In 1845 J. B. Wilmeth having learned – mainly from an advertising pamphlet of a colony agent – of the fertility and other attractions of the broad prairies in the region of “The Three Forks of Trinity” and also of the grant of title free to one mile square to every head of a family locating in the colony, he determined to possess himself and family of a Texas home. He accordingly resigned his clerkship of the Lawrence county court, which he had successively held for eight years, and began preparations for the move. Six vehicles, great and small, such as Arkansas shops could turn out, with teams to suit, some four-horse, some combined oxen and horse, and the Madam’s “carry-all” with one big horse. Tom complete the train was F. C. Wilmeth’s two-horse wagon. Then about forty head of saddle and loose horse stock and a hundred head of sheep, provisions for six months or more, tents and plenty of heavy homemade bed clothes were Nancy Wilmeth’s special care. Her spinning wheel and loom along with plenty of guns of different kinds and caliber with ammunition were deemed indispensable; likewise plows, hose, mattocks, spades and a complete set of blacksmith’s tools.
About the last of Oct. the procession moved out. When in line, the company counted as follows: J. B. and Nancy Wilmeth, with ten children: Mansel W., Martha M., Kentura M, Jas. R., Jos. B., Wm. C., Hiram F., Nancy Ann, Jno. F. and Andrew J.; attaches of the family: Jas. Blackwell, a nephew of Nancy Wilmeth: a young man by the name of Isaac Smith: Jordon O. Straughan and wife with four children, Emily, Elisha B., Edward and Mary J. (J. B. Wilmeth had hired J. O. Straughan as farmhand, but soon finding him a clever scribe, he used him as a deputy in the clerk’s office. And on resolving to move to Texas he proposed to bring him and family along simply for his service in driving a four-horse team and for his general cleverness as a traveling companion) and F. C. Wilmeth and wife with six children: Lucinda M., James, Jno. G., Polly Ann, Elizabeth and a nephew, Alex Thompson. The route was taken via Batesville and Little Rock; at the latter place considerable dry goods, especially gay colored calicos, bridles and other leather goods, ammunitions and a barrel of whisky were laid in. The last was then thought to be an antidote for all the ills of such a journey, except high water and Indian attacks. Red River was ferried at Lane’s Port, Clarksville, the first Texas town, of probably thirty to forty houses had a bake shop, where the young folks got a treat of the regular old-fashioned ginger cake, compounded, basted and baked to a molasses brown on the back, by “black granny” – no doubt the inventor as well as vendor of this most delicious loaf. At Skidmore’s Mill, a few miles west of Clarksville, the company rested a day or two to wait the grinding of an additional supply of meal. Pinhook, or Paris had nothing in sight save a dozen or more cabins. Here all signs of civilization were left behind. A dim wagon way called the “Military Trail,” stretched across the prairie to the southwest. The first night out without wood or water, the next night camp was pitched on the bank of East Fork. The woods were dense, the stream narrow, deep, dark, sluggish. Bridging was proposed, and soon the work began. Two tall cottonwood trees standing near each other on the west bank were felled so as to span the stream. Flooring was obtained from rafts constructed by previous emigrants and drifted near by, and by cutting and splitting additional timbers. The puncheons were simply laid loose on the cottonwood sills; the wagons were rolled across by hand and the teams hitched them on the west bank. It was Christmas day when this bridge was completed and crossing began. The next day brought the company to Dallas, then they spent most of the week in camp about two hundred yards south of where the courthouse now stands. Some of the men went west to select sites for settlement, and on Jan. 1, 1846 the company camped on the south bank of West Fork near the present site of Grand Prairie station. J. B. Wilmeth and J. O. Straughan having selected adjacent sections fronting on West Fork at this point. F. C. Wilmeth located four miles further west near the Travis Trading House, then vacant in the edge of cross-timbers.
Game was abundant; deer everywhere, bear, turkeys and wild bees in the woods just north of West Fork, and buffalo a day’s ride to the southwest. But houses were to build and lands to put in cultivation. To this all hands addressed themselves with such persistence as to allow little time for hunting. Three tribes of Indians however – Kickapoo’s, Tonkawas and Keechies camped for the winter nearby, were not unwelcome neighbors in this emergency, for they were more than willing to exchange venison, etc. for calicoes and ammunition. They professed to be very friendly to the whites but would occasionally suggest that by and by when the grass would grow plenty that the Comanche’s would come to steal horses. They would however, give it an optimistic coloring In favor of the settler by dramatizing a scene in which the Comanche would get down to unhobble the horse, the white man would shoot and the Comanche fall. Some thinking ones surmised that these friendly fellows, having learned the lay of the land might turn Comanche and play the scene differently. A brief buffalo hunt brought in the carcass of one old bull. The beef was large but the quality poor. It had the one merit, however, of being “gamy.” The rug with its mop, was immense, a pallet for a whole family of children.
