A memorial and biographical history of Navarro, Henderson, Anderson, Limestone, Freestone and Leon counties, Texas from the earliest period of its occupancy to the present time, together with glimpses of its prospects; also biographical mention of many of the pioneers and prominent citizens, Part 10

Author:
Publication date: 1893
Publisher: Chicago, Lewis Publishing Co.
Number of Pages: 954

USA > Texas > Henderson County > A memorial and biographical history of Navarro, Henderson, Anderson, Limestone, Freestone and Leon counties, Texas from the earliest period of its occupancy to the present time, together with glimpses of its prospects; also biographical mention of many of the pioneers and prominent citizens > Part 10
USA > Texas > Freestone County > A memorial and biographical history of Navarro, Henderson, Anderson, Limestone, Freestone and Leon counties, Texas from the earliest period of its occupancy to the present time, together with glimpses of its prospects; also biographical mention of many of the pioneers and prominent citizens > Part 10
USA > Texas > Leon County > A memorial and biographical history of Navarro, Henderson, Anderson, Limestone, Freestone and Leon counties, Texas from the earliest period of its occupancy to the present time, together with glimpses of its prospects; also biographical mention of many of the pioneers and prominent citizens > Part 10
USA > Texas > Anderson County > A memorial and biographical history of Navarro, Henderson, Anderson, Limestone, Freestone and Leon counties, Texas from the earliest period of its occupancy to the present time, together with glimpses of its prospects; also biographical mention of many of the pioneers and prominent citizens > Part 10
USA > Texas > Limestone County > A memorial and biographical history of Navarro, Henderson, Anderson, Limestone, Freestone and Leon counties, Texas from the earliest period of its occupancy to the present time, together with glimpses of its prospects; also biographical mention of many of the pioneers and prominent citizens > Part 10
USA > Texas > Navarro County > A memorial and biographical history of Navarro, Henderson, Anderson, Limestone, Freestone and Leon counties, Texas from the earliest period of its occupancy to the present time, together with glimpses of its prospects; also biographical mention of many of the pioneers and prominent citizens > Part 10

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rivers, and, consequently, competition with the railroads is impossible. The Sabine was formerly navigable for three hundred miles from its mouth, while cotton boats capable of carrying a thousand bales made regular trips up the Trinity to Green's Landing in the northwestern part of Anderson county. A small steam launch is also said to have once ascended this river as far as Dallas."

Now, take from the middle course of this river, where the timber terminal and Trinity sands mingle with the prairie black and green sand as if bent on showing how much variety could be compressed into one area, what may be called a star of counties, with Freestone as the center, and Navarro, Henderson, Andersor, Leon, and Limestone as its five radiating points, and there presents itself the interesting terri- tory under consideration in this volume. It is a somewhat circular area of a larger size than most Texans are wont to think, in their constant familiarity with vast areas. Its 6,014 square miles of territory embraces an area nearly two-thirds as large as Vermont, about three-fourths the size of Massachusetts, nearly six-sevenths of New Jersey, over a thousand square miles larger than Connecticut, about three times the size of Delaware, and about five times the size of Rhode Island. Its comparison with the areas of foreign countries, too, will occasion no small surprise with many readers, when they learn that it is nearly as large as Wurtemburg, San Salvador, or Hawaii, and larger than Saxony.

But, turning to the individual counties of this Trinity star, and even their size is not appreciated: take the two large urban

LIMESTONE, FREESTONE AND LEON COUNTIES.

counties of the star, Anderson and Na- varro, the larger of the six, and either one of them is but little smaller than Rhode Island, only the difference between 1,250 and 1,088, Anderson's, or 1,055, the area of Navarro.

It is in this last connty of Navarro that this sketch is particularly interested, and since its general geological and geographical position has been given, a glance may be taken at its own particular structure and surface. This could not come from more desirable sources than, in the one case, from lier oldest and most respected lawyer, and in the other, from the pen of an ex- pert geologist, whose long residence in the county makes him as familiar with the county as he is to her people.

