A twentieth century history and biographical record of north and west Texas, Volume II, Part 76

Author: Paddock, B. B. (Buckley B.), 1844-1922; Lewis Publishing Co., Chicago, pub
Publication date: 1906
Publisher: Chicago, New York, The Lewis publishing co.
Number of Pages: 972

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HISTORY OF NORTH AND WEST TEXAS.

tled in Virginia. Her death occurred in 1880, . tive of Virginia. His mother, who bore the at Belton, Texas. Of her three children who lived beyond infancy two yet survive, while Kate, the second, has now passed away. The other daughter, Annie, is the wife of M. Mc- Ilhenny, of San Antonio, Texas.

Dr. James M. Isbell, whose name introduces this review, was born in Gonzales, Texas, June 26, 1848, and was reared in the little fron- tier town of Belton. His more advanced edu- cation was obtained in the university at Waco, Texas. During the closing period of the war he left school and entered the Confederate army as a member of the Sixth Texas Cavalry, forming a part of the brigade under command of General Ross. He was at that time sixteen years of age and in May, 1865, he was dis- charged and sent home to await further orders, but the order to return never came. A few years afterward he took up the study of medicine, be- coming a student in the medical department of Tulane University, at New Orleans, from which institution he was graduated in 1872. He began practice in Falls county, Texas, where he remained for a year, and then after living at various places, he settled in Abilene in 1881 at the time the town lots were sold and the town established. Here he has remained continuously since and has been in active prac- tice during the greater part of the time but in recent years has largely put aside the course of the profession, owing to his own impaired health. He has always been accorded a liberal patronage and has kept abreast with the prog- ress of the times concerning the medical sci- ence. He is today the oldest physician in Abilene.

Dr. Isbell was married in 1881 to Caro J. Jones, nee Anderson, of Pontotoc, Mississippi, a sister of . T. O. Anderson, one of the early settlers of Abilene. Dr. Isbell is a member of the Catholic church. He has ever stood high both professionally and socially in this community and ranks today with its repre- sentative men, having the qualities of man- hood which ever command respect and con- fidence.

THOMAS O. ANDERSON, a successful real estate dealer of Abilene, who has nego- tiated important realty transfers, has been one of the sources of the city's upbuilding and improvement, becoming a resident of this por- tion of the state in 1878, Taylor county being organized the same year. He is a native of Pontotoc, Mississippi, born August 14, 1849, and is a son of Benjamin D. Anderson, a na-

maiden name of Sarah Lindley, was a native of Ohio and the daughter of a Presbyterian minis- ter, the Rev. Jacob Lindley. They were mar- ried in Athens, Alabama, and became the par- ents of seven children-three sons and four daughters.

Because of the progress of the war, which so greatly broke up the educational system of the south, Thomas O. Anderson received but limited school privileges, hostilities beginning between the north and the south when he was about twelve years of age. Not long afterward he began to earn hs own living and he made his home with his father until twenty years of age, his mother having died when he was between five and six years of age. Immediately after the war he removed to Memphis, Tennessee, where he resided until coming to Texas in 1878.

In the meantime Mr. Anderson was married in November, 1872, to Miss Madge E. Ander- son. of Memphis, Tennessee, a daughter of Judge J. A. Anderson, an attorney of that city, who, though of the same name as our subject, was not a relative. Following his marriage Thomas Anderson gave his attention to the stock business and continued in the same line subsequent to his removal to Texas. He rep- resented the stock industry of this state until January, 1881, when the Texas & Pacific Rail- road was built. He then took up his abode upon the present site of the city of Abilene, where he has since conducted varied business interests. He first engaged in buying bleached buffalo bones, which were thickly strewn over the prairies. These he shipped to New Or- leans, Chicago, and East St. Louis for the purpose of being utilized for sugar refining and fertilizing. At a later day he turned his attention to the grain business, which he con- ducted for a few years. He was then elected county treasurer of Taylor county and held that position for six years, or for three success- ive terms, proving most capable, and retired from office in 1890 as he had entered it- with the confidence and good will of all con- cerned. When his official duties were over he began dealing in real estate. The town of Abi- lene was founded in 1881 and on the 15th of March of that year lots were sold. Mr. An- derson was one of the first to embark in the real estate business here and has since con- ducted operations along this line. In 1892 he formed a partnership with his brother-in-law, J. T. Anderson, which connection was contin- ued until 1900, and since that time Thomas

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HISTORY OF NORTH AND WEST TEXAS.

