Early Pioneer Days in Texas
Chapter XVIII
Tribute and Eulogy to Uncle John Jones
(J. Taylor Allen)
Honey Grove, Texas.
Words fail us to fully express our tribute of love and respect for our kind, good friend, J. W. Jones, Sr., with whom it was our happy, pleasant lot to be associated in my youthful boyhood days, herding horses on the luxuriant, nutritious grass and boarding with him in the long ago, when our memory with retrospective view, turns and lingers with those indescribable happy times. We can testify that surely Uncle John Jones complied with the edict of God in the beginning, "In the sweat of thy face shalt thou eat bread all the days of thy life." For he labored diligently and continuous, and acquired a competency of the necessaries of this life. Though at times misfortune by fire bore heavily upon him, he persevered courageously, patiently and faithfully ever trusting in God, who comforted and sustained him, now in old age, longer than the usual time limit allotted to man. He is still with us. Oh, may God's richest blessings rest and abide with him, and may his last days be the most joyous, happy and peacable, and as the shadows of time grow less, oh, may he triumphantly realize that God is with him, and that his friends and loved ones are beckoning him home to the other shore, into the house of many mansions, where he shall ever be free from care, sorrow and pain. And, oh, may the same hope and blessed assurance be with all the weary, careworn pilgrims, our early settlers and pioneers, both mothers and fathers, is the sincere desire of the author and compiler of this book.
J. Taylor Allen
Ninety and One
Monday of this week Honey Grove's oldest citizen passed another milestone in the grand march of life to eternity's shore. So far as our knowledge extends, J. W. Jones has had a longer stay on earth than any person within the bounds of what we term the Honey Grove country. The subject of this little sketch was born in North Bend, Ohio, March 18th, 1827, and is now entering his ninety-second year. The village in which Mr. Jones was born is now a part of the great city of Cincinnati.
It was in 1846 that Mr. Jones turned his face westward to make his home in a new and undeveloped country. With his parents he journeyed down the Ohio and Mississippi rivers by boat to New Orleans, and thence up Red river to Shreveport. From the latter place the family traveled by wagon to a point one mile north of the spot on which the present village of Selfs now stands. About five months intervened between the time of starting and the day the family finally drove stakes on the spot which was to be their home. In 1857 Mr. Jones purchased 300 acres of land, which included the present location of Selfs, paying 25 cents per acre therefor.
When the bugle call summoned the sons of the Southland to the defense of their country, Mr. Jones was one of the first to enlist, and he served until peace was declared in Settle's battalion, which did State guard duty. After the war he built a mill at Self s, which for many years ground corn for all the people of this section.
Our country has had no more useful man than John W. Jones, and no country ever had a better man. This writer has known the man thirty-two years, lived under his hospitable roof for more than two years, and can say, in all sincerity, that John W. Jones is one of the grandest characters it has been his lot to know. Never did we hear him speak against any many, and never did we know him to say a foolish or an unkind word. One of the finest pictures we see is this fine old gentleman passing his declining days so peacefully, so contentedly, so hopefully, and so happily. He attends church regularly, reads the news of the day with a deep interest, discusses issues with his neighbors, tells jokes, and enjoys life to the uttermost. He has well earned a rich reward in heaven, but the Lord he has served so well has granted unto him a rich foretaste of the glories of the world to come even while he tabernacles in the flesh.