Mr. B. F. Giltner, of Corsicana, has long been an expert geologist, especially in the realm of iron, coal and petroleum, and the following will be read with as much interest by the uninitiated as his accounts of rare Navarro specimens are by the more learned readers of the American Journal of Science. He writes:

On account of the absence of any high elevations of land or deep erosions by water courses it has been very difficult until very recently to give the exact lithologic conditions underlying the sur- face of this county; but now that a hole has been drilled down to a depth of 2,235 feet, we may easily determine the corela- tion of the strata of this locality.

This county lies wholly in the lower Cretaceous area. The Trinity river is the eastern boundary of this county, where the lower Cretaceous meets the boundary of the Eo-Tertiary, and where it is possible

that a great fault line occurs. The green- sand rises to the top of the western bank of the river, showing its characteristic lower Cretaceous fossils, found in the middle and western part of the county. The eastern bank of the river at the same alti- tude exhibits the characteristic fossils of the flora and fauna of the Eo-Tertiary. These conditions force us to the con- clusion that an uplift occurred on the east side of the river, as the altitude going east of the river rises to an elevation of more than 250 feet above the county on the west side of Navarro county.

The western boundary is met very closely by the overlapping rocks of the upper Cretaceous. In fact this overlap forms a crescent boundary of the entire west line, sweeping around to about half the boundary on the north and south lines respectively, and the remaining gaps to the north and south being filled by the lower Cretaceous.

The topographic features of the county are somewhat monotonous, as no elevation in the county will exceed seventy-five feet above the lowest drainage. The surface of this county is entirely a drift formation derived from the country to the north; the depth of this drift will probably average forty-five feet. At the base of this drift we find the remains of the Elephas primi- genius just on top of the greensand, and with the fossil remains of this proboscidian we find the Exogyra ponderosa, Ostrea planicosta, with many marine Gasteropoda. Above thiis greensand lies a superincum- bent clayey mass graduating to the sur- face into a sandy soil, black waxy and intermediates, all very fertile and lasting.

HISTORY OF NAVARRO, HENDERSON, ANDERSON,

On the top surface there is quite a sprinkle of igneous gravels, representing many varieties of precious stones.

The sandy lands represent the ocean cur- rents, and the black lands the dead or still waters of the ocean that covered this part of Texas in the past geological ages.

The lithology may be represented by the following: forty.five feet of drift; eighty feet of greensand; 1,600 feet of carbonaceous soft shale; 100 feet of chalky limestone; 400 feet of dark, tough shale; and Trinity sand containing artesian water. There has been some severe disturbance in the post-Cretaceous of this county as evidenced by the faults that show a down- throw of eighty feet on the west side of the fault running along through the south side of the city of Corsicana. The faults as far as observed run from north- east to southwest.

There is but little building stone in this county, and the majority of this lies south of Richland creek, commencing near Love's bridge. This limestone exhib- its itself along the ridge running south to the Navasota creek, known as Telinacana Hills. There are no minerals in the county in quantity or value worth looking after, but the fertility of the soil is suffi- cient to support a large population.

Even back immediately after the war, the Nestor of the Corsicana bar-Lawyer Croft-wrote in The Observer in this strain, and it is still true, as far as natural conditions are concerned :

" The soil of Navarro is various, but principally black sandy, black sticky, sandy loam, and sandy. Her peculiar location is favorable to the culture of wheat and

other cereals, and to the production of corn and cotton, all of which have been ·

successfully produced. In many places all have been profitably raised on one plantation.

