History of Texas, together with a biographical history of the cities of Houston and Galveston; containing a concise history of the state, with protraits and biographies of prominent citizens of the above named cities, and personal histories of many of the early settlers and leading families, Part 50

Author:
Publication date: 1895
Publisher: Chicago, The Lewis publishing co., 1895
Number of Pages: 1532

USA > Texas > Harris County > Houston > History of Texas, together with a biographical history of the cities of Houston and Galveston; containing a concise history of the state, with protraits and biographies of prominent citizens of the above named cities, and personal histories of many of the early settlers and leading families > Part 50
USA > Texas > Galveston County > Galveston > History of Texas, together with a biographical history of the cities of Houston and Galveston; containing a concise history of the state, with protraits and biographies of prominent citizens of the above named cities, and personal histories of many of the early settlers and leading families > Part 50

Note: The text from this book was generated using artificial intelligence so there may be some errors. The full pages can be found on Archive.org (link on the Part 1 page).

were: Harriet, born March 1, 1796, died December 25, 1878; Azariel, born Feb- ruary 20, 1798, died May 15, 1874; Charles S., born May 8, 1800, died May 6, 1869; Sibyl G., born November 18, 1802, died February 24, 1892; William, born August 11, 1806, died about 1882; Sophia, born November 6, 1808, died September 1, 1893; Ophelia, born January 18, 1811, died at the age of eighty-one years; Hannah Eliza,. born April 20, 1817, now the widow of Fred- erick Shepard, living in Bethel, Fairfield county, Connecticut; and Frederick Wil- mot, whose name introduces this sketch.

362

HISTORY OF TEXAS.

Frederick W. Smith was eleven years old when his father died, after which event he made his home with his brother Azariel till his sixteenth year, when he began to work for farmers, for regular wages. By industry he managed to obtain a fairly good education. In 1836 he started West, with $300, and spent several months in the un- settled portions of Ohio and Michigan, being present at the opening of the land office at Ionia, in the latter State, then Territory. He then returned to New York city, by sleigh through Canada, riding the full length of Lake St. Clair on the ice.

Many were the rough experiences which Mr. Smith encountered in those years, and he relates many an interesting incident which befell him while he was roughing it in the then "far West." Among others was one which happened on the return trip to New York. There were eight other young men in the sleigh on the occasion mentioned, and they were all "snoozing" comfortably one night, when, about the hour of twelve, the sleigh, through the care- lessness of the driver, or by unavoidable accident, was upset, at a point near where the great Indian chief, Tecumseh, was killed, and the entire party rolled down a hill several feet. No one was hurt, though all were badly frightened. The driver hav- ing to go back some sis miles to the nearest station for another sleigh, the men ein- ployed themselves with the task of getting the old sleigh back in the road, more, how- ever, as a means of keeping warm than from any hope of rescuing and rendering serviceable the stranded vehicle.

After a long, cold and tedious ride the party reached New York city, where, after a few days' looking around, young Smith secured a position as salesman in the store

of Baldwin, Burnham & Company, dealers in imported notions, at the corner of Pearl and Cedar streets. He remained in New York only a few months when the Western fever again struck him, and he made an- other flying trip to Michigan. Returning to New York he there met a Mr. Alanson Tay- lor, with whom he became interested in an enterprise of establishing a mercantile house in the then newly created Republic of Texas, and on November 22, 1838, he sailed in company with that gentleman on board the schooner "Warsaw," Captain Bundie, loaded with mercandise and a partly con- structed store-building, for the new South- west. Their objective point was Houston, and the agreement was that, in considera- tion of Mr. Smith's assisting in starting the store and filling the position of clerk, he was to have one-fourth of the profits. After reaching Galveston, Mr. Taylor came on at once to Houston to select a lot and make preparations for the erection of a building. Mr. Smith remained in Galveston to look after the cargo and to see to getting it to its destination.

No sooner was the young merchant on the soil of Texas than he began to meet with those difficulties which always beset a beginner in a new country and of which Mr. Smith came to know a great deal more in his subsequent career. When he undertook to transfer the cargo at Galveston, prepara- tory to freighting it up the bayou to Hous- ton, he was confronted by the custom- house officer, who asked that the duties be paid before the goods were admitted. This was something which neither Mr. Taylor nor Mr. Smith had thought of, and, as the latter had no money, he was placed in a very embarrassing position. But he frankly explained the situation to the officer, and

363

HISTORY OF TEXAS.

that gentleman being satisfied with the statement permitted the cargo to pass, say- ing, as Mr. Smith turned away: "It's all right; I'll take your face for it; send me the money when you get to Houston." For- tunately, before leaving Galveston, Mr. Sinith met a friend, M. O. Dimond, from whom he borrowed enough money to dis- charge the debt.

