The Unidentified & The Wilks Mysteries

The overwhelming surprise when the Wilks and Bonham Cemeteries were disinterred was the number of unmarked graves found. What we had assumed to be the resting place of two well-marked families became a much more complicated situation. Like the Cagle family (see previous post) the outline of the Wilks family emerged early and seemed complete.  But again, my assumptions were called into question.

With the exception of Mary Wilks, whose grave was marked only by a metal funeral home stake, the Wilks graves had lovely tombstones - richly decorated and graceful, with touching symbols of birds, lambs, twining ivy, and clasped hands. Each stone was also graced with loving sentiments carved in script. Mary died in 1932 and was presumably the last of the family to be buried in the cemetery. While her grave was not given a stone, it remains hard to imagine any prior Wilks burial remaining unmarked given the beautiful tombstones standing witness to a family who honored their dead with great care.

But there are mysteries to be solved in the Wilks family just as there are in the Cagle family. The information in the historical record poses questions and the three unmarked graves lying between the Wilks and Cagle rows (see schematic below) beg explanation. These graves could be from either family or from neither family. Only the results of the scientific assessment of the remains will provide true closure. In the meantime, we can work to develop educated guesses as to who these souls might be and the records do provide some possibilities.

Gray markers indicate the relative position of the unmarked graves found. Yellow markers indicate the Cagle row. Green markers indicate the Wilks row.

Though the Wilks family did not buy the Cagle farm from Susan and Martin Cagle’s heirs until 1873, clearly the Wilks developed some association to the farm or the immediate surrounding area soon after arriving in Fannin County in 1865 (see newspaper article here regarding Fannin County Old Settlers Association meeting in Dodd City, Texas on Aug. 1-2, 1917, in which Milton Wilks is listed as having arrived in Texas in 1865). Margaret Wilks was buried in the Wilks Cemetery in 1869 and Thomas Wilks joined her there in 1871. Perhaps the Wilks were tenants of the Cagle heirs. Perhaps the cemetery was already in use at the time of Margaret’s death as a community cemetery rather than a private family cemetery. We do know that when the land was sold to the Wilks sons in 1873, 1/4 acre was held out of the original 214 acre land grant. Perhaps this quarter acre holdout is a reference to the cemetery.

The 1870 census for Thomas Wilks includes Cornelius Edwards, age 27, working as black smith, Sarah Edwards, age 26, keeping house, and Warren Edwards, age 3, in addition to sons Madison, Newton, and Milton Wilks, aged 19, 16. and 14, respectively. Thomas is listed as a farmer and the boys as farm laborers. The three graves between the Cagle and Wilks rows are those of children. With Cornelius and Sarah in their prime child bearing years, and given the rate at which young children were lost in that era, these could be Edwards graves.

Poking deeper into the census records related to the adult Wilks children, I found a reference in the 1880 census to Mattie Wilks, one-year-old daughter of Newton and Mary Wilks.  The 1890 census is missing and Mattie is not mentioned in the 1900 census, though she would have been 21 by this time and perhaps married. I’ve not found any reference to Mattie other than that one census entry. If Mattie died as a baby or young child, she could be lying in one of those unmarked graves. However, it would seem strange for her resting place to remain unmarked when the resting places of her little brothers are so beautifully marked.

In that same 1880 census record, the Newton Wilks household includes Tenny Martin, white, servant, age 7. Setting aside the heartache of imagining a seven year old servant, Tenny must be added to the list of possibilities. If she died young, an unmarked grave would seem consistent with the sad circumstances of her life.

Finally, we have the tragic case of Alvie Wilks. Alvie died at the age of 8 after being severely burned in an accident. Her mother also suffered severe burns while trying to save Alvie. The mother lived, but little Alvie succumbed. Alvie’s death certificate places her burial at the Wilks Cemetery but her grave was not among those marked. Either there is an error in her death certificate or she is one of our unidentified children. It stands to reason that she will be identified during the scientific assessment of the remains given the abundant family DNA available from well-marked close relatives disinterred, and the availability of living descendants of her family. It would be comforting to see her placed in a marked grave among her family when the remains are re-interred.

Story by Wanda Holmes Oliver.