A later and more extended hunt brought in more and better beef. On this hunt J. B. Wilmeth, who furnished the saddle stock for the expedition, lost six of his best mares, taken in by a mustang herd and made wild in one night. Jas. Mills, a young man boarding in the family and putting in a farm without fence north of West Fork, as there was no stock on that side, proposed to recover the mares by killing the mustangs one by one in this he was succeeding measurably but was drawn away into the Mexican war by soldiers passing through early in the summer. The rangers that in compliance with previous petition had been stationed in this region, seeing the mares the next summer with fine colts following them offered fabulous prices for them. Bill Davis hearing of this, and being expert with a lasso and fond of adventure, agreed to capture them for one half, so in the summer of ’47, taking two fleet horses and a spirited mule, with Mans Wilmeth as aid, after about ten days’ day and night chase, brought in two mares with mustang colts.
About the rising of grass the Wilmeth brothers with some young men made a trip to the Brazos country, about Wheelock, to buy corn and cattle. They brought back about seventy head, among them some very large long horned oxen. At this time the prairie spreading from West Fork toward Mountain Creek seemed a sea of waving green, and when the full-uddered cows came lowing home and the hum of myriads of bees was heard on this boundless field of wild flowers, who could say a new Canaan, literally flowing with milk and honey, had not been found? The farm work had not let up till by the middle of May nearly fifty acres of corn from knee to shoulder high promised bread for the future. But Canaan had its Philistines and West Texas had its wild Indians. The settlers with families west of Trinity at this time, as nearly as memory can now recall, were about a baker’s dozen. These were heads of families as now remembered: Judge Hoard, Overton, (who built the first mill), Combs, Cockerel, Graham, Carpenter, Wilson, J. O. Straughan, J. B. Wilmeth, Bradshaw, F. C. Wilmeth, Joel Blackwell and son, Hiram. To these might be aided a half dozen young men improving claims or working with families. There may have been others near the Trinity and southward, but if so, their names and locality had not been learned. Rangers had been petitioned for but had not yet materialized. The Indians began to wear war paint and otherwise threaten the settlements. The settlers were but a handful compared to the savages in sight, and imagination pictured the boundless wastes beyond Cross-timbers alive with predatory tribes. The Mexican war, it was feared, might aggravate the enmity toward the whites. Visions of midnight burnings and massacres of women and children haunted the settlers’ dreams. So the whole Arkansas delegation, with stock and all, gathered at J. B. Wilmeth’s for consultation. The common feeling was to seek safety by falling back to some of the stronger settlements east of Trinity. But during a week of hurried preparation the Indians disappeared and the majority concluded to remain. But the Wilmeths and J. O. Straughan pushed with livestock and other movable effects across Trinity at Cedar Springs above Dallas. They took the ridge route north. A more enchanting scene than the train and herds moving over this most beautiful stretch of prairie, with little children on horse and foot rounding in the calves and sheep, could hardly be imagined. A fine view of some of the finest country on the face of the globe was here afforded. On the head of White Rock, settlements began in come into view. Those of Jacob Baccus and Jas. Herndon was right on the road. Others were seen in the distance. Buckner, the acknowledged county seat of Collin County and headright home of Col. Jack McGarrah,the present Wiygle place, was reached. It was hardly “a wide place in the road,” the travel not having been sufficient yet to give it width. It had its importance, nevertheless, as a public gathering place with a store and the indispensable “liquor” and some other goods for sale. Above all it was an intelligence office where could be learned the news from the different settlements, of the Indian camps and incursions, and of the more than welcome newcomers to the settlement. Though from their first attempts at settlement nearly three years before up to about a year previous they had lost several of their number by the bands of the savages, had houses sacked and horses stolen, fear of Indians seemed to have subsided, and their gardens, sweet potato patches, fresh sodded pumpkin fields and green corn waving above the fences, gave the county a hopeful aspect. Our procession, however, bearing now more to the east, moved on and having crossed Honey Creek and East Fork, camped about a quarter from the latter, that place being then held down by a man by the name of Shelby.
Nancy Wilmeth had taken in the situation as she had seen things from her “carry-all” and heard them discussed in camps. She suspected that “Uncle Frank” was heading for the poor hills of Tennessee and that her husband was only too prone to accommodate the inclinations of his good-natured elder brother. This camp was said to be within a few miles of the east boundary of the Peters’ colony grant. Her determination was never to cross this boundary. The breakfast was set and thanks were given. Nancy’s secret thanks were that she was well within the colony with seven sons and three daughters. A few tears, a few firm words, and the law was laid down, that while she lived her children should never be carried to Arkansas or Tennessee. but that her body should be buried within the bounds of this colony. J. B.’s reply to this Medo-Persian decree was thoughtful, submissive silence. Uncle Frank was moody and mum, especially in the presence of “the power behind the throne.” J. O. Straughan seemed neutral and cheerful, ready for any fate. Within a week the improvements and and claim of Moses Wilson, on the ravine two miles north of the site of the present McKinney court house, had been purchased at a cost of $600, and the family of J. B. Wilmeth installed in their headright homestead, to be as Nancy wished, her residence for the rest of her natural life. Thus did the little woman’s fiat, fate these three families to become citizens of Collin. Nor were any regrets expressed in after years as to the outcome of her action.