On arriving at Houston Mr. Smith was met at the wharf by Mr. Taylor, who in- formed him that he could not find a suitable lot for a store building; and furthermore that he was disgusted with the place and people, and was ready to return to. New York. But the cargo was unloaded and stored in a small building in the rear of where the First National Bank now stands, and Mr. Smith at once sat about to see if he could not secure a building site. After con- siderable search he finally selected the lot, at the corner of Main street and Congress avenue, on which the Houston National Bank now stands; but he could not find the owner of the lot, although he made diligent inquiry and wished to acquire some sort of title before taking possession. On the advice of Major Holman, who then represented the Messrs. Allen, founders of the town, lie proceeded without authority from the owner to put up his store. The business of Taylor & Company was soon under way and it was not until a year afterward that the owner of the lot, Mr. J. T. Doswell, came along and informed the enterprising merchants that they had built on his property. He did not disturb them, however, but offered to sell thein the lot for $3,000, a price which Mr. Smith considered reasonable enough, but which Mr. Taylor was unwilling to give, as he did not want any real estate in Houston. The lot is now worth $150,000.

Bad health, continued aversion to the place and people, and the yellow-fever epi- demic the year after their arrival, sent Mr. Taylor back to New York, Mr. Smith turn- ing his attention to other pursuits. In the meantime, however, Mr. Smith had become interested in the city, having purchased three lots on Fannin street, opposite where the postoffice now stands, for each of which he paid $1,000 in salt at $20 per sack, and cheese at 50 cents per pound.

Although his mercantile career did not last long, Mr. Smith was thus one of the first merchants of this city, and during the time he was in business he sold large quan- tities of goods. He is the man who sold the first "Sam Houston hat" in Texas, a style of headgear that the hero of San Jacinto made very popular, and for which it is said he had, even to his latest years, a great fancy. Mr. Smith relates that he had one of these broad-brimmed white hats on dis- play in his store one day, when Stephen Z. Hoyl, President Houston's private secretary, saw it in passing, and remarked that he thought the General would like one. He brought the General down the next day, and each of them purchased one. Wearing this hat, General Houston walked up Main street to where Congress was in session, when, being seen by the members of that body, he was asked where he got his hat. On being informed, each one went down to Mr. Smith's store and supplied himself with one. Mr. Smith thinks that he sold over a thou- sand of thein, at $10 each, before the run ceased.

Mr. Smith was the first Postmaster re- commended by the President and confirmed by the Senate after the State was admitted to the Union. This was in 1848, and he was induced to accept the office under the

364

HISTORY OF TEXAS.

following circumstances: There were no banks in Texas in those days, and large amounts of money were transmitted by post. On this account, and for the further reason that Houston, as the distributing point for all interior Texas, made this an important office, although the compensation was very small. But the business interests of the city, as well as the reputation of the place, were somewhat at stake, and it was essential that the affairs of the postoffice be honestly and expeditiously administered. Mr. B. A. Shepherd and Mr. B. A. Botts, two prominent business men of Houston, learning that application had been made for the office by a man of questionable charac -: ter, sought out Mr. Smith, laid the facts before him, and insisted that lie take the office. On being reminded by Mr. Smith that the compensation was by no means equal to the services required, and that it was doubtful if he could handle the business alone, Messrs. Shepherd and Botts agreed that they would give him their personal assistance when needed if he would take the office, to which he consented, and en- tered at once on the discharge of his duties. It turned out as he had anticipated, "all work and no pay," but with the assistance of Messrs. Shepherd and Botts, who put in the greater part of three nights in every week, the business of the office was kept up, and there was no complaint about the mails. However, after he liad satisfied his sense of duty to the public and found, as time passed on, that he could not make a living out of the office, Mr. Smith sent in his resignation to the authorities at Washington. But he was not relieved until after he had resigned three times. He served about four years. During his term of office one of the lessees, who had undertaken to carry the mnails on

one of the interior routes, failed to comply with the law in the matter of conveyances and other equipments, and Mr. Smith, with- out waiting three months to get authority from Washington, advertised for bids and re-let the contract, assuming that the pub- lic service demanded this extraordinary ex- ercise of power, in which opinion the Post- master General fully concurred when the matter was brought to his attention, since he ratified all that Mr. Smith had done. The Texas postmaster, however, got no little notoriety at the national seat of government out of this extraordinary pro- ceeding on his part. Before finally giv- ing up his office Mr. Smith took in O. L. Cochran, and taught him how to manage the business, and secured his appointment as his successor.

