Red River

My friend Jim Clark lives close to the Red River, on the Texas side. The river is the northern border of his land. Jim’s family first moved into Red River County before there was a county by that name, before there was a Texas. His great-great-great grandfather, James H. Clark, and great-great-great grandmother, Isabella, were members of the Wavell Colony.

The Red is known for its floods, not as many as before the Lake Texoma Dam went in, but still some good ones now and then. It gets low during summer, too. Drive across any bridge in the summer and you will see long sandbars.

Jim said the Red went down so low one year that even he got surprise one day. “I went out and there was a place, must have been a thousand musket balls in the sand.”

The sand was too wet to get out in at that time, Jim said. “And then a little while later, we got a rain and that part was covered with water again.”

There is also a story about a paddle wheeler that hit a snag one day in the late 1800s. All passengers and most of their luggage got off the steam boat before it went down. Not rescued were barrels of whiskey, said to be several hundred or a thousand, depending on the story teller.

That boat has been seen at least three times since it sank. But water always came back up before anybody could rescue the barrels of whiskey. One story says a finder got a barrel from the wreckage, and shared the whiskey with friends. When they sobered up, not a one could remember where the boat was.

1850 census, Red River County, Texas

While looking for something else from the history of Red River County, I came across the 1850 Federal census. That census is important in Texas history, because it was the first census in the former Republic of Texas.

Some interesting entries from the census:

Daniel Remington, age 39, occupation gunsmith, born in Massachusetts, was listed as head of household. Remington Arms was founded in 1816 by Eliphalet Remington in Ilion, New York. There was no evidence Daniel Remington was associated with the arms company, but it was interesting to see that name in the 1850 census in Texas.

From the McKenzie Institute, 57 people were listed in the household, including John W.P. McKenzie, minister/teacher. Three students were 12 years old at the time of the census. Students were from almost all the Southern states, with two from the Cherokee Nation (ages 15 and 21) and one from England (age 21). The McKenzie Institute was just beyond the western edge of Clarksville. The school was the first co-educational institute west of the Mississippi River. McKenzie was also a circuit preacher, given the Clarksville Circuit, also called the Sulphur Fork Circuit. The circuit encompassed the area from the Red River on the north, east to the Sulphur River on the south, then west to the area of present day Dallas and Denison. “It took several months to make one trip around the circuit in those days.”

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/McKenzie_College_(Texas)

Also on the census is Valentine Day, 36, blacksmith, born in Kentucky. His parents had a sense of humor.

George Osburn, 22, born in Tennessee, listed his occupation as “mailrider,” an important job in the times of few roads, no railroads in the area and no post office letter carriers.

In addition to McKenzie’s college, the census also listed residents of the Clarksville Female Institute, which was headed by William S. Todd, district judge, 41, born in South Carolina. Josaphine Horn was the teacher, age 25, born in Ohio. The Institute had 20 residents, including farmer Thomas Hughins, age 61, born in Virginia.

There also was a Clarksville Female Academy, headed by Robert Weathered, 57, and Martha Weathered, age 44. The academy had 25 students, ages 9 to 21.

W.T. Montgomery, 42, born in Tennessee, listed his occupation as “gentleman.”

These days, the purpose of the census is to determine how much your local school will get in federal dollars. That’s what the TV ads say, anyway. Bureaucrats in D.C. believe we exist solely to receive federal dollars, with their permission and determining who gets what. Those federal dollars are tax dollars, from thee and me. Thank you for yours, and you’re welcome for my donation.

The Three M’s

The chief deputy in Red River County, Texas, said one day: “Men I used to arrest for moonshine, I’m arresting their grandsons for marijuana and methamphetamine.”

Hola, viejo! We are from the government, and we want your guns.

Nacogdoches, Texas, Zip Code 75962. The oldest town in Texas. Also site of an 1832 battle between local militia and Mexican army force of cavalry and infantry. Mexico was in turmoil for much of the 1820s and 1830s, with central government adherents and federalist supporters at odds and often in battle against each other.

