Picking Up the Threads

In the weeks since my last post, I have retired from my profession and found myself busier than ever adjusting to my ‘life of leisure’. My work on this project has been interrupted and my New Year’s pledge is to pick up the threads and move forward with it again. While I have new research to organize and plenty of research yet to do, a good place to reengage, I think, is to share some research already completed about the life of Milton Wilks.

When Milton died on August 8, 1927, he was not the last of his generation - his sister-in-law, Mary Wilks, wife of brother Newton Wilks, would live until 1932 and sister, Rebecca Wilks White would live until 1940 - but the details we have of his life provide fitting bookends for the beginning and ending of an era. Milton arrived in Texas in 1865 or 1866 with his parents and four of his siblings. He was the baby of the family and would have been nine in 1866. We have to believe that moving from Iowa to Texas in the aftermath of the Civil War had to figure as something of an adventure to a young boy, and northeast Fannin County something of a wild frontier. It had only been 30 years since Daniel Rowlett and his band of families had become the first permanent anglo settlers to make their homes west of Bois d’Arc Creek. The Treaty of Bird’s Fort ending hostilities with the Native Americans was only 23 years old at the time. At the other end of the spectrum, as Milton’s death approached, the industrialism and economic growth of the Roaring Twenties were drawing to a close. Cotton was King and Fannin County had seen years of booming agricultural production and wealth creation.

Eldest brother, Jefferson Wilks, died in 1864, a victim of the war, and though that death was no doubt deeply felt within the family, Milton, a child of six or seven, may have felt the loss less severely. And it must have been with great optimism that his parents left behind married daughters and grandchildren to make a new home in remote Texas. However bright the future had appeared when the family arrived in Fannin County, repeated loss would sadly mark Milton’s life. He was not quite 12 when his mother was laid to rest in 1869, and only 14 when his father joined her.

That the siblings remained close is evident in family correspondence (which can be seen here), and further corroborated by the purchase by the Wilks boys, Madison Solomon, Newton, and Milton, of the 214 acres containing the Wilks Cemetery in August of 1873 from the heirs of the Cagle estate. Milton was only 16 at the time, Newton 18, and Madison Solomon not yet 22. Again, they must have had high hopes and grand plans for their future as they made their investment. At $412 (approximately $8,800 today) the land was acquired at considerably less than the $535 it had been valued at in 1864 when the Cagle estate was settled. When the boys sold the land to George Buchanan in Oct, 1879 for $500 (just under $13,000 today), they realized a nice profit. Perhaps Milton’s good fortune set him up to pursue marriage as he became a married man the following year.

In November of 1880, at the age of 23, Milton married Betty Moore. He laid her to rest in January of 1887 just over six short years later. In those six years the two of them had buried 3 baby boys. Milton and their only surviving child, a son not yet 2, were left to grieve Betty’s passing.

In June of 1888, Milton married for the second time. His bride was Florence Ester French, a girl still a couple of months shy of her 16th birthday. With his young bride, Milton must have once again looked to the future with bright hope. Their first child, a daughter, was born in August of 1889 and buried that October. In January, 1898, they were graced with a second daughter who would live to adulthood, but in February of 1901, Milton would lose his wife, Florence, and his brother, Newton, within two weeks of one another. A widower for the second time, Milton had to bear up under the load of life with two children, Frank, not quite 16, and Winnie, barely three.

1908 would see the death of a granddaughter, tragically burned, and Milton’s third marriage. Milton and Raymond Bill Holiday Clark were married on November 18, 1908. Milton was 51, Raymond 47, and Winnie 10. Raymond was a widow with an 11 year old son. Just shy of ten years later, Milton was again left a widower, when Raymond died in September, 1918.

In August of 1920, Milton married for the 4th time. His bride was Mattie Cornelius Jones McConnell. Mattie was the widow of Ellis Thurston McConnell.  At their marriage, Milton was 63, Mattie was 46.  Mattie had several adult children and a young daughter of 10. In an interesting side note, George, son of Ellis and Mattie married Milton’s great-niece, the granddaughter of Rebecca Wilks White.

In July of 1927, Milton sat down to write his last will and testament, a document you can see here. It is easy to speculate that he felt his time drawing near as he died within a few weeks of the writing, on August 6, 1927, just shy of his and Mattie’s 7th wedding anniversary. His will reads to me as the testament of a stalwart and dutiful man, taking great care to leave his affairs in order and his loved ones sharing fairly in the estate he left behind.

The inventory of his estate lists $2,671.00 in separate property, and $661.00 in community property, for a total of $3,332.00. The equivalent in today’s dollars is just over $47,000.00.

From left to right, Julia, Milton, & Rebecca Wilks. Photo courtesy of Donald White.

Story by Wanda Oliver.

The Unidentified

As we wait for the first bit of scientific information to emerge from Dr. Whitely and her team about the remains removed from the Wilks and Bonham Cemeteries, I want to explore several lines of inquiry that could shed light on the unidentified remains found. These lines of inquiry include looking at the occupation of the land, the families on the surrounding properties, the early road systems in the area, and further details and gaps related to the information we have about the Cagle, Wllks, and Bonham families.

