POWHATAN LAWRENCE COUNTY ARKANSAS GENEALOGY TRAILS Powhatan Courthouse State Park Powhatan, pronounced "Pow-uh-TAN," was named for the Indian chief Powhatan, whose three empires in the early 17th century covered most of eastern Virginia. Powhatan was the father of Pocahontas. Long before Powhatan was incorporated as a town, the area was occupied by Osage Indians. In 1817, they were moved onto reservations outside the state. In 1820, John Ficklin established a ferry on the Black River and built a house on the hill northwest of the ferry. The house, destroyed by fire during the Civil War, was probably the first residence of Powhatan. Historians give Ficklin credit as the town's founder. The first steamboat to arrive at Powhatan-the Laurel-docked at Ficklin Ferry in 1829. Cargo and passengers arrived and embarked from sternwheelers and keel boats, and crossed the rivers on ferries. Ficklin Ferry, on the Black River, was once described as "the most accessible point at all seasons of the year from Jacksonport to Pocahontas." This ferry, later called the Powhatan Ferry, increased in importance into the 1880s. Powhatan was the chief shipping point for a large territory. Steamboat passengers boarded at Powhatan to travel down the Black and White Rivers, then up or down the Mississippi to their final destinations. Eventually, steamboat transportation declined and was used mostly by the timber business. Powhatan began its decline when the Frisco Railroad bypassed the town, roads improved, and rail travel began to overtake river passage. Powhatan Courthouse The period after 1869 was one of rapid growth and community development. Upon selection of Powhatan as county seat, commissioners were appointed to select the site for a new courthouse. The first courthouse, completed in 1873, burned in 1885, the foresight of fireproof vaults protected the records, some dating to 1813. A second two-story courthouse, built with brick manufactured at a local kiln, was erected on the same foundation. The cornerstone of the courthouse standing today was laid May 10, 1888. In 1963, voters decided to consolidate two county seats into one at Walnut Ridge, and in 1966, county officials departed Powhatan for the last time. The Northeast Arkansas Regional Archives is located on the first floor of the Powhatan Courthouse. The courthouse was placed on the National Register of Historic Places in February of 1970. It became a state park in 1974. Source: Arkansas Department of Parks & Tourism Source - Lawrence County , Arkansas 1895 Photo - Steamer Bragg, running on Black River , Makes weekly trips from Newport to the Missouri Line. POWHATAN. This town is located on Black River, is the present county site, and lias a beautiful and splendidly built court-house, which would be an ornament to a city of ten times the number of inhabitants. It has three churches, a good public school-house, and is peopled by about 300 inhabitants, among whom may be found some of the most substantial and leading citizens of our county. It was the landing point on the western bank of Black River for steamboats, in earlv day's, for a long distance above or below its site.
Charles C. Childers. As a public official Hon. Charles C. Childers has given most loyal and effective service both in Arkansas and Oklahoma, in which latter state ho represented Garfield County in both the Fourth and Fifth General Assemblies of the Legislature. He is one of the broad-minded, appreciative and progressive citizens of Oklahoma, is here the owner of valuable farm property and has identified himself most worthily with the industrial and civic affairs of the state. In addition to giving a general supervision to his own farm properties he has for several years past had charge of the farm connected with the Oklahoma State Home for the Feeble Minded, at Enid, in which thriving little city, the judicial center of Garfield County, he maintains his residence. Charles Clarence Childers was born in Lawrence County, Arkansas, on the 1st of September, 1872, and is a son of William and Clara (Wells) Childers, the latter of whom died at the age of forty-two years. William Childers likewise was born and reared in Lawrence County, Arkansas, a representative of a sterling pioneer family of that state, and he was long one of the honored and influential citizens of Lawrence County, where he served as county treasurer and for two years in the dual office of sheriff and tax collector. In the Civil war he was a valiant soldier of the Confederacy, and in the command of Gen. Sterling Price he took part in numerous engagements, including the battle of Vicksburg, Mississippi. He continued to reside in Lawrence County until his death, at the age of sixty-one years, and he passed away in 1907. His first wife, mother of the subject of this review, passed her entire life in Lawrence County, her parents having removed from their native State of Louisiana and become pioneer settlers in Arkansas. William Childers contracted a second marriage and of the children of the first union five are now living, five children of the second marriage likewise surviving the honored father. Of the first marriage the surviving children other than he whose name initiates this article are: William S., who was foreman of concrete construction