William Holman Cartwright

Notes:

His cousins, Lon and Matthew Cartwright, hired him to manage ranches that they managed in Cooke County, north of Denton, and Stephens County, west of Forth Worth. (Henson and Parmelee, THE CARTWRIGHTS OF SAN AUGUSTINE, p. 295).

Notes:

Clinton worked as a errand boy and perhaps clerk for both is father and brother Matthew. (Henson & Parmelee, p. 103) Clinton inherited a boardinghouse and store from his father's estate, and also entered into a partnership in a blacksmith shop in town with William T. White, where he kept the slave Jordan, a valuable blacksmith given to him by his mother, employed. (Henson & Parmelee, p. 151). Clinton became quite ill with malaria in November 1847, and never fully recovered, dying in May 1848. (ibid, pp. 152-153).

John married Elvira "Ella" Holman on 19 Mar 1844 in San Augustine County, Texas. Elvira (daughter of Col. Isaac Holman and Anne Wigglesworth) was born on 14 Oct 1825 in Tennessee; died on 6 Apr 1855. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Notes:

After John Cartwright's death, Elvira married Otis M. WHEELER, and can be found as "wife" in his household, along with a namesake newborn son, and her first-born, four year old William Cartwright. They later moved to Polk County. Matthew Cartwright wrote in his daybook "Mrs. John Clinton Cartwright married O. M. Wheeler in 8 mos and 8 days from Death of her Husband. Myself & wife rec'd invitation from the Madam late in the evening to take supper at candle lighting. She intended to moving to the country and making her home at Col. Wheeler. We went in the dark and Rain through the mud and saw the last of John C. Cartwright's fond and ever adoring wife." (Henson and Parmelee, p. 153).

(Research):

Census Listings:

1850 Census
Texas, San Augustine County, San Augustine District
Enumerated 10 OCt 1850
Stamped 353
311-311
W. W. Holman 39 M Farmer 30,000 KY
Eliza Holman 26 F Mi
Wm. Holman 1 M Tx
312-312
Otis M . Wheeler 37 M Farmer 50000 Mass
Elvira Wheeler 25 F Tenn
Otis Wheeler 5/12 Texas
John Polley 27 M Overseer Tx
John Kelly 26 M Laborer Ohio
Wm. Cartwright 4 M Tx

Notes:

Married:
Henson and Parmelee write that Clinton and Ella had a second child that died soon after birth, ca 1846. (P. 149)

Notes:

John was the only son of Matthew (1754-1812) and Mary "Polly" Grimmer Cartwright (1761-1824), although he had five sisters. He was a grandson of John Cartwright (1728-1780) and Sarah Miller.

Harry Noble wrote a twenty page biography of him in his book, TEXAS TRAILBLAZERS (pages 70 - 90). He noted that much additional material can be found in the first five chapters of Margaret Swett Henson and Deolece Parmelee's volume THE CARTWRIGHTS OF SAN AUGUSTINE (Texas State Historical Association, Austin, 1993).

Margaret Henson, in her preface of her book about the Cartwright Family, writes that Emily Griffith Roberts, the wife a John Cartwright's great-grandson, privately published a two-volume genealogy about the family in 1939 and 1948. The volumes included research and many documents concerning the Roberts, Griffiths, Cartwrights and other interrelated families. A committee of descendants later employed Mrs. Deolece Parmelee to explore the collections of papers scattered in private hands, along with some archived at the Eugene C. Barker Texas History Center, and to prepare a more complete history. Parmelee made photocopies and typescripts, arranged them in a usable order, and eventually compiled a 450 page typescript. This was largely the basis for Henson's 1993 book.

Noble wrote that when John Cartwright was five years old his parents sold their farm in North Carolina and moved westward across the mountains into Tennessee. There they purchased two hundred acres on Drake's Lick Creek in Sumner County. John spent his childhood in Tennessee. He would continue a pilgrimage that would cover approximately 800 miles and involve at least five moves, but when completed thirty-three years later, he would be in Texas--his home for the remainder of his life. Texas would also be the home for several generations of his descendants.

While in Wilson County, Tennessee, John was a merchant, an occupation he would continue for the rest of his life. By 1818 he was having trouble collecting certain debts. His attorney, a new resident in Lebanon, Tennessee, was Sam Houston....the two men were detstined to meet again--the next time in San Augustine, Texas. (Noble, page 71)

John later moved his family to Mississippi, and "caught 'Texas fever' when the new Mexican government...stabilized...with a constitution resembling that of the United States." He began the last leg of his pilgrimage in early 1825...(taking) his family down the Mississippi River to New Orleans by steamboat and then across the Gulf and up the Red River. Leaving the river at Natchitoches, the family traveled by wagons overland past Fort Jessup to James Gaines ferry. John picked his homesite about five miles east of the Ayish Bayou close to the banks of springs near Palo Gacho Creek. The area was vacant, not a settler anywhere near, "...although the house of a previous owner remained in the vicinity." John's thirty-three year odyssey was over, ending on the banks of the Palo Gacho Creek in Texas and Coahuila, Mexico. What a mosiac of people John found in the Ayish Bayou region when he arrived. Most were hard working farmers or businessmen of modest means, but some were unscruplous drifters, already at odds with the law. (Noble, page 72)

John and his family can be found on the 1835 Sabine District census. Their were 11 slaves in their home, from ages 12 to 39. There were also 4 children born to their slaves.

