Tracing Back the Blackshear Line, part 10
Today we are going to wrap up our
Blackshear family's time in Anderson County by looking at the last of the
documents I have been able to find from there. Several weeks ago, (okay,
actually a few months, I guess!) I mentioned two court cases in which Silas
Blackshear and J. S. Hanks were co-defendants. One of those cases led to
the sheriff's sale of Silas' land and property. We know this because the
deed of sale said that the auction was held to satisfy a judgement in that
specific case. The minutes for those cases themselves only revealed that
Silas and Mr. Hanks lost both cases and were ordered to pay damages.
(You can find that post here, and a transcription
of the minutes for the two cases here and here.)
The records, however,
shed a bit more light on things. The two cases were heard during the
spring term of 1859. The first was the case of Taylor & Radden vs
Silas M. Blackshear and James S. Hanks.
But wait - before we look at them,
I need to correct an error I made earlier. (Oops! This is why you
should keep up with reading these things - this isn't the first time something
like this has happened!)
Back in that other post, I told you
all that the judgement was that their assets were to be liquidated in order to
pay what they owed. Well. I have since spent time looking more
closely at the original documents, trying to decipher every word of the clerk's
sloppy handwriting (a necessary step when trying to type up a transcription!),
and I noticed that that isn't what it said at all! What it actually said
was that it was a liquidated demand, which is a demand for a fixed
sum of money, as opposed to the courts determining the damages. So, the
minutes only said that they had to pay the plaintiff. But obviously they
couldn't come up with enough money to pay both parties they owed a debt to, or
Silas wouldn't have had his land seized and auctioned off. My guess is that he
was able to come up with the money owed in the first case, but couldn't cover
the second amount.
As for James Hanks' part in it all, I'm guessing that maybe he backed people's loans, since he was a co-defendant on so many
other cases at the same time. But seeing as how he had numerous other
suits against him and the other men he was (presumably) backing, it's no
surprise that he didn't have enough money to cover all of the defaulted loans.
Okay. The first case:
There are actually seven pages of records, but I didn't want to put them all up here so I just put up the first page and linked the title to a pdf of all seven pages combined, in case any of you want to attempt to read it. (Not only did the clerk have terribly sloppy handwriting, but he was also quite possibly dyslexic - it took me hours to try to decipher the words and type up a transcription, which you can find here.)
This case was brought against Silas Blackshear by two merchants from New Orleans, operating under the name of Taylor & Radden. Apparently, Silas made out a promissory note on March 25, 1858 for $334.15 (or $324.15, depending on which part of the records you read!) plus some amount of credit (that I couldn't really decipher). Now, the initial description of the complaint says that Silas delivered the note to the plaintiffs in exchange for a valuable consideration. That's the same terminology that is always used on deeds when a person is buying land, but could also refer to anything of value, including the promise of work to be performed.
The records don't tell us what Silas was paying for, but I did manage to find some advertisements for Taylor & Radden online. The Eastern Texian newspaper had this 1857 ad (the "New York" at the bottom is a typo - the other ads say New Orleans):
Hmmm. Shoes. And hats - but wholesale, not retail. Why would Silas give this company over three hundred dollars and arrange a line of credit with them? Surely he didn't buy hundreds of dollars of hats and shoes, especially since a pair of men's heavy work boots only cost $2.75 back then. Weird, weird weird.
The description of the complaint goes on to say that the plaintiff felt they were owed one thousand dollars. I'm not quite sure where that number came from. The records then give a transcription of the promissory note, which just so happens to tell a slightly different story:
$324.15 Exhibit
“A”
Plenitude March 25 1858
One
day after date I promise to pay J S Hanks or bearer three hundred and twenty
four dollars and 15 cts with Interest at ten percent from date for value
received
Silas
M Blackshear
Endorsements
March 25 1858 Received $1125 by [amt]
on Wm H Rogers
Pay to Taylor & Radden
J
S Hanks
So, on March 25, 1858, in Plenitude, Silas wrote a promissory note for $324.15 to J. S. Hanks (or bearer), not to Taylor and Radden. J. S. Hanks then signed it over to Taylor & Radden, but in between, there was some sort of transaction with a William H. Rogers that I honestly don't understand, and the amount changed to $1125 (not one thousand, like they were asking for in the lawsuit). I tried looking up William H. Rogers, but it turns out that that was an extremely common name back then, so I have no idea if he was someone who lived in Anderson County or if he was maybe an agent for Taylor & Radden (and just so you know, I found Radden/Raddin spelled both ways all over the place online).
