12-year-old bride learned business lessons early

In 1836, Mary White turned 12, got married and became one-third owner of a league and labor of land, 4,605 acres, given as a headright by the Republic of Texas to her dead father.

In 1837, Mary was a mother, a widow and sole owner of the land.

Three years later, she sold the land to two different men.

No one said anything about Mary’s twice-sold land until the son-in-law of the first buyer discovered the chicanery in the early 1850s in probate court. T.J. Guilford then filed suit against James Fornoe, claiming Fornoe’s purchase of the land illegal. The land, Guilford said, belonged to his wife, the only child of the first purchaser.

Mary might not have arrived naturally to questionable deals, but she did learn from her husband and she observed deals and sales in Red River County. The same kind of deals most likely went on in much of the rest of the Republic of Texas.

In the early days of the Republic, neither the government nor most of its citizens had much money. What the Republic did have was land, lots of land, unsettled prairies and woodlands. Land was what drew early Anglo-American settlers to Texas, and the amount of available land certainly did not decrease when the new Republic gained recognition from the United States as well as European countries.

A man or woman who was head of a household at the beginning of the revolution was eligible for a league and labor, provided he or she had not left Texas during the revolution and had not given aid and comfort to the Mexican government or army. The Spanish league was 4,428 acres and a labor, 177 acres. A head of household applied for headright, and then paid survey cost, a penny per acre, when approved.
As the Star of the Republic Museum says, “This was the amount of a headright (first-class) granted to ‘all persons except Africans and their descendants, and Indians, living in Texas on the day of the Declaration of Independence… if they be heads of families… and if a single man, 17 years or older, one-third league’ (1,476 acres).”

http://www.starmuseum.org/questions.htm

The Republic recognized women as heads of household and granted women the same land rights as men. However, the “single man, 17 years or older …” did not apply to single women.

Whether Mary’s marriage at age 12 to James Morton was approved by the general community, is not known. The only written facts of her life are contained in Sixth District Court records in Clarksville, and those depositions were taken in the 1850s.

What is known is that Mary’s husband filed for headright in the name of Mary’s father. One deposition in case records states Mr. White “was believed to have died in an Arkansas jail.” He was not around to file for himself in 1836. The land commission approved the application, and the grant was split between Mary, her older sister and her older brother.

Sometime in 1837, Mary’s husband died, as did her sister and her brother. Mary then became sole owner of the 4,605 acres. She first sold the land to Benton Truman, then later to Fornoe.

One man deposed in the case knew Mary, Truman and Fornoe. That witness said he asked Truman if the sale was legal, since Mary was 16 at the time. Truman said Mary was able to legally sell the land, since she had been married, and therefore was considered to have gained majority.

The witness also said he knew of Mary’s sale to Fornoe. He asked Mary why she sold the land to two men. She replied that she had not received a fair price in the first sale. She had been cheated, she said.

The case never went to trial. Guilford, representing his wife, and Fornoe, announced their intent to settle out of court.

Mary was not around to be deposed or otherwise questioned. She died in 1846, at age 22.