Corsicana Daily Sun, Corsicana, Texas
March 1, 2008
The last of the 1860 agricultural census reported

By Bill Young

The article this week will be the last one pertaining to the 1850 and 1860 
agricultural censuses. I don’t have any census for 1870 or later and even if 
I did, I think we need to break away from the census for a while. Every now 
and then too much of one thing can get boring.

Last week I started listing the values of animals slaughtered and I stopped 
last week at $200. This week’s article will list some of the farmers who had
less value starting with Jeremiah Melton from the Dresden area with $185 
followed by Thomas Conner from Hester Grove with an odd amount of $181. Six 
individuals were tied at $180 each. They were H.B. Epps, David Pevehouse from
Cross Roads, Margaret Houston, M. Davis, Robert Lewis and A.N. Smith.

Josiah Daniel told the census taker he had slaughtered $176, another odd 
number followed by W.C. George with $175. Jedadiah Welch and Jonathan Melton,
both from the Dresden area, were tied at $170 each. Next was R.P. Oliver with
$168 followed by several more tied at $165. These farmers were Thomas Melton,
another member of the Melton clan from the Dresden area, Martin Box and 
Warren Blackwell. Four individuals were tied at $160 each. They were Robert 
Davidson from the Eureka area, Sidney Haynie also from the Eureka area, W.S. 
Robertson from Corsicana and William Richie who lived north of present-day 
Dawson.

J.W. George and Francis Jones were the only farmers who listed $155 but 15 
farmers were tied at an even $150. They were Joseph Bragg from Hester Grove, 
Nancy Hickman, J.J. Hammond, A.C. Brown, Hiram Brown, Benjamin Roberts from 
Pursley, William H. Garner from the area where Lake Navarro Mills is now 
located, Martha Barnett, Thomas Haynes, Naz White, who lived for a while on 
Pisgah Ridge but moved to the area south of Retreat, J.P. Anderson, D. 
Weaver, Jesse Pugh, E. Nash from Pisgah Ridge and Elias Carroll, who owned 
land on the ridge but had other holdings in the Rural Shade area.

One individual, Silas Baker, told the census taker he had slaughtered $147 of
animals and 11 farmers were tied at $140. They were R.M. Phillips, John Burt,
Anderson Nix, Roger Q. Mills, J. Brewster, B.F. Carroll, J.V. Real, Minerva 
McCane, Henry Griffin, James McDuncan and P.F. Winn. Three people were tied 
at $135. They were Thomas Smith, Martin Caddell and James W. Coppell. One 
individual, J.M. Curry from the Purdon area, had an odd amount of $133 
followed by five individuals tied at $130 each. They were Philip Trammel from 
the ridge, Samuel Parmley, James Smith, S.P. Nabors and H.J. Cage. Theophilus
Killian had a total of $126 followed by Moses Newman and William Meador with
$125 each.

I decided to cut this list off at $125 but there were many more farmers who
listed less than $100 each. During the past few months I have written a 
number of articles about the 1850 and 1860 agricultural censuses. With each 
article, new names appeared under one of the various categories while other
people’s names appeared almost continuously. With each new name we have a 
better understanding of some of the people who helped Navarro County get 
started. If we look at the actual census where each person told the census 
taker what his profession was, we realize not every one was associated with
farming on a full-time basis. However, many of the people who migrated here
especially after 1850 brought with them numerous skills which helped the
county grow. Farming and the cattle business have always been important to
our region because we had good land and most of the time a reasonable amount
of rainfall. However, we know from our past experiences just how fickle the 
weather for this area can be. Many farmers had one or several bad years back 
to back forcing a number of families to move on to other areas. The practice
of sharecropping came in the late 1880s. One year would be good and the next
two were terrible and eventually the practice of sharecropping slowly faded 
away. It is my hope most of the people doing research on their ancestors have
found their names somewhere within the two early agricultural censuses 
written over the past few months.