Clarence M. McCain, M. D.: Evangeline Parish, Louisiana Submitted by: Greggory E. Davies 120 Ted Price Lane Winnfield, LA 71483 Date: Nov 1997 * ********************************************** Copyright. All rights reserved. http://usgwarchives.net/copyright.htm http://usgwarchives.net/la/lafiles.htm ********************************************** Clarence M. McCain, M. D. In the practice of medicine and in his experience as a business man Dr. McCain lived in a number of localities in Louisiana, finally returning to the community where he spent a part of his youth. He descended from the McCain & Hicks families, who have been in Louisiana since early times, and were of sturdy Scotch-Irish ancestry, and were people of note and worth in their communities. Doctor McCain was born near the Ebenezer Camp ground in Ward Five of Winn Parish, January 21, 1872 , son of Felix McConnell and Sarah Hicks McCain. His grandfathers were Henry Elizabeth (Hicks) McCain. His grandfather was Henry B. McCain and Rev. Jimmie Hicks. (The previous two sentences are apparently erroneous but were extracted verbatim from the source). Both these families came from Wetumpka, Coosa County, Alabama, to Louisiana in the early 1840s. It was their intention to go on to the republic of Texas, but the fine springs and clear running branches in Louisiana inspired them to stop and make their home in this state. Both were well to do people, slave owners, but the McCains were opposed to secession. Rev. Jimmie Hicks was probably the first minister of the Methodist Protestant Church to live in Louisiana. He was founder of the Mount Zion Church, which still has a large membership. He accomplished a great deal of good by his life of singular purity and beneficence. He died after the war, at the age of forty-nine. Henry B. McCain died when eighty-two years of age. One of the slaves of the McCain family refused to accept his freedom and remained faithfully with them until his death in 1923, at the age of seventy-five. The McCain and Hicks families were in many senses of the time constructive citizens, prosperous in their own affairs and doing much for others besides. Felix McCain, father of Doctor McCain, died in 1917, at the age of seventy-one. When he was seventeen years of age he volunteered in the Confederate Army. He had three brothers who were also soldiers; Matthew, a major, Van and Adam. At first these brothers were divided between the Third Louisiana and the Twelfth Louisiana Infantry, but in time all of them were in the Twelfth Regiment. Major Matthew subsequently became tax assessor in Winn Parish and a member of the legislature. Felix McCain was a sergeant of his company, and for part of the time was in Joseph Johnston's command. He was taken prisoner at the Battle of Franklin and held at Camp Chase, Ohio, until the end of the war. Part of his education was acquired in Alabama, but for the most part he studied privately and taught school ten years. He was a farmer, ginner and operator of saw mills, owning a large acreage of land, and gave his children good public school education. For many years he held the office of president of the Winn Parish Police Jury. He took part in suppressing the historic Colfax insurrection. He was a member of the Masonic Order. He and his wife continued their working membership in the Methodist Protestant Church until 1910, when, having removed to the home of their son, Doctor McCain at Basile, they joined the Methodist Episcopal Church. Felix McCain died at Basile, while at Basile, while his wife passed away in Alexandria in 1922, at the age of seventy-five. They had a large family of sons and daughters; the son Irvin, who died at St. Maurice, aged twenty-two; Edna, who died at St. Maurice, wife of Robert Woods; Eugenia, who died in childhood; Rev. Henry H., who graduated in medicine at Tulane University, practicing twelve years, and then accepted the call to the ministry, and was presiding elder in the Texas Conference and later pastor of the First Methodist Episcopal Church, South, at Conroe, Texas; Doctor Clarence M.; Lettie, wife of William O'Neil, general manager of O'Neil Produce Company at Alexandria; Emma Beatrice, who married Rev. Mr. Hughes, who died three months after his marriage; Lillian, wife of Marion T. Shumate; Sarah Elizabeth, wife of A. J. Richardson; Ruth, wife of Archie Fowler, both who were well known musicians at Shreveport; and Walton, who served as president of the Bank at Basile. Clarence M. McCain received his first school instruction at Mount Zion, his teacher being William Yancy McCain, and later he attended school at the Ebenezer Camp Grounds, his birth place, and finished his literary education at Montgomery. His years were spent on the farm until he entered medical college, graduating from Tulane in 1896, and passing the State Board examination the same year. He later took a number of post-graduate courses. He practiced at St. Maurice near his birthplace, married there and remained in that locality ten or twelve years. He also opened a store, his brother being in active charge. In that locality he carried on a wide and successful practice and had a well established business until a certain drop in the price of cotton forced him into bankruptcy. He turned over his home, lands and goods to his creditors and then moved his family to Winnfield, where, associated with Dr. John Pugh, he took over the medical practice of the Germain & Boyd Lumber Company of Atlanta and Whitford for two and a half years. Another two years he spent at Clarence in Natchitoches Parish and then moved to Basile in Evangeline Parish, where in addition to a general practice he acted as local surgeon for the Gulf Coast Railway for eleven years. While there he and his brother became chiefly responsible for the building of the Methodist Church. The original owner of the townsite was James Lewis, who had donated two lots for this church. Doctor McCain and his brother, buying the townsite for $ 10,000 gave a site more convenient to the church and with the aid of some local assistance, and the Church Exemption Society built the Methodist Episcopal Church there. These brothers were also responsible for the building of a girls' school, a Methodist Mission School. Doctor McCain acted as steward and trustee of the church at Basile. After eleven years of work in that community he moved to Elton, where in connection with his medical practice he engaged in rice planting. His crops for 1920 were five thousand sacks. The cost of production was about eight dollars a sack, and when the price suddenly dropped he was again a victim of market conditions over which he had no control. Doctor McCain in 1923 returned to his old home community at Montgomery in Grant Parish, where he continued his work as a physician and surgeon. He married Alma Milling, daughter of Thomas Milling, a member of a prominent family of Winn and Grant Parishes. She was born at Winnfield, was a graduate of the Louisiana State Normal School, and taught school until her marriage. They had a family of three sons and six daughters. Mrs. McCain was formerly a Baptist, but converted to Methodism. Doctor McCain was affiliated with the Montgomery Lodge of Masons and Winnfield Chapter No. 59, Royal Arch Masons. He voted republican in national politics, being democratic in state in local elections. (Source: Chambers' "A History of Louisiana", 1925. Submitted by Greggory Ellis Davies, Winnfield, Winn Parish, La.)