Freestone Co, Tx - Marriage Notes Submitted By : Eric Wood ************************************************************************ USGENWEB ARCHIVES NOTICE: These electronic pages may NOT be reproduced in any format for profit or presentation by any other organization or persons. Persons or organizations desiring to use this material, must obtain the written consent of the contributor, or the legal representative of the submitted, and contact the listed USGENWEB archivist with proof of this consent. The submitter has given permission to the USGENWEB Archives to store the file permanently for free access. The information in this file is in the public domain, as set forth by the TX State Legislature. However, we respect your right to privacy. If you find your name on this list and want it to be removed,please send a message to Lisa Thomas: http://www.usgwarchives.net/ *********************************************************************** Notes: Orginial Marriage Books The marriage books in Freestone County begin with "Book A". However, all the other marriage books are numeric, not alphabetical. Thus marriage book "1" follows marriage book "A". The original books are handwritten in cursive with different people's handwriting over the years. My Sources The true original source of my information is Mrs. Lena Fay (Canady) Bonner. She spent countless hours reading the books, hand copying the marriages, typing the stencils, and producing the original pamphlet on a mimeograph machine. Credit is also due Ann Farnsworth for copying marriage book A which was later typed by Lena Fay and Marcia Dunnahoe for copying marriage book 3. I have only taken their work, retyped it into Excel, and added some cross-referencing. Thanks to Mike Bonner for doing the Volume I cross-referencing in the Marriage Book I. I have tried to reduce my own errors with cross-referencing the History of Freestone County, Volume I and Volume II. Remember that the number (such as #635 refers to the narrative #635, not page 635). These two books are available at the Freestone County Museum located in Fairfield. Dates Dates are displayed "year-month-day" for easier sorting. The added note of "ixr" means "issued, but not returned". Marriage licenses are issued before the actual marriage and one (usually the minister) is to return the competed license in thirty days to the county courthouse in Fairfield. Not all the licenses were properly returned. These are noted as issued with no return date. People were not always consistent in finding the initial issue date entry and filling in the return date and minister's name, so they entered another subsequent line with the information. I have consolidated some of the entries that show the issue of the license with some of the subsequent return of the license that occurred later in the book. Names For easier sorting the names are "last name, given name". I made a Mrs/Miss column to allow easier searching of the brides names. Usually "Miss" indicates that the bride has not been married before, while "Mrs." reveals that she has already been married (probably a widow or divorced). If you are having trouble identifying the bride, remember that she could be a widow whose last name is different than her birth name. The marriage book clerks do not always identify her as "Mrs.". Ministers/Public Officials I have done some research on the ministers and civil servants performing the service. The reason is to get an idea of possible religious affiliation of the married couple and a possible guess at where in the county the marriage took place. I provide more information about the minister such as full name or church if I have it. The source for the church history information comes from the front section of the History of Freestone County, Texas Volume I. Basically the churches listed will have the modern church names. For the civil servants, I cross referenced the marriage book against the Freestone County jury lists from 1852-1870. These jury lists yield information about some of the justices of the peace, clerks, judges, and chief justices of the period. I currently do not know how the precincts of Freestone County were divided, but there were multiple precincts each having a different justice of the peace. Remember that "circuit" judges and ministers were not uncommon then. For instance, John Gregg was the district judge for the Thirteenth District who married Simon Jones and Mrs. L. Starnater in January 1857. John Gregg would later become a confederate general in the American Civil War. The book, Two Stars in the Southern Sky, by Davis Blake Carter recounts the county seats he visited in the year 1857 (in order of appearance) as Boonville (Brazos County), Owensville (Robertson Co.), Marlin (Falls Co.), Springfield (Limestone Co.), Hillsbourgh (Hill Co.), Corsicana (Navarro Co.), Fairfield (Freestone Co.), and Centerville (Leon Co.). The Reverend Thomas Joell Bonner (b. 1821 - d.1895) split his time at the Harmony Associate Reformed Presbyterian (ARP) Church, Richland ARP Church (in Navarro County), County Line ARP Church/Schoolhouse (located near the border of Freestone and Navarro County), and Ebenezer ARP church (near the County Line church, organized in 1880, building subscription done, but the building was never built and in 1882 the church was disorganized). Also, ministers often founded multiple churches. The History of Freestone County, Volume I (Narrative #415) states that elder Jeremiah Terry Seely "founded multiple churches in Freestone County including one for the colored at Rocky Branch, a Baptist church for the colored at Shiloh near Kirven, and a Baptist church at Wortham that stood where Keethley's Service Station is now located". The same source mentions that the Reverend James Hill Bounds in Narrative #135 was a traveling Methodist preacher in Mississippi and later moved to Texas where he built a church in Tehuacana Valley near his home (3 miles south of Wortham). In 1867, Rev. Bounds organized the first church in Wortham that hosted services by the Primitive Baptist and Methodist Episcopal. Remember over time churches merge, move, disband, split, and change their name. Common marriage book abbreviations: "M. G." stands for "Minister of the Gospel" and "J. P." for "Justice of the Peace". "V.D.M." means "verbi Dei minister" (Minister of the Word of God). "O. M. G." is "Ordained Minister of the Gospel". William Scott Compton performed marriages and was a church elder, but was never ordained. He always put the initials of "L. D." for his title. What "L.D." refers to is unknown to me at this point, but it is probably "licensed deacon". "B. M." is "Baptist Minister"