Refugees: GONE TO TEXAS

[18thVirginia]

In talking about refugees from Missouri, Arkansas, Louisiana, there's considerable discussion about what happened in Texas, how they got to Texas, their reception in the Lone Star State, so I thought it might be help to talk about how Texas dealt with refugees and how they felt upon finding themselves in that vast territory. Perhaps some of those whose families traveled to Texas, like @RobertP, have details to share with us, or those whose families had already settled in Texas are aware of tales of how the locals reacted to those who found themselves GONE TO TEXAS.

Bishop Lay of Little Rock, Arkansas wrote to his wife before that city fell to Union hands that many citizens were fleeing to Texas, but he decided to move his family further east, eventually landing in North Carolina. For many Louisianans, however, Texas became the destination, even if they did consider it "the end of the earth." Refugee Life in the Confederacy, Massey, p. 90.

To the Louisianans, Elizabeth Massey noted that Texas had nothing to offer but heat, dust, wind, reptiles, insects, and uneducated, boorish neighbors--nothing else, that is, but safety from the enemy. And it was this last inducement that drew thousands of Louisiana-loving citizens to Texas, Massey, p. 91.

Texas, 1860 Census

 

[18thVirginia]

"In the vicinity of Old Tarrant, south of here, the Civil War refugee family of Mrs. Amanda Stone, of Louisiana, was shown great kindness when rescued by Hopkins countians after a road accident. The Stones saw the Texans share the little they had, even cooking the last tough old farm hen, to feed them. The Stones were but one of many families to flee from war lines to the comparative safety of Texas. Here, though Federal invasion repeatedly threatened, only a few coastal towns were under fire from the enemy. The family of Gen. Stand Watie, from Indian Territory, visited relatives in Wood County. Gen. Kirby Smith, with headquarters in Shreveport, rented homes in Marshall or Hempstead for his wife and babies. Like most refugees, the Stones when they visited in Hopkins County were heartbroken over loss of their old home to the enemy. In Texas they endured poverty, loneliness, and sorrow at deaths of two sons in the war. They had to lease farm land, to support the family and 90 slaves dependent upon them. Their young boys at one time carried pistols for safety when schoolmates resented their strange manners. Yet eventually they and most other refugees were grateful to Texas for its many generosities."

A roadside marker in Hopkins County, Texas details the travels of one Louisiana family to its new home in Texas.

 

[18thVirginia]

@RobertP generously shared this letter from one family member to her husband in another thread. Since it involves Louisiana refugees in Texas, I thought we'd add it here as well.

RobertP wrote: My gg-grandmother and her children, including my then 11 year old g-grandmother, left their place in north Louisiana near Monroe after the fall of Vicksburg and headed for Texas. Her husband, my gg-grandfather, was in the CS army as QM of the 31st La. and at the time was arranging for regimental supplies throughout that part of the State. He was not captured in Vicksburg as were his two brothers also in the 31st. Following is a transcript of a letter from her to him about a year later from Rusk County, TX:

Millville May 29th 1864

My dear Husband,

I have the pleasure this evening of acknowledging the receipt of your kind favor of the 18th, which had been written 10 days and the only one I've received since Thursday week. I had become very uneasy about you and regret hearing that you were not well. I sincerely hope you have recovered before this and that you may continue to enjoy good health. I wrote you twice in the past week in which I gave you all the news except the return of Bro. Mc and I think he has written you since his return. He told me he had mailed a letter to you on yesterday, though for fear he has not I will mention that he brought all the wagons with him, though he had to go to Shreveport and get an order from the chief adjutant general before getting them. Birge was on the eve of sending them to San Antone. If he had been one week later, they would have been gone. Bro Mc has money which he says he wishes you to have, that he collected in the old issue. He says if I don't leave soon enough to take it, he will send it some other way. I will try to leave in time to get to Homer by the 25th, if that will be in time for you to dispose of it I can bring it with me.. I will write you definitely as to when I will leave so that you can meet me in Shreveport.

The mules are looking tolerably well except Rock. He was scarcely able to get here. I don't think he will ever be of any more service. Your mules that were here are very poor. Beck has been very low for several weeks -- cannot travel unless he improves Randle and Jeff only have 4 mule teams that they brought from Jefferson except Rock, which is only a frame of bones, barely surviving. If we take our best mules for the wagons and one for the buggy, I don't think there will be 4 left, though I haven't asked Bro. Mc and the boys are not here or I would inquire. I think I had better leave the poorest mules as the crop will soon be laid by and that will be giving them the benefit of a pasture as they are too poor, 2 or 3 of them, to travel. The others look very well.