On August 21, 1840, with the assistance of San Augustine attorney William W. Frizell, Cartwright made his will. In it he gave the 885 acre homesite on Palo Gacho to his two minor sons, Clinton and Richard. He also gave his wife an interest in the homesite and placed the restriction that it couldn't be sold until after her death. Additionally, he gave her all monies due him by debt. He then distributed the remaining assets to various family members. (Noble, 89) John Cartwright died on July 18, 1841, and (his son-in-law William) Garrett, along with Mary, Cartwright's widow, were appointed executors of Cartwright's estate. Their selections was confirmed the following month. With assistance from Matthew Cartwright, Garrett then compiled an inventory of the estate. It was valued at $72,800. (Noble)

In the book, The Cartwrights of San Augustine, it was noted that elder sons, Matthew and Robert, challenged the will, likely on the grounds that the document was not in keeping with the community property laws adopted by the Republic of Texas in January 1840, and because John had exceeded his testamentary powers in the distribution of his property to his children. Mary Cartwright immediately renounced her executorship in order to contest John's will so as to "receive in common with my children such portions of said estate as we are by law entitled to." The family reached a settlement in January 1842. (Henson and Parmelee, pp. 119-120).

John married Mary E. "Polly" Crutchfield on 21 Jan 1807 in Wilson County, Tennessee. Mary was born on 26 Oct 1787 in Virginia; died on 17 Jun 1848 in San Augustine County, Texas; was buried in Cartwright Cemetery, San Augustine County, Texas. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Notes:

The daughter of George and Dicey Hoskins Crutchfield. George Crutchfield, her father, was a veteran of the revolutionary war. (Noble, page 71). Her family moved from Virginia into Kentucky, and later moved south into Tennessee. (Henson & Parmelee, page 4). On the 1880 census, son George indicates his mother was born in Virginia. "The Cartwrights of San Augustine" indicated that she grew up in Smith County, Tennessee, and that her four sisters and three brothers mostly remained in Smith County for the rest of their lifes.

Mary suffered from recurring malaria since at least 1847, and died ten days after son Clinton succumbed to the same disease. In twenty-two months, the three surviving Cartwright brothers has lost two sisters, a brother and their mother. (Hemson and Parmelee, pp. 153-154).

Notes:

Isaac was a veteran of the War of 1812 where he earned the title of Colonel. An attorney by profession, he was attracted to politics. He was elected to the Kentucky legistlature in 1810 and again in 1816. In 1818, he moved his family to Lincoln County, Tennessee, where he immersed himself in public affairs, running for the Tennessee assembly in 1823, and later serving as state senator. A credit squeeze in Tennessee put the Holman family in a financial bind, and the family decided to move to Texas. Sons William W. and James S. made the trip first, arriving in San Augustine in October 1834. (Noble, page 111). Isaac arrived in December with his two younger sons. In March, 1835, his wife and daughters followed. The entire family became citizens of the Redlands. Isaac died only eight months after his arrival in San Augustine. (Harry Noble) In "The Cartwrights of San Augustine" it was written that the family brought 20 slaves with them to Texas. (Henson & Parmelee, p. 84)

Isaac married Anne Wigglesworth on 25 Dec 1800 in Kentucky. Anne was born on 14 Sep 1783; died on 22 Jul 1841 in San Augustine County, Texas; was buried in Holman Cemetery, Sabine County, Texas. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Notes:

Henson and Parmelee, in their book "The Cartwrights of San Augustine," wrote that Anne, along with her teenage daughters, Amanda, America and Elvira, journeyed "from Lincoln County, Tennessee via Nashville, Natchez, and Natchitoches in only fifteen days, a remarkably short time, having connected with steamboats at all three places by mere minutes. In Natchitoches a drove of horses from Arkansas had just arrived and they bought three for only $180. The colonel had been Sandford, his youngest son, to Tennessee to escort his mothers and sisters, but he had unknowingly passed them on the river. From this brief account, it is clear that Anne Wigglesworth Homas was an unusually self-reliant woman, unafraid to travel alone over unfamiliar territory. She and her three teenage daughters were relatively safe on board the steamboats, but the journey from Natchitoches seems unusual. The ladies most have been accompanied by loyal servants who could hitch the horses to their vehicles and act as an escort past Fort Jesup and through the Sabine Bottom. (pp. 84-85). Aldophus Sterne in Nacogdoches noted that a number of pope suffered from fever and died during the month [of July 1841, when both John Cartwright and Anne Wigglesworth Holman died]. While no local people identified the sickness that summer, it may have been yellow fever. Two men who left Nacogdoches in September died of the dread disease as soon as they reached Vicksburg. (p. 117).

Notes:

Married:
Shown as marrying in Woodford County, Kentucky by some. Henson and Parmelee instead cite their marriage as taking place in Harrison County.