The pioneer spirit

Crab Orchard, KY was near the end of the Logan Trace of the Wilderness Road and was an early pioneer station. There are several mineral springs in the area and from 1827 until 1922 taverns and hotels were located at Crab Orchard Springs
Richard Frederick Williams was born in Crab Orchard in 1782.

Wilderness?
The Wilderness Road was the principal route used by settlers for more than fifty years to reach Kentucky from the East. In 1775, Daniel Boone "blazed" a trail for the Transylvania Company from Fort Chiswell in Virginia through the Cumberland Gap into central Kentucky. It was later lengthened, following Native American trails, to reach the Falls of the Ohio at Louisville. The Wilderness Road was steep, rough, narrow, and it could only be traversed on foot or horseback. Despite the adverse conditions, thousands of people used it.

In 1792, the new Kentucky legislature provided money to upgrade the road. In 1796, an improved all-weather road was opened for wagon and carriage travel. The road was abandoned around 1840, although modern highways follow much of its route.

The Logan Trace was a wilderness trail through central Kentucky, a branch of Daniel Boone's Wilderness Road. It was named after its originator, Colonel Benjamin Logan. Logan came over the mountains with Boone in 1775, but went west toward Buffalo Spring instead of north. Its terminus was northwest of present-day Stanford, Kentucky, where Logan built a fort known as Logan's Station or St. Asaph. Stanford eventually emerged from Logan's original settlement.

Richard's son William T. Williams was born Dec. 16, 1824.  (I posted here last year a bit about his life)

William moved to Missouri probably in 1832 and with various siblings, and uncles and aunts settled there, and began farming.  William T. Williams at 38 joined the US army for part of the Civil War, and then moved much of his family to Texas by 1877, when his daughter Annie Elizabeth (born in 1862) married Leary (or Leroy) Francis Webb, my great grandfather. 

These people kept on moving, and I keep feeling amazed at their spirit of exploration.  Texas was pretty wild still in the 1870s, though the Wild West was still to become glamorized in fictionalized paper back books. 

The Webbs had been in Texas for a while, since Leary was born (1857) in Clinton County, to parents from Maryland and New York.  He married and settled in DeWitt County Texas, where they raised their 8 children (losing one as a child).  The family prospered by running a feed and general store.

But by 1910 the family was living in the metropolis of San Antonio.  Here was a city environment, where L.F. lived out his years, dying in 1921.  His wife Annie lived until 1942.  But my grandfather died young, Bud Webb was buried in the Masonic Cemetery in 1919.

I can only explain my desire to move about the country as the same urge that probably spurred these ancestors to travel to new horizons.  But it sure is a lot easier for me to do so than it was for them.

Leroy Francis Webb - Ancestor Saturday

It's time for looking into the life of another of my ancestors...Ancestor Saturday 2014!
He was alive at the time cowboys were riding the range, driving their Texas cattle to market in Kansas and Illinois before railroads took that job away.

I share this with Sepia Saturday HERE
Topic - old photographs hidden in a book.  (There is an old photo included below.  As well as lots of data that comes along with research about my great grandfather.) 



Leroy Francis Webb was born on Jan 14, 1856, in  Clinton, DeWitt County, TX

Died 27 Mar 1921, San Antonio, TX
He was my great grandfather.  He outlived my grandfather (who died at 28) by 2 years.

Unknown event being memorialized in 1894..."In Memory of the L. F. Webb Family"

L. F. Webb Store, Weesatche, Texas.  Apparently the gathering is of Employees, Friends and Customers.  See information about DeWitt County below, but my guess is most of these "customers" were cowboys, farmers and ranchers.

Born in 1856 in DeWitt County, an early settlement of Texas...Here's some info from Wikipedia:

In 1825, empresario Green DeWitt  received a grant from the (Mexican government) Coahuila y Tejas legislature to settle 400 families (in Texas territory).  Between 1826 and 1831 settlers arrived from Tennessee, Kentucky, Missouri, and other Southern states.

A temporary county government was set up in 1846, with the county seat being Daniel Boone Friar's store at the junction of the La Bahía Road and the Gonzales-Victoria road.  On November 28, 1850, Clinton became the county seat until Cuero became county seat in 1876.

From April 1866 until December 1868 a subassistant commissioner of the Freedmen's Bureau served at Clinton. The community of Hopkinsville was established in 1872 by Henry Hopkins, freedman former slave of Judge Henry Clay Pleasants, the judge credited for ending the Sutton-Taylor Feud. Residents began a school that was active until 1956, and established the Antioch Baptist Church.

The notorious Sutton-Taylor feud began as a Reconstruction era county law enforcement issue between the Taylor family and lawman William E. Sutton. It eventually involved both the Taylor and Sutton families, the Texas State Police, the Texas Rangers and John Wesley Hardin. The feud, which lasted a decade and cost 35 lives, has been called the longest and bloodiest in Texas history.

April 1, 1866 marked the first cattle drive on the Chisholm Trail, which originated at Cardwell's Flat, near the present Cuero (also in DeWitt County). The coming of the railroads eliminated the need for the Chisholm Trail

Mr. Webb is listed on the census in Gonzales, Texas at age 3 in 1860. His father, Samuel Webb, had been born 28 January 1827 in Vienna, Dorchester, Maryland.  His mother, Ellen Ann Delamater Webb was born 25 Jan 1842 in New York.  They had married in DeWitt County, Texas, he at age 29, she was 15.  Leroy Francis Webb had 7 siblings.

In 1870 (age 13) he lived with his parents, Samuel (a  merchant) and Ellen in DeWitt County, TX.

At 20 he married Annie Elizabeth Williams, in Goliad, TX on Aug 7, 1877.  She had been born on June 20, 1862 in MO.

