WILLIAMSON COUNTY, TEXAS
WILLIAMSON COUNTY, TEXAS
Obituaries/Death Notices
(Bartlett is located in both Williamson and Bell counties, and the Bartlett
Tribune covered both, so make sure and check our Bell county website for data too!)
Child Killed by Rattlesnake
Belton, Texas, Aug. 19—News reached here yesterday that two little girls, who reside with their parents near Sparta, this county, were out in the orchard gathering peaches. One was shaking them from the tree and when the other stepped to pick up the fruit a rattle snake struck her, from the effects of which she died in a short time.
[The Bartlett Tribune (Bartlett, Tex.), Vol. 21, No. 18, Ed. 1, Friday, August 24, 1906 - Submitted by Robyn Greenlund]
Beulah Bailey
Mrs. Chas. C. Bailey Dead.
Monday morning at 7:30 o’clock at the family residence in this city Mrs. Chas. C. Bailey, aged 41 years, 4 months and 17 days, died very suddenly from heart trouble, with which she had been afflicted for several years.
The funeral services were held at the family residence Tuesday morning at 9:30 o’clock. Rev. Berry of the First Methodist Church and Elder Homer Mc Carty of the Central Christian Church conducting the sad rites. The attendance was large, and the scene pathetic. The many beautiful floral offerings fully attested the popularity of the deceased. The interment was in the Bartlett Cemetery in the presence of a large concourse of relatives and friends.
Mrs. Bailey was Miss Beulah Ferguson, and was united in marriage to Mr. C. C. Bailey in 1898. To this union was born six children, four of whom are living, the youngest being an infant of only a few days. In early life Mrs. Bailey accepted Christianity, uniting with the Methodist Church and lived a consistent life. She lived for her home, her husband and her children and the good she could do for humanity. She was a ray of sunshine wherever she went, and was admired and respected by all who knew her. The knowledge of her death will be a sorrow to scores of friends of the family throughout this section. In her death the church loses a faithful worker, the husband a devoted wife, the children a loving and affectionate mother, brothers and sisters a loyal sister, and her associates a true and a tried friend. To them we would say grieve not, for she is now released from earthly care, and her weary body no longer holds her spirit, but endowed with immortality, her ransomed soul is walking the sunlit hills of glory. [The Bartlett Tribune and News (Bartlett, Tex.), Vol. 28, No. 47, Ed. 1, Friday, June 19, 1914 - Submitted by Robyn Greenlund]
Sam Bass
The End of a Bandit
How Sam Bass Met a Violent Death In a Texas Town
In the little town of Round Rock, in Williamson county, Tex., not more than 80 miles distant from Austin, repose the remains of one of the most desperate highwaymen that ever operated in our section," said Mr. I. N. Crocker of the Lone Star State to a reporter.
It was in the spring of 1878 that Sam Bass met his fate in this sleepy little town, and when he died with his boots on the southwest was rid of a criminal who was easily the peer of Jesse James, though he hadn't quite as long a run as that noted outlaw. Bass was a product of Michigan-at least, his sister, a gentle girl, came down from some town in that state to see that his body was decently interred. Bass had collected about him a company of as hardened thieves as ever engineered a hold up. The gang had robbed a number of trains in Missouri and Arkansas and concluded they would make one more good haul in Texas before riding across the border into Mexico, where they proposed to stay in retirement for a season. Bass had planned the looting of the only bank at Round Rock as an easier job and doubtless a better paying one than tackling a train, which feat had been performed too often to be thoroughly safe. By changing his program to raiding a village bank there might be more lucre and less risk.
So on that lovely morning in May when he and his fellow thieves rode into the unsuspicious town they chuckled to think what an easy job it would be to transfer the bank's cash to their pockets. So thoroughly certain were they of getting off with the plunder that they were in no haste about the matter. One wanted to get a shave, another went into a restaurant and so they scattered singly over the place, but there was no understanding as to the time of attack, and a rendezvous was fixed upon. Meanwhile, unknown to the bandits, a squad of mounted Texas rangers had been pressing hard upon the trail of the bad men, and within an hour after the Bass outfit entered Round Rock, Sergeant Dick Ware, with eight or ten rangers, also reached the scene. He wasn't aware of the presence of the robbers, nor did thy dream that the officers of the law were in that vicinity. Neither did any citizen of the town have the remotest idea of the identity of certain rough men, strangers in the place. But they might be cowboys from some distant west Texas cattle ranch, for the presence of such was too common to occasion notice. The climax came quite by accident. One of the ruffians who had sauntered into a store to make a few purchases, in reaching for his purse to make payment, disclosed a big Colt's revolver. The Texan law against carrying guns was strict, and it so happened that the man who saw the weapon was none other than the town marshal, as brave a fellow as ever lived. He walked up to the desperado and said quite courteously:
"My friend, I'll have to relieve you of that six shooter."