Here is an overview of the battle: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Nacogdoches

“The Mexican army commander in Nacogdoches, José de las Piedras, after reviewing all that occurred during the Anahuac Disturbances, had issued an order that all residents in his area surrender their arms. … The city officials of Nacogdoches resisted the order and soon organized a militia.”

So, whenever some guncontrol leftwingnut says he’s OK with you owning a shotgun or a rifle for hunting, remember he’s most likely full of wet gunpowder and he will be most happy when only cops and soldiers have guns, and he’s not sure about cops and probably we’d be better off without soldiers because everybody knows the Pentagon gets more than 50 percent of the federal budget and if we’d just sit down with people who don’t like us and admit we caused the problem to start with … Well, the world could live as one.

(That “more than 50 percent" business? A high school ex friend posted that on Facebook, and after checking, I posted a riposte, giving chapter and verse that his claim was not factual. He made no reply, nor did he remove the inaccuracy. In another post he did say he remembered in high school that I had a sense of humor. I replied that I remembered in high school he had some intelligence.)

Nacogdoches is where David Crockett joined the Texas army, after entering Texas at Jonesborough (or Jonesboro) on the Red River, a long ride northwest.

Detroit, Texas, Zip 75436 (it’s pronounced Dee-troit)

The real pronouncement is probably something like Da-Twa or De-Twa, it being French and all. Why this town of 10 downtown buildings is named Detroit, I don’t know.

East Texas has many uniquely named towns.

In southern Red River County is Bogota, but with a Texas twist on pronunciation – Buh-go-ta.

There is Telephone in Fannin County. “Poke Hindman owned a store in Fannin County and wanted a post office. All of his name suggestions were rejected, so he submitted ‘Telephone’ since he was the only person in the community with one.”

http://www.texasescapes.com/BobBowman/Town-names.htm

Mr. Bowman writes about Direct, Ben Franklin, Cuthand and Pickton, among others, but he does not mention Detroit.

Barely west of Clarksville on Highway 82 is Little Chicago. A longtime resident and frequenter of Dairy Queen coffee said when asked that the community was called that because it wasn’t far from Detroit. I think there’s more to the story – probably something to do with Prohibition and Red River County’s numerous illegal whiskey stills over the years, but who was I to argue with a fan of Dairy Queen coffee?

The best story on how a Texas town got its name: People in a certain locale petitioned the U.S. Post Office Department for a post office. There was a form; it was, after all, the government. Anyway, the man filling out the form came to a blank space before which was “Proposed Name of Post Office (write in ink).” So he did. And that is how Ink, Texas, got its name.

That is a Texas tale, so you know it is gospel truth.

Detroit (Texas) had 776 people living there in 2000. John Nance Garner was born south of Detroit. He was FDR’s vice president, but the president and the vice president got crosswise on New Deal programs, and FDR did not pick Garner for the 1940 election.

Here are pictures:
http://www.bing.com/images/search?q=detroit+texas&qpvt=detroit+texas&qpvt=detroit+texas&FORM=IGRE

Here is one from a long time ago. The buildings are still there, but with different names.

http://www.bing.com/images/search?q=detroit+texas&qpvt=detroit+texas&qpvt=detroit+texas&FORM=IGRE#view=detail&id=0022E230704D62577EDECE353F4F54FE89FD2335&selectedIndex=20

When working for the newspaper in Paris, Texas, I drove through Detroit three times a week for four years, going to various places in Red River County. I think I did three stories there – one about a hardware store, one about an antique store and the other about the Texas Historical Commission marker at the farm where John Nance Garner was born. The maker was lying face down and was too big for me to pick up and put back in place.

1866 court case disproves feminist accusations

Every time a supposed historian talks about how women had no rights in 19th century America, I wish the educated class of propagandists would just take a look at laws and court cases in the backward Southern and Western states.