O. Anderson has been alone, buying and sell- ing property in Abilene and the surrounding districts. He has a large clientage and is thor- oughly familiar with property values in this portion of the state, so that he is enabled to advise his patrons how to best invest their money for the purposes desired.

Mr. Anderson's home is pleasantly located two and a half miles southeast of Abilene, near the Lytle Lake, which supplies the city of Abi- ene with water. He has taken considerable interest in political affairs, and his allegiance has always been given to the Democracy. 'In July, 1904, he was made county commissioner of precinct No. 2, to fill an unexpired term and was elected to the same office in the fall election of that year. He belongs to the Knights of Honor, and Knights of Pythias fraternities, and to the Masonic lodge, and he has also attained the Knight Templar degree in Masonry. He is regarded as one of the prominent citizens of Abilene and is a strong man viewed from any standpoint. He is strong in his personality, in his honor and good name, and in possession of those business traits which constitute the best prosperity.

MARTIN ANDERSON EPPS. The range of possibilities within the domain of grazing in Jack county lends encouragement to the be- lief that every intelligent and well-planned ef- fort in that direction leads naturally to success. So many individual cases are discoverable where young men without other capital than sheer nerve, in the beginning, have created and are creating wealth for themselves through the medium of stock, that justification can be found for the conviction that a superior mental poise is essential to even the successful con- duct of a business where the cow, the grass and the water are the three physical elements dominating the field. This suggestion covers numerous cases of thrift on the range, in the hills and valleys of this romantic county, but none is more conspicuous or interesting in the details of his career than that of Martin A. Epps, of this review.

A perusal of the origin of this family, which has played an important part in the affairs about Postoak for the past quarter of a cen- tury, shows it to have its origin in William- son county, Tennessee, where Martin Epps, Sr., our subject's father, was born and where his father, Daniel Epps, started his westward journey toward Missouri in the early part of the past century and established himself in Butler county. The latter married Miss Irmin

Appleby and their children left their adopted state because of the mixed and hostile senti- ment engendered by the events leading up to the Civil war, and came to Texas, where they passed their remaining years. A glance at their personalities shows Obediah to have died in Collin county ; Robert, who died in Denton county ; Mary became the wife of James Bays, and died at Brownwood; and Martin, who passed away at Postoak in 1892 at eighty years of age.

Martin Epps, Sr., came to mature years in Missouri, where he was a pupil in the primitive schools of the frontier and learned to read, write and spell. He took up the vocation of his father, as a man, and pursued farming with some success until his departure from the state. He raised a company for the Confederate serv- ice but was prevented by sickness from serv- ing it long and when he recovered his health Union sentiment in Butler county, where he resided, was too strong and too radical for further peaceable occupation by an adherent of the southern cause and he reached Texas with his family in 1863. In Texas, while he maintained himself and family on the farm, he actively followed the ministry and for many years filled charges for the Missionary Baptist church. His first wife died in Missouri, with issue : Joshua, who resides in Coryell county, Texas ; Nancy, who died in Missouri as the wife of Andrew Miller; Narcissa married Ezekiel Miller and passed away in Missouri ; J. B. went to Old Mexico in 1868 and was lost; Charles, of Mckinney, Texas, and Mary married Wil- liam H. Sevidge and died in Oakland, Indian Territory. Rev. Epps' second wife was the widow Smart, before her first marriage being Sarah Jennings. Stephen Smart was her first husband, and one of their children, Bertie, lives in Denison, Texas, and Nancy is the widow of J. C. Turner, of Clay county, Texas.

Martin A. Epps, our subject, was the older of two in the immediate family of Rev. Epps and his wife Sarah. He was born in Butler county, Missouri, August 21, 1860, and survives his younger brother, Isaac D. The work of the farm was his lot as he passed childhood and youth and the rural schools provided his ele- mentary mental training. From Collin coun- ty the father moved to Denton and from that county he came on to Jack, settling on Jones' creek just in the edge of Clay, one and one- half miles north of Postoak, where they pur- chased the Robinson farm. Some years later the Sevidge tract just southeast of Postoak came into the hands of our subject, and, as

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HISTORY OF NORTH AND WEST TEXAS.

prosperity warranted, the Stewart farm of one hundred and sixty-two acres was purchased and has been his home since 1893. With the small bunch of cattle which he possessed on assuming his independent station in life, to- gether with substantial results upon the farm, he has accumulated the six hundred and thirty- seven acres of land listed for taxes in his name and the herd of five hundred cattle and horses which graze upon his two thousand acre lease on the Jesse B. Irving survey.

