USA > Texas > Tarrant County > Fort Worth > History of Texas : Fort Worth and the Texas northwest edition, Volume III > Part 40
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During the first year he entered the army at Beecher City in Fayette County in Company K of the 35th Illinois Infantry, under Cap- tain Dobbs and Colonel G. A. Smith. The regi- ment assembled at Decatur, Illinois, was sent to Jefferson Barracks, St. Louis, during the summer, and reached the zone of active serv- ice at Kansas City, in the campaign against General Price. The regiment followed Price
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into Arkansas, and Mr. Griffith saw his first great battle, Pea Ridge, where the Federal troops under Curtis waged a long and critical fight against Price and Van Dorn. Thence his command was marched to the Mississippi and took transport to Pittsburgh landing on the Tennessee, reaching that place the day after it was evacuated by the Confederates. The regiment was with the Federal forces that endeavored to check Bragg's campaign into Kentucky, fought at Perryville, where the Con- federate General Zollicoffer was killed, and Mr. Griffith was in the battles of Perryville and Murfreesboro, and the following year participated at Chickamauga on September 19, 1863. He was in the following battles of Mis- sionary Ridge and Lookout Mountain, and then engaged in the Atlanta campaign, being in battle almost every day until reaching the Chat- tahoochie River, where his regiment was de- tached and sent to Texas. The entire Third Division of the Fourth Corps took boat at Johnsonville, Tennessee, floated down that river and the Mississippi, tying up at night to avoid surprise atacks from the Rebels, and at New Orleans they embarked on ocean ves- sels and unloaded at Matagorda Bay, Texas. The command was marched to San Antonio, where it spent the winter and remained until the end of the war. Mr. Griffith was mustered out at Cape Girardeau, Missouri, and dis- charged at Springfield, Illinois, after almost five years of military duty. He came out as a corporal in the 59th Illinois, having been as- signed to that regiment after he veteranized, following three years' service. It seems re- markable that a man could pass through five years of hostilities, participating in battle after battle, and never receive a single wound, though after the fight at Pea Ridge he found seven holes made by bullets in his clothing.
During the war Mr. Griffith had married, and he returned from the army and imme- diately settled down to the vocation of farm- ing as a means of support. He plowed and harvested several crops near Effingham, but finally determined to seek a new country with new opportunities. Putting his limited house- hold furniture onto a wagon, together with Mrs. Griffith and six children, he started across the wide expanse of country separating Illinois from Texas, crossing the Mississippi at St. Louis and the Red River at Denison, having traversed the Indian Territory with no moles- tation from the Indians. The end of his journey was at Eaves Gin, about three miles east of the present site of Roanoke, and in
the same community where his subsequent activities as a renter and farm owner kept him busy for many years. He arrived in Texas in November, 1876. He lost one of his horses on the journey, so that he had only one horse, a wagon and less than a dollar in cash on his arrival. The first year he took a lease on Denton Creek bottom, and while making the crop he attended his own work for one week and the next week worked for wages in order to supply his household, his wife and children keeping the hoes busy in the mean- time. He was fortunate in securing a good crop, making nine bales of cotton and plenty of corn. This was the first experience of the family in growing cotton, and they picked it themselves, saving every dollar they made. Mr. Griffith rented land from John Dunham five years and from George Medlan four years, and thus after about ten
years of residence in Texas was in a situation where he could make an independ- ent start. He bought land, then selling for ten dollars an acre, paying $300 down and the balance in payments. He missed only one of these payments, and the two final pay- ments were made on schedule time. He still owns the original farm, which has been made valuable by substantial and convenient im- provements. The children grew up and went forth to homes and independent careers of their own from the farmstead, and Mr. and Mrs. Griffith continued to live there until 1910, when they moved into the town of Roanoke.
While in that rural community Mr. Grif- fith served as a trustee of the school district As an Illinois man and an ex-Union soldier he normally favored the republican party. though for several years after coming to Texas a man of Mr. Griffith's peaceable and orderly disposition would hardly seek trouble by proclaiming a staunch republicanism. How- ever, it has been a matter of considerable satis- faction to him that he has seen the town in which he lives gives a republican majority. Members of the Griffith family are adherents of the Baptist Church.
