Back to the Beginning

 The Erasmus Miller Owen Family, part 7

Today I have decided that I'd better get back to work on that timeline I said I was going to start for Erasmus Miller Owen (but never did).  When we began tracking his movements in Texas, we got sidetracked and didn't really get very far.  This is all we have:

1832 - Shelby County, TN

1849 - TX, whereabouts unknown

1856 - San Saba County, TX

1860 - Burnet County, TX

1870 - San Saba County, TX

Let's get the easy stuff (ha!) out of the way, and finish the framework using the census records.  Oh, I just realized that I never put up the full-page record for the 1870 census, so here it is:

1870 U. S. Federal Census
San Saba County, Texas

So here we see that the family was indeed living in San Saba County in 1870, only instead of reporting his occupation as stock raising like he did in 1860, Erasmus reported that he was a Minister of the Gospel.  In 1880, Erasmus was still living in San Saba County, and he was still preaching:

1880 U. S. Federal Census
San Saba County, Texas

We don't have the 1890 census, and we can't find Erasmus on the 1900 census, so we have to skip twenty years to the 1910 census:

1910 U. S. Federal Census
Brown County, Texas

Erasmus' Confederate pension application states that he had moved to Brown county in 1882, and we see that in 1910 he was (still?) in Brown County.  His occupation was listed as "Minister."  The pension application itself was signed in 1913, and it stated that he was still living in Brown County at that time.  However, if you remember, it said that he was no longer preaching.  

So now we have a timeline that looks like this:

(I tried to just insert the table, but of course the Blogger template wanted to add extra spaces and erase the left-hand border of the third column, so I had to just take a screenshot of my Word document, which turned out blurry!)

This first version of Erasmus' timeline takes us from his birth to his death, but it doesn't have a whole lot of detail included.  You'll notice that some of the dates are bumped to the left and are in bold; those indicate that a move had taken place.  The source column at the right just shows numbers; on the finished version of the timeline, the numbered sources will be listed at the bottom of the page.

Now let's go back to the beginning - of his Texas life anyway - and see what we can add in.

We know that Erasmus entered Texas in 1849, because he reported that fact on his pension application.  But exactly where in Texas we don't know.  The earliest date that I have been able to find for him so far has been 1852, the year in which he married his first wife.  Pretty much everybody online says that Erasmus married Mary Ann Carr in Jefferson County, Texas.  I haven't been able to come up with an original marriage record yet, because all of the Jefferson County records on FamilySearch are locked to the general public, but a lady did create a transcription of marriage books A and B back in 1969, and that shows us this:

Marriage Books A & B
Jefferson County, TX
(transcription by Mrs. W. T. Nowlin)

There, down at number 203, we can see that Erasmus and Mary Ann were married on September 1, 1852.  Now, I'm always a tiny bit skeptical of transcriptions, because I've found a lot of (sometimes really important!) errors when comparing them to the originals.  Could this be one of those cases?  If you look at number 204 on the list, you'll see that there was another Carr girl married on exactly the same day.  It is possible that the transcriber accidently copied the same date twice.  However, it appears that Mrs. Nowlin just went through the books page by page, and the two girls appear one page after the other.  It probably makes more sense that they were sisters who were married on the same day than that they were sisters or cousins who were married within one month's time.  Also, there was apparently some guy named Thomas J. Russel who had some of his "reminisces" of Jefferson County pioneers published in a Beaumont newspaper way back in 1906.  In the article, he stated the following about William Clubb:

Mr. Clubb continued to work with stockmen on the range and in farming, and in doing such other work as offered from time to time. He accumulated some property, horse’s cattle and other stock. He attended parties of young folks, danced with the girls, talked sweet nothings to them and had his sweethearts as usual with the other young men of the country. He hunted wild turkeys, ducks, brant and geese in game time and chased the wild deer and fierce wolves and followed the dogs after foxes. He was a good shot and furnished plenty of game for the family where he made his home.

Life passed pleasantly with him and as he grew older, he found his fate in the person of a pretty girl of the bayou. This charming lady, who subsequently became Mrs. William Clubb was Miss Sarah Carr, a daughter of William Carr. She was born in Louisiana, 12 January 1833, before the family moved to Taylor’s Bayou in 1834. She was raised up in this county and received such education as was obtainable in the schools here. They were married at the residence of William Carr, Esquire, the home of the charming bride on 1 September 1852. There was a double wedding at that time and place, a Mr. E.M. Owens marrying another daughter (Mary Ann) of Mr. William Carr at the same time. There was a large party present and a good time was enjoyed by the large number of guests, especially among the young folks. Mrs. Sarah Clubb is still living at the old Clubb homestead on the bayou, a mile northwest of Fannette, but is an invalid and carefully attended by her devoted husband and eldest daughter, Mrs. R.J. Degat. She is in her 74th year.