" Numerous creeks, such as Chambers', Richland, Pin Oak, two Post Oaks, two Rushes, two Briers, and other smaller creeks divide the settlements and distribute the timber throughout the county in liberal proportions. Taking the timber on the Trinity, Navarro may be said to be one of the best timbered prairie counties in the State. Shuward, the State geologist, when he was here, said he saw better and larger cedar in Richland than he had seen elsewhere in the State. The soil, in all the bottoms, or second bottoms of these water courses, is rich indeed. The Brazos bottom does not surpass them in any- thing but quantity. Before the war the prairies were considered rich enough and the bottoms were therefore seldom en- croached upon; but during the war so many refugee negroes were rushed upon us that it became necessary to clear a great many bottom lands in order to give the negroes employment. This enterprise demonstrated the fact that more cotton call be raised per acre in these bottoms than on the Brazos and Colorado rivers on an average one year with another, for the reason that the worms never damage the cotton to any serious extent; and with proper cultivation these bottoms will aver- age a bale or nearly a bale to the acre from year to year.

" About one-fourth of the county is timber, and the balance prairie. The timber is composed of the usual Texas

LIMESTONE, FREESTONE AND LEON COUNTIES.

varieties, with the exception of pine, and the prairies are beautifully rolling, afford- ing in some places splendid landscape scenery, and all are covered with a luxnri- ant growth of grass, mostly mesquite, sup- porting countless numbers of horses, cat- tle, and sheep, and keeping them fat through the winter.

"Several towns besides Corsicana have grown up in different parts of the county, affording every facility to the settler, as well as good society and the advantages of education. Some of them are handsomely situated. They are Chatfield, Wadeville, Mount Pisgah, Dresden and Spring Hill. All of them contain stores, shops and schools.

" In addition to the variety of soil, tim- ber and productions already mentioned, fruits can be raised in almost endless va- riety, as has been demonstrated by George M. Hogan, near Chatfield (whose nursery can boast of a little of everything in the fruit or shrubbery line), by William Richie, near Spring Hill; by S. D. Mc- Conico, south of Richland; by R. N. White and the writer in the town of Cor- sicana. Apples, cherries, plums, pears, grapes, figs, strawberries, etc., have all been raised by one or the other of these gentlemen within the last twelve years. Peaches and other fruits have been raised by others. A great many fine peach or- chards can be found in this county. Many. have made fortunes right in this county by the raising of stock; and a great many more are making their living that way now, to the neglect of almost everything else."

MAJOR BURTON'S GEOLOGICAL COLLECTION.

On his homestead property,-" Gem Hill"-appropriately named, near Corsi- cana, Texas, Major Burton observed years ago, as far back as 1868, that it embraced a strange and remarkable formation, a geological curiosity in fact; that here " was experienced an agitation or agitations of extreme violence, the principal effects of which, after the lapse of countless centu- ries, are at this day perfectly discernible." In geology this disturbance is known as a fault, etc. The precious and semi- precious stones, fossils, arrow-heads, etc., hereinafter named, were found all along the line of this fault, including an area of abont twenty acres of land, and nowhere else on his property, nor elsewhere in this country known to him, have any discover- ies of this kind been made.

The following named precious and semi-precious stones he has now in his private cabinet: Rock crystal, amethyst, blue quartz (sometimes called water sapphire), ferruginous quartz, prase, jasper of various kinds, Egyptian jasper, chalced- ony, chrysoprase, plasma, carnelian, avan- turine, onyx fingernail, agates (a large variety of beautiful gems), sard or agate quartz, beryl or aquamarine (this stone and the emerald are of the same chemical composition, differing only in color), topazes (all very small), silicified wood, Lydian stone, with numerous other speci- mens of the chalcedony variety of quartz, and quite a number of other stones, some of whichi have entirely different character- istics from the above, whose proper classi- fication he has been unable, for want of time, to determine. Abont 150 specimens