What those propagandists mean is that in the states that mattered (the Northeast ones), women’s rights were quite limited. In most of the backward states, though, women had the same property rights as did men, could and did file for divorce, and often listed personal property before agreeing to marriage.

In Red River County Texas in 1866 occurred a case that encompasses all of the rights women are supposed not to have had. On Nov. 15, 1866, a man who had been gone from home in Confederate service, filed for divorce, claiming that while he was gone, his wife went to live with another man and had a child by that other man.

Showing legal and moral statements were hardly the province for men only, the wife filed six days later filed her own suit.

Reading papers in Sixth District Court records, one realizes neither Thomas J. nor his wife Hester Ann lacking in accusatory nature.

Thomas and Hester were married July 1, 1847. He claimed theirs was a good marriage, but Hester said different in her suit.

In 1863, Thomas answered the call, entering “the military service of the Confederate States and so continued serving said forces until the close of the existing war.” When Thomas returned home in spring 1865, he discovered a new addition to the household, Hester having delivered a baby that February.

Thomas claimed his investigation of the matter showed that “while your petitioner was serving with his command on the Rio Grande in this state,” Hester “committed and was taken in the act of adultery with (a named man).” And, Thomas said, the affair “was kept up until the year 1865.”

Thomas also said he “has not admitted the said Hester to his conjugal society or embrace and … he has not carnally known any other woman since this marriage.”

Thomas asked for dissolution of the marriage, custody of his and Hester’s three children (ages 16, 14 and 8) and division of community property. Hester, he said, was “not a fit person to have control or education of said children.” He also said Hester “has separate property of the value of ten thousand dollars.” Their community property was less than that, he said.

In two pages, Thomas’s suit spells out his accusations; Hester’s Nov. 21, 1866, suit fills seven pages. Hester says she and Thomas were married “__ day of __ 1848.” Shortly afterward, she discovered Thomas possessed of “quarrelsome disposition.” As a good wife and “desiring to discharge her duties, (she) made every effort to overcome his violent disposition.”

“His whole nature seemed to be changed,” she claimed. “He became a tyrant.” Thomas also used abusive language toward Hester: “’You damned old bitch, you damned hellion,’ and other language too indecent and disrespectful to be written.”

In 1861, Hester claimed, Thomas left her “with several little children” and “encumbered with debts.” She discharged all the debts which came to her knowledge. Two years later, Thomas returned “and resumed his former treatment of her.”

Matters came to a head in 1866. That year, Hester said, her husband “attacked her person and threatened to murder her. She lives in dread of her life.”

In her petition, Hester lists community property of 500 acres, of which 30-40 acres were in cultivation; 13 horses; 50 head of cattle; 30 head of hogs; a small lot of household items and furniture; and farming implements, of a total value of $2,000. She asked for division of community property and custody of her three children by Thomas. She made no mention of her other child, nor of the $10,000 in personal property Thomas said she had.

In court records, Thomas’s suit never made the court docket, nor is there evidence that he dropped his suit.

Hester’s case came before the district judge on April 1, 1867. Court records say that “at the suggestion of the plaintiff’s attorney,” the case should be dismissed at Hester’s cost.

“It is ordered by the court,” records state, “that the Defendant have and recover of the Plaintiff all the costs in this behalf expended.”

So what happened? Did Hester and Thomas settle their dispute? Did they decide to go their separate ways without divorce? Did they decide division of 500 acres and livestock would leave both in reduced circumstances? Records do not say.

William Becknell – pioneer entrepreneur and criminal defendant

On Christmas Day 1843, somebody beat the tar out of Henry Wagner. Not satisfied with doing bodily harm to the Red River County man, the assailants then threw Wagner out of Texas, presumably casting him onto the north side of the Red River, then the border between the Republic of Texas and the Choctaw Nation, United States of America.

Those days, near the end of the Republic, Texas was becoming a bit more civilized than it had been during the days when big government was in Mexico City. Possibly taken up in civilized manners, Wagner did not take pistolero justice. Instead, he did what most modern-day Texans do – he sued.