I found this on the FamilySearch website.  I tried to find a copy of the actual newspaper article online, but only GenealogyBank has anything from that paper available and the article in question doesn't pop up no matter what search term I put in.  Also, I am either using their website wrong, or it doesn't let you just read random editions of the newspaper, so I guess we have to be satisfied with a second-hand reporting of what Mr. Russel said way-back-when.  Anyway, during my searching I did get some other hits from the Beaumont Banner, and it looks like they were doing a whole series of articles with recollections of local history told by different people, so this sounds legit enough to be trusted.  

Now I know I was just supposed to be talking about Erasmus and his first wife, but I included the first paragraph because it talks about the life of a young man who lived in the same place and time as our Erasmus was living when he was a young man.  I figure it can give us a little sense of what his life might have been like for him.  Perhaps he, like William Clubb, worked for stockmen on the range and was employed doing general labor where needed.  Perhaps he also saved his wages and "accumulated some property . . . and other stock."  Perhaps he went hunting with other young men, maybe even with this William Club guy himself!  It is hard to imagine the stern-looking Reverend attending parties of young folks and dancing with the girls, though, isn't it?  The last sentence of the first paragraph of the story mentions that Clubb was living with a family that was not his own - Erasmus would most likely have been in this same situation as well.

As for the marriage, Mr. Russel tells us that Erasmus married Mary Ann Carr on September 1, 1852 in a double wedding with her sister at the brides' home.  There were many guests at the occasion who enjoyed a good time, meaning the wedding wasn't just some vows said before a preacher, but instead a big occasion with a party.

Now isn't having this information so much better than just filling out a data sheet with a date for a marriage?

While we are talking about this particular time period in Erasmus' life, I think I will go back and look more closely at that book about the Carr men that I found on the FamilySearch website a few weeks ago.  

Okay.  The book, well, I guess we would call it a manuscript, is titled "The Family Annals of John Carr Lawhon and Judith Ellen Gardner."  It didn't really tell me very much, other than where to find the deed record showing that Mary Ann and Erasmus had an inheritance from her mother's estate (I believe she died in 1849 and the land was either sold or redistributed in December of 1852, shortly after they were married.)  It also showed that Mary Ann's father died in 1874, and that he left one-eleventh of his estate to the children of his deceased daughter Mary Ann.  That would be Ellen and Sam, and I am thinking that 1874 was right around the time that we think Ellen married Tolbert Shoultz and he drops off the tax rolls in San Saba County, so maybe they went to claim this inheritance in another county.  It certainly gives us a clue as to where to go looking for them.  (Hopefully I will remember to get back to that later!)

And speaking of Ellen and Sam, we need to place those two children - along with the 1852 marriage - onto Erasmus' timeline.  I have seen some variation on the dates given for each of their births, possibly due to the fact that Ellen's death certificate and gravestone give us weird information and I don't really know what the deal is with Sam, because the date on his gravestone makes actual sense so there is no reason to doubt it.  Most people say that Ellen was born in February of 1853 or 1854, but February 1853 would have been much too soon after her parents' marriage so I'm going with the 1854 idea.  Sam's gravestone says 1856, so that is what I am going to put in the timeline.  Unfortunately, there is still the problem of place.  Sam was born in February 1856, and Erasmus registered one of the first cattle brands in May of the same year in San Saba County.  According to the Texas State Historical Association website, nobody who acquired land in the early grants actually lived in the area, and it was not until 1854 that people began to settle there permanently:

Early permanent settlers included the Harkey family, who settled at Wallace and Richland creeks in the fall of 1854, and the David Matsler family, who moved from Burnet County and settled on Cherokee Creek that same year. San Saba County was organized in 1856 from Bexar County and was named for the San Saba River. The act establishing the county was passed by the Sixth Legislature and approved on February 1, 1856. The first election was held on May 3 to select county officers and a county seat. The results of this election were set aside because of irregularities, and another election was ordered. On July 19 the present site of the town of San Saba was selected for the county seat.

So when did Erasmus and Mary Ann arrive?  Nobody could register a cattle brand until there was a clerk to record the registration, so it makes sense that it was May of 1856 before he was able to do that.  The question is, was he living in the area before it was an official county, and if so, for how long?

You know, it's a good thing I write all of this research stuff down, because I totally forgot that the 1856 tax rolls from San Saba County showed that Erasmus was there in 1855!  Sooooooo, what about 1854?  I checked the Bexar County rolls, since that is the county that San Saba was carved out of, and didn't find them.  But then I realized that I didn't have any notes in my research notebook showing that I had looked at the tax records of Jefferson County!  Sure enough, I found Erasmus there.  