The Unidentified & The Cagle Mysteries

In the Wilks Cemetery there was a beautiful monument to the “Family of S. C. and M. G. Cagle”.  Tall, monolithic, beautifully carved and inscribed all round, it marked what we came to term, “the Cagle Row”.  To the north of the monument were four small foot stones with the initials, “MSC”, “SHH”, “ESC”, and “MVC”.  To the south was a foot stone marked, “JHC”, for a total of seven expected graves.  The disinterment revealed eight graves in this row, only two of which we could be certain about - the graves of Susan Catherine Barkley Cagle and Martin Gaines Cagle.

Rubbings from the Cagle monument.

Based on the inscription on the monument, the ready assumption was that the foot stones with initials ending in “C” were Cagle children.  It also seemed certain that SHH, resting between MSC and ESC, was a family member. I set out early on to discover as much as I could about the Cagle family, and align the facts with the evidence in the Cemetery.

I was able to use familySearch.org to zero in on an 1850 census that seemed to establish the nuclear family as parents Martin and Susan, along with children Robert, Frances, Edward (or Edmond), Martin, and Mary.  Then I discovered an entry in the 1850 Fannin County Mortality Index, that established the existence of little Martha, dead in Sep, 1850 of scarlet fever, and my definition of the family expanded. 

In the 1860 census, Susan, age 44, Robert, age 23, Edward, age 19, Mary, age 13, and John, age 9, are listed. Martin Cagle (the senior) had died in 1852.  I had found uncorroborated evidence that Martin (the son) died at age 16, placing his death in 1860, though he is not listed in the 1860 Fannin County Mortality Index. His absence from the census seemed to support an early death, perhaps earlier than 1860. Frances had married in 1956 which explains her absence. John was not yet born at the time of the 1850 census. His presence in the 1860 census led me to expand my definition of the family again. (As a side note, the 1860 census also includes Willis Escue, age 21, a farm hand.)

I worked for months with this family roster - Martin and Susan and seven children, mapping the family members onto the marked graves in the “Cagle row” with a sense of certainty.  MSC and MVC I ascribed to Martha and son Martin. ESC and JHC I presumed to belong to Edward and John. SHH remained a mystery.

Then, months later, I found a memoir written by Frances Cagle’s husband, Thomas Hale, which stated, “…. To Mr. and Mrs. Cagle were born eight children: Frances, who is now Mrs. Hale; Robert; Edward; Martha, who died in childhood; John; Martin; Susan, deceased; and Mary, the wife of R. Russell.”   My conception of the family had to expand again to include Susan, who must have entered and left this world in between census years. This bit of information had the advantage of providing closure in a reliable way - there were eight children, a fact confirmed by a close and contemporary family member, well after the death of the parents, Martin & Susan.  The family roster was complete.  However, I still had no information on little Susan other than the fact of her existence. And I had found almost nothing about the sons that appeared to reach manhood - Robert, Edward, and John.

Martin and Susan married in May, 1836.  Robert was 12 years old in the 1850 census, placing his birth in 1838 or thereabouts.  Frances was born in May, 1839.   In the 1840 census for Lafayette, Arkansas, which does not list by name anyone other than Martin, the family consists of an adult male between the ages of 30 and 39, an adult female between the ages of 20-29, two children under the age of 5, and a female aged 15-19.  The teenager is a mystery, but the adults correspond to what we know about Martin and Susan, and the two children to what we know of Robert & Frances.  It is possible that daughter Susan was born in 1837 and died before the 1840 census was taken, however there is a user-submitted family tree on ancestry.com that places her birth in 1847.  If this is Susan’s correct birth year, she presumably died in Fannin County, though we have no record of her death.  If she had died in the same epidemic as Martha, surely she, too, would be listed in the 1850 Fannin County Mortality Index.  Why is there no foot stone in the cemetery corresponding to her initials?  Had she already been laid to rest when Little Martha died?  Could she have been laid to rest elsewhere?  It saddens me to think of the little sprite all but lost to history.

Tax records also provided valuable insight into the family circumstances.  After Martin’s death in 1852, the records clearly show that Susan continued as head of household and might even have expanded the family holdings.  The Fannin County tax rolls for 1857 show Susan assessed for 320 acres on the Sulphur River in addition to the 214 acre tract that held the Wilks Family Cemetery.   The 1864 Tax Rolls list the tracts as “Cagle, Susan, by T. C. Hale, Admin”, indicating that the land is still held by the family despite Susan’s death in 1861.  In 1865, both tracts are listed under Thomas C Hale. 