To begin that effort, I pulled all the known burials in Fannin County dating from 1838 to 1852 from the Fannin County GenWeb site. I used these dates because 1838 is the earliest recorded burial in Fannin County and Martin Cagle, the first fully documented burial in the Wilks & Bonham Cemeteries, was buried in 1852.  The initial on-site assessment of the removal team was that the burials to the east of the Cagle row in the Wilks Cemetery were older graves, so my focus was on the period prior to Martin Cagle’s death. My intent was to map the ‘hotspots’ of early Fannin County settlement by locating where the known burials were, hoping that the pattern produced might provide clues as to these early Wilks Cemetery graves. The surnames of other early burials in the area would, I thought, provide good starting points for further research. I used the map of all known cemeteries in Fannin County from the GenWeb site as my starting point. The result for the northeastern part of the County is show below, with the current path of Bois d’Arc Creek highlighted.

There are a few scattered locations along Red River, and then a concentrated area south and east of Bois D’Arc Creek.  The only known burials in the 1838-1852 time frame along the western side of Bois D’Arc Creek are those at the Wilks Cemetery itself (dark red dot on the map).  The Wilks Cemetery stands conspicuously alone. Certainly there are burial grounds we will never know about where the only markers were wooden posts that have completely disappeared, but it seems likely these would be in proportion to the marked graves that have remained. And perhaps this pattern should not be surprising, illustrating early settlements spreading into the area from the more established communities to the east, overland and along the River.

Studying this map, I began to think about how one would choose a burial ground for a loved one in frontier conditions. If there was a community cemetery in a given location, how wide an area was it likely to serve? What distance was considered nearby, what distance a long journey? To what extent would the area creeks limit travel in a time of few roads? These sorts of questions led me to the creation of another map.

Base map from “Texas Land Survey Maps for Fannin County”, by Gregory A. Boyd, J. D., used with permission of the publisher.

In this one, I highlighted the major creeks (in red) on a map of original land grant awardees, estimating the original course of the creeks prior to the creation of Coffee Mill Lake (in light purple). A ‘basin’ of sorts emerged (highlighted in pink) around the Wilks & Bonham cemeteries. The headright names provide a starting point for the original claimants of the land, and the creeks a reasonable boundary of an extended community.

In an attempt to put the ‘basin’ in context within the larger land area and the earliest settlements in Fannin County, and to explore the distances between them, I created a third map. Using the Google Earth app, I drew a five mile radius around key areas. I am told by old-timers from the Carson area, that even in the early 20th century a trip to Bonham was a two day affair in horse-drawn wagon. One day was dedicated to the drive into town and taking care of business. By then it was late, and folks would stay over night then start the journey home the next morning. Given the well established road system at that time, I felt safe in assuming that a five mile journey in an area of few roads would be a significant distance.

These maps have given me a lot to think about and a wealth of questions to pursue. They will guide and inform my research going forward as we piece together as much as we can of the story of the Unidentified.

Story by Wanda Holmes Oliver.

Growing Up on Bois D'Arc

My parents moved to Fannin County from Grayson County in 1955.  I was two and my brother had not yet arrived.  My grandfather had bought a couple of hundred acres north of Windom at Spring Hill that my dad would farm.  My dad and his brother had also purchased a farm on the east side of Bois d’Arc Creek near Bonham.  That land sits directly across the creek from the Legacy Ridge golf course and is now largely broken up into small acreages.  The brothers split the land, my father taking the northern part and my uncle the southern.  When you travel US Highway 82 in that area today, you drive right through the middle of what was once my family farm.  

We lived on the farm at Spring Hill, but spent equally as much time on the Bois d’Arc place. Our bottom land was used for crops, primarily maize and alfalfa.  Our uplands were used for pasture.  Our only timber was a strip along the creek itself and a few groves scattered here and there in the pastures.  A lot of my days there were spent hoeing fields, feeding cows, and hauling hay but there were lots of days spent tromping around alone, with my brother, or with my cousins just seeing what we could see.  The timber and the creek always offered the most interesting possibilities and I often marvel that we didn’t break our necks, drown, or wind up snake-bitten.  As long as we were home by supper, or came when my mother or my aunt honked the truck horn, we were left to roam as we pleased.  I would not trade those days for any treasure.

I was in my mid-twenties and living in the city when my father called to tell me he had decided to sell the farm.  His reasons were sound, but I was nevertheless heartbroken.  The next year my father died unexpectedly.  I came to see his decision to sell as one that saved us the greater heartbreak of having to sell after his death.  However, seeing the land upon which I had been formed, and that had served as my anchor, pass to another and be put to new uses was wrenching.  What played out there on a small scale is now playing out on a large scale as the last parcels earmarked for the lake pass into the hands of the North Texas Municipal Water District.  So many families have sacrificed the land that anchored their lives to make this new reservoir possible.

My favorite place on our farm was a grove of tall, tall trees that I called my “cathedral trees”.  I felt a spiritual connection to the universe walking among them.  The trees seemed older than time and stretched majestically heavenward, filling the sky and my imagination. This photo, taken from the bottomlands on Mike Barbaro’s ranch, quite near the location of new dam, reminds me of my trees.  My trees were lost years ago, the grief for these is fresh and raw.

Story by Wanda Holmes Oliver.

The Last Embrace, photo by Wanda Holmes Oliver.