On Feb. 23, 1844, apparently recovered from injuries and having returned to Texas, Wagner filed suit in Sixth District Court.

In Wagner vs. Becknell and Guest, Wagner’s attorneys Martin and White alleged that “on the twenty-fifth day of December eighteen hundred and forty-three defendants did with force and arms commit trespass upon the person of your petitioner by beating wounding and otherwise misusing him and then and there with force of arms to wit sticks staves and fists beat bruise wound and greatly abuse said petitioner and afterwards to wit on the day and year last aforesaid the said defendants did falsely imprison tie and confine and carry beyond the limits of this Republic your said petitioner with other wrongs to him then and there done whereby your petitioner was greatly injured and hindered in his business contrary to the laws of said Republic …”

(Almost all writers of 170 and more years ago were not yet aware of the invention of the comma.)

Wagner considered his injuries serious, which comes as no surprise, “to the damages of your petitioner five thousand dollars …”

The men Wagner sued, though, were two of the most influential people in Red River County. Becknell was so well known, he had a prairie named after him – Becknell’s Prairie west of Clarksville, county seat. In 1936 the State of Texas put up a monument near the Becknell burial grounds, a few miles west of Clarksville and south of U.S. Highway 82, at the edge of a clump of trees.

The Encyclopedia Britannica 13th edition has this to say in its article on the Santa Fe Trail: “The earliest successful commercial expedition was that of William Becknell, who in 1821 made a profitable journey with $300 worth of goods on pack animals and returned the next year to open the trail with wagons.”

The Santa Fe Trail then ran from Independence, Mo., in almost a straight line for 800 miles. Becknell was the first trader to take wagons the entire length of the trail, and in so doing amassed a considerable amount of money, measured in the hundreds of thousands of dollars.

Guest, while not as well known as Becknell, was of local fame and later became county sheriff.

Wagner would have been better off had be been beaten by lesser-known men. Be that as it may, he filed suit for $5,000 damages, and law officers were bound to carry through.

Maybe not pressing too much, though.

With suit filed, District Court Clerk W.H. Vining on Feb 26, 1844, wrote summonses on Becknell and Guest. County Sheriff Edward West got the paperwork the same day. West did his duty, at least to a degree. Written on the back of the summonses is: “Traveled twice to Becknell and Guest residence neither found.”

The case came up for trial on March 19, 1844, but District Judge John T. Mills, ruling the accused had not received notification, ordered trial continued until the fall session.

It might seem strange that Becknell and Guest, as well known as they were, knew nothing about Wagner’s suit, nor did Sheriff West know of the accused’s whereabouts between Feb. 26 and the beginning of court.

Sometime between spring and fall court sessions, clerk Vining received an undated note.

“Capt. Vining,” the note begins. “This is to inform you that I stand no longer as security for Mr. Wagoner (sic) for the (unreadable) of a suit he entered against Becknell and others. Respectfully yours J.G. Faucett.”

In the end, Wagner did not get any kind of damage money. On Sept. 28, 1844, court records show, “upon agreement it is ordered by the court that the case be dismissed.”

Wagner paid court costs.

http://williambecknell.com/?page_id=202

http://www.tshaonline.org/handbook/online/articles/fbe17

What it was, was whiskey

Elias Miller liked his whiskey, and for good reason.

In 1863, Miller filed a law suit claiming theft of whisky in Clarksville, but not until a second suit 14 months later did Miller spell out reasons his whiskey was so valuable.

Miller filed his first suit in December of that pivotal year of Southern defense against Northern aggression. With the fall of Vicksburg and Robert E. Lee’s defeat at Gettysburg only six months past, a suit concerning whiskey might seem paltry. Soldiers in blue and soldiers in gray were dying by the thousands, and Miller was worried about a barrel of whiskey.