In the 1880 Census, they are living still in Goliad, and he's a Retail Grocer (perhaps in  the building shown above).  He is 23 and Annie is now 18.  They have 2 sons, J.E. (2) and John (3 mos).  And in the way of families, his sisters and brothers are also living with them: Phiney, 12; Joe, 9; D. E. (female) 6; and Sam, 4.   W.E. Ramsey, age 68, is a clerk who also lives with them.  His mother had died in 1876 and his father died 8 days after his wedding in August 1877.

There is also on the same 1880 census sheet a person identifying himself as a photographer, B. Kehner, a 66 year old German and his wife.  I wonder if he is the source of the great photograph in 1894 of L.F. Webb's store.

It is also interesting to note that Leary and Leroy were given as spellings of his name, as well as Larry.  I think this was politically motivated perhaps, or maybe just transcription errors.

In the Census of 1900 his household had changed a bit.  He's 42, having been married 22 years, but still Head of General Merchandise.  His wife Annie has given birth to 7 children, 6 of whom are listed as living.  Daughter 16, Maggie E. W; 13 year old Thomas K; 11 year old Clara; and 8 year old son, Albert J. (to become my grandfather.) 25 year old Katie Avers is their houseservant.

And on that census sheet, the next listing after that household is for James E. Webb, age 21, living with his brother, 20 year old John.  These were the oldest sons of Annie and Leroy Webb.  J. E. is a bookkeeper, and John is a salesman of merchandise. I wonder if they helped in the family business.  They haven't left the area, in spite of the 1894 photo in "memorial" of the business.

Then in the census of 1910 his family is living on Lewis St, San Antonio and he's still a General Merchandise Merchant.  I would love to know what motivated the family to travel from Weesatche to San Antonio. Perhaps it was that railroad which changed the cattle drives from cowboys spending weeks on a trail to Kansas to just loading the cattle on cattle cars, though that change began when he was a child.

Annie in 1910 has all 7 of her children living, but other sources say there was a daughter who died at 5, Laura Mae.  Listed in the household, Tom is 22; Clara, 20;  Albert 18; and L. F. is 5.  A servant is 17 year old Orestes Ware.

A delightful resource is available also for 1910. The San Antonio City Directory which lists L. F. Webb as a Confectionary located at 262 San Pedro Ave, SW...with a telephone number.  He and wife A. E. live at 130 Lewis Ave.  Also listed is Thomas K. as a clerk for L. F. Webb (and living at home as well).  Miss Clara Webb is listed at the same home address, no occupation.  And 18 year old Albert is a solicitor for Conness Realty, also living with parents.

By the Census of 1920, L.F. Webb is retired as a merchant, age 61, living with Annie still at 130 Lewis St.  36 year old John is a manufacturer, living at home, as well as a daughter Mattie, age 33.   A servant is also cook.  I have no idea who this John and Mattie might be.  Their son, John would have been over 40.  He had married someone named Elizabeth Hohn.

Mission Burial Park, San Antonio, TX

In Texas Find-A-Grave, I find his family marker, and both his and Annie's graves.  She outlived him by quite a few years (dying in 1942, age 80) .  He died when he was 64 years old, on 27 Mar 1921.  I never heard if he saw my mother, Mataley Webb, who was born in March of 1917.

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San Antonio house

Once a good idea is born, it should be fed and nurtured.  How about more 69 year olds in my family tree?

Maybe go back another 69 years, beyond Eugenia Almetta Booth Miller's, my great grandmother's birth 69 years before mine.  The next generation back would have been born in 1804. Perhaps still alive during the Civil War.  Next would be someone born in 1735.  That person would have gone through the Revolutionary War, if they were in America at the time, and lived that long.

I do fortunately have documents copied from the Rogers Family Bible which my grandfather typed by  hand as he copied them.  He made 4 carbons, and gave one to my father.  But those records are of my father's family.  So far I've been looking at just my mother's family.

Look at what a neat tie these people's lives have together...some of whom lived 69 years, and what that year of achievement meant, not to mention all the rest of their interesting lives.  And even just having been born 69 years before me, then 69 years before that person...jumping back through our history.

I believe I visited Eugenia Booth Miller's house in the 40's when going from Houston to San Antonio to see my grandmother, Mozelle Booth Miller, who I think lived here herself.  I missed ever meeting Eugenia "Grandma" but I understood that she mostly raised my mother since Mozelle was widowed twice while very young.

I remember arriving in San Antonio at night, and the streets had an interesting drainage system, many of which were flooded.  The fun I remember was driving over humps at each intersection, which sent me bouncing (on the back seat) in a moment of weightlessness.  I giggled, and of course my mother harrumphed, which was her usual comment about my father's driving.  But I do remember that ride as being as good as many an amusement park ride later on.  I also remember later during the day, driving right through several inches of water, over some dam or bridge which was flooded as much of San Antonio was at that time.

If not Grandmommy Mozelle, one of the other daughters (Dorothy Dain Miller or Margaret Etha Miller) might have been living in this home still.  Margaret never married so easily could have stayed in the homestead.  Rowena (the 4th sister) had married a man named Rodgers many years before my mother also married a Rogers.  Since it was spelled differently, everyone assumed there was no relationship.  But I've never tried to trace it.  If you go far enough back, spelling got pretty iffy.

I don't remember my great-grandfather, Charles Herman Miller, who may have been still alive when I was born. I believe he had been a conductor on the railroad.  I did find it strange that my grandmother would never travel by train, but only took airplanes or drove to visit people.  I wonder if he had an train accident or told her something that kept her away from trains.  I personally loved travelling by train as a young girl with my mother from St. Louis to go visit my grandmother and her family in San Antonio.

A map of "The Santa Fé Route" and subsidiary lines, as published in an 1891 issue of the Grain Dealers and Shippers Gazetteer.