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History of Eastland County, Texas by Mrs. George
Langston, Dallas, Texas, A. D. Aldridge & Co., Stationers, Printers
and Book Binders, 1904
Submitted by
Jim D. VanDerMark |
Pages 011 to 014
Period I – 1858 to 1873Chapter II
The First Settlers.
The creation of those new Counties caused a stir throughout the
contiguous frontier, and several settlements were made even in the
first year.
The first man who came to the County was a Mexican, Frank Sanches.
He had worked for Thomas Donahoo, of Parker, County, but came here
with his own stock and located between the Jim Neal Creek and its
junction with the Leon.
In 1855 or ’56 John Flannagan emigrated from Kentucky to Texas, and
settled on Kickapoo Creek, in Parker County. When the new counties
were laid off, the impulse to “grow up with the country” again
possessed him, and, moving over into Eastland with his family, he
built a home on Colony Creek, about eleven miles from the center of
the County. He was the first white man who moved into the County.
One can but wonder if he looked down the years, and, passing by the
choice locations of the Palo Pinto Creek section, south the center
of the County for Financial reasons. Mr. Flannagan had a wife and
four children, Golston, Wesley, Julia Ann and “Bud.”
It is curious that a man, forgetting this he once loved, and moved
by the spirit of unrest, will sever ties of long standing and expose
himself and his family to untried dangers. This strange influence
burned in the heart of W. H. Mansker as he sowed and reaped on his
farm in Arkansas, and was fanned to flames by news of the Texas
lands. With his family he pushed across the unsettled wastes of
Easter and Middle Texas, and stopped awhile in Parker County, but
hearing of the Leon country he moved on and camped on a lake in the
southern part of Eastland County. Later he built a home there, and
the lake still bears his name.
The next to cross the boundary line were James Ellison from Georgia;
J. M. Ellison from somewhere in Texas; Dr. Richardson from Arkansas,
with their families, and the Gilberts, four or five young men from
Alabama. All these took up or bought surveys around Mansker Lake;
Ellison to the south, at Ellison’s Springs, where he still lives;
the Gilberts, Jim Jasper and Tom, at Jewell, and Sing and Sam,
brothers and cousins to the other Gilberts, three and one-half miles
below Jewell on Sabano Creek. This ranch is now known as the Morgan
place.
Following these was C. C. Blair, who came from Georgia to Alabama,
stopped awhile in Collin and Parker Counties, and finally settled
six or seven miles northeast of Mansker Lake. A little later this
settlement became known as Blair’s Fort.
W. C. McGough came from Georgia and camped at Blair’s Fort. His
first son, born at the Fort Aug. 17, 1861 was the first white child
born in the County. |