This was the extent of my information when I began looking at the Fannin County Probate Minutes. In Book E of the Probate Minutes, page 260, there is an entry dated, November 24, 1862, which states

“Guardianship of the minors Mary C. Cagle and John H. Cagle. It is ordered by the court that Thomas C. Hale be appointed guardian of the persons and property of John H. Cagle and Mary C. Cagle ( the said Mary C. having chosen in open court the said Thomas C. Hale) and that he give Bond in the sum of $1000. One thousand dollars each and that letters issue.“

At the time of this entry, Mary Cagle would have been sixteen years old and John eleven. Then on page 421 of the same book, minutes dated November 28, 1864 address the settlement of the estates of Susan Cagle, Edward Cagle, and Robert Cagle. The entry reads in part

“Thomas C Hale the admin of the estate of Susan C. Cagle, Edward C. Cagle and Robert Cagle dec’d would file herewith his final report for a settlement of said estates and ask to be discharged from all further liability as admin. He states that there are but three heirs to the said estates viz Frances D. Hale the wife of this admin & the minors Mary C Cagle and John H Cagle.”

With this document we have confirmation of the deaths of Edward and Robert at some point prior to November, 1864, and a strong indication that they died without descendants, their siblings being their only heirs. The absence of any mention of son Martin, is a strong indication that he, indeed, died sometime prior to the death of his mother. Furthermore, we have confirmation that John H. Cagle is still living in late 1864.

In Book V, of the Deed Records, page 492, in an entry dated August 11, 1873, the sale of the 214 acres of the Wilks Cemetery tract by the Cagle heirs to Madison, Newton, and Milton Wilks is recorded. The signatories to this document are Thomas C. Hale, Frances D. (Cagle) Hale, R. F. Russell, and Mary C. (Cagle) Russell, leaving us to wonder still about the fate of young John. In 1873 John Cagle, if living, would have been a young man of 22. Does his absence as signatory to this deed indicate that he had died sometime between 1864 and 1873? Hoping to find more of his story I returned to the County Clerk’s Office to investigate the death records - records I had not yet dipped into. I went prepared to carefully search the death records from 1844 - 1873 - from a year prior to the date I believed the Cagles to have arrived in the area through the year of the sale of the Cagle property to the Wilks. I hoped to find more information about the deaths of the Cagle children. I hoped to find references to the burial place of Martin Gaines and Susan Catherine, a reference that might prove useful in understanding the history of what became the Wilks Cemetery. Sadly, what I found was that we do not have death records in Fannin County prior to 1903.

Regarding the foot stones in the Cemetery, the assumption that those with initials ending in “C” line up with children Martha, Martin, Edward, and John is not disputed by the facts, though the facts do not provide certain proof either. “SHH” is still a mystery - perhaps a member of the Hale family - and the unmarked grave even more obscure. Unless some unexpected breakthrough comes my way in my research, we will have to wait for what science and DNA can tell us.

There is an interesting side note that came out of this research. In the record of the transfer of the land to the Wilks, the document describes the property as

“…on Bois D’Arc Creek containing two hundred and fourteen acres less one fourth of an acre surveyed by virtue of the headright certificate of James Kerr…”. 

I can’t help but wonder if that 1/4 acre exclusion is our cemetery, and whether that indicates that it was, in 1873, seen as a community cemetery rather than a family cemetery on private land.

Story by Wanda Holmes 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.

The Disinterment of the Graves, Part II

On December 6, 2018, Jeff McKito arranges another visit to the Wilks Cemetery disinterment. In the weeks since we were last on site in October, the number of unmarked graves has grown from ten to thirteen. There is an unexpected grave in the Cagle family row, and there are two additional burials to the east of the row of unmarked graves previously discovered. These plus the 3 burials between the Wilks & Cagle rows brings the total to thirteen.

In addition to the unmarked graves, there are a couple of other surprises. The grave marked by the Bois d’Arc posts - the grave that we had speculated might be that of Alvie Wilks - was found to be empty. I asked Cody if it was possible that the remains had decayed to dust and he did not think that likely. The remains of one-day-old, Infant Son Wilks, had been found in excellent condition. If the remains of a newborn buried in 1881 were intact, then any burial in the cemetery should have some discernible remains. He thinks it truly was a false grave. We are left to ponder when the Bois d’Arc markers were added, by whom, and why they believed they were marking a grave. Who did they intend to honor and why had the true location of that person’s burial site been lost?