At the end of that December, in what must have been a cold month for Texas secessionists, Miller accused J.N. Nelson of taking a barrel of valuable spirit.

In petition to Sixth District Court, Miller noted he was a resident of Red River County, while Nelson “is a resident of _______ county, but who is now in the county of Red River.” Accusations and declarations filed long ago often lacked specific locations and dates.

Miller claims to be “owner of a certain barrel of whiskey of the value of sixteen hundred dollars.” Miller’s petition does not further identify the certain barrel of whiskey, nor do papers on file speak of the barrel’s volume. Unless the barrel was of extremely large volume, $1,600 seems steep. But, in the third year of the war, inflation had already lessened the value of any money that was not gold or silver.

Miller goes on to say “that upon the 29th day of December 1863 the said Nelson with force of arms seized and took … the said barrel of whiskey … and refuses to deliver the same …”

“Whereupon,” the petition states, “he (Miller) sues and prays that the defendant be cited …”

Miller’s biggest concern, though, was this: “(P)etitioner further alleges that he fears the defendant will waste the said whiskey – or move the same out of the county so that the same will be lost to petitioner.”

One wonders: How would Nelson waste the said whiskey?

In the end, what was wasted was Miller’s time and his legal expense. Written in pencil on the back of the petition is one word: “Dismissed.”

Miller’s second suit over whiskey gives more insight into his concern for spirituous and vigorous liquors.

On Feb. 13, 1865, Miller noted to district court that he “is the owner of a certain house in Clarksville where he is engaged in trade or business as retailer of spirituous … liquors.” As such a retailer, Miller “pays to the State of Texas heavy license tax and to the Confederate States the occupational taxes established by authority.”

As barkeep or saloon owner or peddler of whiskey, Miller might be expected to be concerned about the whereabouts of his filled barrels.

In that second suit, Miller alleges: “On or about the __ day of February 1865 defendants (L.D. Van Dyke and J.H. Thompson) assisted by certain armed men under their control did with force of arms enter the said house of plaintiff and did seize and take away a certain barrel with faucets and appurtenances attached of the value of one hundred dollars and five gallons of whiskey extra of the value of seven hundred fifty dollars.”

As in his suit 14 months before, Miller claimed he had demanded return of the whiskey, but the defendants refused. Loss of barrel with faucets and appurtenances, Miller said, “prevented petitioner from pursuing his legitimate business” and had cost him $1,000 in sales.

That same day, the district judge issued a sequestration order. Written on the back of the order is: “Executed this writ by levying on 1 barrel and 5 gal whiskey … pointed out to me by Elias Miller, done in the presence of W.C. Phillips and John Dickson. J.M. Stanley Shrff RRC.”

Since Miller got his whiskey and appurtenances returned, the case did not go to court.

Texas water

More than a dozen years back, the Texas Legislature created 16 water regions, “based on a ‘bottom-up,’ consensus-driven approach” for water planning.

http://www.twdb.texas.gov/publications/shells/RegionalWaterPlanning.pdf

What you need to know about water in Texas is this: Some places have a lot of it; other places, not so much; and still other places almost none at all.

Places with lots of water have used what was needed and, for the most part, allowed the rest to empty into the Gulf of Mexico, where a proper mix of fresh and salt produced shrimp, red snapper and numerous other sea foods to grace tables not only in Texas, but all over these United States.

People with almost no water at all learned what to plant and how to prepare dry land, but mostly how to successfully run cattle on what is available.

The people in the not-so-much-water category seem to live mostly in the Dallas area -- Region C under the state designation -- and they want the water in Northeast Texas – Region D.

Region C wants to flood around 70,000 acres of Northeast Texas, mostly in Red River County (a third of the county), but also small parts of Morris and Titus counties. Most of the landowners in those counties don’t agree that their property should become the bottom of a lake just so Dallas can continue to have lush green lawns and golf courses.

In addition to the flooded acreage, an almost equal amount of private land will be set aside from any future development, to make up for the millions of trees killed and hundreds of thousands of animals displaced by Marvin Nichols.