A brief survey of the horizon brought nearly or quite a hundred heads of families and young men into a view within the county. Some wheat was harvested in the Coffman neighborhood in 1846. J. B. Wilmeth bartered dry goods for seed and sowed some on his won and some on land rented of Tolly Dunn in the fall. A good crop was cradled next spring. At this time Jesse T. Veal, the clock peddler, appeared. He furnished the people with Seth Thomas clocks at about $25 apiece. He plied his trade well for some years, making not a little money, making his home in meantime at J. B. Wilmeth’s.
The chief effort was to fence and turn the prairie sod with big plows and long ox teams. Not long had J. B. Wilmeth’s wagon been unloaded till his blacksmith shop was set up. Plows had to be sharpened and other implements forged and welded. Nancy’s loom was also set up and the cards and wheel brought into play. Homespun was the main dependence. Cotton and wool had to be finger-picked, carded and spun by hand, and woven into cloth. In this the Wilmeth women folks were expert. They even brought to bear some knowledge previously acquired in the manufacture of silk. Having brought a small supply of silk worm eggs with them, they reared the worm on wild Collin county mulberry leaves and so produced a good quality of silk thread, fingers. Some of this they put in the stores to sell for sewing thread, the rest they used to make brilliant silken stripes in their homespun dresses. And most of these pioneer women worked in the same way to help the country on.
The Fourth of July 1846 was celebrated at Buckner by a barbecue, public speeches and a dance. Some of the speakers remembered were Uncle Jake Baccus, Col. Jack McGarrah and the young doctor G. A. Foote. The doctor and the colonel figured also in the dance, the latter taking a set with his eldest granddaughter.
The county officers showing up at that time were: Jonathan Allen, chief justice; Tolly Dunn, clerk; King Custer, sheriff; Leonard Searcy, assessor and collector; and Godfrey Baccus, treasurer. Maj. Samuel Bogart seemed a distinguished character, not alone from the fact that he was a representative of the people, but also from the reputation that he brought with him of having individually slain a Mormon before he came to this country. The badge continually reminding of this was, a weapon-loaded pair of saddlebags carried in public on his left arm. He as well as the other officers had evidently been elected in Fannin County prior to the creation of Collin by an act of the legislature Feb 1846. He had not sought public position without a purpose. He was a man of individuality and executive ability and he did things. To him was attributed the act requiring the relocation of the county seat within three miles of the center of the county. In carrying this out, Geo. White having been appointed to make the survey to find the center, ascertained it to be about three miles nearly southeast of the site of the present courthouse. This was late in 1847. The commissioners appointed to secure a site and lay off the town were Jno. Fitzhugh, W. C. McKinney, J. B. Wilmeth, Jno Melton and another not now remembered. Two sites of 160 acres each were tendered; Sloan’s Grove, three miles southeast of center, to be called Sloanville by Bennett and Lee Martin; and the present, or northwest site, to be called McKinney, by Bill Davis. An election held early in 1848 gave a decided majority for McKinney. Though only 120 acres of the Davis offer were secured the town was soon plotted, surveyed and lots put on sale. Improvement began at once. A frame storehouse was hauled across the prairie from Buckner and set fronting south on the site of the Foote House. This served for some years or the Almarine and C. C. Alexander house, Geo. Barnett, Clerk. “Our House,” a saloon, by E. Whitley & Co. sprang up about the place of Abbott’s bookstore. Dr. Worthington built a little board office about where the first National Bank now stands. Soon Uncle Jno. Lovejoy Sr. came, built a store and residence back of it, on the southwest corner of the square and kept store and hotel. Residences sprang up here and there. Mrs. Standifer, improved on the hill to the south, putting in farm and furnishing country board to some of the bachelor businessmen. Peter Wallace built a blacksmith shop and residence on southeast corner of square. But growth expands too much to attempt any further details.
A courthouse was built during 1848 and 1849, and courts organized. J. B. Wilmeth served for a time as District Clerk under appointment from Judge Mills. Later he was elected County Judge and served in that capacity for one or more terms, making a specialty during this service of locating the county’s school lands on the best territory then available. Much of the however, was undone later by floating them to accommodate individual settlers.
As the Arkansas so in Texas, J. B. Wilmeth made his house a place of Christian teaching and worship. At an appointment for preaching at the old Throckmorton place he met some disciples from the McKinney settlement. Turning his attention at once to these, in Nov 1846 a church was constituted in the house of Carrol McKinney – recently vacated from the loss of his wife, with Ashley McKinney and J. B. Wilmeth as Deacons. Soon their place of meeting was changed to a new community meeting house built a mile south near the Collin county line, and named Liberty, Succession, Mantua, Van Alstyne.
In the summer of 1847 he organized a church at his own house, with F. C. Wilmeth, Henry Webb, John Larimore, Jas. Masters, officers. Later it held its annual meetings in the courthouse at McKinney. His evangelistic efforts, preaching and founding churches, extended to Dallas, Denton, Grayson and Fannin Counties. Many of these have grown to be strong churches.
By J. R. Wilmeth
Transcribed from the McKinney Courrier-Gazette (McKinney, Texas), June 4, 1921 (By J. R. Wilmeth, Ebony, Texas)
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