwarspionee02brow
INDIAN WARS
AND
PIONEERS OF TEXAS.
Vol. 2
BY JOHN HENRY BROWN.
840
-
L. E. DANIELL, Publisher, Austin, Texas.
..
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INDIAN WARS AND PIONEERS OF TEXAS.
of Moody and Jemison was dissolved as to the New York house in 1877, Col. Jemison remaining in New York and conducting that business with other as- sociates under the name of E. S. Jemison & Co. In 1881 he also retired from the Galveston house, and W. L. Moody, Jr., and F. B. Moody (sons of Col. W. L. Moody) were admitted as partners under the firm name of W. L. Moody & Co. This firm at present is doing a general banking and eot- ton factorage business. Col. Mood was elected to the Legislature in 1874, but before the end of the session he was appointed by the governor financial agent, to effect a sale of State bonds issued for the purpose of restoring publie credit and placing the fiscal affairs of the State in a sound and healthy con- dition. Called to perform this important service for the State -- a service requiring for its successful dis- charge great influence and great capacity, as these were the first Texas State bonds offered for sale in the money market after the war, he resigned his seat and went to New York and effected a negotiation under which $2,000,000 of Texas bonds were sold. In 1882 he was made chairman of the deep water committee at Galveston and spent the greater part of the winter of 1882-83 in Washington City in the interest of what was known as the Eads bill, a measure providing for the improvement of Galves- ton harbor. While the bill failed to become a law, its discussion became general, and wide-spread interest followed. It was the opening, as it were, of an educational campaign which has since so far progressed that all who have looked into the subject are now agreed a deep-water harbor on the Texas coast is an imperative necessity and wouldl prove of
incalculable benefit to the people of the Southwes- tern States, and of the feasibility of securing such a harbor at Galveston. This pioneer work of Col. . Moody and those associated with him eventuated a few years ago in the appropriation of over $6,000,- 000 by Congress, which is now being expended at Galveston. The work has progressed to a point where it is certain that when it is completed the result will more than realize the brightest dreams of its projectors and Texas have one of the finest harbors in the world. Col. Moody was also one of the early promoters of the Gulf, Colorado and Santa Fe Railway, an enterprise that has been vastly instrumental in developing the resources and in- creasing the population and taxable values of the State. He was one of the directors of this road until it was sold and became a part of the Atchison, Topeka and Santa Fe system. He was president of the Galveston Cotton Exchange for twelve years. He has been, and is now, connected with many im- portant local enterprises. He is senior member of the firm of W. L. Moody & Co. who besides doing a large and successful banking business has been one of the largest receivers of consignment cotton in the South.
The firm in handling cotton does its own banking. It owns one of the finest bank buildings in the city, and the Moody Cotton Compress & Warehouse covering four full city blocks near the wharves, perhaps the most complete plants of the character in the United States. W. L. Moody & Co. are commission merchants and not buyers, as all of the cotton received by them is handled and sold by them on commission.
1752958
JUDGE A. H. WILLIE,
GALVESTON.
Asa Hoxie Willie was born in Washington, Wilkes . sacrificing exertion met the requirements of the County, Georgia, October 11, 1829. His father was James Willie, a native of Vermont, and his inother bore the maiden name of C. E. Iloxie, and was a daughter of Asa Hoxie, a Massachusetts Quaker who moved to Savannah, Georgia, carly in the present century.
Left fatherless at the age of four, the early training of Asa HI. Willie devolved entirely upon his mother, who, however, by her ample mental endowments re-inforced by untiring zeal and self-
situation and gave her and her son the benefit of the best schools then in reach. At the age of six- teen, in February, 1846, he came to Texas and located at Independence in Washington County where he made his home for a year in the family of his maternal uncle, Dr. Asa Hoxie. In 1848 he began the study of law under his brother James Willie at Breuhan, and in 1849 was admitted to the bar, before he had attained the age of twenty-one. by a special act of the Legislature. He took up the
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INDIEN WARS AND PIONEERS OF TEXAS.
practice at Brenham in partnership with his brother and pursued it there till 1857, when he moved to Austin to assist his brother in the discharge of his duties as Attorney-General of the State and Com- missioner for codifying the laws of Texas. Ile remained at Austin about a year when in 1858 he moved to Marshall and entered into a partnership with his brother-in-law, Col. Alexander Pope, with whom he was associated in the practice, except the period covered by the late war, until 1866. At that time he moved to Galveston which has since been his home.