On December 4, 1862, in Effingham County, Illinois, Mr. Griffith married Miss Louisa Wendell, daughter of George and Isabel (Moore) Wendell. Her father was a native of Germany, and Mrs. Griffith's mother was his second wife. Mrs. Griffith was born Sep- tember 13, 1845, and there were three other children : Casey Wendell, who came to Texas with the Griffiths, was married in Denton
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County, and mysteriously disappeared twenty years ago; Emeline, who married and spent her life in Wayne County, Illinois; and Miss Hessie, who died unmarried. To Mr. and Mrs. Griffith were born fourteen children, only two of whom are now living. Those who grew up and married were : George W., who married Jessie Lewis, died near Roanoke, leaving six children ; Irvin, who married Ella Walker and died at Roanoke, leaving no chil- dren : Mary lives at Fort Worth, the widow of Satley Arnold, and has four children ; Emma is the wife of Thomas Crites, a farmer near Roanoke, and has six children.
JOHN PERRY JACKSON. With the vast in- crease in wealth and population concentrated in Wichita County since the beginning of the great oil development in 1918 has come a proportionate addition of responsibility to those government agencies trusted with the administration and constructive measures in- volved in the public affairs of the county. The business handled by the Board of County Com- missioners is now estimated in millions where before it was a matter of thousands. The expenditure of great sums for road building and other public purposes is not only a great financial responsibility but one vitally related to the welfare of every resident of the county. The citizens of the county and particularly of Wichita Falls therefore congratulate them- selves upon the presence on the board of John Perry Jackson, who was elected in 1920, largely upon the record he made in former years as a member of the board.
Mr. Jackson has been a business man and citizen of Wichita Falls for fifteen years. He was born in Dallas County, Texas, in Octo- ber. 1859, son of John and Caroline (Perry) Jackson. He represents one of the oldest and most prominent families of Dallas County. His father was a native of England, old Devonshire, son of John Jackson. The senior Jackson, accompanied by his wife and sons, came to America when John Jackson was four- teen years of age. The family settled in the Northern part of Dallas County in 1848, the year that county was organized, and the year which for practical purposes marks the be- ginning of Dallas County history as a settled community. John Jackson and his three broth- ers, William, George and Frank, all became prominent in Dallas County and all are now deceased except Frank, a resident of Dallas. Of these four brothers George Jackcon was the author of the book "Sixty Years in Texas."
published a number of years ago and constitut- ing a valuable contribution to Texas history, particularly relating to Dallas and Dallas County. John Jackson married Caroline Perry, whose people came from Illinois to Dallas County in the year 1846.
The old Jackson homestead in Dallas County was about two and a half miles North- east of Carrollton, in one of the richest agri- cultural communities. John Perry Jackson grew up there, acquired a good business educa- tion, and his time and talents were applied to farming until 1906. Since that year his home has been in Wichita Falls, and for several years he was actively engaged in the mercan- tile business there.
He was first elected a county commissioner in 1912. By re-election in 1914 and 1916 he served six consecutive years. Those terms were marked by a highly progressive and con- structive period in the county's affairs. While he was on the board the county courthouse was built, one of the finest county buildings in the state. The county also undertook and entered upon extensive plans for the improve- ment of the roads and the building of bridges. After an interval of two years Mr. Jackson was again elected commissioner, in 1920, rep- resenting Precinct No. 1, including Wichita Falls. His past experience in office, coupled with his skill and good judgment in business and his conservatve attitude in all public affairs, make him a most valued member of the board, especially now when economy and prudence are necessary. Mr. Jackson is a member of the Methodist Episcopal Church and is affiliated with the Order of Elks.
He married Miss Emma Torrian, a native of Louisiana. Their three children are: J. Lee Jackson, a business man of Dallas; Mrs. Bessie Jones, of Wichita Falls ; and Miss Vir- ginia, at home.
ISAAC DANIEL INMON. Achievements of a practical and substantial nature are credited to Isaac Daniel Inmon of Denton County, and perhaps the best of all has been the results of his work as a farm and ranch developer at his present attractive place eleven miles northwest of Krum.
Mr. Inmon was born in Giles County, Ten- nessee, January 9, 1851, a son of Isaac Inmon, who at the close of the Civil war accompanied the family to Denton County, Texas, and fol- lowed his trade as a carpenter at Pilot Point until his death in 1873. The Inmons have been prominent and well known in this sec-
& P. Jackson
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tion of Texas for more than half a century. A brother of Isaac D. Inmon is Joseph M. Inmon of Denton, whose career is also sketched in this publication.
