[GEN0017] [Note in top margin: "My Great Grandad", apparently written by my Dad -MRW] COPY of a letter from Mrs. C. W. Whitis to her son Charlie. [(Ruf's Dad) - apparently handwritten by Ruth Josephine (Roome) Whitis -MRW] Austin, Texas July 12, 1896 My dear Son, Charlie, You have adked me to write for you a biographical sketch of the life of your father, Charles Wesley Whitis, and of his immediate ancestry and family. Also a like sketch of my own life and my family history. Beginning with your father. Of his parentage and family hisory I know very little. He was very reticent in this subject, singularly so I always thought, and for this reason I never asked many questions. His fathers name was Thomas, his mother's Elizabeth. Of the date of this birth, or place of nativity, or his mother's maiden name or date of this marriage, I know nothing. I have heard your father say that his family came from North Caroline to East Tennessee, also that his ancestors originally were from France. It is very probable, therefore, that there was in his (your father's) veins some of the blood of the old Hugenots - _Certain it is_, that however lowly the circumstatnces to which the family may have been reduced, or however humble and illerate they may gave become, there was _good blood_ in the family. This I new from my knowledge of your father's disposition and character, as well as from little incidents of family history which he occasionly related to me. [Credibility Alert!!! - MRW] Your father, charles Wesley Whitis, was born near Rogersville, E. Tennessee, about six miles from Rogersville, I have been told, on a little farm owned by the family-Born Jan 8th, 1828. His father,he told me, died before his birth. Of his mother he spoke but little, but to her extreme neatness and [crossed out] habits, in her household management, he sometimes referred when memory carried him back to the clean, pure, white "goord" out of which the cold, sparkling whater from the East Tennessee mountain spring, was a sweeter draught than any when sipped from crystal glass or silver goblet in later years. Here in this humble home, with a widdowed mother, two half brothers, and a half sister, children of a former marriage of his father, and one _full_ brother - he spent his childhod and youthful days, helping to tend the little farm, attending for a few months in the year, the old time coutnry schools, kept in the little one roomed log school house, with its mud chimney, with great flaming fire place, almost big enough to hold all the pupils- its one little window being a hole cut through the logs, and in cold or storm closed by a shutter which excluded all light, benches mad of slabs rough hewn from the trees and placed as pegs for legs with no backs to them, and long enough to hold from six to ten children huddled close together - which often provoked the cry "teacher, teacher, Sam is a crougen me". [Handwritten note: I called this letter back from the Austin Public Library because it had been so badly copied by one of the staff. Our Grandmother was an educated woman. [this note was apparently NOT written by my grandmother so it was probably written by Mary Bell] -MRW] [Handwritten note: Mis Mary Bell, granddaughter of Mrs. C.W. Whitis granted permission to [cut off]] [Stamp: AUSTIN PUBLIC LIBRARY] [GEN0018] Page 2 Of taking the scythe and cradle in the time of harvest, and running races with the farmers of mature years, and comming off victorious, of rifle shooting matches, of mountain hunts, and many daring boyish pranks incident to the wild, free life of that mountinous country, he has often told me, of a life that was simple, pure and beautiful. That there was strong moral and religious influences in the home life I am sure. He told me that his people were Baptists - how he ever came to be named for the great Methodist preacher, and poet, I do not know. At about the age of eighteen years he began to get restless and to llong for an opportunity for a broader education, and a chance to make for himself a name, and a place in the world, there was no money, and the way seemd dark, but a brother's love, and a brother's self sacrifice came to the rescue. His own brother - Hiram Whitis, had a fine young horse, and this horse he proposed to give to his brother "Wesley" that he might ride it to "college" and then sell it to defray his expenses. Of this one act of his brother's life, he has often talked to me in terms of great love and gratitued, and I am sure that in later life when he had become a prosprous man, the value of that horse was paid back with heavy interest. After spending two or three years at Tusculum College, Greenville, Tennessee, then under the direction of Dr. Samueld Doake, he went to Bean Station Tennessee where for awhile, he taught scool, afterwards he was appointed Clerk of the District court, and during that time studied law under Judge Shields at whose home he was living during his stay at this place. It was here that he formed so many of the warm friendships that went with him through all his later life, I never saw any of those friends of his, but I have heard him talk so much of them, that there are many names I still recall. Judge Shields and wife, Grinsfield Taylor, Colvin Taylor, and Dr. Rufus Taylor, three brothers, Miss Lizzie Shields, Miss Mary Murry and many others. Several families living in or near Beane Station decided to come to Texas and your farther concluded to come with them and try his forturne in the then new and comparatively unknown state of of Texas. These families, three in number, ofwhose names I only remember two, Moore and Cardwell. Taking what few hosehold effects, that could be carried in small two-horse, covered wagons, and their negro slaves, set out in the long overland journey from E. Tennessee to Texas. Your father offered to take charge of, and drive one of their wagons if they would permit him to join the party, and in this way closing many long weeks of travel, and many thrilling incidents connected therewith, they at last reached their destination, Lockhart, Caldwell Co. Texas, in Dec. 1854. I have often heard your father say that when he reached Lockhart he had but fifty cents in his pocket, that being all the money he had in the world. But he had the faculty of making friends and inspiring confidence, and he was at once taken into the family of Judge John Storey, through whose influence he soon obtained a school, which he taugh for some litle time, but having presented his license to practice law, granted by the State of Tennesssee, and his license being recognized by the Courts of Texas, he began the practice of law, at first alone and then in partnership with my brother, your uncle, Theophilus Rogan. [GEN0019] Page 3 It was