In 1852 Mr. Willie was appointed District Attor- ney for the Third Judicial District of Texas which then comprised the counties of Washington, Bur- leson, Milam, Bell, McLennan, Falls, Limestone, Freestone, Robertson and Brazos, and held the office for six months under this appointment when he was elected to the same and held it for a term of two years. In 1861, on the opening of the Civil War, he offered himself for service in the Confed- erate army and was placed on the staff of Gen. John Gregg with whom he served till that gallant officer's death, when, after a brief interval, he was stationed at San Antonio, and there had charge of the exportation of cotton during the last eleven months of the war. In 1866 he was elected Asso- ciate Justice of the Supreme Court of the State for s term of nine years, but at the end of fifteen months was removed along with his associates, George F. Moore, Richard Coke, George W. Smith and S. P. Donley, by Gen. Griffin, the military commander of Texas. In 1872 he was elected from the State at large to the Forty-third Congress and served his full term but declined a re-election because he wished to devote himself to the law. Resuming practice he was actively and exclusively engaged in it till 1882, when having been made the Dominee of the Democratic party for Chief Justice of the Supreme Court of Texas, he was elected to that office and held the same until his resignation March 3, 1888. Since that time he has not held any public positions but has given his time and attention wholly to the practice of his profession being now senior member of the well-known law firm of Willie, Campbell & Ballinger of Galveston.
Thus for a period of forty-five years Judge Willie has had to do in varying capacities and more or Jess actively with the legislative and judicial history of Texas upon which he has left the imprint of his
talents and character in a marked degree. He has always enjoyed a wide personal popularity both among the people and with the members of the bar as has been cvideneed by the votes received by him and the expressions of esteem and good-will ten- dered through resolutions and the newspapers when his name has been suggested for positions of pub- lic trust. The vote cast for him for Chief Justice in 1882 gave him the largest majority which up to that time had ever been received by any candidate .in Texas, his vote being 190,000 out of 200,000 cast for that office. It was a source of mueh sur- prise and regret to the people throughout the State when Judge Willie resigned his place as Chief Jus- tice but it was a step which was forced on him by the inadequacy of the salary as stated by him in his letter to the then Governor accompanying his resignation.
Judge Willie has at all times sinee taking up his residence at Galveston manifested an abiding faith in the future of that city and has lent his aid on all proper occasions to everything tending to pro- mote its growth and welfare. In March, 1874, while in Congress he delivered in the House of Repre- sentatives one of the ablest pleas and most eon- vincing arguments in behalf of appropriations for the improvement of the harbor, made during that session of Congress on commercial matters.
It is however as a lawyer and a member of the State judiciary that Judge Willie is best known and as such that he has achieved the most solid results. His chosen profession has been the ambition of his life and he still pursues its arduous duties with the enthusiasm of youth.
In politics Judge Willie has always been a Democrat. He voted for secession but when the war was over he accepted the results in good faith, and has since given his support to all those meas- ures of a practical nature looking to the rehabili- tation of Texas and placing it where it is destined soon to be: first in the grand sisterhood of States.
At Marshall, Texas, on October 20, 1859, Judge Willie married Miss Bettie Johnson, a native of Bolivar, Tenn., and a daughter of Lyttleton and Mary C. Johnson, the former of whom died when his daughter, Bettie, was an infant, the mother being subsequently married to William C. Harper of Brandon, Miss. Judge Willie and wife have had teu children born to them, five of whom are living.
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INDIAN WARS AND PIONEERS OF TEXAS.
THE STANDEFERS,
OF BASTROP.
