When I was three years old, my parents moved to Texas by boat (water) arriving in Red River Territory 8 miles north of Daingerfield on the Dr. John Rutherford place (the Jas. Cunningham) old place then, on April 28th, 1846. M. T Barrier (Mike) moved us up from Jefferson, Texas, in ox wagon. Spring was far advanced. The road, on either side, was stren with ripe wild strawberries. The 1st Legislature was in session. Major Jack Titus, the member from Red River Co., had our territory erected into a County and named Titus for himself. He lived 12 miles east of Clarksville in the White house. He has a grandson, Jack Titus, in Sulphur Springs, Texas, now a candidate for County Treasurer of Hopkins County.

During the summer of 1846, two U.S. Regiments of Cavalry passed our house going overland to the Mexican War; one was a Ky. Regt., the other a Tenn. Regt. My mother and father had many friends and kindred among them.

The seasons were ideal that year--crops were fine, health good. Two little snows that fall and winter. One about Xmas and one latter part of the winter. About Xmas we moved to Charley Barrier's farm two miles west. My father located a homestead of 320 acres, two miles west of us, and 10 miles east from Mt. Pleasant. The Wm. Witt and Si Wright place on the head of Boggy Bo.

The year 1847 was a fine crop year for all crops. A bale of cotton per acre. Price, 6 cents. A good deal of sickness that year. My uncle P. M. Ferguson, my brother P. M., and our neighbor Rev. Jno. B. Cherry died that summer. The Mexican war was at it's height under Gen'l Taylor in Northern Mexico, and my father wanted to go to it, but our having but recently come to the state, and not having our place improved, and we being a young and helpless family, among strangers, my father could not volunteer. The rains came principally at night during crop time in 1847, and then not excessive. One Sunday in May or June, the family took dinner at Chas. Barries, north on the hill, two hundred yards away, in full view of our house. In the afternoon, a thunder shower came up, and during the rain storm we saw something in the cow lot running the calves around; the cows being there, they broke down the fence and went into the lot. My father and Mr. Barrier hurried over to our house in the rain. The cows and calves were out of the lot, and a panther's tracks were all over the lot in the mud. He had been chasing the calves, and cows broke in preventing him from eating one. He probably went off and got a deer, as they were very plentiful.

In the spring of 1848 we moved to our new home. Our nearest neighbor was Jas. Smith, 11/4 miles northeast. The neighborhood E. was 2 miles West, 3 miles to the Horse Creek neighborhood. No settlement north for 20 miles to Dalby Springs and vicinity. We were 8 miles south of White Oak

Bayou and l2 miles from Sulphur Fork of Red River. In the spring and summer, the soldiers from the Mexican War began to return home. The grass, all over the woods, was waist high, and in glades and flats, head high. Deer, frequently, came up in bunches, in gunshot of the house door, and were killed from the door. The woods were alive with native wild animals. A few cattle, horses, and hogs on the range. Gen'l Zachariah Taylor was elected President that year, a Whig nominee, over Gen'l Lewis Cass, the Democrat nominee, for the reason he was a La. [slave] holder and would draw the Soldier vote and the Southern vote as well. Cass. Co.. Texas, two years before had been named for Gen’l Cass. Gen'l Taylor's victorious campaign, in northern Mexico, from Palacento, Resuca De La Palma, Monterrey, and Buenavista, over the Mexican Gen'l Santa Ana, with his superior numerical strength gave Gen'l Taylor national renoun. But I so small, I knew nothing about these things at that time, except to hear them say that the battles were taking place against Mexico and Old Santa Ana, and that some of our neighbors were in the war under Gen'l Taylor. Col Bill Young of Red River Co. raised and commanded two Regts in that war. Two 1 year vols. Young was our Dist. Attv. after the war. He raised, took out, and comanded the 11th Texas Cav. in the C.S.A. in 1861. In 1862, his health failing he resigned and came home to Gainesville, Cooke Co. Texas, and was waylaid and shot to death by brush men--deserters. In 1848, the face of nature was a poem to me. The primitive woods, the high green grass, and the ferns and wild flowers in profusion, intoxicated my little being and have left visions and perfumes that I can never forget, while my memory lasts. There is nothing on earth like it now. In the fall of Nov. 1st, 1865, Indians passed our house one day and set the grass afire all over the country. They were on horses. The men in the neighborhood happened to be gone to town or someplace. On the next morning the families were forted up and 40 men went in pursuit of the Indians.