The Clarksville Times http://clarksvillenews.net/ reports that a week ago in Mt. Pleasant, Texas, the water board and Region D board heard what 350 citizens think about the lake. Some people who spoke have history on the potential lake bottom going back to the 1840s. That’s how long their families have lived on and farmed the land. Other families go back only 120 years; still others 50 years.

Those families overwhelmingly oppose flooding 70,000 acres of Northeast Texas. So do environmental organizations and timber companies.

Favoring the lake are some elected mayors, county judges and county commissioners, in addition to high-dollar consultants and water officials in the Dallas area.

In addition to the 350 people at the Mt. Pleasant meeting, more than 7,000 people wrote letters to the Texas Water Development Board. A good guess – Almost all oppose the lake.

The Dallas-area group says it will raise the $3 billion or $4 billion to build Marvin Nichols. In 2000, the estimated cost was $1 billion.

But money will not cause Texans to throw up their hands and quit. That ain’t the way things work south of the Red River. What the Legislature might do is authorize one region of Texas (Dallas) to claim eminent domain over another region (Northeast Texas).

Texans are not too good at using pitchforks and torches when storming a castle, but they darned sure are good at using other extra-legal means if necessary to gain and keep freedom. Just ask Antonio Lopez de Santa Anna.

Cleaning up after a murder

One night during TV crime drama, my wife asked, “Who cleans up all the blood when there’s a murder?” I said I didn’t know. She asked, “Do the police clean it up?” I doubt that, I said. She wondered, “So the family has to clean up all the blood? Or, maybe there are companies that do that.”

During coverage of a murder trail in Texas, I found out the answer.

A man killed his live-in girlfriend, in the kitchen of their house, with a 12-guage shotgun. He was known to have beaten her several times. She had left him, or thrown him from their house several times.

Her friends all told her, “Leave him. Make him go away. One of these days he will kill you.”

She responded with the usual “But he loves me” and “He promised to stop.” So, she always brought him back home.

In studying that kind of violence, my wife said she read that killing the abused person occurs after more than two or three forgivenesses.

That was what happened in this case.

The man had a defense, other than he was a worthless SOB.

On the night the murder happened, he said, he came home from hunting and had his shotgun in his hand when he went into the kitchen. His girlfriend, he said, started arguing about his absences. She had a butcher knife, he said, and at one point walked toward him, waving the knife. He said he had been stabbed several years before, and developed post-traumatic stress.

He shot his girlfriend in self-defense, he said. He shot her two times.

He was arrested, charged and indicted. His court-appointed attorney got a change of venue, from Clarksville, Texas, to Paris. Location of the trial did not matter. Everybody knew the man would receive a fair trial and a guilty verdict in any court in Texas. The trial took little more than an hour, the verdict substantially less time.


The mother of the dead woman’s son’s fiancé was a deputy sheriff in Red River County. She and her husband, the county constable, cleaned up the murder scene. The dead woman had no relatives, other than her son.

“We used more than two big rolls of paper towels,” the deputy later told me. “It was …” She just lapsed off and stopped talking.

A History of Luna County

This is part of a chapter I wrote several years ago for A History of Luna County, the history far from complete, more an ongoing idea. Priscilla said I should put together all my research on Red River County. Luna County is the result of that suggestion -- historical research, plus people I met.

Nathan Bullock


Nathan would have been beyond surprise had he known April drove down that street hoping to see him there.