More than a century ago, three brothers of the name of Standefer, came from England, and set- tled in this country, one in Virginia, one in South Carolina, and one on the Western frontier. From equally high regard. James W. Standefer after the death of his wife, Sarah Kive Standefer in 1879, went to Lampasas, where he made his home till his death February 19, 1892, being then in the this last Anderson Standefer was descended, being . eighty-fourth year of his age. Ile was one of probably a son. About the beginning of the those brave, generous, patriotic men to whom Texas is so greatly indebted for what it now is as a State and who profited so little by his long resid- dence and arduous services. He has been for more than forty years previous to his death a mem- ber of the Christian Church and for about fifty years a member of the Masonic fraternity. present century he married and moved to that part of Illinois known as the " American Bottoms," where he lived till his death some eight or ten years later. He left surviving him a widow, three sons, James Williamson, William Bailey and Jacob Littleton, and a daughter, Sarah. Shortly after her husband's death, the widow Standefer moved The sons and daughters of James W. and Sarah Standefer who became grown, thirteen in number, were: Elizabeth, now widow of David Scott; Mary widow of Jonathan Scott, both residing in Bastrop County ; William Jolinson Standefer of Lampasas ; Thomas Standefer of Burnet County ; Sarah widow of N. B. Scott, residing on the line of Lee and Bastrop Counties; James Standefer who died some years since in Bastrop County ; Jane the widow of W. C. Lawhon, of Bastrop County ; Richard N. Standefer, who died in 1889 in Bastrop County ; Elvina, Mrs. Kemp of San Antonio; Arminta widow of Richard Favors of San Saba County ; Arinda widow of Thomas Wolf, of Burnet County and Ellen the wife of George Wilson, of William- son County. from Illinois to Alabama, and settled in Franklin County. From there the family came to Texas ten years later in 1827, and for a time (about a year) lived near the line of what is now Brazoria and Ft. Bend Counties, then designated by the general name of Austin's Colony. In 1828 they moved up on the Colorado, and the widow having married Leman Barker, they all settled in what was then called Barker's Bend of the Colorado, about five miles from the present town of Bastrop. That was then on the extreme frontier of Texas, and the three sons of this pioneer family, James Williamson Standefer, William Bailey Standefer, and Jacob Littleton Standefer, becoming identified with the history of the country, bore an honorable part in the same during the struggles which fol- The data is not at hand to give in this connection the names of the descendants of William B., Jacob L. and Sarah (Mrs. J. L. Litton) Standefer but the following facts concerning James W. Standefer's descendants may be added. His three sons William J., Thomas and Richard N., were soldiers in the Confederate army during the late war, the eldest as a member of MeMillen's Company, Nelson's Regiment, with which he served a year when he raised a company of his owu for frontier service, and the other two as members of Capt. Highsmith's Company, Parson's Regiment. Thomas Standefer was wounded at Cotton Plant, Arkansas, and Richard V., at Yellow Bayou. All were good soldiers and all are or were good citizens. lowed. All three of them were in Houston's army, and took part in the battle of San Jacinto, besides serving in numerous Indian campaigns, under those distinguished leaders, John H. Moore, Matthew Caldwell, Ed. Burleson, and the McCul- loch brothers, Ben and Henry. They never heid any public positions of note, though the eldest, James W., was a commissioner in connection with the capital location proceedings at Austin, when that place was first made the temporary seat of government. But in the military defense of the country they were active and in some degree con- spicuous. James W. Standefer married just previ- ous to the family's coming to Texas; the other two, William B. and Jacob L., and the daughter, Sarah, married after settling in Bastrop County. William B. Standefer died in Bastrop County some twelve or fourteen years since, an honored and respected citizen, and Jacob L. still lives there, being a resident of Elgin, where he is held in
Richard Vaughn Standefer, born in Bastrop County, Texas, December 30, 1838, was reared in his native county and there spent his entire life except the time he was in the Confederate army. September 11, 1866, he married Miss Tex Gatlin, of Bastrop County, and shortly afterwards taking up
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INDIAN WARS AND PIONEERS OF TEXAS.
mercantile pursuits (being incapacitated for active outdoor work by wounds received during the war) was engaged in merchandising in Bastrop County till his death May 23, 1883. He met with good success and left his family well provided for. A widow and six children survived him, though a son and daughter have since followed him to the grave. Ilis children are Nannie Olive now Mrs. M. L. Ilines ; Woody Allison who died in 1892 at the age of fifteen; Lula Love who died in 1895 at about
the same age; Charles Herbert, Dick Hunter and Grace Vaughn.
Mrs. Tex Standefer widow of Richard V. Stande- fer also comes of old settled families, her father Thomas Gatlin, having come to this country in 1840 and her mother, Nancy R. Christian, in 1832. She being a daughter of Thomas Christian who was killed by the Indians at the time Wilbarger was scalped. (See account of this elsewhere in this volume.)