While yet in Denton county Mr. Epps be- came acquainted with the range and acquired a fascination for the cow business. By the ex- ercise of ingenuity and the practice of indus- try he gathered up a small bunch of cattle in Jack county, with which he can be said to have begun life. Many and various other interests have claimed some of his time, but nothing has ever diverted him wholly from the chief business of a ranch. He has entered the gin business, owning gins at Postoak and at Park Springs at some period of his career, and these and other side issues passed from him as op- portunities offered, showing it to his advantage to turn the property. As an enduring mark of his capability at improving a farm stands his commodious and stately residence just south of the village of Postoak, one of the largest coun- try residences in the county. His home farm lies in the valley of Jones' creek and is the choice farm of the locality and commends itself to the public eye most desirably as a country seat.

December 18, 1880, Mr. Epps married Lizzie, a daughter of George Gore, who came to Texas from McLean county, Illinois, and died in Grayson county where his widow yet resides. Mrs. Epps is one of nine children and was born in McLean county, Illinois, July 2, 1862. She and Mr. Epps are the parents of Leslie LeRoy, Chesley Clinton, Leona, Etta, wife of J. H. Cannon, of Jack county ; Anderson, Alta, Trice Harvey, Ottis, Winnie and Onza Ray.

Recurring to the origin of Mr. Epps' forefa- thers we find his grandfather Epps a Virginian with English antecedents, while the Jennings were also English, but an early-founded family in the United States. William Jennings was our subject's great-grandfather and he married Miss Fannie James, and among their children was Anderson Jennings, the father of our sub- ject's mother. William Jennings was one of the heirs to an estate in England and sailed for that country to claim his portion but died in Birmingham, England. Anderson Jennings

married Miss Nancy K. Ligan, and Sarah Epps is one of their seven children.

Martin Epps has always essayed a citizen's interest in civic affairs, and when matters of public import were to be acted upon and set- tled he has always taken a hand. In matters of local concern he favors the man most compe- tent to fill public office but when national or state tickets are in the field Democracy always wins his support. He has been a member of local conventions of his party and has been chosen at times to fill the position of a trustee on his school board and was also deputy sheriff in Jack county. He is a Missionary Baptist and is held in high esteem in the community where his active life has been passed.

W. W. DILLARD, an agriculturist of Mon- tague county, was born January 22, 1839, in Alabama. He comes of English lineage, the Dillard family having been descended from English ancestors who settled in Warrington county, Virginia, at an early epoch in the colonization of that state. The representatives of the name became prominent families and large slave owners there and were numbered . among the successful men of the Old Dominion. They had large property holdings in Warring- ton Springs, which, however, was mostly de- stroyed by fire during the Civil war. The paternal grandfather of our subject spent his life there and was a prominent and influential citi- zen. Some of the older representatives of the family participated in the Revolutionary War. In the grandfather's household there were two sons and two daughters: James, who became a resident of South Carolina; Fannie, Sallie, and William.

The last named was born in Virginia and remained under the parental roof until he at- tained his majority when he went to South Carolina, later to Georgia, and subsequently to Alabama. While in South Carolina he married Miss Susan Bell, who was the fourth in a family of five children, the others being Adam, James, Lizzie and Robert. After his marriage Wil- liam Dillard removed to Alabama, then a new country, in which he secured land and devel- oped a splendid farm, rearing his family there- on. He became known as a prominent agricul- turist and slave owner and in connection with his farming pursuits owned and operated a grist mill. He was influential in all matters pertain - ing to the welfare and upbuilding of his county and was a man of unblemished character. He entered the Confederate army under General

MR. AND MRS. W. W. DILLARD

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HISTORY OF NORTH AND WEST TEXAS.

Bragg's command, and while at Knoxville, Ten- nessee, in 1863, died of illness. His political support had been given to the old line Whig . party and at one time he was a candidate for the state legislature and won a large vote, al- though he did not overcome the strong Demo- cratic majority. His wife survived him and died in 1879. After selling the old homestead she went to Choctaw county, Alabama, where her remaining days were passed. Both she and her husband affiliated with the old school Pres- byterian church. In their family were eight children: James, John, George and W. W., who were soldiers of the Confederate army ; Mrs. Elizabeth Wells, Mrs. Sarah Dillard, Susan, and Mrs. Jane Gaines.