To me, this looks like Silas paid (well, not really - more like he promised to pay, I guess) J. S. Hanks for something entirely unrelated, and then Hanks used the money (which he didn't really even have) to make a purchase from Taylor & Radden. And now that I think of it, Mr. Hanks was listed on the 1860 census as being a farmer, but his occupation on the 1850 census was listed as "General Store." So this is all making a bit more sense.
I do wonder what exactly Silas Blackshear paid J. S. Hanks for, though. Maybe he he was just promising to pay back money that J. S. Hanks had loaned him.
The case was heard by the courts in April 1859, more than a year after the promissory note was signed. The records tell the outcome of the case, and here is another example of how you can't blindly accept everything that those darned clerks wrote down, because it says that the plaintiff (Taylor & Radden) appeared via their attorneys, but the plaintiffs Blackshear and Hanks failed to appear. Obviously, he should have written that the defendants failed to appear. Anyway, neither of them showed up for the trial and so judgement was pronounced against them. But, they were only ordered to pay $359.07 (principal plus interest) as well as the court costs, not the $1000 the plaintiff was asking for.
Silas and J. S. Hanks then filed for a "writ of Error" and a "writ of Supersedeas," which basically means that they were appealing the case and asking for the original judgement to be suspended until the new trial was finished. The Texas Supreme Court finally heard their case another year later, in April 1860, and ruled that the first judgement should stand.
So, my earlier guess (from way back when I was looking at his wife's probate papers) that he had taken out a loan to pay for his guardian bond and then wasn't able to pay it back was incorrect, since the promissory note that started the whole mess was signed eight months before the probate process even began.
Now let's look at the next case, and see what happened there:
(Once again, the picture subheading is linked to the original document, and a transcription can be found here.)
This case was heard in the same term of court as the first one, but actually involved a transaction that began much earlier. The records tell us that William G. Lane of New York City was suing Silas Blackshear and James Hanks over a promissory note that was signed by Silas back on November 22, 1856.
Wow. That was before his wife even died. And if you thought the first case involved some convoluted dealings, that was nothing compared to this:
So at this point, after reading just the portion of the records with the initial complaint, I have a few questions. What was Silas purchasing from J. M. Stephens? What did Mr. Stephens purchase from J. S. Hanks? Who was William G. Lane, and what did J. S. Hanks purchase from him? What does it mean that there were two credits on the note? Why was Mr. Lane suing for two thousand dollars? And finally, why did all of these men think it was a good idea to pass around promissory notes with no guarantee that they would ever be honored?
The next portion of the records provide a transcript of the promissory note:
Wow. That was before his wife even died. And if you thought the first case involved some convoluted dealings, that was nothing compared to this:
- On November 22, 1856, Silas Blackshear signed and delivered a note for $664.50 to J. M. Stephens (or bearer) in return for a "valuable consideration."
- J. M. Stephens then delivered the note to J. S. Hanks for a valuable consideration.
- On February 24, 1859, J. S. Hanks endorsed the note and delivered it to William G. Lane for a valuable consideration.
- By that point, two credits had been placed on the note: The first, for $130.95, on January 1, 1859, and the second, for $40 on the same day.
So at this point, after reading just the portion of the records with the initial complaint, I have a few questions. What was Silas purchasing from J. M. Stephens? What did Mr. Stephens purchase from J. S. Hanks? Who was William G. Lane, and what did J. S. Hanks purchase from him? What does it mean that there were two credits on the note? Why was Mr. Lane suing for two thousand dollars? And finally, why did all of these men think it was a good idea to pass around promissory notes with no guarantee that they would ever be honored?