While yet in the postoffice Mr. Smith engaged in steamboating between Galveston and Houston, and, as soon as he was re- lieved of his office, he went on to Washing- ton for the purpose of securing the contract to carry the mails between these two places. At that time the lamented Rusk was one of the Senators from this State and a man in high standing in the Postoffice Department. He cheerfully undertook to introduce Mr. Smith around to the officials of that depart- ment. Inquiry soon led to the disclosure of the fact that the then applicant for the inail contract between Houston and Galves- ton was none other than the one who had advertised the star routes without authority from the Postmaster General and who had three times resigned his office at Houston and finally demanded that his resignation be accepted. He had but little trouble in obtaining the contract, the negotiation of which took him to Washington, and which was awarded him at $11,900 a year for

365

HISTORY OF TEXAS.

carrying the mails three times a week be- tween the two cities mentioned. Mr. Smith also received a pleasant surprise, just be- fore leaving Washington, in the shape of a warrant on the Treasury for $400, which was handed him by the head bookkeeper as part of the back salary due him for serv- ices rendered while Postmaster at Houston.

On his arrival home Mr. Smith became associated with B. A. Shepherd and John 11. Sterrett, and formed a stock company, of which he was made general manager, and began to build and operate a line of boats between the cities of Houston and Galves- ton. A year or so later he again visited Washington and secured a contract to carry the mails six times a week between these two points, for $20,000 a year. In addi- tion to this they were doing a large passen- ger and freight business, and were making money rapidly. The opening of the war, however, put a stop to their operations, and besides losing their business, their prop- erty, consisting of a number of boats, barges and a regular shipyard, with all the neces- sary equipments for carrying on an exten- sive transportation business, were taken possession of by the Confederate govern- ment, and the gunboats which won the bat- tle of Galveston belonged to them.

At the close of the war Mr. Smith ac- cepted a position as general freight agent of the Houston & Texas Central Railroad, which he filled for a number of years. Re- signing this in 1872, he embarked in the manufacture of cottonseed oil at Brenham, starting the pioneer enterprise of this kind in Texas, which, unfortunately, was not a financial success; but did serve to direct attention to the possibilities of this industry in this State. For the last twenty years Mr. Smith has lived mostly in retirement.

In November, 1843, he married Miss Annette Brown, a native of New York city, and a daughter of Robert Brown, who was a native of Scotland. Mrs. Smith died March 26, 1868. She was a faithful wife and an affectionate; good mother. Four children survive her, two sons and two daughters: Charles W., Walter M., Katie and Mary. The eldest is a resident of Fort Worth, the other three remain at home with their father. Mrs. Smith was for many years a member of the Episcopal Church, npon the services of which her husband was and still is an attendant, but not a member of the church.

The subject of this brief sketch, now one of the few remaining old settlers of the city of Houston, has never sought to fill the public eye nor to gain great wealth at the sacrifice of the nobler qualities of manhood. He has lived modestly, soberly, rationally, giving the widest possible application to the old maxim: "Live and let live."

ENRY S. FOX .- The subject of this sketch dates his connection with the business interests of this city sufficiently far back to be numbered among the early business men of the place, having had to do with current af- fairs of the city for more than forty years. He is a native of the province of Posen, Germany, where he was born in the year 1835. He emigrated at the age of fifteen to the United States, and after spending two years in New York came to Texas and settled at Houston. He was prepared in a fair degree for the duties which he had already decided to take up, having received the rudiments of a good business education and served for some time as salesinan and accountant in a New

366

HISTORY OF TEXAS.

York mercantile house. On coming to this place he secured a position as collector and adjuster of claims for the then well-known firm of Coleman & Levy, with whom he re- mained the greater part of three years. Dur- ing this time his duties as the outside rep- resentative of a somewhat diversified mer- cantile interest introduced him to a large number of people and gave him valuable in- formation on current trade demands and existing business methods. The house of Coleman & Levy was, in those days, one of the leading business concerns of Houston and in addition to a large retail business carried on a very respectable jobbing trade with smaller merchants in the interior part of the State. As their representative it fell to the lot of young Fox to look after this trade, so that he may be said to have been in a restricted sense a pioneer in that field of commercial activity since so fully occupied by traveling salesmen. In 1855, then in his twenty-first year, Mr. Fox engaged in busi- ness for himself, opening a store at Marlin, in Falls county, from which point he began larger operations, in a short time establish- ing other stores in the interior part of the State and one also, in 1857, in Houston. At the opening of the war he was the owner of six such houses and was well on the way to a prosperous career as a merchant. But the opening of hostilities between the North and the South brought a cessation of busi- ness activity, and Mr. Fox prudently pulled in his country stores and concentrated his funds in his Houston house, where they would be under his personal supervision. During the troublous times of 1861-5 his affairs followed to some extent the general course of events, long seasons of dullness being interspersed with brief periods of brisk trade, but the business always being of that

unsettled and unsatisfactory kind which is the necessary outgrowth of war.