W. W. Dillard was reared in Alabama and in the common schools and a select school' at Troy, Mississippi, acquired his education. At the age of sixteen years he started out in life on his own account, being employed as a farn hand in Mississippi. He was also overseer at one time and thus continued until 1861. He then enlisted in the Confederate army as a member of Company I, Thirteenth Mississippi Infantry, under Colonel Barsto, McClaus' Division and Longstreet's Corps. The regiment was as- signed to the Army of Virginia and did much skirmishing in the Old Dominion. In the first year Mr. Dillard participated in the battle of Manassas and of Ball's Bluff, after which the regiment was re-organized. He continued with that command in Company G and did service in Virginia, taking part in the seven days' battle before Richmond and in other hotly contested engagements. General Griffith was killed and W. Barksdale was promoted to the command of the brigade, in which he continued until he lost his life on the field at Gettysburg. At the battle of Sharpsburg Mr. Dillard four wounds, his right hand being shattered by a canister shot which crippled him for life. In the same fight a minie ball struck him on the right side of the head and dazed him, while another bullet cut his upper lip. He was then sent to the hospital at Richmond and as soon as able returned home on a furlough. The follow- ing spring he rejoined his command at Fred- erick City, but soon afterward received an honorable discharge on account of disability oc- casioned by his injured hand and other wounds. This was in 1863.

sustained

Mr. Dillard then returned home and resumed farming, but in the spring of 1864 assisted in raising a company of cavalry as Home Guards. He was chosen lieutenant and thus acted for a short period. Following the close of the war

he continued farming on the old homestead until 1873, when he came to Texas. After pros- pecting at many places he located in Montague county in 1874 and for two years rented farms after which he settled on vacant land and made some improvements. Six years later he bought one share of a tract of twelve hundred and eighty acres, the property being owned by some heirs. Mr. Dillard secured one hundred and seventy-one acres and later added to his first purchase until he had five hundred and seventy- two acres of very fertile and productive land. He has since sold one hundred and eleven acres, but retains possession of the remainder, all of which is under fence and is well im- proved. There is good pasture and highly cultivated fields and all of the equipments have been placed on the farm by Mr. Dillard, in- cluding his commodious residence, which is a well-built structure tastefully furnished. There are also good barns, cribs and sheds on the place, a windpump and the latest improved farm machinery. An orchard yields its fruits in season, and in fact there is no equipment of a model farm that is lacking. He has telephone connection with the surrounding business centers and his home stands upon a natural building site, in the midst of a beautiful grove of natural forest trees. In his farming opera- tions he has been quite successful and has raised good crops, always having corn enough for use upon the farm and some to sell, raising as high as eighty-three bushels to the acre. He has had some light crops, but no failures and cotton has always brought a good return. In the early days he raised as high as twenty- three bushels of wheat to the acre and sixty bushels of oats.

On November 25, 1860, Mr. Dillard was mar- .ried to Miss Nancy Owen, who was born in Macon county, Alabama, on October 1, 1839, and who has been to him a faithful companion, able assistant, and wise counselor on the journey of life, bravely sharing with him in all the hardships and privations incident to settling on a frontier. She is a daughter of Wil- liam Owen, of South Carolina, who became an early settler of Alabama, and there followed the tanner's trade. After his death his wife removed to Choctaw county, Alabama, where she passed away. Both were members of the Baptist church. They had seven children, Christopher, Thomas, Isaac, Eliza, Mary, Sarah and Nancy.

Mr. and Mrs. Dillard have an interesting family of four children: Willie, the wife of J. D. Dunn ; John J., a prominent attorney at law

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at Lubbock, Texas, also a real estate dealer and editor of a paper ; Robert J., who is a graduate of Lee University and a practicing attorney at Bowie, Texas ; and Susanna, at home. A friend of education Mr. Dillard has given his children excellent advantages in that direction and his two sons are prominent attorneys, the youngest being a college graduate.