The next portion of the records provide a transcript of the promissory note:
$665.50 Exhibit A
Anderson County Texas Nov. 22. 1856
On or before the 1st day of
January One thousand Eight Hundred and fifty nine I promise to pay J M Stephens
or bearer Six Hundred and Sixty five dollars 50 cts with interest at Eight per
cent from the first day of January 1857 until paid It being for land bought of said Stephens
value received Silas M
Blackshear
Endorsements
January 1st 1859
Received on the within forty Dollars by
order from J M Stephens
Jan 1st 1859
Received of the within one Hundred and
forty one Dollars 95 cts by James Scarbrough
This Belongs to J S Hanks.
Pay to William G Lane Feby 24 1859
Okay. So Silas Blackshear purchased land from J. M. Stephens, with interest to begin accruing on January 1, 1857. He was supposed to pay for the land by January 1, 1859. That makes perfect sense, because the 1858 tax rolls show that Silas owned land in Anderson County for the first time in 1857. If you remember, that year's rolls included corrections from previous years, and they showed J. M. Stephens as the original owner (well, actually they show "J. M. Stephensen" but it was corrected in the rolls for the next two years. Gotta love it.)
As for the credits, I don't really understand that part - did somebody give J. M. Stephens forty dollars or did he give it to someone else? The other credit involved someone named James Scarbrough (most likely a relative of Silas' son-in-law), which means the transaction was even more complicated that originally explained in the complaint!
Oh, and did you notice that, once again, the amounts named in the original complaint do not match what was written on the actual promissory note? And not only that, but the note itself doesn't make it clear that J. M. Stephens transferred it to J. S. Hanks for a valuable consideration. Somebody just wrote "This belongs to J. S. Hanks" on it. And I thought all of those old-timers in 1920's Laveen were crazy with their business dealings!
It's no wonder there were so many financial panics and recessions during the 1800's.
As for the identity of William G. Lane, I discovered that he was a merchant in New York, and quite a prosperous one, apparently, because he had six servants in his household in 1855!
So, we already know from the Sheriff's sale deed that Silas and James Hanks lost the case. The records confirm this, and tell us that, once again, both men failed to show up in court. And, once again, they appealed the decision. And, once again, the Texas Supreme Court upheld the original judgement.
Obviously, Silas couldn't pay the damages, because his land was auctioned off. The deed only said that the auction was held to cover the debt to William G. Lane, and since it was the second of the two court cases to be heard, that makes me think that he was somehow able to pay off the debt from the first case.
And speaking of debt, maybe the reason he didn't pay off the promissory note for his land in the first place was because of the whole fiasco with his daughter and her husband suing him. Maybe he spent what money he had on attorneys and the guardian bond. This is quite possible, since the probate costs began in October of 1858, and the note came due on January of 1859.
We are going to switch gears a bit now and talk about that purchase of land that Silas made from J. M. Stephens. The one that I couldn't find the deed to when I originally searched for it. After reading these court records, I was all excited because they confirmed that Silas did buy land, and that he bought it from J. M. Stephens. So, armed with this new information, I headed over to a Family History Center to try looking for a deed again.
Instead of looking under the list of grantees, this time I looked under the list of grantors, and guess what? I still did not find a deed showing a transfer of land from J. M. Stephens to Silas Blackshear. I did however, find one in which he was transferring land to J. S. Hanks. (Okay, I actually found two, with transactions dated on the same day, but only one of them is even somewhat relevant.)
That deed stated that J. S. Hanks bought two hundred and thirty-six acres of land for $236 from J. M. Stephens on July 11, 1857. The land he purchased was part of the William B. Harrison survey, which was the same survey that Silas Blackshear's land came from. It appears that J. S. Hanks purchased the westernmost portion, and Silas owned the easternmost portion (approximately 1004 acres). That would have left about 236 acres of land in between. When giving the description of J. S. Hanks purchase, the deed stated that it was bordered on the east side with Silas Scarborough's fifty acre survey.
