Biography of Ellen Brazeal McLelland Ward of Union Co AR & Union Par LA Submitted for the Union Parish Louisiana USGenWeb Archives by T. D. Hudson, 8/2004 ................................................................................. ************************************************ Copyright. All rights reserved. http://usgwarchives.net/copyright.htm http://usgwarchives.net/la/lafiles.htm ************************************************ ================================================================================= Biography of Ellen Brazeal McLelland Ward of Union Co AR & Union Par LA Researched and written by T. D. Hudson ================================================================================== Ellen Brazeal was born in Georgia on 13 May 1804, reputedly the daughter of Benjamin Brazeal. Records indicate that Ellen’s father lived in Hempstead County around the time of its creation by the Missouri territorial government in 1817 from what had previously been Arkansas County. At that time Hempstead consisted of the southwestern corner of the present-day State of Arkansas (it was a part of Missouri Territory until the creation of Arkansaw Territory in 1819) as well as an undefined portion of what is now Oklahoma. In 1817 while still a very young teenager, Ellen became the wife of James McLelland, Jr., the son of James McLelland, Sr. The elder James had arrived in what is now southwestern Arkansas quite early; he wrote his will in 1817, naming his sons Francis, John, and James and daughter Martha McLelland Thompson. Following their father’s death in about 1818, John and Francis McLelland lived in Hempstead County, where John remained until his death between 1832 and 1836. Meanwhile, by about 1818, James McLelland, Jr. and his wife Ellen migrated across the state line into Louisiana by about 1818. Although I have no records that indicate precisely where they lived in the 1820s, by 1830 he resided in Claiborne Parish (which then included much of northwestern Louisiana). Sometime in the 1820s, James’ brother Francis moved across the state line and joined him in Claiborne Parish; in 1830 they lived in adjoining households. The 1830 census provides us with the only estimate of James McLelland’s approximate date of birth: between 1780 and 1790. Shortly after 1830, James McLelland, Jr. returned to Arkansas and settled in Union County. He wrote his will on 23 May 1834, stating that he suffered from some disease and was about to leave home. McLelland was still alive on June 30th, for he added a note to his will, naming his wife’s brothers Gordon and Allen Brazeal as his executors and ordering that they and Ellen divide his property among the McLelland children as each came of age. McLelland died a short time later. Ellen Brazeal McLelland remained a widow for over thirty years after James’ death, maintaining her farm and raising her children. In 1840 she lived near her brother Gordon and son-in-law Joel Smith, who had married her daughter Mary Ann in 1837. In about 1847, Ellen decided to leave Arkansas and move south to Shiloh, in Union Parish. She settled on the extreme western edge of the parish, about eight miles northwest of Shiloh and less than one mile from the Claiborne Parish line. Ellen left her married daughter Mary Ann McLelland Smith in Arkansas with her husband Joel, but the records indicate that Ellen remained close to her daughter and her Smith grandchildren. Through church meetings, Ellen Brazeal McLelland may have met David Ward and his family in the 1840s while she still lived in Arkansas or after she moved to Shiloh. We know that Ward actively participated in the Methodist Protestant Church that he established on his property, but we do not know if Ellen’s family belonged to the Methodist Church in those years. However, Ellen and David’s families became connected in the early 1860s when her youngest son Frederick Marion McLelland married David’s niece Elizabeth Frances Gee. Frederick and Elizabeth had one daughter born in January 1862 before he left for service in the Confederate army in the spring of 1862. Frederick survived the war, but his brother James did not. He died in the service of the Confederates States of America at Grenada, Mississippi in 1862. Ellen’s son Benjamin F. McLelland survived the war, but died soon after his parole in June 1865. After spending thirty-three years as a widow, Ellen Brazeal McLelland married on 31 January 1867 to David Ward. Her sons Francis M. and Frederick M. McLelland and grandson Frederick M. McLelland all witnessed the ceremony, which was performed by a Methodist minister. After her marriage, Ellen left her old house west of Shiloh on which she had lived for almost twenty years and moved to David Ward’s plantation east of Farmerville. That fall, while on a visit to the Wards, Ellen’s son Frederick made his mother and uncle a proposition: if they would move to Shiloh near him, he would build a house for them on a tract of government land he had purchased in 1856 but never cleared. McLelland offered them free use of the house and property for the remainder of Ellen’s life. McLelland related to others at the time that he worried about his aging mother and uncle (now his step-father), and wished for them to be close to him so he could see after them. David and Ellen agreed, and they moved onto their new retirement home in the fall of 1867. Ellen and David did not live