As much as Nathan thought about April, he never considered whether she thought about him. In the war, a few months after reading of Tom’s death, Nathan did wonder, but those thoughts came when he thought about April, when the tears threatened, because to think of April was to think of goodness, and there was none of that in the war. Those times, Nathan sat alone, sometimes on ambush in the jungle -- his reclusive nature made others avoid him -- or at a fire base when the company was in from the bush a few days and everyone had at least one night of drunkenness. Sometimes there would be more than a few days, occasionally a week or ten days. Most soldiers became uneasy when in from the bush longer than a week. Officers and sergeants too often decided soldiers needed reminding they were part of the army, and that the army survived by regulations and standard ways of doing things. What the officers and sergeants could not understand was that, yes, they were part of an army, but most of their soldiers were not. The soldiers were part of a great, efficient killing machine. Some soldiers considered themselves only a cog on a small gear in the machine; others knew their true place as an essential part of the machine, that without them, the machine could not function. Those men were very good at their job. Nathan knew his place.

When Nathan sat alone in the war, he read, oftentimes books of history, although he yearned for books of poetry. When such works were available at the fire base library, Nathan borrowed the books, read and reread the poems, then studied favorite poems assiduously. In August 1968, Nathan discovered Siegfried Sassoon and Wilfred Owen. It was a momentous discovery. He had not known such writers existed. In his senior year of high school, Nathan read The Waste Land. That poem opened his mind to style; Sassoon and Owen led him to content. Nathan tried his own hand, writing several short poems, reading and revising. He discovered in those early attempts too many dead bodies. In late August, the company went back to the bush. In that three-week period, Nathan discovered the death of a single person as meaningful as the deaths of thousands. The first night of the company’s return to the fire base in the bush, Nathan took a pad and a pencil and wrote:

“The old woman shuffled to the village gate,
“And Wizard made her dead.”

Nathan wrote many lines that night and in nights that followed. He declined to term the lines poetry, instead considering what he wrote as running prose with natural breaks. Poetry was a delicate thing and should consist of endearing terms. What Nathan wrote that night was a hammer, pounding a piece of metal, red hot and recently removed from smoldering coals.

There were delicate writings, but those always were of April. Those lines Nathan wrote when on ambush or in night defensive position, taking quietly a small notebook from a pocket, sometimes writing in total darkness, translating the scribbles when the sun rose. At times, though, Nathan wrote of April, and his love for her, on fullmoon nights and he could see the words. In one such writing, he told of the difference between Texas and Vietnam in the rising of the moon, how the moon appeared full grown above the trees, with no glow on the horizon to announce its imminent arrival. On those nights, Nathan achingly remembered the moon at home, of the paling on the horizon, of the sky satin and the moon easing through thin clouds edged with gray lace. At times, he closed his eyes and saw April standing before such a moon, her profile in sharp detail. On those nights, Nathan compelled the tears to remain where they belonged.

Nathan kept all the writings in an ammunition can in his tent at the fire support base. Some notebooks were damaged from heavy rains and Nathan’s sweat. Writings in those books he transcribed in ink on lined pads. Notebooks bought at the small PX were almost useless in the humid jungle. Nathan began taking small items from the VC and NVA he killed, exchanging with the company supply sergeant North Vietnamese currency, belts and knapsacks for army notebooks. Those notebooks had thick covers and pages relatively water resistant.

When Nathan left the war, he wrapped notebooks and pads in plastic and wound large rubber bands around the packages and packed them in the middle of his duffel bag. Inspectors at Long Binh did not ask about the notebooks and pads; they were interested only in finding drugs, weapons and military equipment.

This sort of thing never happened …

Or so most writers of history say.

In the spring 1843 session of Sixth District Court in Red River County Texas came the case “The Republic of Texas vs. John, a slave for life – Assault with Intent to Murder.”

There is not much else in the large, thick ledger-size books. The initial entry does not list who owned John, nor is there an account of the crime for which he was accused. We do not know who it was John was accused of assaulting. The case has a document number, but that number is not in the boxes from 1843.

A few weeks after the first listing is another, with the same title, plus a trial date and the entry that a jury found John, a slave for life, not guilty of the charge of assault with intent to murder.

If you search “rights of slaves in America,” you will discover a quick answer. “None.”