Before I talk about that, though, I should probably put up a map!

Colton's Map of Texas, 1856

(I actually tried to redo the color coding on this map and it was turning out even worse, so I guess we're stuck with this one!)

Okay.  San Saba County is over on the left outlined in red.  Jefferson county is waaaaaaay over on the right, practically on the border with Louisiana (outlined in blue).  Erasmus did not show up on the tax rolls in Jefferson County in 1852, the year he was married.  Whether this meant that he wasn't living there yet at the beginning of the year or if it was because he was young enough that he wasn't required to pay taxes yet, I don't know.  Maybe it just meant that he didn't own any property.  He does appear on the 1853 rolls, however, right next to none other than B. H. Owen.  

B. H. Owen?  That sounds like Bluett Hardy Owen, his father.  According to the Owen Family Association Newsletter,

The last record we have of Bluett [in Tennessee] is the sale of some Shelby County acreage to Ezekiel Sanderlin on April 21, 1849, for $349.50. There are unconfirmed accounts that Bluett went to Texas, and some say he accompanied his son, Erasmus, there.

Well, it looks like those unconfirmed accounts might need to be confirmed, huh?  Perhaps he and Erasmus made their way to Texas and left the rest of the children with friends and family while they settled in and got situated.  Of course, if we could find Erasmus on the 1850 census, we just might find his father there, too, and that would answer the question once and for all.  (Too bad research rarely gives us just what we need to find!)

As for the information on the tax rolls, they show that in 1853 Bluett owned nothing and payed no taxes except for the poll tax.  Erasmus, on the other hand, owned 246 acres located on Taylor's Bayou.  The land was part of tract 4428, originally granted to a Hezekiah Williams.  Here is the page showing this information:

Jefferson County, Texas Tax Rolls - 1853

In 1854, Erasmus is shown with the exact same property, only this time his father is missing from the rolls:

Jefferson County, Texas Tax Rolls - 1854

I'm not sure what happened to his father, but maybe we'll investigate that after we are all finished looking into Erasmus' life.  By 1855, Erasmus was absent from the Jefferson County tax rolls.  His wife's brother-in-law, David E. Lawhon (Lawhorn), however, added a tract of land with the exact same description to his holdings on the tax rolls.  My guess is that Erasmus sold his land to him some time during 1854, and then headed west.  Hopefully I can get into a FamilySearch history center soon to look at the deed records and confirm whether or not that is what actually happened.  

Two days later . . . .

Well, I did manage to get to a family history center this week, and the documents confirm my theory:

Taken from the Index of Jefferson County, TX Deed Book J

This is a page from the index of Deed Book J from Jefferson County.  We can see that there were two deeds recorded in which E. M. Owen purchased land from David E. Lawhon.  I know, some of you are saying, I thought you said he sold land to David Lawon?  I did, and we'll get to that!  Here is the first page of the first deed record:

Jefferson County, TX
Deed Book J pg. 13

This shows that Erasmus purchased 246 acres of land in Jefferson County (a part of the headright of Hezekiah Williams Sr.) from David Lawhon for $375 on December 12, 1852.  That would have been three months after he married Mary Ann.  The interesting thing is that David Lawhon himself had just bought the land two months earlier, in October.  I don't know if he bought it for the same amount or what, because I only had one hour to spend at the family history center and so I didn't have time to actually read the pages I was looking up and copying, so I didn't look up the deed where David Lawhon bought the land originally, because I didn't know there would be something weird going on that I wanted to get more information about.  This deed does say that Erasmus had already paid him the amount due, but it also says that Lawhon was quit-claiming the property to him, so that none of his own heirs could ever lay claim to it in the future.  That is kind of strange because that extra bit of wording is not usually thrown into a regular deed in which full price has been paid for land - I've only seen it when it says something like for "other valuable considerations."  So, I'm guessing that there was a particular reason that Erasmus' brother-in-law arranged the transactions to take place that particular way.  

This document actually came from an 1883 transcription of Deed Book J; I mentioned up above that I am not-so-trusting when it comes to transcriptions.  However, I think that this deed is probably pretty accurate because the transcriber included specific notes at the end of each deed, citing erasures on certain lines and alterations after particular words in the original book.  That means that they were concerned with getting it copied exactly right.  (If you click on the document image caption, you can view/download the entire deed record.)

As for the second deed mentioned in the index, it is the same as this one (you can view/download the document here).  The only difference is that in the first one, David Lawhon signed the deed all by himself, and in the second version, his wife (Mary Ann's older sister, Nancy) signed it as well, and there is a note from the notary public saying that he examined Nancy to make sure that she wasn't being coerced into selling the land against her wishes.  That was standard practice for states in which women had dower rights.  The crazy thing about the need for the second deed is that David E. Lawhon just so happened to be the Chief Justice of Jefferson County at the time, so you would think he would have had things done right in the first place!  