in the erection of the fine Oklahoma State Capitol; John C. is clerk of Lawrence County, Arkansas; Grover C. is a farmer at Plant City, Florida, and there also resides the one sister, Mrs. Mollie Coffman. Of the children of the second marriage it may be recorded that Thurman M., Carlisle and App T. reside in Grant County, Oklahoma; Nelson remains in Lawrence County, Arkansas; and Clara Lee maintains her home in Oklahoma City. In the public schools of his native county Charles 0. Childers gained his early education, which was supplemented by a course of study in the high school in the City of Memphis, Tennessee. Thereafter he was a student in the University of Arkansas until the close of his junior year, in 1893, when he returned to his native county and assumed a clerical position in the office of his father, who was then sheriff and tax collector of the county. He was elected as his father's successor in this dual office, of which he continued the incumbent for two terms of two years each, and had the distinction of being the youngest sheriff in Arkansas. He was then elected district clerk and ex-officio register of deeds of Lawrence County, and he held this position likewise for four consecutive years, his long and effective service in public office in his native county showing the estimate placed upon him and that in his case there could be no application of the scriptural aphorism that "a prophet is not without honor save in his own country.'' In 1908 Mr. Childers came to the new State of Oklahoma and settled on a farm near Hillings, Noble County. Two years later he removed to a farm near Covingtou, Garfield County, and after there remaining one year he established his residence in Enid, where he has since given much of his time and attention to the active supervision of the farm of the State Home for the Feeble Minded. He is the owner of a well improved farm in Grant County and also of a valuable farm property in Roger Mills County, and city property in Enid. In 1912 Mr. Childers was made democratic nominee for representative of Garfield County in the State Legislature to which he was elected without opposition. During the session of the Fourth Legislature he was chairman of the Coinmitteo on Levees, Ditches, Drains and Irrigation; was the author of the law that substituted electrocution for hanging in this state, and of the bill that was enacted and provides for and authorizes the organization of farmers' mutual insurance companies. It was primarily due to his earnest efforts, also, that an appropriation was secured for the erection of au additional building at the Home for Feeble Minded, an institution in which he has taken the deepest interest. In the Fifth Legislature Mr. Childers was chairman of the Committee on Insurance, and was associated with Senator William A. Chase, of Nowata, in the authorship of a bill providing for free textbooks in the public schools, besides which he was especially active in the promotion of measures designed to establish a minimum wage scale for women employed, to place the school land income in the direct jurisdiction of the state treasurer, to enable county attorneys to adjust probate matters, to establish hospitals for railroad workers, and to pension the widows of men who were killed in a fight between officers and prisoners in the State Penitentiary at McAlester, in 1814. Loyalty and progressivencss dominated the course of Mr. Childers as one of the efficient legislators of the state, and his record in the Legislature is one that will reflect enduring honor on his name. At Enid Mr. Childers is affiliated with the Blue Lodge and Chapter of the Masonic Fraternity, and with Camp No. 35 of the Woodmen of the World. At Covington, another of the flourishing towns of tJarfield County, he holds membership in the lodge of the Independent Order of Odd Fellows. Both he and his wife are members of the Methodist Episcopal Church, South. In Lawrence County, Arkansas, November 3d, 189.1, was solemnized the marriage of Mr. Childers to Miss Elizabeth Wells, a native of Kentucky, born December 17, 1876, daughter of Ira and Emily (Morgan) Wells, both natives of Kentucky. The father died in 1903 at Powhatan, Arkansas; the mother is still living aged seventy-two years (1916). They were parents of six sons and four daughters, all living but the youngest child, Bell, who died at the age of six years; the eldest of the family, Fred, of Oklahoma; William of Kansas; E. Jesse, of Nebraska; Nancy, of Kansas; Joseph, of Kansas; (Elizabeth) Leah, of Arkansas; John of Kansas; Madison of Arkansas, and Bell, deceased. Their only child, Ruth, born October 20, 1897,
is now a student in Phillips University, at Enid, from which she
graduates in June, 1917, besides being one of the popular young women