Here are facts: John, a slave for life, was arrested by a white law officer. John was charged by a white justice of the peace or judge. John was indicted by a grand jury of white men. John was tried by a white prosecutor before a white judge and defended by a white attorney. And a jury of 12 white men found John not guilty of assault with intent to murder. John was then released from jail, probably returned to the man or woman who owned him, probably to remain a slave for life.

And another thing: Most likely, John was accused of assaulting a white man. Had he assaulted another slave, John’s owner and the owner of the other slave would have settled the matter.

Historians say slaves had no rights. In the main, that is true, if we consider today’s rights. But somewhere in the emotions of the Republic of Texas, lay the idea that the man John deserved a legal trial for his supposed transgressions.

I talked with Jim Clark about the case. Jim’s long ago ancestor James Clark was the founder of Clarksville. Jim said, “There shouldn’t have been a trial in the first place.”

“Why not?” I asked.

“Because,” Jim said, “property cannot commit a crime.”

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.

‘Dead bank robbers wanted’

The version people usually tell.

On Sept. 10, 1926, a car drove to and parked near the front of the Red River National Bank in Clarksville, Texas. Two men got out and went into the bank. The men, carrying revolvers and bank bags, exited the bank a few minutes later. A Texas Ranger happened to be walking on the sidewalk across the street when the two men came out of the bank. Seeing the guns and bank bags, the Ranger pulled his own pistol and said, “Texas Ranger! Put up your hands!” The two men failed to follow the Ranger’s instructions, instead pointing their guns at the Ranger. The Ranger then killed both bank robbers, identified as A.M. Slaton and T.L. Smallwood.

What really happened, as told by Henry Lee Somerville, who was 11 years old at the time.

On the September day mentioned, a car did park at the front of the bank. Two men got out of the car and went into the bank.

So far, it’s a usual bank robbery story.

But then, things got interesting.

After the two men went into the bank, the driver of the getaway car got out of the car and walked away. And, as soon as the gunmen were in the bank, the town constable began directing traffic away from the bank.

Across the street from the bank, Texas Ranger Captain Tom Hickman and a local law officer were sitting on the running board of a car, hidden from the gunmen. The Ranger now and then eased up high enough to check the bank. Captain Hickman was a patient man. Patience is part of being a Texas Ranger.

About 20 minutes after entering the bank, the two robbers came out, holding bags of cash and pistols. Captain Hickman and the other lawman stood up. The Ranger later said he identified himself and told the robbers to put up their hands. Instead, the robbers pointed their guns at the Ranger. They died for their mistake.

People at the scene, Somerville said, did not hear the Ranger make his announcement.

Somerville also said that the Texas Bankers Association not long before the robbery announced a reward for dead bank robbers. The announcement is at Page 21,

http://www.texasranger.org/dispatch/Backissues/Dispatch_Issue_31.pdf

The announcement stated in part: “$5,000 Reward. Dead bank robbers wanted. $5,000 cash will be paid for each bank robber killed while robbing a Texas bank.” The announcement also said the association would not pay one cent for a captured, live bank robber.

The Bankers Association gladly gave Captain Hickman a reward.

So, a getaway driver walks off, a Texas Ranger is concealed from the robbers, the bad men do not do as instructed by the Ranger and suffer the consequences.

But that’s not all of the story.

After Somerville’s recounting, I checked back issues of the newspaper and learned that on the day after the robbery, the Red River County sheriff went to a popular camping lake south of Annona and southeast of Clarksville. There, the sheriff took into custody two women who were in their 20s. He had the women taken to Dallas County Jail, where one was identified as having been in a drug store in Irving, Texas, a month before, on the same day a bank was robbed there. Both women denied knowledge of the Clarksville or Irving bank robberies, but did not give credible information on their decision to drive to Red River County for a campout.

Law officers never got a chance to charge the women, though.

The day after the women arrived at the jail in Dallas, an attorney from Fort Worth arrived, saying he represented the women, one of whom was from a prominent Fort Worth family. The women were released.

A story unfinished.