"I'll give it to you, then," said the robber with an oath, and in a second had drawn his weapon and fired upon the marshal, who fell dead at the report.
Upon this the robber rushed out of the store, and immediately his comrades came running to the spot, but no faster than did the rangers with their Winchesters, ready for action. In a second it seemed as if both sides had the situation revealed, and the robbers turned to run to where their horses stood tied, a block from where the murder of the marshal occurred. Before he had run 50 yards Dick Ware had sent a bullet into the head of Barnes, Bass' lieutenant, which laid the highwayman low. Bass, mortally wounded, managed to get upon his horse, which he urged to breakneck speed. The animal ran for about three miles till he reached the open prairie and stopped to graze. As he did so his rider, unable to sit longer in the saddle from loss of blood, fell to the ground. When they found him a few hours later, he was dying. He recognized Sergeant Ware as the man who had killed him and said he wanted Ware to have his horse. He regretted their procrastination in robbing the bank, for if they had only known the rangers were so near they could have finished the job and escaped.
[San Jose Mercury News, Published August 02, 1899 -- Submitted by Cathy Danielson]
Elizabeth Connell
Last Monday morning the remains of Elizabeth Connell who died at Hereford, Saturday at 2 p. m. at the age of nine years, were laid to rest in the Stockton cemetery, near here, it being her last wish, we are told, that she be buried there. The funeral services were conducted by Elder Shane, pastor of the Central Christian Church. The remains were accompanied to this place by the parents, Mr. and Mrs. Ed Connell, and Mrs. W. P. Holland, aunt of the little girl. She was sick only a few days and death was caused from typhoid feyer. She was a sweet Christian child and died as she lived.
She was the eldest child and was a great favorite of all who knew her and in the family circle she will be greatly missed. Much happiness and sunshine was brought into that home by her, and a place has been made vacant which can never be filled, but Heaven is made more attractive now to the sorrow stricken parents, since their darling child has gone to dwell in the Celestial city.
[The Bartlett Tribune (Bartlett, Tex.), Vol. 21, No. 18, Ed. 1, Friday, August 24, 1906 - Submitted by Robyn Greenlund]
Thos. A. Evans
Georgetown , Tex. , Nov. 22. – Thos. A. Evans, who was shot near Hutto yesterday, died this evening. John Hysmith was brought to the county jail last night. Albert Hysmith, father of John, was arrested in Georgetown an hour ago, charged with being a party to the offense and is now behind the bars. Hysmith alleges that Evans was advancing on him with a knife when he fired the fatal shot.
Both families are prominent in this county. Evans leaves a wife and fourteen children, three of whom are grown.
[Dallas Morning News – 23 Nov. 1897 - Submitted by Dan Zwakman]
Mrs. L.L. Lyles
Aged Pioneer Lady Dies.
Rogers, June 14. — Mrs. L. L. Lyles, known and loved by everybody as “Grandma,” died at the home of J. I Bradshaw, her son-in-law, near Holland, last Wednesday, and was buried at Valverde cemetery Thursday. She was a native to Georgia, was 86 years old and had lived in this portion of Bell county for at least fifty years. She leaves twelve living children, all of whom have families, and she has something over one hundred grandchildren, Mesdames Hugh King, Jesse Fulton and Dock Whittington of Rogers are grandchildren.
[The Bartlett Tribune and News (Bartlett, Tex.), Vol. 28, No. 47, Ed. 1, Friday, June 19, 1914 - Submitted by Robyn Greenlund]
L. M. Oliphant
Georgetown , Texas , Oct. 25. – The body of Sergeant L. M. Oliphant, who died in Camp Cody , N.M. , Oct. 21, of influenza, arrived here yesterday. He enlisted from Georgetown last November in the Quartermaster Corps.
[Dallas Morning News – 26 Oct. 1918 - Submitted by Marla Zwakman]