Five years before the Caddo's had murdered Ambrose Ripley's family, 10 miles west from Mt. Pleasant in Titus Co., near Keiths fort. When my father and the Company overtook the Indians, the first day, they were accosted by the whites to know what they were burning the grass for, they refused to talk, only grunted. The white co. prepared to fire on them; then the old Chief talked; and said that they were friendly and had a permit to hunt, and were Ring firing to kill deer. They were told that they must get out of the white settlements, and stay out, which they promised to do and did so. For several years afterward, we would move and then come across a wigwam and a few Indian mockasins, but no band traveling through the country.

SEASONS
The winter was without snow, the spring of 1848 was wet, but the rain ceased late in May or 1st of June, and no rain all summer. In Oct. a big rain came all at once, but rained no more 'til a big sleet the 1st of December, the biggest sleet I ever saw. It remained on the ground a few days.

Before Christmas, we moved 3 miles west, 35 degrees north, to the Horse Creek neighborhood; there were 11 families, with a school house and church house; some of the neighbors were as close as a half mile apart. We had one 1/2 miles north, and one 1/2 miles south; there was David Young – north, Jesse B. Keith – south, on East Horsecreek 8 miles east, 35 degrees north from Mt. Pleasant. The names of these families were as follows, beside my father’s, J. B. Keith, and D. Young,: Warren C. Keith, Wm Keith and wife, (Parents of the other Keith's) Jo. Keith, J. H. Keith, Wm Tigert, Wm Heath, Wm (Buck) Taylor, Jas. Spencer, and John Rogers and wife. We had school every year, and preaching occasionally. Pardon me for giving a faint description or our home in the wildwood. A neat little cabin, one room and a loft of plank shedded on both sides. A smoke-house, a small peach orchard, 4 acres in cultivation, and a crib and stable. A walled spring in 30 yards. The creek in 50 yards. The green cane lined the creek bottom to the foot of the hills. No switch cane, but big cane--big enough for fishing poles.

The creek was deep, blue and clear, and running all the time; full of fish, and the shoal places could be seen shoals of mussels, by the hundred, moving along on edge, partly open. The woods were alive with snakes, all kinds, and sizes.

There was a ridge of Pine timber, set in a few hundred yards south, tall and stately I thought; and in the winter, in cold weather, or after a rain, those pines would loom up, so lively and green, that I watched them for hours. Nothing will ever be as green to me, as those cane breaks and pines, at our little home, 2 miles north of where the town of Cookville now stands, on the Cotton Belt Ry. The cane vanished, died out, was eaten out in 1852 by 3 ox. The pines have long since been cut; the old neighbors have long since been gathered to their fathers, and but a few of their children remain, and descendants remain in the old neighborhood. The survivors are scattered to the four winds of heaven, so to speak.

I went to my first school in the spring and summer of 18... The wolves howled me to school every morning, and home every evening almost.

I learned to spell in four or five syllables, and my mother learned me how to read, and the first book I read that fall and winter, was the Life of Davey Crockett. It made the hair rise on my head to read of his hairbreadth escapes in bear hunting, and the cougar fight on the Brazos. I was, especially charmed with his poem, or Farewell Address, which I memorized, and although I have not seen it but once since, 1868, I remember it yet. It ran like this I think:

Farewell to the mountains, whose maizes to me,
Were more beautifully fair, than Eden could be;
No fruit was forbidden, but nature had spread
Her bountiful board, and her children were fed.

The hills were our garners and herds wildly grew,
And nature was shepherd and husband man too;
I felt like a monarch, yet thought like a man,
As I thanked. the great Giver, and worshipped his plan.

Farewell to my Country, I've fought for thee well:
When the savage rushed forth, like the demons from hell.
In peace and in war, I have stood by thy side;
My Country, for thee I have lived, would have died!

But now I'm a cast off; my career now is done;
I must wander abroad, like the prodigal son;
Where the wild savage roves, and the broad prairies spread
The fallen despised, will again go ahead.