Isaac Daniel Inmon was a child when his parents moved to southwestern Missouri and located at the town of Ozark in Christian County. He acquired his early education there and was still only fourteen years of age when the family came to Texas. His people were not wealthy, and as soon as possible it de- volved upon him to do for himself and he has absorbed most of his practical education with- out the aid of schools.
His brother and brother-in-law were black- smiths at Pilot Point, and Isaac D. went to work in their shop at the age of fifteen and stayed there until he finished his trade. His father also did his carpenter work in the same shop. Mechanical ability is practically native to the Inmon family. After learning his trade I. D. Inmon went to Callahan County, Texas, and conducted a shop of his own for
four years. He located there just before Christmas in 1889, and remained there four years. His next home was at Bloomfield in Cooke County, where he conducted a shop two years, and then bought a farm two miles west of the village. For two years he worked at his shop on the farm, and then gave his time and energies completely to the farm.
In November, 1913, Mr. Inmon moved to his present locality in Denton County, in the vicinity of Slidel. The land he bought was all pasture, and he and his family lived in tents until his first home could be built. The farm
is a part of the Judge J. A. Carroll estate on the William Roebuck Survey. His residence and his barn mark some of the most generous and substantial improvements of the commu- nity. Two deep wells provide a copious sup- ply of water for domestic and stock purposes. He has also constructed several miles of wire fencing and has brought almost three hundred acres under cultivation, chiefly to grain. His cattle are high grade Shorthorns, and he keeps a flock of Merino sheep partly to clean out the weeds from his pasture and also for the profit of their wool clip. Mr. Inmon has been work- ·ing for himself more than half a century; and his material accumulations are represented by a ranch of more than eight hundred acres, regarded as one of the most desirable stock and general farms in Denton County.
While living in Cooke County he served as trustee of the Breedlove School District, where his children were chiefly educated. He
has no ambition in a political way. He sup- ported the democratic party candidates for many years, casting his first vote for Horace Greeley in 1872, and the last for Grover Cleveland, but since then his allegiance has been with the Socialist party.
In the Bloomfield neighborhood of Cooke County Mr. Inmon on Janury 16, 1879, mar- ried Miss Malinda Montgomery. Her father, Jeff C. Montgomery, came from Missouri to Texas and married Ann Jones, daughter of Reason Jones, one of the earliest settlers in the Bloomfield locality, and a man of excep- tional prominence, whose lifework has been sketched elsewhere. Jeff Montgomery served as a Confederate soldier, and after the war located near Bloomfield, on part of the Jones headright, where he lived out his life. He was the father of three sons and four daugh- ters : Mrs. Inmon, who was born on the Jones headright in 1857; Fannie, wife of Isom Mikiel, living in Cooke County ; Robert Mont- gomery, of Durant, Oklahoma; Edward, of Wichita Falls ; Alonzo, a farmer in the Breed- love community ; Lela, who died as Mrs. Earl Sipes ; and Ada, wife of Emerson Parsons, living at Lois in Cooke County.
In their declining years Mr. and Mrs. Inmon have around and near them both children and grandchildren. Otis, their oldest child, a far- mer near the homestead, married Phebe Bates and has a daughter, Lorene. Homer, also on the home farm, married Eva Walker, and their children are Ray, Ethel and Earnest. The next in age is Miss Ethel, at home. James C. Inmon, a farmer in the home community, married Jessie South and has a son, J. C., Jr .; Earl, the youngest, also active on the home ranch, married Myrtle Flowers and has a daughter, Nellie.
H. N. ROBERTSON, M. D. The active profes- sional career of Dr. Robertson as a physician and surgeon covers a period of thirty years. He began practice at his native home in Ken- tucky when he was twenty-one years of age, but since 1912 has been the leading physician of the Ponder community in Denton County and has become a very enthusiastic and well satisfied Texan.
Dr. Robertson was born near Calvert City, Marshall County, Kentucky, not far from Pa- ducah, January 1, 1870. His grandfather, Thomas Robertson, came out of Virginia in pioneer times and developed a farm in western Kentucky. Thomas Marion Robertson, father of Dr. Robertson, was born near Smithland.