I have occupied a portion of today in reading the Yankee paper you sent me, and I greatly fear our defeat since reading it, should they raise those 100 days men, which undoubtedly they will, and they will have overwhelming numbers against us, which is useless for us to deny. And they are told that if they will push forward that they will soon conquer us, and what is to be dreaded mostly, those men are coning on in time to destroy our crops, overrun our country, and in all probability leave us or those of us who may live through it in a starving condition. It is useless to say the North can't raise an army. Lincoln has the same power that President Davis has and can enforce it. I am sure I would like to think differently, although we must take a common sense view of the case. They have the power and it is with the people as to whether it is enforced or not. I greatly fear the result of the next 4 months. Nothing, save the hand of Providence, can screen us from the foe. Oh, that the good Lord would be pleased to smile upon us and would save us from the hand of the enemy. I am very anxious to get through and be able to leave for La. Since hearing of the enemy's reinforcing so largely, I am afraid to bring many of my things. I will pack them so that I could send for them provided I stay long enough to need them. Tuesday Bro. Mc will send this with his letter to Henderson to be sent by the courier and as Wiley is waiting on me, I shall have to bring my letter to a close.

I was quite sick night before last, though all right again. All well. The children are more anxious to leave than they ever were to come to Texas. They join me in sending love to you. It is useless for me to write you about the fine prospects for a crop as Bro. Mc has written. Say to Mrs. Bennett, Bro. Mc was in Henderson yesterday, there was not a yard of dress goods in Henderson, it being sent from Shreveport when the Yanks were coming up the river. Has since been taken back, selling there when Bro. Mc was there last week at $45 per yard calico. I regret not being able to make the purchase for her.

Your affectionate wife,

Mary Oliver

 

[18thVirginia]

Photos of the letter from Mary Oliver to her husband.

 

[18thVirginia]

One of the most famous refugees from Louisiana was Kate Stone, who was often less than kind in her descriptions of life in Texas and the Texans whom she met. She documented her thoughts in a diary, which was published in 1955.

Here we are safely hidden in a dark corner of the far off
County of Lamar after a tiresome, monotonous trip of
little less than three weeks, and I am already as disgusted
as I expected to be. This part of the land abounds in white-
headed children and buttermilk, my two pet aversions. It
is a place where the people are just learning that there is a
war going on, where Union feeling is rife, and where the
principal amusement of loyal citizens is hanging suspected
Jayhawkers. Hoops are just coming in with full fashion.
This is indeed the place where hoops ' most do flourish and
abide/ Have not seen a hoopless lady since entering the
state. Shoes are considered rather luxuries than neces-
saries and are carefully kept for state occasions. As for
bowls and pitchers, * Oh no, they never mention them.
https://archive.org/stream/brokenburnthejou008676mbp/brokenburnthejou008676mbp_djvu.txt​

 

[18thVirginia]

Kate continued and noted her disdain for the locals in this place which she called "A dark corner of the Confederacy."

The only way of killing time
and one never feels more like killing him than on this deso-
late wind-swept prairie is to attend some of the protracted
meetings that are being carried on all around us. And oh,
the swarms of ugly, rough people, different only in degrees
of ugliness. There must be something in the air of Texas
fatal to beauty. We have not seen a good-looking or edu-
cated person since we entered the state. We are in the dark
corner. We could not stand it here for a permanent stay,
but Mamma has only stopped here for a breathing spell
and to see how the Negroes are getting on. She will start
out soon in search of a home until the war is over.

 

[18thVirginia]

The County of Lamar where the Stones landed originally. Kate Stone has always seemed like a somewhat spoiled and frivolous young woman to me, but perhaps the fact that my ancestresses lived in Lamar County at the time of the Civil War always influenced my opinion in ways that I didn't realize.

I will admit that I've always gone barefoot as much as possible.

 

[DaveBrt]

"Gone to Texas" was the cry for many years after the war. My ancestors were living in northern Georgia (Murray County) when the war came. By the time it was over, all three adult men had been killed in combat or a POW camp. The women survivors lived on small rented farms at various places for many years. Eventually, my direct ancestor, who was born 9 months after Stevenson's Division passed through the area enroute to Vicksburg, decided it was time to get gone.

A male friend had been working for the railroad and had killed a black worker in a fight. Rather than take his chances with the law, he got Gone to Texas. He settled in McLennon County, central Texas (Waco) and had his wife join him. Three years later, to escape the hard times and the "unsettled conditions" several families took advantage of a railroad offer to book a box car, fill it and ride in it through to Texas to join him. When I visit the cemeteries near where they lived in Georgia, I seen many family names that I knew when I grew up in Waco.

