Hill County presented by Genealogy Trails

Benjamin Winslow Dudley Hill, M. D., of Dawson has been identified with this locality since 1886, when he came here as a young physician, newly graduated from the medical department of the University of Tennessee. Since that time he has steadily advanced in his profession to a leading and recognized position, but his strength as a citizen is based not only on his successful and honorable record as a medical practitioner, but as a business man, a financier, and a thoroughly useful and helpful citizen who has steadfastly allied himself with those movements which have made for civic betterment and general progress. Doctor Hill was born in Warren county, Tennessee, January 3, 1863, and is a son of Jonathan and Vesta (Scott) Hill.

The Hill family originated in Wales, and some of its members came to America during Colonial days, settling in Virginia, and from there drifting to Georgia and later to Tennessee. Ervin Hill, the grandfather of Doctor Hill, died in Tennessee when a comparatively young man, being one of the pioneers of the Volunteer state, where his father, Henry Hill, settled. Jonathan Hill, the father of Doctor Hill, was born in Warren county, Tennessee, and was a farmer of the slaveholding class of citzenship of that state. He was on detail for the Confederacy during the war between the North and the South, and had two brothers in that service. He also had a brother killed at the battle of Monterey, Mexico, during our war with that country, and another brother died on the gulf while returning from that war. The family has ever been lined up with the Democratic party, and Jonathan Hill had two uncles who helped frame the constitution of Tennessee. One of them, H. L. W. Hill, went to Congress, and another brother, George W. Hill, after whom Hill county, Texas, was named, served as secretary of war under President Houston, was one of the congressmen of the Texas Republic, subsequently returned to his medical practice in Navarro county, and died in the vicinity of Dawson in 1859 without issue. Benjamin J. Hill, a cousin of Jonathan Hill, was a Confederate brigadier-general. Jonathan Hill was married in Warren county, Tennessee, to Vesta Scott, who was a daughter of Cooper Scott, a native of North Carolina, who moved to Tennessee in boyhood and spent the balance of his life as a farmer. He married Elizabeth McCullom, and they became the parents of a large family. The children of Jonathan and Vera (Scott) Hill were as follows: Ervin L., who is in business as a merchant at Dawson; Lucian C., who died at Hillsboro, was once county judge of Hill county and left a family at his death; Dr. B. W. D. of this review; Lee, a farmer of Dawson; Sue, who is the wife of C. M. Better of Waco, and Miss Linda, who is engaged in teaching school at Sacaton, Arizona.

As Doctor B. W. D. Hill grew to manhood, he attended the public schools of his native county, and later was a student at Irving College, and, after leaving that institution, began life as a country school teacher. This he followed for ten months in Grundy and Sequachie counties, and then chose medicine as his life work and began his preparation in the medical school previously mentioned. When he graduated, in 1885, he entered practice at his home place, and was there a year before coming to the West. Doctor Hill came to Navarro county without acquaintances and found Dawson a wooden town with a good farming trade and with four physicians already here—Kirksey, Dean, Berry, and Meredith, all of whom have since vanished. During the quarter of a century or more that he has been located here he has taken postgraduate work in New Orleans, at Tulane University, in the Post-Graduate School at Chicago, and the Polyclinic at New Orleans. He has been president of the Navarro County Medical Society and is a member of the State and American Medical Associations.

Soon after coming here, Doctor Hill became identified with farming in Navarro county, and, associated with his brother, purchased 633 acres of raw land, which they brought nearly all under the plow, put six buildings upon it, and, after years of cultivation, disposed of it. They also purchased other tracts of land and have given labor to numbers of wage-workers as farmers. Doctor Hill has devoted his farms to cotton raising and grain. He took an interest next in the promotion of the Dawson Cotton Oil Company, of which he was vice president, and was next prominent in the organization of the First State Bank of Dawson, being elected its vice president, and in 1909 was elected its president, a position he now holds. The bank was chartered with a capital of $25,000 seven years ago, and now has $85,000 in the surplus and undivided profits. The vice president is J. C. Keitt and the cashier C. O. Weaver, the other members of the board of directors being P. L. Adams, M. L. Berry, J. L. Taylor, F. L. Hill, J. F. Sims, W. N. Matthews, and C. W. Akers, all well known in and about Dawson. In 1913 Doctor Hill purchased the Dawson Supply Company, which he is conducting at this time. This venture is in the nature of a department store, and, with all its departments, is the chief business place of the town, handling dry goods, hardware, saddles, harness and implements. Doctor Hill has extended his building interests only by the investment of his capital in improved property in Dawson.

In politics, Doctor Hill is a Democrat, and has taken an active part in the success of his party in this county, having served as precinct chairman on several occasions and as county chairman during the Bailey and Johnson fight for delegates to the national convention at Denver. His first state convention was at Waco, and the next at Dallas, when Governor Campbell was nominated, and since that time has been frequently selected as delegate, but has declined the service. He advocated Woodrow Wilson for president at the time the Professor was elected governor of New Jersey, and has been steadfast in his support. Dr. Hill has served Dawson as city health officer for five years and as president of the school board for a period of four years. Fraternally, he belongs to the Blue Lodge, Chapter, and Council of the Masonic order.

On January 17, 1893, Doctor Hill was married at Dawson to Miss Cynthia Adams, a daughter of Peter L. Adams, M. D., who practiced medicine near Dawson, and came here prior to the Civil War from Tennessee, and served as a soldier in that struggle. Ten children have been born to Doctor and Mrs. Hill, namely: Ermine, Mark, Annie, Ada, Robert, Virginia, Joe, Evelyn, Lynn, and Benjamin Winslow Dudley, Jr. [Source: A history of Texas and Texans By Frank White Johnson, Eugene Campbell Barker, Ernest William Winkler Published by American Historical Society, 1914]