alone in their new home – Ellen’s son Benjamin and his wife Julia died in the latter 1860s, leaving his three children Frederick Marion, Ellen Melissa, and Francis D. McLelland orphans. The McLelland children moved in with their grandmother and lived with them in the latter 1860s and early 1870s. The tragedies among Ellen’s children continued in the 1870s. Ellen’s youngest, Frederick Marion McLelland, died of tuberculosis in 1870, and her eldest son Francis M. McLelland perished the following year. So by 1871, at the age of sixty-seven, Ellen Brazeal McLelland had outlived each of her five sons and one of her daughters. Her only surviving children were her daughters Sarah, who lived in eastern Union Parish, and Mary Ann, who lived just south of El Dorado in Union County Arkansas. Fred McLelland’s death left his three minor children as the legal owners of the retirement home he had given rent-free to his mother Ellen and David Ward. The 1873 remarriage of Fred’s widow to Thomas N. Bailey caused serious problems for Ellen and David. After assuming legal control of Fred McLelland’s estate in the latter part of 1873, Bailey apparently squandered the money and property and so by 1876 the estate was insolvent. Moreover, the house had become dilapidated, and Bailey apparently wanted to move to a nicer one. Apparently, the new retirement home Fred McLelland had built for his mother and step-father became irresistible to Bailey. In 1876, Thomas N. Bailey demanded that Ellen and David yield possession of their retirement home to him. Believing they had the legal right to occupy the place until Ellen’s death, the Wards refused Bailey’s demand. In January 1878, Bailey and his wife sued Ellen and David for possession, demanding that they vacate the place and pay some $550 in rent for their use of it. The matter dragged on through the legal system for three years through a total of three district court trials and two Louisiana Supreme Court trials. The courts finally ordered Ellen and David, by then an elderly couple in their mid-70s with David in the midst of serious health problems, to vacate their home and turn possession to the Baileys. In December 1880, Ellen and David left their retirement home given to them by Fred McLelland on which they had lived since 1867. They moved back to Ellen’s old home about one-half of a mile away from their retirement home, the place upon which she moved her family when she came to Louisiana from Arkansas in 1850. Contemporary descriptions of her house indicate that by 1876 it had become quite dilapidated, and we do not know if she and David had a new house built on her farm or if they moved into her old dilapidated house. David Ward lingered on in poor health until his death in May 1882. For the remainder of the growing season after David’s death, Ellen lived on her old farm with several sharecroppers who worked the fields, namely Dan, Dave, and Peter McLelland. We believe they were all former slaves of Ellen’s family. After the 1882 harvest, it appears that Ellen moved east and lived with her widowed daughter Sarah McLelland Wickliffe Taylor, the widow of former Union Parish Judge John Taylor. Ellen died there in 1884, and Sarah buried her mother in the Taylor/Liberty Hill Cemetery, the community graveyard founded by Sarah’s deceased husband soon after he moved to Louisiana in January 1837. Today, Ellen’s grave is directly beneath the large magnolia tree in the center of the cemetery. Her marker reads: “Sacred To the Memory of Ellen Ward; Born May 13, 1804; Died Mar. 21, 1884”. Some six years later, Sarah’s daughter Amanda Wickliffe Tatum died. She was buried beside her grandmother Ellen in the Taylor/Liberty Hill Cemetery. Her marker reads: “Amanda Tatum; July 15, 1850; June 27, 1890; Wife of Organ Tatum”. ================================================================================== SPELLING OF THE NAME: The McLellands were a rather progressive family for their time in that all of Ellen’s children, both male and female, received some education and could sign their own names (as opposed to David Ward’s family, in which clearly the males received the bulk of the education). Although various government officials used a variety of spellings, most of Ellen’s family spelled their surname “McLelland” when they signed their own names. However, her eldest son Francis signed his name “McCleland” in 1857 when he signed his will and in 1870 when he witnessed the inventory of his brother’s estate. Additionally, Frederick M. McLelland’s widow Elizabeth Frances Gee signed her name as “McLeland” on various records immediately following her husband’s death. Thus, as with numerous surnames of that era, it appears there was no uniform spelling of the name. Most modern descendents spell it “McLelland” or “McLeland”. ================================================================================== SOURCES: I wrote this biography based upon my own personal research into the records of Union Parish Louisiana, Union County Arkansas, and Hempstead County Arkansas, together with family information from Patty Childress. Specific records used include US censuses and government land records, parish and county court records, and tombstone data. I gratefully acknowledge the assistance of Wayne Barrett and Patty Childress with gathering documents and supplying information. ###########################################################