Needless to say, this wasn't the kind of information I was hoping to find. Of course, it does tell us that Frances Angelina didn't live too far from her family during that time, which I guess gives us a better overall picture of the family, but I'm left wondering why there was never a deed filed showing that Silas purchased his land. Maybe Silas just never got around to it - he made the purchase at the very end of 1856, and his wife died some time in 1857. Maybe her death created enough chaos in his life that he never recorded it. Maybe he even lost it. It's possible that his son James also died at the same time, or within the same year, and if Sophama had died in childbirth, perhaps there was even another child to be taken care of (in addition to the other six still at home), who then also died. Whatever the reason, it is clear that he was recognized as holding legal title to the land regardless of the missing deed.
It also makes me wonder why, if J. M. Stephens sold a tract of land to J. S. Hanks for $1 per acre, Silas promised to pay him only $665 for one thousand and four acres (the amount he bought according to the sheriff's sale deed and tax roll) only six months prior? Maybe the fact that it bordered the river had something to do with the quality of land or something. I don't know.
What I do know is that, out of the twelve or so years that the family lived in Anderson County, the last six or seven of them were most likely somewhat tumultuous, especially considering that the Civil War was also going on for part of that time and Silas' only son old enough to help work the land and/or oversee their slaves enlisted in the Confederate Army.
By 1864, there was no trace of Silas Blackshear or his minor children in Anderson County, Texas. Next time, we'll try to figure out what happened to them during the eight year interim before they show up in the historical records again.
- Therese
As for the credits, I don't really understand that part - did somebody give J. M. Stephens forty dollars or did he give it to someone else? The other credit involved someone named James Scarbrough (most likely a relative of Silas' son-in-law), which means the transaction was even more complicated that originally explained in the complaint!
Oh, and did you notice that, once again, the amounts named in the original complaint do not match what was written on the actual promissory note? And not only that, but the note itself doesn't make it clear that J. M. Stephens transferred it to J. S. Hanks for a valuable consideration. Somebody just wrote "This belongs to J. S. Hanks" on it. And I thought all of those old-timers in 1920's Laveen were crazy with their business dealings!
It's no wonder there were so many financial panics and recessions during the 1800's.
As for the identity of William G. Lane, I discovered that he was a merchant in New York, and quite a prosperous one, apparently, because he had six servants in his household in 1855!
So, we already know from the Sheriff's sale deed that Silas and James Hanks lost the case. The records confirm this, and tell us that, once again, both men failed to show up in court. And, once again, they appealed the decision. And, once again, the Texas Supreme Court upheld the original judgement.
Obviously, Silas couldn't pay the damages, because his land was auctioned off. The deed only said that the auction was held to cover the debt to William G. Lane, and since it was the second of the two court cases to be heard, that makes me think that he was somehow able to pay off the debt from the first case.
And speaking of debt, maybe the reason he didn't pay off the promissory note for his land in the first place was because of the whole fiasco with his daughter and her husband suing him. Maybe he spent what money he had on attorneys and the guardian bond. This is quite possible, since the probate costs began in October of 1858, and the note came due on January of 1859.
We are going to switch gears a bit now and talk about that purchase of land that Silas made from J. M. Stephens. The one that I couldn't find the deed to when I originally searched for it. After reading these court records, I was all excited because they confirmed that Silas did buy land, and that he bought it from J. M. Stephens. So, armed with this new information, I headed over to a Family History Center to try looking for a deed again.
Instead of looking under the list of grantees, this time I looked under the list of grantors, and guess what? I still did not find a deed showing a transfer of land from J. M. Stephens to Silas Blackshear. I did however, find one in which he was transferring land to J. S. Hanks. (Okay, I actually found two, with transactions dated on the same day, but only one of them is even somewhat relevant.)
That deed stated that J. S. Hanks bought two hundred and thirty-six acres of land for $236 from J. M. Stephens on July 11, 1857. The land he purchased was part of the William B. Harrison survey, which was the same survey that Silas Blackshear's land came from. It appears that J. S. Hanks purchased the westernmost portion, and Silas owned the easternmost portion (approximately 1004 acres). That would have left about 236 acres of land in between. When giving the description of J. S. Hanks purchase, the deed stated that it was bordered on the east side with Silas Scarborough's fifty acre survey.