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Livingston County, Kentucky, in 1831, being one of a number of children. He was of a southern family and a southern sympathizer during the war, though not in the army. As a young man he established his home near Cal- vert City and was a successful farmer in that community until his death in 1902, at the age of seventy-two. His wife was Sallie Bird- well, daughter of Anthony Birdwell, a farmer in the same locality. She died when about thirty-five years of age, leaving two children, Dr. Robertson and Maggie, who died at Cal- vert City in 1901 as Mrs. John M. Howard.
Dr. Robertson grew up on a farm, attending the country schools of Marshall County. At the age of eighteen he entered the Kentucky School of Medicine at Louisville and grad- uated in 1891, and at once began practice among his old neighbors at Calvert City. His professional career there continued for eigh- teen years except for advanced work he did in the Kentucky School of Medicine, and he was a member of the County and State Medical Society. Following another post graduate course in 1908 at the University of Louisville Dr. Robertson left Kentucky and in the fall of 1908 settled at Haskell, Texas. He practiced there until the fall of 1912, when he joined the medical fraternity of Denton County and began practice at Ponder. He is local sur- geon for the Gulf. Colorado & Santa Fe Rail- way Company and a member of the County, State and American Medical Associations. He was instrumental in establishing a drug busi- ness at Ponder, subsequently bought the stock, and gave his personal attention to the manage- ment of the store until his son, James M. Robertson, was sufficiently trained to become proprietor.
Dr. Robertson was a volunteer in the Medi- cal Reserve Corps during the late war, and gave the full extent of his influence and ener- gies to the war campaigns in his locality. He was reared a democrat, and has case his vote according to that faith. At Calvert City, Ken- tucky, he was made a Master Mason, took the Royal Arch degrees at Haskell, Texas, and was a past master of Doric Lodge of Sharp, Kentucky, and represented the Lodge in the Grand Lodge of Kentucky. He was initiated an Odd Fellow at Kentucky, and subsequently took the encampment degrees at Haskell, Texas.
In 1893, in Marshall County, Kentucky, Dr. Robertson married Florence Lee Barnes. She died six years later, survived by a son, James Marion, who after finishing his education en-
tered his father's drug business, and is now conducting a very prosperous business. In September, 1900, also in Marshall County, Dr. Robertson married Miss Ada English, daugh- ter of William W. and Elizabeth (Harper) English. Her people were among the pioneers of western Kentucky. Mrs. Robertson was well educated in the public schools and was the second of the three children of her parents, her brother, Walter English, being a resident of Jackson, Michigan, and her younger sis- ter is Mrs. Maud Howard.
B. LAFAYETTE SPENCER, president of the First National Bank of Lewisville, earned his early reputation in business affairs in north Texas at Fort Worth, where his abilities con- tributed to the upbuilding of two of the great wholesale grocery houses of that city. He went to Fort Worth when that was the only business town of importance in all north- west Texas. For the past twenty years and more he has been a resident of Lewisville in Denton County, and a leader in the financial life of the city and also a contributor to its other business activities.
Mr. Spencer was born on a farm a few miles south of Lynchburg, Tennessee, April 4, 1859. He finished his education in a little academy not far from his home. His father was a dis- tiller and sawmill owner. Lafayette Spencer as a youth learned the mechanism of a still and the methods of making rectified spirits. Otherwise he had little business experience when he left home to come to Texas. His qualifications came to him by the burning in process with the business branding iron. His older brother, J. WV. Spencer, who preceded him to Texas, located at Fort Worth, where for many years he has been a successful mer- chant and able financier. His encouraging progress in the pioneer town was the example which stimulated Lafayette Spencer to join him in that community.
He reached Fort Worth in July, 1882. He immediately entered the service of his brother's firm, Spencer & Taylor, "the green grocery men" at 314 Main street. This firm was suc- ceeded by Spencer & Tucker, and that by the Fort Worth Grocery Company. Lafayette Spencer was a charter member of this firm and was secretary of the company when the business was acquired by the Waples-Platter Grocery Company. He continued with this widely known organization for two years as credit man. He then helped organize and became a charter member of the Carter-Battle
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Grocery Company, subsequently the Carter Grocery Company, and continued with the growing fortunes of that house until 1899, when he resigned to become a banker.
