From Proud Heritage, Volume I by DCPA, currently out of print.
The Sypert family in America was originally French. Francis Scypert and his wife Sallie Townsend (prob. English) arrived circa 1740 in North Carolina as indentured servants. Descendants with various spellings of the name live throughout the United States today. The one who came to Dallas County was James Lawrence Sypert.
James Lawrence Sypert, son of Robert Bell Sypert and Priscilla Davis, born 21 January 1829 in Wilson County, Tennessee, married Nancy Thompson born 9 November 1837, daughter of George Brooks Thompson and Martha T. Sanders. Nancy was born in Bedford County, Tennessee, and Nancy and James L. Sypert were married in Harrison County, Texas, on 18 July 1854.
Both James Sypert and Nancy Thompson migrated as children with their parents from Tennessee to Harrison County, Texas about 1844, both families settling near the present community of Hallsville. She was 17 and he was 25 when they married in Harrison County in 1854. By 1855 they had moved to Dallas County.
Their children (all born in Dallas County): 1) George Sypert born 1856, died as a young man post 1880, buried Beeman Cemetery. 2) Laura Elizabeth Sypert born 5 September 1858, died 14 April 1941, buried Grove Hill; married George T. (Tim) Hawpe on 11 May 1876 at Floyd Christian Church in Dallas. 3) Walter A. (Watt) Sypert born circa 1860, died young, buried Beeman Cemetery. 4) Dallas Thompson (Babe) Sypert born 1863, died 5/6 August 1936, buried Grove Hill; married Arminda Hay 1871-1946, buried Grove Hill. 5) Isabel (Bell) Sypert born 10 September 1865, died 4 May 1929, buried Grove Hill; married Tom Wilson born 25 April 1863, died 27 March 1905, buried Beeman Cemetery. 6) William Clinton (Clint) Sypert born 1868, died 1932; married Sudie Price born 1873, died 1944, both buried Grove Hill. 7) Brooks Sypert born 1870, married Eureika Chandler.
James and Nancy Sypert lived in the area east of Dallas, near the Thompson family. James Lawrence Sypert served in Hawpe’s Regiment of Texas Cavalry in the Confederate Army during the Civil War. There is a collection of letters which he wrote to his wife during his absence from home during the war. He seemed to have been ill most of the time, and he was discharged on August 2, 1863.
His description on his papers reads: “34 years of age, 5 feet 9 inches high, dark complexion, black eyes, dark hair”. He had been unfit for duty for 53 days. Cause: “Phthisis Pulmonali (now known as tuberculosis) and chronic inflammation of the kidneys”. His medical discharge was signed at Camp Vermillion, Louisiana, but his mustering out papers were made out and signed by him at Camp Walker, Arkansas. He received pay for five months and twenty one days, $68.40 ($12.00 month), and travel allowance from Camp Walker to Dallas, Texas, $38.50. Pay for the use and risk of horse for 174 days at 40 cents per day, $70.80. Should be $69.60. Although the error was made in the extensions on the statement, the final figure was clearly a total of $177.70.
He arrived back in Dallas just in time to witness the killing of his former (retired) commanding officer, Colonel T. C. Hawpe. Family tradition says he was the first to reach the wounded man after the attack. (Tim Hawpe and Laura Sypert were not married until 1876. They were both children at the time of the death.)
James Sypert apparently never overcame his afflictions from his army life, because he died of “lung fever” eight years later on January 10, 1872. His wife, Nancy, also died a week later on January 17 of the same disease. Both are buried at Beeman Cemetery, Dallas.
Their seven children ranged from age 2 to age 16 at their deaths. The two older boys (George and Watt) went to live with their mother’s sister, Aunt “Ag” (Agnes Galleher). Bell, 7 years old, also stayed with her part of the time. Clint and Babe, 4 and 9, went to Aunt “Artie” Sypert in East Texas. Laura, 14, the oldest girl, took the baby, Brooks, and stayed with Grandma and Grandpa Thompson. Four and one-half years later when Laura married Tim Hawpe, she took Bell, Brooks, Clint and Babe to live with her. Laura Sypert Hawpe always “looked after” someone in her family. She was mother of a large family in addition to the siblings she reared and the grandchildren she “helped” rear. She was born, grew up and was educated in Dallas. She was a very small woman but apparently ruled with an iron hand. She married at age 18; at age 56 she was a widow and spent the last twenty-six years of her life as a widow; she was 82 years old at her death. She was a member of the Christian Church. She is buried at Grove Hill Cemetery beside her husband.
By Coye Hawpe, Dallas