DEWITT CLINTON GIDDINGS,
BRENHAM.
This well-known ex-member of Congress, lawyer and banker, was born on the 18th of July, 1827, in Susquehanna County, Penn. His father, James Giddings, a native of Connecticut, was in early life a ship captain, and in later years a farmer in Sus- quehanna County, where he died in 1863.
The carliest account in this country of the family (which is of Scotch extraction) is of George Gid- dings and his wife, who emigrated to America in 1635. Members of the family joined the patriot army at the beginning of the Revolution and re- mained in the ranks until vietory perched upon the Continental colors and the independence of the colonies was won,
Col. Giddings' mother, Lucy (Demming) Gid- dings was a native of Connecticut. The Demmmnings are of French descent. Representatives of the family were early emigrants to America. In the Revolutionary War they associated themselves with their fellow-colonists and fought for independence.
Mrs. Giddings was a woman of rare force of character. She reared a large family, and her sons proudly boast that to the lessons of self-denial, industry and love of freedom taught them by her is due whatever of success has attended them. Col. Giddings was the youngest son. As his broth- ers finished school and attained maturity, one by Que they left the old home and the dull routine of farm life. Wishing to keep his youngest boy with him, his father refused to educate him as he had the others; but Col. Giddings determined to se- eure a liberal education, and this he obtained in the best schools of New York, earning the money w defray his expenses by teaching country schools. At the age of twenty he was for a short time
a civil engineer on a railroad, but in 1850 com- menced reading law at Honesdale, Penn., under the direction of Earl Wheeler, a distinguished lawyer of that State, and in 1852 eame to Texas, whither he had been preceded by five brothers. The eldest, Giles A., a civil engineer, came to Texas in 1833, and in 1836, on his return from a campaign against the Indians, in which he had been engaged for several months, learned that Houston's army was retreating, and, with his companions, hastened to join it. Three days before the battle of San Jacinto he wrote his parents a letter, full of the purest patriotism, telling them that if he fell, they would have the joy of knowing that their son died " fight- ing against oppression and for the rights of man," a letter that was almost prophetic, for he received wounds during the battle from which he died the second day of May following. The subject of this memoir, Col. D. C. Giddings, on settling in Texas, associated himself in partnership with his brother, J. D. Giddings, for the practice of law at Brenham. In 1860 he married Miss Malinda C. Lusk, a daughter of Samuel Lusk, an early pioneer, who was an active participant in the Texas revolution, a member of the Convention which framed the Con- stitution of the Republic of Texas, and for many years County Clerk of Washington County. They had five children, only three of whom survived in- faney, viz. : Dewitt Clinton, Mary Belle ( who mar- ried E, H. Cooke and whose death occurred in 1895) and Lillian Giddings. Col. Giddings opposed the idea of secession, believing that Southern rights could best be secured within the Union; but, when the State seceded, he went with her heart and soul. He entered the Confederate army in 1861 as a
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INDLIN WARS AND PIONEERS OF TEXAS.
private in the Twenty-first Texas Cavalry and was elected Captain and shortly after Lieutenant-Colo- nel, though, owing to the absence of his superior offieer, he was virtually Colonel, commanding the regiment in all its engagements. He served in the Trans-Mississippi department. While seouting near Helena, Ark., he was taken prisoner after a fight, in which he with sixty men had killed, wounded or captured ninety-eight of the enemy, and was sent to St. Louis. After being retained six weeks he was exchanged and rejoined his command and was with Marmaduke in his raid into Missouri and par- ticipated in most of the fights in the Louisiana cam- paign. As a soldier and officer he was much esteemed by his men and by his superior officers. The following official order of Gen. Wharton attests his courage : --
" HEADQUARTERS WHARTON'S CAVALRY CORPS. "IN THE FIELD, May 24, 1864.
" General Order No. 8.
" The Major Gen'l Com'd'g, takes pleasure in calling the attention of the troops under his com- mand, to the gallant eonduet of Lt. Col. D. C. Giddings and four companies of the Twenty-first Texas Cavalry, under his command on the 21st April, 1864, two miles this side of Cloutierville, La.