Needless to say, this wasn't the kind of information I was hoping to find. Of course, it does tell us that Frances Angelina didn't live too far from her family during that time, which I guess gives us a better overall picture of the family, but I'm left wondering why there was never a deed filed showing that Silas purchased his land. Maybe Silas just never got around to it - he made the purchase at the very end of 1856, and his wife died some time in 1857. Maybe her death created enough chaos in his life that he never recorded it. Maybe he even lost it. It's possible that his son James also died at the same time, or within the same year, and if Sophama had died in childbirth, perhaps there was even another child to be taken care of (in addition to the other six still at home), who then also died. Whatever the reason, it is clear that he was recognized as holding legal title to the land regardless of the missing deed.
It also makes me wonder why, if J. M. Stephens sold a tract of land to J. S. Hanks for $1 per acre, Silas promised to pay him only $665 for one thousand and four acres (the amount he bought according to the sheriff's sale deed and tax roll) only six months prior? Maybe the fact that it bordered the river had something to do with the quality of land or something. I don't know.
What I do know is that, out of the twelve or so years that the family lived in Anderson County, the last six or seven of them were most likely somewhat tumultuous, especially considering that the Civil War was also going on for part of that time and Silas' only son old enough to help work the land and/or oversee their slaves enlisted in the Confederate Army.
By 1864, there was no trace of Silas Blackshear or his minor children in Anderson County, Texas. Next time, we'll try to figure out what happened to them during the eight year interim before they show up in the historical records again.
- Therese
A note on the transcriptions:
When transcribing these documents, the process of reading, re-reading, and re-reading them again allowed me to become somewhat familiar with the clerk's handwriting quirks. In addition, many of the phrases were used consistently across the records, so if a word was illegible on one page, it could often be compared to a different page in the record book. Words in brackets are ones that I was still not completely sure of or that were spelled quite strangely, and brackets with a question mark inside denote words I simply could not make out.
You will notice that the word "test" occurs in brackets frequently as a part of the the phrase "due return hereof make [test]." I believe I have seen this phrase in other documents before and it is supposed to say "make haste." It is definitely not spelled here in a way that can be interpreted as "haste," so I chose to transcribe it as spelled and place it in brackets.
In addition, the portions of the records discussing the appeal of the case, the word "Shin" (or Shen?) appears several times. I found this fantastic old book, A Dictionary of Slang and Colloquial English, which is an abridged version of a seven volume work on slang words used prior to 1900, and it is possible that the word might indeed have been "Shin" (a generic word for taking action). However, it is also possible that the word is actually "Show" considering the clerk's haphazard penmanship and the overall gist of the sentence. I chose to represent it with just a question mark in brackets.
When transcribing these documents, the process of reading, re-reading, and re-reading them again allowed me to become somewhat familiar with the clerk's handwriting quirks. In addition, many of the phrases were used consistently across the records, so if a word was illegible on one page, it could often be compared to a different page in the record book. Words in brackets are ones that I was still not completely sure of or that were spelled quite strangely, and brackets with a question mark inside denote words I simply could not make out.
You will notice that the word "test" occurs in brackets frequently as a part of the the phrase "due return hereof make [test]." I believe I have seen this phrase in other documents before and it is supposed to say "make haste." It is definitely not spelled here in a way that can be interpreted as "haste," so I chose to transcribe it as spelled and place it in brackets.
In addition, the portions of the records discussing the appeal of the case, the word "Shin" (or Shen?) appears several times. I found this fantastic old book, A Dictionary of Slang and Colloquial English, which is an abridged version of a seven volume work on slang words used prior to 1900, and it is possible that the word might indeed have been "Shin" (a generic word for taking action). However, it is also possible that the word is actually "Show" considering the clerk's haphazard penmanship and the overall gist of the sentence. I chose to represent it with just a question mark in brackets.