He wrote that on leaving Tenn. for Texas, in 1836; after Mr. Woodman the one-legged Democrat, beat him for Congress. Crockett had served two terms in Congress as a Whig, but he said that President Jackson's influence was too much for him. So he came to Texas and fell at the Alamo in the massacre of the garrison. But like Marco Bozzaris "his was one of the few of the immortal names that were not born to die”. When the little generals, little Congressmen, little Cabinet Ministers, Governors, and little Presidents have been forgotten and covered up by the dust or time, the name of Davey Crockett, will shine out, like a beacon in a lighthouse.

SEASONS
Dec., 1848, one Snow...part of winter, mild, fine seasons during crop time of 1849, but heavy rains and wet weather in summer, fine crops and much sickness in late summer and fall. Winter rather cold with one snow. Our teacher's name was Boris Cantrel from Tenn. His brother Pinkney moved that year, 1849 to California to the new Gold diggins--overland. Many of our friends and acquaintances went to the Gold Diggins in California, overland, many of them perished, for water crossing the deserts. Some fell sick and were devoured by wolves and other wild animals, others were killed by the Indians. Some reached there, but all did not make fortunes. Daingerfield was the oldest and only town in Titus County in 1846, but when the County was organized late in the fall of 1846 (or early in the year of 1847,) Mt. Pleasant, just west of Henry Jones, was made the County site, it being near geographical center. Titus County as organized originally embraced the territory from the west line of Cass County, west to the east line of Hopkins Co., north to Sulphur River, and south to Cypress--including a piece of territory south of Cypress in the southwest of the county adjoining Winnsboro, Wood Co.--on the Co. line. April 29th, 1875, Morris Co. on the east and Franklin Co. on the west of said Titus Co. were organised, leaving Titus in the middle. About the close or 1849 or early in 1850, my recollection is that President Zechariah Taylor died (his partisans called him old rough and ready). He graduated from West Point Military Academy and took a commission in the Army, and had been continuously in the U.S. Army 'til his nomination to the Presidency, and he had not voted in 40 years. Mi1lard Filmore filled out his unexpired term. Ear1y in 1850, we built a new house 1/4 miles west of Horse Creek on a bluff. An ideal location where we lived for five years.

SEASONS
Winter before January in 1849, cold and clear. One snow during winter. Late cold spring in 1850. Dry, hot summer, no moisture and poor crops.

No snow in winter of 1850 and 5l, mild winter. 1851, long, dry hot summer, and poor crops. Dec. 4th. 1851, grandfather and grandmother King and Uncle John K. King, and Uncle Sam'l McGaughy, his wife, Aunt Bettie, and their family arrived by boat, from near Cleveland, Tenn. Hard freeze, and thick ice just before Christmas. Big rain Christmas day of 1851. Balance of winter mild, cyclone 1st of April 1852, fine crop year: excessive rains in summer and early fall. Much sickness everywhere. Big sleet Christmas of 1852, and heavy snow after Christmas. Fall of 1852, big campaign between Gen'l W. W. Scott. and Gen'l Franklin Pierce for President. Pierce was elected, a Democrat over a Whig. During this year, the school house was moved to 400 yards south of us and called the Keith school house and Keith neighborhood. It was on land donated by Jesse B. Keith, it had a good cold rock spring. Mild winter and early spring in 1853. Fine season and fine crops of every kind.