At that date Mr. Spencer moved to Lewis- ville, and with E. L. Berry opened the private bank known as the Citizens Bank. In 1904 they chartered the First National Bank, and Mr. Spencer has been president of that insti- tution from the beginning. It was chartered with a capital of $25,000 dollars, and its capital and surplus are now $75,000 dollars. The vice presidents are E. L. Berry and J. H. Donald, while M. H. Milliken is cashier and Charles G. Thomas, assistant cashier. The directors are M. H. Milliken, J. H. Donald, W. D. Milliken, Charles G. Thomas, P. L. Jacobsen, B. L. Spencer and E. L. Berry.
A man of public spirited energy, Mr. Spen- cer has worked for and with other organiza- tions representing the business progress of his community. He organized the Lewisville Cot- ton Oil Company and the Raiza Milling Com- pany, being secretary-treasurer of the former and treasurer of the latter. He is also one of the stockholders of the Lewisville State Bank. He was largely responsible for the new bank home of the First National, erected in 1917. He built an attractive residence of his own at Lewisville in 1902 and another business house in 1920. He has contributed toward the con- struction of churches and other matters that depend upon public support. Mr. Spencer is not interested in politics but has been one of the trustees of the Lewisville schools. He is a Master Mason.
At Sherman, Texas, in December, 1888, Mr. Spencer married Miss Annie L. Fowler. She was born at Washington, D. C., but was reared at St. Louis, where her father was a business man. Her oldest sister is Mrs. A. H. Fred- erick, of Milwaukee. Mr. and Mrs. Spencer have one daughter, Helen, wife of P. L. Jacobsen, of Louisville.
MAJOR DUNCAN M. PERKINS, who shared in the distinguished record of the Thirty-sixth Division in France, is almost a native of that . region of North Texas along the Red River, and is one of the older residents of Wichita Falls, knowing that city when it was a modern country town more than twenty years ago. He has had an active business career and is especially prominent in military affairs, being a veteran of the Spanish-American war as well as of the World war.
He was born in Ashley County, Arkansas, in 1880, but in 1884, when he was four years of age, his parents, David and Sarah (McCann) Perkins, moved to North Texas. His father was a native of Mississippi, and lived only a few years in Arkansas. After coming to Texas in 1884 the family spent a brief time in Wichita Falls, but subsequently moved to Quanah.
Major Perkins has had his home in Wichita Falls since 1898. In that year, though only eighteen years of age, he helped raise a com- pany of volunteers for service in the Spanish- American war. He was elected captain, the company being recruited from Wichita Falls and Quanah. This organization became Company D of the First United States Vol- unteer Infantry of Texas. Following the muster out of the volunteers he continued to be actively associated with the old National Guard of Texas as an officer, and as such was in command of a company that did duty at Galveston following the great storm of 1900.
Soon after the beginning of the war with Germany he volunteered for the National Army and was instrumental in raising two companies, Companies F and G at Wichita Falls. He went to the training camp at Camp Bowie with the rank of captain, and was in service there from the summer of 1917 until the latter part of June, 1918. Then with his company and regiment, the One Hundred and Forty-sixth, as part of the Thirty-sixth Divi- sion, he went to France. He landed on French soil about the first of July and almost imme- diately went into service in the great offensive beginning at that time. The Thirty-sixth Division bore the brunt of some of the hardest fighting in the great battle of the Argonne, and Major Perkins was on front line duty in that battle for twenty-nine continuous days. No other battle in the World war means so much to the community of Wichita Falls, since 115 men who went out from the city and vicinity were lost during that fighting. In that battle Major Perkins was in com- mand of the division ammunition train on the front lines. He received the decoration of the Croix de Guerre.
After having been abroad a year Major Perkins returned to America in July, 1919, and shortly before being mustered out was promoted to the rank of major. He then re- sumed business at Wichita Falls, in general insurance and real estate, and is individually owner of some substantial property interests in the city. He is also a member of the
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Chamber of Commerce and the Elks, and a popular member of other leading organizations of business men and citizens.
Mr. Perkins married Miss Myrtle Coffield. who was born and reared in Wichita Falls. Their four children are David M., Duncan, Myrtle Beth and Corrinne.
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