HISTORY OF NAVARRO, HENDERSON, ANDERSON,

lie sent to the State of Colorado to have polished, some in part and some entire, which are now the wonder and admiration of all who behold them. They were all found in the form of water-rolled pebbles, some on the surface turned up by the plowshare, and some under it at various deptlis down to six feet, imbedded in a hard, tough. sticky, ferruginous clay, mixed with coarse gravel and sand, and with pebbles of quartz, flint, quartzite, sandstone, oyster shells, silicified wood and divers other siliceous minerals; fossils, coral, two specimens of the corallum ru- brum, precious coral, and one of the Fungia echinata species, with some other speci- mens named by Prof. Dana cabbage coral species. Not being a learned geologist or mineralogist, he may be mistaken in liis classification of these fossils, but he thinks he is correct. He also has a specimen of amber, a rounded nodule, oxydized, weighing a little over two ounces; arrow- heads, a large variety,-a rare, curious and interesting collection, indeed, all tlie the handiwork of prehistoric man, he be- lieves, with other evidences of his work, but do not know for what purpose they were made or to what use or uses they were applied.

SETTLEMENT.

The Indian life of the Navarro region was so comparatively uninteresting in the earlier days, because it was so far from the entering places of immigrants. These were near the San Antonio road, the north trail from Nacogdoches, and the upper Red, or rather the middle Red river. Then, too, the Indians headquartered here but

little, although they hunted a great deal. Then, again, this was the border line be- tween the woodland and the prairie In- dians, consequently not so safe a place for headquarters, as these two classes of In- dians were further estranged by the fact that the woodland Indians were supposed to be friendly to the whites, while those of the prairies were always ready for their scalps. "The Trinity river at that time," says an old resident of the Neches river saline settlement of 1832 to '36, inclusive, near the southeast edge of Henderson county, "was considered a line of demar- cation for hostilities between the white and red man. Indeed it was the Rubicon of Texas." The Cherokees, Shawnees, Kickapoos, Delawares, Caddoes, Ionies and Anadarcoes were east of the Trinity, while the Tehuacanas and Keechis, backed by the Wacoes, all subject to raids by the trans-Brazos Comanches, were west of the Trinity, the former with headquarters in the counties immediately below. Indian events here previous to the revolution of '36, are very few and far between, as far as white interest in them is concerned.

Probably the only white man residing in the region of the Tehuacanas, west of the Trinity, was James Hall down in Freestone in 1834, and his trading house became a sort of supply station to the surveyors that began to arrive about that time. It was during this year that the first survey was made in the territory now embraced in Navarro connty. It was cut out as an in- dependent survey by that shrewd old American who became an omnipresent gobbler of choice pieces of Mexicau-Texas land, especially in that part of it over which

AND LEON COUNTIES.

LIMESTONE, FREESTONE

he was a Mexican judge; this was Thomas Jefferson Chambers, whose survey was made on September 23d of that year (1834). The other ante-revolution surveys were made about a year later, under the resur- rected Burnet Colony of 1826: Rachel Leach, 27th October, 1836; Jehu Peoples, 27th October 1835; John Taylor, 12th Oc- tober; Enoch Frier on the 11th; Michael Shire and also Jeremiah Latham, both on the 11th; Martin Latham on the 5th; John McNeal on the 15th, and John Clioat on the 18th of October, 1835. These were large surveys located chiefly in the north- east and south central parts of Navarro's present territory.

The dispute as to whether this territory was properly in the Burnet Colony, is well shown in the syllabus of the litigation over the Rachel Leach survey in 1866; it reads: " The boundaries of Burnet's colony, under his contract with Coahuila and Texas, of the 22d December, 1826, are thus described in the record: 'Beginning at the town of Nacogdoches; thence on a north course, the distance of fifteen leagues, to a point clear of the twenty boundary leagues par- allel with the river Sabine, which river is the boundary or dividing line with the United States of the North; here a land- mark shall be made; and thence on a line run west to Navasota creek; thence down said creek with its meanderings, by its left bank, to the place where it is crossed by the road leading from Bexar to Nacog- dochies; thence with said road to the fork of the Bull's Hill (Lomo del Toro) road, be- fore arriving at the military post on the Trinity, with said road to its junction with the old road; and with said old road to the

town of Nacogdoches and place of begin- ning. Leaving at the right, all the lands granted yesterday to citizen John Lucius Woodbury, attorney for Messrs. José Veh- lein & Company.'