In the Cagle row, one of the graves marked by a foot stone was also empty, though the total number of graves in the row was one more than expected. This an indication that perhaps the Cagle monument and markers were also added at some later time, as they are out of alignment with the actual burials. 


Second visit to excavation, photo by Wanda Holmes Oliver.

Recovery team at work, photo by Wanda Holmes Oliver.

Taking measurements, photo by Wanda Holmes Oliver.

At this point the layout of the cemetery precedes from east to west in five irregular rows. At the extreme east are two graves, followed to the west by a row of seven graves. Then we have the row of marked and unmarked Cagle graves, eight in total. Wedged between the Cagle row and the Wilks row, the westernmost, are three graves, all of children or babies. The Wilks row contains fourteen graves as expected, all marked, making a total of 34 graves at the Wilks Cemetery site.

For illustrative purposes only.

The easternmost graves are thought to be the oldest burials. Moving from east to west the burials are more decadent - fancier caskets and coffins, more buttons, etc. Coffin and casket screws, found in abundance, and very identifiable right down to the manufacturer, will provide important details about the approximate timing of the unexpected burials once the team is back in the lab and can analyze them. The timing of the burials will be a critically important clue when forming hypotheses about who these people might be and how their story fits into the overall picture. Imagine - something as humble as the screw that affixed the lid may hold an answer to some of the mysteries here. The idea fills me with a sense of wonder and irony.

Other details serve to bring into focus the living people who were resting here. One of the children from the Cagle row shows severe remodeling of the bones, indicating a serious, long-term infection. One of the adults from the Wilks row suffered from gall stones. Thomas Wilks had broken his leg at some point well before his death, and most probably walked with a limp, one leg being noticeably shorter than the other. The hair of Margaret Wilks and of an adult female in the Cagle row were dressed with hair pins. Florence Wilks’ hair was arranged with a decorative comb. One of the coffins showed clear traces of white paint. But the most heart breaking of all the grave artifacts is the little red pocket knife in the shape of a dog buried with 8-year-old Charles Jefferson Wilks. It so embodies the love and the grief with which his parents laid him to rest and reminds us all of our common humanity.

Though there is some scraping still to do to the south and west, we are told that the pattern of graves found so far makes it unlikely that more graves will be found at the Wilks site. Furthermore, no graves have been found outside the fenced area of the Cemetery. Strangely enough, before the disinterment began, that was precisely where we thought we might find unmarked graves.

Detail of scraping, photo by Wanda Holmes Oliver.

Sections cleared, section remaining, photo by Wanda Holmes Oliver.

As we are preparing to leave, Cody gives us an update on the Bonham site. The work there has not yet begun. With reassurance from Jeff that he will keep us posted, we drag ourselves away.

Story by Wanda Holmes Oliver.

The Disinterment Of The Graves, Part I

On September, 12, 2018, Jeff McKito, Public Relations Specialist for North Texas Municipal Water District (NTMWD) invited Ginger & I, along with Larry Standlee, representing the Fannin County Historical Commission, to visit the Wilks Cemetery site. We were escorted by Fain Butler, Assistant Construction Manager, NTMWD. The detailed mapping of the cemetery had been completed, and the tombstones were scheduled to be removed the next day in preparation for the beginning of the disinterment. This would be our goodbye visit.

The disinterment would involve a number of steps, moving from the use of chainsaws and tractors to painstaking work done with gentle brushes. The first step would be to cut all vegetation at ground level and remove it in a perimeter extending 25 feet from the line of the existing fence in all directions. Then, section by section, the earth within that cleared area would be removed in progressive layers using heavy equipment to scrape off a few inches at a time. During this scraping process, the team would be watching for telltale changes in the color of the earth indicating a grave shaft. Once one or more grave shafts in an area were found, the scraping would stop. All grave shafts identified would be flagged and covered by a plastic tarp, to be addressed one by one. As each grave became the target of work, a sheltering pavilion would be erected over the area, the shaft carefully measured, and the soil slowly removed by shovel. Once coffin wood was struck, the work would shift again - to finer tools and yet more careful processes of slowly working deeper into the grave using archeological recovery methods. As the work progressed, all coffin hardware, coffin wood, artifacts such as buttons, fragments of clothing, jewelry, etc, and skeletal remains would be painstakingly documented, gently removed, and carefully stored. Even burial dirt would be saved to be reinterred.