Mr. Fox was actively engaged in busi- ness from 1855 to 1868, chiefly handling dry goods, notions and the like.

In 1868 he went out of business, selling his stock, good will and fixtures, but two years later formed a partnership with F. W. Heitmann, under the firin name of Fox & Heitmann, and began handling hardware and metal goods. This business was dis- posed of by sale to his partner in 1876, at which time Mr. Fox turned his attention to banking. "Fox's Bank," a private institu- tion which he founded, was for a number of years one of the recognized financial con- cerns of this city, continuing such in fact up to 1889, when its owner was invited to take the presidency of the then newly or- ganized Houston National Bank, a position he accepted and has since held. For the past five years he has given his attention chiefly to the duties of this position. Mr. Fox is a large stockholder in the bank, but not especially, or exclusively, on this ac- count is it that he occupies the responsible position that he does as its chief executive officer. His long and intimate connection with the business interests of the city, his recognized ability as a financier and the noteworthy success he has achieved in his own affairs constitute claims in his favor as the head of this institution, regardless of the size of the block of stock which he holds in it. He is really one of Houston's men of solid wealth and proved capacity. From the first he has had confidence in the future of the place; and even in the early years of its struggles, before the railroads had connected it with the rich regions to the north and northwest, -when the slow-motioned ox- train was the only means of transportation,

367

HISTORY OF TEXAS.

-he invested his funds here and has con- tinued to do so since. The improvement of these investments has not only attested his faith in the place, but has added to its tax- able wealth and given homes and places of business to those who have taken up their residence here.

As to office-holding, politics and things of that kind, there is little to record in Mr. Fox's career. Beyond such local positions as his fellow-citizens have seen fit to elect him to, and chiefly those connected in some way with the business interests of the com- munity, he has never figured in public affairs. Ile has served as Commissioner of the county, Alderman of the city, chairman of the Democratic executive committee of the city, county and district, and has attended the usual number of conventions, where he has been more or less active in behalf of the men and measures which he has seen fit to favor. He is a director in the Houston Gas Company and president of the Houston Clearing House Association. Public enter- prises, local interests, whatever he believed to be helpful to the community, meet his ap- probation and receive his advocacy and as- sistance. His charitable impulses, rejecting ostentatious display, seek an outlet through the different social and benevolent orders, such as the Masonic fraternity, Odd Fellows, Elks, B'nai B'rith, and in private and less known ways.

Coming to Texas a lad of seventeen, Mr. Fox spent all of his early manhood and has passed a goodly portion of his mature years in the State and city of his adoption, with whose social life he has become intimately connected. He married Lena G. Coleman, in this city, in 1857, but in 1887 lost the estimable lady whom he selected for a life companion, she having left him two chil-

dren, Mamie A. and Henry S., Jr. Mr. Fox married his present wife, whose maiden name was Leonora Harby, in October, 1889, and one child, Gladys Louise, has been born to this union.

R. D. F. STUART .- From the iniquitous religious persecutions which prevailed throughout Europe during the seventeenth and eigh- teenth centuries there fled to this country a large number of people who, constituting as they did the thrift, intelligence, patriotism and moral forces of the communities where they lived, formed no unimportant accession to the population of those communities where they settled on this side of the At- lantic. From Scotland and Ireland, espe- cially, was the exodus large, Pennsylvania and North Carolina being the chief recipi- ents of this kind of emigration. Hence arose thie phrases of so frequent occurrence in our history, "Of Irish" and "Scotch- Irish" origin.

The subject of this brief notice traces his ancestry to the sources here indicated, being the third removed in the paternal line from Galbraith and Elizabeth (Scott) Stu- art, natives of Scotland, who emigrated to America in 1780 and settled in Washington county, Pennsylvania. In that county they died, each at the advanced age of eighty- two. There also most of their children were born, among them William, their eldest son and the father of David F., of this article. William married Mary Cum- mins, daughter of Robert and Mary Cum- inins and a native of Brooke county, West Virginia, and settled in that county, where he resided until, overtaken by financial troubles, he went to California during the

368

HISTORY OF TEXAS.

great gold excitement and died at Shasta City, that State, in 1857.