" If the northern line of Burnet's colony, being run directly west, would pass north of Navasota creek, it must be so varied as to strike the most northern branch of that creek.

" The condition of the country in 1835 requires that liberal construction be given in favor of grants and locations then made.

" If the lines of Burnet's colony had been established, the survey of a colonist, claim- ing under that colony, innst, if valid, have been made within its limits.

" But if, as is believed to have been the case, the lines of the colony had never been surveyed, or otherwise established by certain boundaries, the fact that the colo- nial commissioner and a colonist located the land of the latter a short distance without the limits of the colony, as since ascertained, did not necessarily invalidate the title of the colonist to the land located.

"If it can fairly be concluded that the commissioner and the colonist reasonably believed that the land located for the col- onist was within the limits of the colony, the title of the colonist is valid, notwith- standing it may have since been ascertained that the land is not comprised within the colonial boundaries."

This colony divided Navarro with the old defunct Edwards colony on the north, in 1835, but no Edwards' colonists came upon the territory. The Robertson or Nashville colony on the west, hung in an uncertain boundary about the head of the

HISTORY OF NAVARRO, HENDERSON, ANDERSON,

Navasota, but none infringed from that. The Trinity then bore the name Rio Trin- idad or Arkokisa, there being a town of the latter name on the river below. Thus the days of San Jacinto came on and nothing but surveys in Navarro's present territory.

Afterward Robertson county covered all from the old road between the Brazos and Trinity to the Jackwise, Denton south line; Milam to the Stonewall, Haskell, Throckmorton, Young; Houston from Polk to the middle of Henderson; and Nacog- doches covered the upper half of Hender- son, and other counties.

EXPERIENCES OF A SURVEYING PARTY.

Surveys even did not begin again until 1837 and '38, and one of the earliest was met with resistance.

" A surveying party being formed at Franklin, Robertson county, I went," says General Lane in his Memoirs," with William Love and others from San Au- gustin to join it, all of us having lands to locate. We organized at Franklin-twenty- three of us-electing Neil captain, William Henderson being our surveyor. We started in September, via Parker's Fort, for Rich- land creek, where we intended to make our location. The second day we camped at Parker's Fort, which was then vacated, having been stormed about two months (?) before by a body of Comanches (May 19, 1836), who murdered all the inhabitants or carried them off into captivity, the two historical Parker children being among the latter. We passed Tehnacana hill on our way to Richland creek, and crossed through a dense thicket to the other side of the creek and encamped about a mile on

another stream, where we were going to commence operations. We found there some three hundred Kickapoo Indians, with their squaws and papooses, who had come down from their reservation in Arkansas to lay in their supply of dried buffalo mneat, for the country then abounded with any amount of game, and from the hills you could see a thousand buffalo at a sight. The Indians received us kindly, as a great many of them spoke English. We camped by them three days, going out in the morning surveying, and returning in the evening to camp to procure water.

" The third morning at breakfast, we observed a commotion in the camp of our neighbors. Presently the chief came to us and reported that the Ionies (a wild tribe) were coming to kill us. We thanked them for the information, but said we were not afraid of the Ionies, and said if they attacked us we would ' clean them out,' as they had nothing but bows and arrows any- way. They begged us to leave, saying if the Ionies killed us it would be laid on them. We refused to leave, but asked the chief, why, as he took so much interest in our welfare, he could not help us whip the Ionies. He said he could not do that as his tribe had a treaty with them. They begged us feelingly to go, but as we would not, they planned a little surprise for us. They knew where we had made a corner the evening before, and knew that we would go back there to commence work. So they put one hundred men in a ravine we had to go by. We started out from our camp to resume our work, several of the Indians going with us. One of them stuck to me like a leech, and succeeded in beg-

LIMESTONE, FREESTONE AND LEON COUNTIES.