" On this occasion Lt. Col. Giddings, with these four companies, made a most gallant charge against the enemy, greatly superior to him in number and strongly posted behind fences and houses, driving them from their positions and holding it until re-enforcements was sent him. Not only on this, but several other occasions has the chivalry and daring of int. Col. Giddings been personally marked with pleasure by the Maj. Gen'l Com'd'g.
" By order of " (Signed) MAJ. GEN'L JNO. A. WHARTON. " B. H. DAVIS, " A. A. A. Gen'l.
" Official."
" COWLES A. A. A. G."
After the waning star of the Confederacy had sunk to its nadir in the night of defeat that closed the long struggle between the States, he returned to Brenham, resumed the practice of law and devoted his energies to the upbuilding of his shattered for- tunes. In 1860 he was elected and served as a mem- ber of the State Constitutional Convention. In 1870, when the Democratic Convention met in Houston to select a candidate for Congress, it was regarded as a foregone conclusion that the nominee was doomed to defeat. One by one prominent men de-
clined the doubtful honor, until at last Col. Gid- dings' love of country was appealed to, and he consented to make the race. At first he had no hope of winning ; but, when he took the stump and saw the enthusiasm of the people, his eourage rose and he bent all his energies towards suecess.
He canvassed the district, then comprising about one.fourth of the State, in a buggy ; and a great part of the time his friends were under grave appre- hensions of his assassination at the hands of the Davis poliee. Over a large part of the district he was preceded by a negro company of these police who daily threatened to arrest him and put him in irons. He went on, however, with unfaltering courage. He delivered sixty speeches in forty days, and arraigned in scathing terms the Davis regime, and the people responded to his call and elected him by a good majority over his carpet-bag opponent, Gen. Wm. T. Clark. Notwithstanding the preference expressed by the people at the polls, Governor E. J. Davis gave the certificate of election to Gen. Clark.
Col. Giddings contested for the seat before the National House of Representatives and presented so strong a case that he was seated by a unanimous vote, a remarkable incident in view of the temper of that body. It was the first of the few instances in which a carpet-bagger was ousted from a seat in Congress. This determined fight broke the backbone of Re- publican rule in Texas, and the carpet-bagger went down, to rise no more. Col. Giddings was re- elected in 1873, over his Republican opponent, A. J. Evans, and again in 1876, over Col. G. W. Jones, who made the race as an independent Democrat. In Congress Col. Giddings proved himself an able advocate of the rights of the States, a determined champion of the cause of honest government, and (trne to his patriotic Revolutionary lineage) a vigilant and fearless tribune of the people. He was inflexible in his adherence to the principles enunciated by the Democratic party, not merely from a spirit of partisan loyalty, but because he recognized that its representatives were seeking to prevent the depredations of a passion-swayed and unreasoning majority, who seemed bent upon trampling the constitution of the fathers in the dust, reducing the Southern States to the condition of conquered provinces, plundering the treasury, heaping up an enormous debt for posterity to pay, entlironing venality in high places, and changing the very spirit and genius of our constitution. No crisis so appalling had before arisen in this country since the year 1800, when Mr. Jefferson and his com- peers saved the constitution, as they expressed it,
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"at the last gasp." It was a time when timid men remained silent and inactive, waiting fearfully for the end; when men who were esteemed bold spoke in bated whispers. Yet in those dark and stormy days the Sonth and Southern rights were not without defenders at the seat of govern- ment, at the point from which all danger was to be apprehended. They raised their voices in the halls of Congress and offered a brilliant opposition which has few parallels in parlia- mentary history and, in the face of which the party in power did not dare to advance to the carrying out of its nefarious purposes. The tem- pest broke its force against the breasts of this de- voted band, who threw themselves between its fury and a defeated, plundered, disfranchised and defenseless people. Never were a people and a people's interests more faithfully represented. Col. Giddings moved conspicuous in all these engage- ments. He made a record that entitles him to the gratitude of every Texian, every Southern man, every lover of constitutional freedom, and that entitles his name to a place in the long roll of honor which it is the purpose of this volume to record upon the pages of the State's history. As a lawyer he ranks de- servedly high in his profession. It was in this capacity that he rendered the State signal serviee. During the war Texas had sent $300,000.00 of United States bonds to Europe to be sold and the
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