Great grand father became a very prosperous farmer in the black soil of central Texas. He helped found a local church and provided two stained glass windows for it. The family created a cemetery near the church and it is still cared for and used today -- about half of its occupants are relatives.

A picture of the church was published in a newspaper history article about 50 years ago. The stained glass windows were clearly visible. When the church died off, the last members gave the windows to one of the big Baptist churches in Waco. They are not in use and I have never tried to find out has happened to them.

 

[Patrick H]

This is a great idea for a thread! I have no idea how many Cooper County, Missouri residents went to Texas. Doubtless, some who were banished must have traveled there. I've posted a link to a collection of letters sent by Nancy Chapman Jones to her married daughter in Texas, but the daughter was already living there when the war broke out.

 

[AndyHall]

My Missouri relatives came to Texas after the war, partly at the urging of their eldest son, Joseph Courtenay Ralston (seated right, c. 1903) who ended the war as an ADC in Texas and married Lucy Tate Kirby, daughter of Jared Ellison Kirby, a prominent planter from the area near Hempstead. Jared Kirby was a pretty horrible person whose past caught up with him eventually and he was murdered in 1865. (As one example, before the war Kirby killed another planter's slave who'd taken a shortcut across Kirby's land.) With Joseph and Lucy well-situated, much of the rest of the family migrated to Texas, to get away from postwar Missouri that (according to family lore), "was no place to be raising boys." With the Jameses, Youngers and the rest running wild there, I can certainly understand that. My g-grandfather was George William Ralston, Joseph's younger brother.

Prairie View A&M University is located on land that had been part of Jared Kirby's Alta Vista Plantation.

 

[AUG]

The majority of people already living in Texas at the time were originally born out of state, so I'm sure many refugees moving in during the war were welcomed by family or friends that were already living here. Likewise in a way but in reverse, many of the Texas troops that enlisted in units that were destined to go fight east of the Mississippi River, such as those that comprised Hood's Brigade, were originally from states east of the Mississippi and believed that they should fight in defense of their original places of birth or family and friends still living there.

 

[Patrick H]

My Missouri relatives came to Texas after the war, partly at the urging of their eldest son, Joseph Courtenay Ralston (seated right, c. 1903) who ended the war as an ADC in Texas and married Lucy Tate Kirby, daughter of Jared Ellison Kirby, a prominent planter from the area near Hempstead. Jared Kirby was a pretty horrible person whose past caught up with him eventually and he was murdered in 1865. With Joseph and Lucy well-situated, much of the rest of the family migrated to Texas, to get away from postwar Missouri that (according to family lore), "was no place to be raising boys." With the Jameses, Youngers and the rest running wild there, I can certainly understand that. My g-grandfather was George William Ralston, Joseph's younger brother.

Prairie View A&M University is located on land that had been part of Jared Kirby's Alta Vista Plantation.

Andy, Frank James was married to Annie Ralston. Do you think she could have been related to Joseph Courtnay Ralston?

 

[AndyHall]

Andy, Frank James was married to Annie Ralston. Do you think she could have been related to Joseph Courtnay Ralston?

I didn't know that, and haven't dug into the Ralstons as thoroughly as I oughter. But Ralston is not a very common name, and there could well be a connection there. Thanks.

 

[Patrick H]

I didn't know that, and haven't dug into the Ralstons as thoroughly as I oughter. But Ralston is not a very common name, and there could well be a connection there. Thanks.

Let us know if you find anything. It's pretty easy to come by Annie's life and death dates because she's buried with Frank. They're both on findagrave. I think Annie live until about 1944.

 

[18thVirginia]

This is a great idea for a thread! I have no idea how many Cooper County, Missouri residents went to Texas. Doubtless, some who were banished must have traveled there. I've posted a link to a collection of letters sent by Nancy Chapman Jones to her married daughter in Texas, but the daughter was already living there when the war broke out.

Thanks, Patrick H. Here's the link to the letters from Nancy Chapman Jones to her daughter in San Antonio.

http://digital.shsmo.org/cdm/compoundobject/collection/amcw/id/10829/rec/1

 

[AndyHall]

Let us know if you find anything. It's pretty easy to come by Annie's life and death dates because she's buried with Frank. They're both on findagrave. I think Annie live until about 1944.

I did a quick skim on Ancestry, and none of the material I saw had anything about Annie's family. There may be a common ancestor somewhere.