in the social circles of her home city, she is a fine musician. Source- Southwestern Reporte "powhatan, Arkansas, March 17, 1883. "George H. Nettleton, Esq., Gen'l Manyr. and Pres. K. C, S. & M. E. R. —Dear Sir: A few days ago I was compelled to assign the 15 per cent, retained by the company for the following reasons: As my work is approaching its finish and end, and having had a strong and large force of men, and under the above circumstances having no use of so many men, I am and was compelled to discharge most of them, and they want and were compelled to have their wages before pay-day; and having used all my available means, and my only chance to realize money was by assigning above per cent, held back by the company, and the same I assigned to Mess. Adler, Goldman & Co., -of St. Louis, as they advanced me amount needed to pay these men off; and jou will please accept order should Mess. Adler, Goldman & Co., send order I assigned to them. It is understood with Adler, Goldman & Co. that they are not to receive the money of the 15 per cent, until final settlement is made 'by the company with me. Trusting you will give this your kind attention, I remain Yourg, truly, Henry Boas." The circuit court, as is shown by the instructions given and refused, tried the case on the theory that although these memoranda show an inaccuracy in the paper executed by Boas on the thirteenth March, 1888, in being addressed to Nettleton, president of the Kansas City, Springfield & Memphis Railroad -Company, instead of to him as president of the Springfield & Memphis Kailroad Company, still, if the subject-matter of said paper was understood alike by the parties affected thereby, and the Springfield & Memphis Railroad Company was known by the name of the Kansas City, Springfield & Memphis Railroad Co., as well as by its own special name, and was managed by the same -chief officers, that then the court should disregard the abbreviation "K. C.," and treat the paper as properly addressed; and also upon the further theory that the paper dated the thirteenth of March, 1883, signed by Boas, and addressed to Nettleton, was, when signed and delivered, an assignment to plaintiffs of the percentage retained by defendant under the contract between Boas -and the said Springfield & Memphis Railroad Company, and the said company, -on receiving notice thereof, could not thereafter rightfully pay over said retained percentage to said Boas, whether it consented to said assignment or not. It is insisted by counsel that the theory on which the case was tried is erroneous in this: that it was not competent for the court to apply the assignment to the subject-matter by rejecting or disregarding the letters "K. C." in the description of Nettleton's office. This objection is sufficiently replied to by section 301,1 Greenl. Ev., where itissaid: "There is another class of cases, namely, those in which, upon applying the instrument to its subject-matter, it appears that in relation to the subject, whether person or thing, the description is true in part, but not true in every particular. The rule in such cases is derived from the maxim, falsa demonstratio non nooet, cum de oorpore constat. Here so much of the description as is false is rejected, and the instrument will take effect if a sufficient description remains to ascertain its application." The numerous authorities cited in the brief of
counsel are to the same effect as the above. Besides this, Nettleton
was the president of both these corporations, and, although addressed
as the president of the Kansas City, Springfield & Memphis road, inasmuch as the evidence tended to show that the Springfield & Memphis
Railroad Company was also known by the name of the Kansas City,
Springfield & Memphis Railroad Company, it was competent to remove
the latent ambiguity thus arising by resorting to other evidence on the
same subject, calculated to explain the intent. King v. Fink, 51 Mo. 212; 1 Greenl. Ev. It is next insisted that the assignment in question is an attempt to divide or transfer to plaintiffs a part only of an entire demand, without the consent of defendant, and that, therefore, the theory adopted by the court in trying the case was erroneous. The principle invoked by counsel that a part of an entire debt cannot be assigned without the consent of the debtor is undoubtedly correct, and has received the sanction of this court in the cases cited by counsel; but we are of the opinion that it has no application to the facts in this case. Under the contract payments equal to 85 per cent of the contract value of the work to be done by Boas were to become due and payable monthly, and 15 per cent of the contract value of the work done in each month was to be retained by the company, and to be paid within 90 days after the entire completion of the work. While the contract is entire, there can be no doubt, under the ruling in the case of Union R. & T. Co. v. Traube, 59 Mo. 363, that each monthly payment as it became due constituted a separate demand, for the recovery of which an action could be maintained; and there can be noquestion as to the fact that within 90 days after the completion of the work, in the event of the non-payment of the retained percentage, an action would be maintainable for its recovery as a separate and distinct debt or demandIt is this separate demand as an integer which is the subject of the assignment, and hence the rule invoked by counsel has no application. Having considered and disposed of the questions raised by the appeal affecting the merits of the case, and finding no reversible error in the record, the judgment is hereby affirmed, in which all concur. r Return to Lawrence County Index Page Return to Arkansas Genealogy Trails ©June 2006 Arkansas Genealogy Trails |