In his business career Mr. Dillard has pros- pered, and viewed in a personal light he is a strong man, strong in his success and strong in his honor and good name. His possessions have been acquired entirely through his own efforts. When he came to the county little farm- ing had been done and many doubted whether the soil was fertile enough to produce good crops, but Mr. Dillard and others soon demon- strated the possibilities of Texas land in this direction, and he has developed an excellent property and is now one of the substantial citi- zens of the community. He and his wife attend the Missionary Baptist church and are inter- ested in all matters of public progress and im- provement, Mr. Dillard giving helpful co-op- eration to many movements which have been of direct benefit to the county.

JAMES C. DYER. One of the popular of- ficials who has served Clay county and one whose civil and official standing is based on in- dividual word and deed is the gentleman whose history is hereto appended and whose name in- troduces this personal record.

Born in Miller county, Missouri, January 16, 1842, a son of Obed D. and Caroline (Castle- man) Dyer, pioneers to Missouri from Tennes- see, James C. Dyer represents a sturdy Ameri- can citizenship that has always stood upon its convictions and has braved the storms and borne the brunt of battle that principle and lib- erty should be preserved.

Obed D. Dyer was born at Dyersburg, Vir- ginia, in 1860, emigrated from there to Miller county, Missouri, in 1835, and died in April, 1868. In early life he was a carpenter but en- gaged in mercantile pursuits later and conduct- ed a store at Iberia, Missouri, some fifteen years. He was widely known, had political as well as other convictions and took some part in county politics. He was a son of Elijah Dyer, who died in Miller county, Missouri, in 1839, at about seventy years old. The latter was also a Virginian and a slave owner and married an Irish lady, Anna Dearing, who bore him five sons and a daughter, viz .: Obed D., Hamon, John, Lewis and William. Sarah, the daugh- ter, married James Bowlin.

Nancy and Abraham Castleman, of Tennes- see, were the parents of our subject's mother, and since her husband's death Mrs. Dyer has made her home with her oldest child, the sub- ject of this notice. Her other children were: Eliza, wife of Thomas Elsey, of Ozark, Ar- kansas; John L., of Fort Worth, Texas; Abram, of Duncan, Indian Territory; Kate, wife of I. W. Hathhorn, of Farmersville, Texas; W. B., of Duncan, Indian Territory, and David W., of Beaumont, Texas.

James C. Dyer acquired a fair education and provided for and made it possible for his young- er brothers and sisters to attend school. After his father's death he became the actual, or prac- tical, head of the family and remained so until his marriage some years after the war.

In 1861 he enlisted in Company K, Tenth Missouri Infantry, Captain Brockman and Col- onel Moore. The regiment was ordered into southwest Missouri, where it fought in the battle of Springfield, Pea Ridge and was also in the fighting around Fort Smith and Little Rock, Arkansas; was at Mansfield, Pleasant Hill, Yellow Bayou and Jenkins Ferry. At Pleasant Hill he received a grape-shot wound which lost him his left leg. When his ampu- tation had healed, instead of going home he took a position in the ordnance department of the Confederate army at Marshall, Texas, and was performing his duties there when the war closed.

Returning to civil life Mr. Dyer ran a shingle mill on the Osage river the first summer and then set about learning the shoemaker's trade at St. Thomas, Missouri. After two years he was able to do efficient work and set up his shop at Elston, Missouri. He spent ten years there and then removed to Pilot Point, Texas, where he resided and conducted his shop and at the same time a shoe store some three years. He then, in 1890, came to Clay county and en- gaged in the cobbler and shoe business in this city. He prosecuted his calling here till No- vember, 1902, when he disposed of it to assume the duties of county treasurer to which he had just been elected.

Mr. Dyer has always been a strict adherent to Democratic principles and his loyalty to party justified his candidacy for office. He an- nounced himself first in 1900 but was defeated for the nomination, but was successful two years hence. His incumbency of the office two years attested his fitness for honestly caring for the public funds and the people re-elected him in 1904 for another two-year term.

In October, 1872, Mr. Dyer was united in

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A twentieth century history and biographical record of north and west Texas, Volume II, Part 76

Author: Paddock, B. B. (Buckley B.), 1844-1922; Lewis Publishing Co., Chicago, pub Publication date: 1906 Publisher: Chicago, New York, The Lewis publishing co. Number of Pages: 972

Author: Paddock, B. B. (Buckley B.), 1844-1922; Lewis Publishing Co., Chicago, pub
Publication date: 1906
Publisher: Chicago, New York, The Lewis publishing co.
Number of Pages: 972