 

[18thVirginia]

My Missouri relatives came to Texas after the war, partly at the urging of their eldest son, Joseph Courtenay Ralston (seated right, c. 1903) who ended the war as an ADC in Texas and married Lucy Tate Kirby, daughter of Jared Ellison Kirby, a prominent planter from the area near Hempstead. Jared Kirby was a pretty horrible person whose past caught up with him eventually and he was murdered in 1865. (As one example, before the war Kirby killed another planter's slave who'd taken a shortcut across Kirby's land.) With Joseph and Lucy well-situated, much of the rest of the family migrated to Texas, to get away from postwar Missouri that (according to family lore), "was no place to be raising boys." With the Jameses, Youngers and the rest running wild there, I can certainly understand that. My g-grandfather was George William Ralston, Joseph's younger brother.

Prairie View A&M University is located on land that had been part of Jared Kirby's Alta Vista Plantation.

Thanks, Andyhall, for the family story. My great grandmother was from Missouri also and came to Texas in 1872, but they settled in Denison, close to the Red River. She was arrested and held in jail in Missouri for being a friend to bushwhackers. According to the family story handed down through several generations, she knew the James brothers and Jesse came to lunch one day when my grandfather was a child. Her family was from one of the counties in Missouri where many of the more famous guerrilla families had lived.

There are lots of stories about the James being in and about Sherman and Denison over the years. According to some locals, a relative of the James brothers had a farm in Grayson County outside of Denison, near a place called Carpenter's Bluff. It was a ferry landing before and during the Civil War and supposedly was the location at which Jesse and Frank and their immediate group would flee back across the Red River. My grandfather would later buy a farm in that area and live there until a few years before his death.

 

[BKey]

I don't how well this was enforced but the 1862 Homestead Act barred those who had taken up arms against the U.S. (or given aid to the Confederacy) Texas had its own land grant system and wasn't so particular.

The Keys and Wilsons in my family appear to have left Arkansas and moved to Texas as soon as the war was over. Mom's family, the Decks of Tunnel Hill, Georgia hung on there until about 1871, moving to Jack County, Texas. A cousin there still owns the ranch.

There wasn't any refugee for the rest of the families. They were already in Texas.

 

[18thVirginia]

"Gone to Texas" was the cry for many years after the war. My ancestors were living in northern Georgia (Murray County) when the war came. By the time it was over, all three adult men had been killed in combat or a POW camp. The women survivors lived on small rented farms at various places for many years. Eventually, my direct ancestor, who was born 9 months after Stevenson's Division passed through the area enroute to Vicksburg, decided it was time to get gone.

A male friend had been working for the railroad and had killed a black worker in a fight. Rather than take his chances with the law, he got Gone to Texas. He settled in McLennon County, central Texas (Waco) and had his wife join him. Three years later, to escape the hard times and the "unsettled conditions" several families took advantage of a railroad offer to book a box car, fill it and ride in it through to Texas to join him. When I visit the cemeteries near where they lived in Georgia, I seen many family names that I knew when I grew up in Waco.

Great grand father became a very prosperous farmer in the black soil of central Texas. He helped found a local church and provided two stained glass windows for it. The family created a cemetery near the church and it is still cared for and used today -- about half of its occupants are relatives.

A picture of the church was published in a newspaper history article about 50 years ago. The stained glass windows were clearly visible. When the church died off, the last members gave the windows to one of the big Baptist churches in Waco. They are not in use and I have never tried to find out hat happened to them.

Thanks for the family stories, DaveBrt.

A photo of a ferry carrying a covered wagon across the Brazos River in the 1860s-1870s. It is believed that this photo pre-dates the building of the Suspension Bridge in 1870 and was taken in or near Waco.
https://www.flickr.com/photos/texascollectionbaylor/8554960304

 

[AndyHall]

Likewise in a way but in reverse, many of the Texas troops that enlisted in units that were destined to go fight east of the Mississippi River, such as those that comprised Hood's Brigade, were originally from states east of the Mississippi and believed that they should fight in defense of their original places of birth or family and friends still living there.

Susannah Ural touched on this briefly in her recent talk to the Houston CWRT about members of Hood's Brigade making the long trek back to Texas after Appomattox -- they frequently stopped at the homes of relations, especially in Alabama and Mississippi, for up to a few weeks to rest and recuperate before resuming the long walk home.

My Hood's Brigade ancestor, who'd spent 18 months at Rock Island, apparently didn't have any qualms about accepting what I presume were Federal travel vouchers to get him back to Texas, because he traveled the entire way by steamboat and rail. He may have figured the Yankees owed him that.