David F. Stuart was next to the youngest of six children born to his parents, and first saw the light at the old Stuart homestead, in Brooke county, West Vir- ginia, on the 15th day of August, 1833. He came to Texas in 1849, and two years later began the study of medicine under the preceptorage of his brother-in-law, Dr. George C. Red, of Washington county. After four years' private study he entered Jefferson Medical College, Philadelphia, at which he graduated in March, 1859. Re- turning to Texas he formed a partnership with his old preceptor, Dr. Red, and prac- ticed in Washington county until the open- ing of the late war. He entered the Con- federate army in 1861, becoming assistant Surgeon of the Tenth Texas Infantry, Nel- son's regiment, from which position he was promoted to that of Surgeon of the regiment and was assigned as Brigade Surgeon of Churchill's brigade. He held this place until the capture of Arkansas Post, January 11, 1863, when, after his release from prison in Camp Douglas, Chicago, he was assigned to duty as surgeon of Deshler's brigade, Cleburn's division, Army of the Tennessee. After Deshler's death, at Chick- amauga, he served under Granbury as Brig- ade Surgeon until the close of hostilities.

After the war Dr. Stuart located in Houston, where he at once took up the practice of his profession, and where he has since resided. In the twenty-nine years of his residence in this city he has confined himself exclusively to the practice of medi- cine, being now one of the oldest practi- tioners in the city. He has achieved a wide and enduring reputation as a physician, and has met with reasonably good financial suc-

cess. He has served as vice-president and president of the Texas State Medical Asso- ciation, and as vice-president and president of the Texas Medical College, and was a delegate to the International Medical Col- lege, at Philadelphia, in 1876. The Houston Infirmary, one of the chief eleemosynary in- stitutions of the city, was founded by him in 1874, and during the twenty years of its ex- istence he has at all times been connected with it and contributed largely to its success. Conjointly with Dr. T. J. Boyles, he is chief surgeon of the Houston & Texas Central Railroad, and the Houston East & West Texas Railroad, and is local surgeon of the International & Great Northern and the Gulf, Colorado & Santa Fe Railways. Dr. Stuart is also vice-president of the National Railway Surgeons' Association.

September 17, 1867, Dr. Stuart married Miss Ellen Dart, a native of Texas and a daughter of one of Texas' pioneers, Chris- tian Dart. This lady died April 29, 1879; and on November 28, 1883, the Doctor married Miss Bettie Heath Bocock, of Lynchburg, Virginia, Mrs. Stuart being a native of that place and a descendant of an Old Dominion family. The doctor has four children, two by his first marriage, Joseph R. and Daisy; and two by the second, Susie Walker and Mary Cummins.

J UDGE ANDREW BRISCOE, de- ceased. - More than a century ago, during the troublous times of Eng- land under Cromwell, there came from "the mother country" four brothers of a cavalier family named Briscoe, and settled in Virginia. Two of them remained there, where they became prominent and prosperous planters, and two, whose names

369

HISTORY OF TEXAS.

were Phillip and William, emigrated, at a later date, to Kentucky. William had mar- ried Elizabeth Wallace while living in Vir- ginia, and was the head of a family at the time of his removal West. He and his brother settled in what is now Madison county, near the town of Richmond, Ken- tucky, and there their families grew up. The fourth son of William, named Parmenas, born in 1784, while the family yet lived in Virginia, went, at about the age of twenty- one, to Mississippi, whither he was accom- panied by an older brother named William. There some four years later (December 18, 1809) he married Polly Montgomery, a daughter of Samuel and Margaret (Crockett) Montgomery,, who were early emigrants from South Carolina to Kentucky, whence they had moved southward and settled in the Mississippi country. The Mississippi country at that time included a large area, portions of what is now Alabama being em- braced in this area. The settlements were confined mainly to a few river towns like Natchez, and the chief vocations of the set- tlers were such as grew out of the traffic and transportation along the Mississippi river .. But the fertility of the soil was known, and in the forest and cane-brake wilderness of what was afterward Claiborne county, Par- menas Briscoe erected the rude log cabin which was to serve for his shelter and opened his primitive patch preparatory to enter- ing on his career as a planter. Previous to this time, Andrew, the eldest of his twelve children and the subject of this sketch, was born, on the 25th day of November, 1810, in Adams county, Mississippi.

Need help finding more records? Try our genealogical records directory which has more than 1 million sources to help you more easily locate the available records.

Author: Publication date: 1895 Publisher: Chicago, The Lewis publishing co., 1895 Number of Pages: 1532

Author:
Publication date: 1895
Publisher: Chicago, The Lewis publishing co., 1895
Number of Pages: 1532