during this time that my brother and your father, being on ther way to San Marcus, Hays Co, to attend court, that they stopped at my father's house, some five miles east of San Marcus to get their dinners, and I for the first time met your father, I think this was in the summer of 1855. We were married May 12, 1857. In the early spring of 1858, we moved into our new home, built on a beautiful piece of property embracing several acres, in the outskirts of the little village of Lockhart, which property your father had succeeded in buying before we were married. Our little home was a two roomed, frame cottage, two rooms and a hall, with kitchen and servant's rooms disconnected with the house, the house was lathed and plastered, and was neat and comfortable, and not withstanding its smalliiness, we entertained many friends, ministers, and then beneath its roof, here, our four children, Willie, rufus, Mollie and John were born. Here our first great sorrow came to us in the death of our first born, dear little Willie who died Oct. 20, 1861, when our country was in the beginning of the terrible Civil war, to go back a step through your father's history. In the winter of 1858 there was put into his hands for collection a debt against some man who had left Kentucky and come to Texas, bringing with him a large number of slaves, having severed judgment; the next thing was to levy the judgement and receive possession of property enough to satisfy the claims. The man's property was all in slaves, and he at once went to work to run the negroes out of the state and into Louisiana. Your father started in pursuit on horse-back; coming through Austin, obrained a deputy marshall's commission, and form many days traveled sixty miles a day, often being close on the tracks of the pursued, and again losing all trace of them; the courage, the will power, the dangers and adventures of that pursuit, and the eventual capture of the negroes in Louisiana, would in themselves form a remarkable history. He at last reached home, having secured enough of this human property to satisfy the claims of his client, and bringing with him a valuable negro man as payment of his fee in the case. This man, Dick, remained with us a faithful, and profitable servant until the emansipation of the slaves; and during the later years of your Father's life, "Dick" was a frequent supplicant for "help" from "the boys", and many times I have heard him say he "would gladly be a slave again if he could only have Marse Charles for Master." [A grain or two of salt needed here -MRW] Though your father was born and raised in the south and had no other associations, never having crossed "Mason & Dixon line", he was unqualifiedly opposed to the secession of the South in the Civil War, and during all those terrible years of strife, he managed by his honest appeals to high officers of the Confederate Army to keep from being forced into the Army, though great was the persecution waged against him by individuals, and many times his life was in actual danger. Twice during the war he bought up cotton to be taken to Mexico for shipment. The first time, the cotten was sold in Matameras, and the wagons which carried the cotton to Brownsville, returned laden with goods: Staples, dress goods, shoes, coffee, and our one spare room was converted into a store room, but soon everything was taken by the eager people where supplies had given out. Ten dollars in Confederate money being a moderate price for one yard of calico. Quantities of those goods were given to soldiers and their families, for whom your father always had an open hand. some of these families, or their children, still live, but apparently with no thought of gratitude, or rememberance of him who was such a benefactor to them in their days of trials and hardships. Again in 1864, he bought up another large lot of cotten, men were exempted from service as teamsters emplyed by him to transport the cotton overland to Matamoras, Mexico. At this time war was being waged in Mexico between the Mexicans and French troops, the cotton was blockaded at one little interior town in Mexico, the name of which I can not remember. The teamsters left it and took up their homeward journey. Your father, fearing the cotton would fall in to the hands of one, or the other of the contending armies, or be stolen by some unscrupulous person, hastened to rescue it. After may perilous adventures from danger of Mexican bandits, he reached this place, and found the cotton as yet safe, but he had taken sick with some terrible fever, which he oftens described as the "spotted fever". His stopping place was with a German who kept a "stage stand". his only accomodiation was in an out-house where his bed was a narrow, bare board, where he stayed alone for several days. The driver of the stage was an American, and through him he obtained some Quinine and Castor Oil, and water, placed where he could reach it. The German would ocme and look at him some times, but never offer to do anything for him, and your father, percieving that it was the wish and intention of thes man to let him die, in order that he - the German, might claim the cotton, asked the stage driver, when he stopped one evening, to see if he could not find a Mexican woman who would come and nurse him. this man soon returned with the wife of the Alcalde of the place, who brought with her two "peons" and a chair. Placing the sick man in the chair, the two peons raised him to their shoulders, and took him, through the fresh night air, and bright moonlight to the woman's house, where for six long weeks she nursed him as if he had been her own son, many times despairing of his life and crying over him as she tried to question him of his home and loved ones, who she thought he would never see again. At last convelesence began, and he was able, though the same kind stage driver, to get a physician to come to him from Monterey, and this noble, kind hearted physician stayed with him until your father was able to return with him to Montery. After regaining his health, he succeeded in getting the cotton through to Matamorus, and from thence shipped to Cuba, but by this time, Sherman's Army had made its way through Savannah and cotton was being hurred to that fort, so that after all the dangers and trials throughwhich your father had [Handwritten note: it is such a pity that the remainder of this letter was either never written or got lost! Our grandfather went on to become a leading businessman in Austin, a banker, Raymond + whitis; he worked to bring the first railroads to Austin; baougt a large tract of land just north of the University of Texas and paved up the streets in it, and built the whitis mansion, et cetera. He died at 49 from TB.