My father built a new home, a mile east of us, on the Stephenson Ferry Road, 2 and 1/2 miles east from Mt. Pleasant; and we moved to it in Dec. 1853. We had a genuine norther and blizzard a day or so before Christmas. Snowed and froze, and remained for a week; remainder of winter mild. 1854 was wet in late spring and early summer, excessive rains in May and June ‘til about the 20th or 21st of June. There was an eclipse of the sun about June 12th to 15th of a star. Soon as the eclipse was over, it quit raining and rained no more 'til Nov. and then only sprinkled for a few days. The fires got out in the fall, on the Roads from Camps and in the woods from campfires. And like to have burned all the range out. The ground was so dry that the dead trees that burned would burn down to the roots, many feet. The grass roots and turf burned down beneath the surface of the ground, and the canebreaks in the bottoms got afire and burned for days and weeks, during the fall and winter; burning it out by the roots, so that the next spring of 1855 weeds and bushes spring up instead of grass and cane, to great extent. It rained, none of any consequence during the winter of 1854 and 55. Not enough to run in the creeks, nor fill the holes with water. Horses and cattle would go down into the bed of the creeks, to hunt water (at some ford, and wander up or down, for miles maybe) and would starve to death for water. Many did so. There was a wild unsettled tract of country on Horse Creek from David Young’s to the Stephenson Ferry and Mt. Pleasant Road at the 8 mile post, and there was no bridge on said creek to it's mouth, where it emptied into White Oak Bayou, a distance of 7 or 8 miles geographically. Here and there, a cow ford. No road crossed it, no wagon ford, no bridge. The consequences of this long dry weather, was, that the river's dried up. Navigation ceased at our market at Jefferson, Texas, in the fall of 1854. It ceased at Shreveport our next closet market in the early spring, and we had to go to Alexandria for our groceries. The Red River soon got dry there, and for the balance of the summer and fall, we had to go by ox wagons to H….., 350 miles for our groceries and dry goods on to Gaines’ Landing on the Mississippi River. Salt here was $12 per sack, and other heavy freight in proportion. There was just barely enough rain, in the spring and summer to make crops, and crops were fine and health good. The wheat in our neighborhood made and averaged 25 bushels to the acre. In the early spring, we went to Denton territory for our corn and flour. The deer, during the winter of 1854-5, stayed on our wheat day and night. I frequently counted as many as 50 at a time, in daytime, so we stood guard over it. Jo. Keith, was then killing an average of four deer a day, for the horns and hides. So my father said, he thought he could do as well, and as we made no cotton the year before, and groceries had become so high, he would go to killing deer, too. He went at it for three or four weeks, but he never could average but three deer a day. They called the hides "peltry.” The price he received for his peltry and hams at Shreveport was renumerative. He rec’d $1.50 per 1b. for the hams, and 25 cents per lb. for the hides. They averaged 3 to 4 lbs. each hide.

During Nov. 1854, the smoke settled to the ground and remained a month. We had 2 or 3 days of drizzling rain the last of Nov., but it did not clear up the smoke. No snow during the winter, but a slight sleet in January, l855. About December 1st, 1855, a hard rain, followed by a blizzard and heavy snow and continued cold weather 'til in Feb. 1856. The snow lay on the ground four weeks, with the ground frozen all of the time. That was the longest cold spell of weather, since we had come to the state. They said the thermometer went down to 13 or 14 degrees above 0. I think that held the record ‘til January 1st, 1864. 1856 was not a good crop year in our section. A very early spring. A cyclone 11th of April. Dry hot summer; cotton good, but not grain. In Harrison and Smith Count1es, al1 crops were fine. In Dec. 1856. an 11 inch snow -another about the middle of January, 1857. Latter part of January, and through Feb. and March, weather was warm and spring like, and by April 6th, the wheat was headed out. Corn was up and plowed over, and some cotton up. The foliage on the timber was nearly grown. A cold cloudy norther came up Sunday 5th April, blew cold all day, and ceased after night, and cleared up and on the morning of the 6th April 1857, there was a white frost freeze that killed everything green--every living green plant. We had a little shower or two during that week--we had to plant everything over, except wheat. It sprouted up from the roots, and was very thick; but was low to cut and bind with scythe and cradles, as we used then, but our wheat made from 15 to 20 bushe1s to the acre. It was a poor crop year except cotton. It was cold all summer. No [??] and no fruit of any kind. A great comet crossed the heavens from east to west, probably two or three weeks in its passage. Its tail was over half across the zenith, and it was cold all of the time. Winter of 1857-8 fine winter, except a snow and cold spell about mid-winter. Fine seasons, and fine crop year in 1858. Dec. 1st, 1858, a heavy snow. Another about Christmas--another late in winter. Fine seasons and fine crop year.

• John Henry King Recalls the Years 1859-1863, Includes Civil War Experiences
• Genealogy and Family History of John Henry King