So now, as a person who loves maps, I am of course wondering just where this land was.  The deed gives one of those legal descriptions about the original survey and a stake at the corner and so many varas from such and such kind of tree so we would have to go look at the original survey maps and spend a half an hour doing calculations and what-not.  I really don't have time for that so I am going to do the next best thing . . . . The tax records show that his land sat on Taylor's Bayou.  

Jefferson County, TX (1879)

You can see on this 1879 map from the Jefferson County Historical Commission website that Taylor's Bayou runs right through the center of the county.  The section outlined in violet shows the land originally patented by Mary Ann's father, William Carr.  Not a single version of historical map that I could find from this county shows where the headright of Hezekiah Williams was located, but I know he was an original landowner because there are several documents on the Texas GLO website showing he was granted land back in the 1830s.  So anyway, I don't know exactly where Erasmus had his land, but it was somewhere near the bayou. 

Now, those of you who are paying attention must have noticed that the index page I put up above actually showed three deeds recorded in Book J.  The third deed to be recorded was actually for a transaction that took place three days prior to the other one, on December 9, 1852:

Jefferson County, TX
Deed Book J pg. 29

In this one, Erasmus and his wife, and David Lawhon and his wife, were selling their share of the wives' inheritance from their mother's estate.  Does that make sense?  The mother of Nancy and Mary Ann had died in 1849 and they were still going through the probate process in 1852.  The two women and their husbands decided that they would sell their shares of the inheritance back to their father.  They also chose to sell all of their interest in the cattle brand that their father had registered and used to build a herd that he would one day leave to his children when he died.  So by selling their interest in the brand, they were relinquishing any claim they might have to any cattle carrying that brand in the present or future.  Each couple received a whopping $900 from the transaction.  Wow.  Maybe that is why David Lawhon made the other land purchase and then turned around and sold it to Erasmus.  Maybe he knew that they were going to be coming into some money, and the 246 acres wouldn't wait, and Lawhon had cash on hand but Erasmus did not.  

Alright.  So when did Erasmus sell this land?  Well, there is a deed in Deed Book K:

Jefferson County, TX 
Deed Book K pg. 79

This shows that Erasmus and his wife sold the land back to David and Nancy Lawhon for the same amount of money that they had purchased it for.  Unfortunately, the index says that this deed record runs through page 82, but pages 80-81 were either missing from the deed book or did not get microfilmed, and the top of page 82 is simply blank.  Once again, I didn't read this when I downloaded it so I didn't know that I needed to look at the surrounding deeds, but the last page of the preceding deed shows that it was recorded into the deed book in October 1854, and the first page of the deed following this one shows the transaction dated as June of 1854, so we should be safe to assume that this land sale occurred some time in the middle of 1854.  

That date is consistent with what we see in the tax rolls, with Erasmus dropping off the Jefferson County rolls and showing up in San Saba County by the beginning of 1855.  Since Ellen was born in either February or April (her gravestone says February, but the 1900 census says April), we can confidently place her birth in Jefferson County.  I'll bet Erasmus' wife was just thrilled to leave her comfortable life and treck 340 miles to the wild frontier with an infant in tow.

And speaking of his wife, let's wrap this up with one last document.  While I was at the family history center I also downloaded a copy of their marriage record, so now we can see the original (or at least the earliest transcribed) copy:

Jefferson County, TX
Marriage Book

I'm not exactly sure which book this came from, because the way the microfilm records on FamilySearch is named is really complicated for this collection.  The title implies that I had to look up a transcribed combined copy of Books A & B, which is what it appears that the transcribed index up above was from, but this record has a page number of 60, not 210, so this might be the actual original Book B.  The next time I am at a family history center I will try to remember to look it up again and see if I can figure it out.

I am ecstatic that I was able to find the actual record, because not only does it confirm the date of the marriage and the fact that it was a double wedding, but it shows us that the ceremony was performed by none other than the Chief Justice of Jefferson County, Mary Ann's brother-in-law David Lawhon, which is exactly the kind of information we want to find if we are trying to tell the story of somebody's life.

So now we have a timeline that looks like this:

(This time I tried converting this to a jpg instead of just taking a screenshot; when you open the jpg it looks nice and crisp, but for some reason when I insert it here it looks blurry.)  I just realized after I put this up that I should probably have included a notation about the possible infant son we discovered week before last, so I'll put that in the next version.  And next week we'll see what else we can add in - maybe we'll finally take a look at those Baptist records I mentioned way back when . . . . or maybe we'll look at some newspaper articles . . . . how about I just surprise you?

                                                                                                                                                 - Therese