Chapter XIX
Mrs. N. C. Jones
I was born in Franklin County, Georgia [sic Virginia], in 1838. My father, Armstad W. Ramsey, came to Texas in 1851 in a four-horse wagon, starting on the 6th of October and landing at T. R. Williams the week before Christmas. T. R. Williams lived about one mile above Bois d'Arc Springs and had a water mill there. The 4th of the next July we were all taken down sick. We moved out to the prairie in a log hut on Tolbert Myers' place, the place where Bettie Ramsey now lives, and from there we moved to a log hut on Wilson Allen's place. The next January father died, and was the first one to be buried at Vineyard Grove. That old church was just being built at that time. A Baptist preacher by the name of Brisco put up the house. While we lived on the Allen place we went to school at the chapel in an old log house. A man by the name of Stovall taught the school. That was the only school house within ten miles or more, and the ones that lived off a distance came on horseback, three on a horse. I don't know of but six who are living that went to school there. With us there are Peyton Wheeler and his wife, Clem Wheeler, George Carpenter, my sister, Lucindy Johnson, and myself. Mother was ninety years old when she died. She raised six children and had never lost a child, all of whom were living when she died, but all of them are dead now excepting Philander Jones. My husband is eighty-two years old, the oldest of eight children, who are all dead but him. We never had but one child and he died last June in his fifty-ninth year. We are almost alone, having two grand children and four great-grandchildren. Had a sister die about a month ago, Mrs. M. E. Buie. When we came to Texas it was very thinly settled, just a log cabin now and then, with one room to cook , eat and sleep in, and a puncheon floor with the roof nailed on with logs ; one door, the shutter, made out of boards, and generally opened on the outside to save room. They were so low that there was but one log above the door for the door to shut against. We had no cook stoves, cooking on the fireplace, and had stick and dirt chimneys. If there was a plank house anywhere in this country I don't recollect it, or an oak plank or pine plank, as none had ever come this country then. There were lots of wild animals here. I came very near being eat up twice, once by a bear and once by a wildcat, but I was pretty swift on foot in them days and I outrun them. These bottoms were full of wild hogs at this time and they were sure bad ; the only way you had to get away from them was by climbing a tree or getting up on a high stump and staying there until they had left. But I tell you one did not enjoy waiting for them to leave very much. I forgot to mention old man McCart. He came to Texas in the fall of 1852. I think he came from Missouri. He came in an old wagon and settled just north of the Nicholson place, a short distance. I don't know whether any of them are living or not. And then there was old Jerry Word, Ely Prickett, Mark Dalton, Adam and Columbus Yoakum, old man Lewis Stephens and Joseph Morrison, and the Allen brothers, Hal Wilson, young Elbert Stanmore, old man Gwaltney, a hard-shell preacher, and David Peavler. He lived near where the German church now stands.
Chapter XX
Honey Grove
We are proud of our beautiful, prosperous and progressive little city, Honey Grove, which is situated sixteen miles east of Bonham, twenty-two miles west of Paris and eighty-five miles north- east of Dallas, with a population of 3,500 inhabitants, five churches, three schools, high and grade whites, and one colored school, with an enrolment of 800 whites and 300 blacks; water works, two livery stable and wagon yards, oil mill, compress, two corn mills, T. & P. and Santa Fe railroads and depots, with necessary number of dry goods and family grocery stores, three drug stores, shops, etc., city hall, hotels, restaurants, Woodmen and Masonic lodges; a beautiful, well-kept cemetery, enclosed by beautiful, up-to-date fencing, which is a monument to the zeal and work of the progressive ladies, who so kindly, in commemoration of their departed friends and loved ones, freely contributed to the good work and cause, which will ever be as a memorial unto them.
The city of Bonham shipped, during 1917, 22,500 bales of cotton, 10,000 or 12,000 tons cottonseed, 100,000 bushels of peanuts; oats, corn and hay in quantities not known, but a great deal was shipped out with plenty left to supply our town and country. Our progressive city is surrounded by very rich productive land. In short, we are prosperous, contented and happy.
The justly celebrated Honey Grove derived its name from the immense number of bee trees of richest honey; every hollow tree, and sometimes deposited in the tangled down weeds and grass which David Crockett and my father, W. B. Allen and his many pioneer comrades found here in abundance in the early days of Texas. Oh, what happy, indescribable times we would have if we could find such a country again, but gone forever.
One day, while my father was hacking away with his big hack knife through immense tangle of vines, brush and briars, suddenly came upon a stooping pine oak tree, on which was cut in big letters Honey Grove, which was supposed to have been cut by David Crockett, as they had just passed on before to the famous Alamo, where 180 tried, true and brave held at bay 5,000 Mexicans under Santa Anna for a considerable time, but who were finally brutally murdered, and dead bodies were savagely piled and burned, which proved a death knell soon after to old Santa Anna and his host of demons.
The blood of martyrs is the seed of perpetual truth and principle that shall live forever.
J. Taylor Allen
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