ging a piece of tobacco from me. Then shaking hands with me, he crossed the ravine, within fifty yards of where his friends were lying in ambush for us. We got opposite to them, not suspecting any danger, when about forty of them arose from the ravine and fired into us, killing some of our horses, and wounding some of our men. Captain Neil ordered us to charge them, which we did, and routed them out of the ravine, when they fell back on a small skirt of timber, fifty yards off, from which up sprung one hundred and fifty Indians and confronted us. We re- treated back into the prairie. - The Indians mounted their horses and surrounded us. They went round in a circle, firing into us. We got to the head of the ravine in the prairie and took shelter in it. The In- dians put a force out of gunshot to watch us, while their main force went below about eighty yards, where the ravine widened, and they had the advantage of brushwood. They opened fire on us and shot all our horses except two, which were behind a bush, to make sure that none of us should escape.

" The Indians had no hostility toward us, but knew we were surveying the land, that the white people would soon settle there and break up their hunting grounds; so they wanted to kill us for a double pur- pose: none would be left to tell on them, and it would deter others from coming into that section of country surveying. We commenced firing into each other up and down the ravine, we sheltered by nooks, and they by brush in their part. Euclid Cook got behind the only tree on the bank, firing at them, when, exposing himself, he was

shot through the spine. He fell away from the tree and called for some of us to come and pull him down into the ravine. I dropped my gun, ran up the bank and pulled him down. He was mortally wounded and died in two hours. We fought all day without water, waiting for night to make our escape; but when night came, also came the full moon, making it almost as bright as day.

" Up to this time, we had several killed and some badly wounded. We waited till near twelve o'clock for the moon to cloud over, but as it did not, we determined to make a break for Richland creek bottom. We put our four worst wounded men on the two remaining horses. As we arose upon the bank the Indians raised a yell on the prairie, and all rushed around us in a half circle, pouring hot shot into us. We retreated in a walk, wheeling and firing as we went, and keeping them at bay. The four wounded men on horseback were shot off, when we put other badly wounded ones in their places. We got within two hundred yards of the timber, facing around and firing, when Captain Neil was shot through the hips. He called to me to help him on a horse behind a wounded man, which another man and I did. We had not gone ten steps further, when Neil, the wounded men on horse were all shot down together, and I was shot through the calf of the leg, splinting the bone, and severing the leaders that connected with my toes. I fell forward as I made a step, but found I could support myself on my heel. I hobbled on with the balance to the mouth of the ravine, which was covered with brushı, into which four of us entered, the

HISTORY OF NAVARRO, HENDERSON, ANDERSON,

other three taking the timber on the other side. We had gone about fifty yards down the ravine where it was dark and in the shade, when I called to Henderson to stop and tie up my leg as I was bleeding to death. He did so-cut off the tip of my boot and bandaged the wound. We saw about fifty Indians come to the mouth of the ravine, but they could not see us, as we were in the shade, as we went down the ravine. They followed and overtook our wounded comrade, whom we had to leave, and killed him. We heard him cry out when they shot him, and knowing they would overtake us, we crawled upon the bank of the ravine, lay down on our faces with our guns cocked, ready to give them one parting salute if they discovered us. They passed us so closely that I could have put my hand on any of their heads. They went down the ravine a short dis- tance when a conch-shell was blown on the prairie as a signal for the Indians to come back. After they had repassed us, we went down to Richland creek, where we found a little pond of muddy water, into which I pitched headforemost, having been all day without any, and suffering from loss of blood. We liere left Violet, our wounded comrade; his thigh was broken and lie could crawl no further. He begged me to stay with him, as I was badly wounded, and, he said, could not reach the settle- ments, some ninety miles distant. I told him I was bound to make the connection; so we bound up his thigh and left him near the water. We traveled down the creek till daylight, then ' cooned ' over the dry creek on a log so as to leave no track in the sand, to a little island of brush,

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Author: Publication date: 1893 Publisher: Chicago, Lewis Publishing Co. Number of Pages: 954

Author:
Publication date: 1893
Publisher: Chicago, Lewis Publishing Co.
Number of Pages: 954