As we stood in the cemetery, cleared of all small vegetation and peppered with pink flags, the realization that this really was the beginning of the end pressed in on me. The reality of this transition had been sinking in by degrees for weeks, and now the day had finally come.

Graves surveyed and marked in advance of removal of the stones, photo by Ginger Sisco Cook.

Our last view of the Wilks Cemetery intact, photo by Ginger Sisco Cook.

In mid-October, we received the news that, though the scraping was not yet complete at the Wilks Cemetery site, ten unexpected and unmarked graves had already been discovered. This was our first indication that so much of what we thought we knew about the Cemetery was about to be turned on its ear. On October, 23, Jeff invited us back out to the Cemetery to visit the disinterment in progress. Mitch Harrison, Senior Construction Inspector, NTMWD, is our guide for this visit and we pile into his pickup for the drive from the Foremen’s barn to the site. It has been raining incessantly, and there is standing water in the bottom. The fields are wet and we almost get stuck in one place. Then suddenly we are there. The Cemetery is an exposed spot now - not a hidden glade - and I don’t realize just how close we are until we are on top of it. 


First glimpse of the disinterment, photo by Ginger Sisco Cook.

A pit encompasses the northeast section of the cemetery. Around its edge are heaps of excavated dirt and heavy equipment. In the pit, there are canopies covering work areas and plastic sheeting covering exposed grave shafts yet to be worked. My first reaction is shock and I find myself near tears, but as I walk up to the edge of the excavation, sadness gives way to scientific wonder.

The initial excavation, photo by Ginger Sisco Cook.

The pit itself is terraced somewhat due to there being grave shafts discovered at differing depths.


Detail of terraces, photo by Wanda Holmes Oliver.

Cody Davis, Project Manager and Principal Investigator, AR Consultants, who is responsible for the cemetery removal and relocation effort, greets us as we approach and leads us into the pit. Under the canopies two graves are being painstakingly emptied by teams with hand tools. Another grave is being reduced by thin shovelfuls of dirt from exposed grave shaft to burial site. The graves being emptied are those of Mary Wilks (d. 1932) and Margaret Wilks (d. 1869). Charles Jefferson Wilks (d. 1896) has already been removed and his grave shaft is now a shallow, rectangular indentation in the ground. Cody tells me that his body was very well preserved, that the clay soil enhances preservation. The bodies of Mary and Margaret are also in exceptionally good shape. Mary was buried with her glasses on her face and they are in perfect condition. The shell buttons from Mary’s dress are visible as scattered points of white against the dark earth.

Recovery team at work, photo by Wanda Holmes Oliver.

Recovery team at work, photo by Wanda Holmes Oliver.

Recovery team at work, photo by Wanda Holmes Oliver.

The empty grave of Charles Jefferson Wilks, photo by Wanda Holmes Oliver.

Outline of grave identified, photo by Wanda Holmes Oliver.

The ten unexpected graves found so far are in two rows. The graves of three children lie between the Cagle family row and the Wilks family row. Seven graves lie in a row to the east of the Cagle family row. Are these additional families? Are they additional members of the Wilks and Cagle families that our research has not revealed? Dr. Catrina Whitley, a bio-archaeologist from Southern Methodist University, is the leader of the team removing the remains. In addition to the disinterment, Dr. Whitley's team will be doing the scientific analysis and DNA work on the remains found here. The value of that work has taken on a whole new significance with the presence of the unmarked graves. With luck she will be able to pinpoint gender, age at time of death, cause of death, when the burial occurred, and family affiliation.

The work is fascinating and the care with which it is being done reassuring. As we walk around and talk to the team members, it is abundantly clear that everyone on the site is engaged in a labor of love and deeply respects the nature of the work they are doing. Despite the cold, wet conditions they have been working in almost from the beginning, everyone is cheerful, friendly, and eager to share their findings. We leave with a tentative plan to be back before Thanksgiving, weather and schedules permitting.

Story by Wanda Holmes Oliver.