The John Hunter Lattimore Family

By Minnie Pearl Lattimore Childs

My great-grandfather, Benjamin Daniel Lattimore, came from Ireland in 1773. He and his wife had several children, and when they grew up they emigrated to several states—Virginia, Kentucky, North and South Carolina, and my grandfather moved to Alabama. In 1850, he came to Texas and bought several hundred acres of land southeast of Jacksonville, where Mr. and Mrs. T. F. Keasler now live. He built a large house, as he had four sons and two daughters and hundreds of slaves. He was a farmer and his wealth was in land and slaves, but when he freed the slaves, I think he was broke like everyone else.

My father was John Hunter Lattimore, and he fought four years in the Civil War and didn't get a scratch. He was in prison in Chicago for four months, and when he was released he started for Jacksonville on foot. His clothes were in rags, no socks, worn out shoes and he was without a penny in his pocket. He walked and would ask for food, but they would slam the door in his face as they could tell he had fought for the South by his tattered gray uniform. He had no place to sleep, but he would rake a few leaves together with his hands and sleep under the stars until he finally made it to the Mason-Dixon line. Sometimes he would go more than 36 hours without food, then would stop at a spring, scoop a little water in his hands. The night before he was to get home, he stopped at a farmhouse in Lone Star, Texas, and asked for food. The man of the house reached out, took his hand and urged him into the house. He asked his wife to prepare food for my father, but he became ill after he had eaten as he had had nothing for so long. While he was eating the man prepared a wash tub full of hot water in the kitchen, gave him clean clothes and shoes to put on in the morning. He didn't know how to thank them, but he never forgot it, as he told me about it when I was old enough to understand.

He married my mother, Nellie Catherine Knight, soon after the war. She was the daughter of a young widow, with three sisters and one brother and I think they were very poor. My father and mother had ten children, I being the ninth. My oldest sister, Sally, married Bart Skelton, then Luda married DeWitt Ragsdale and Mollie married Sebastian Burgess. Mattie died at seven years, Charlie at seventeen and my brother, Sam, at seven months. My next brother, John, married Motie Poole, and Jim married Belle Sherman. I married Carter A. Childs and my brother, Cal, married Esther Ross. She and I are the only family members surviving.

My father was a farmer and an officer of the law. He was an excellent provider and always had two or more farms, and worked them with hired help.

They were members of the Methodist Church, where he taught a Men's Bible Class. He was a Mason and a Worshipful Master and his picture is in the Lodge Hall. My mother taught a girls' class, and I was in it, too.

We lived in what is called old Jacksonville until I was about fourteen; then we moved to town and lived on South Ragsdale Street. Three of the children had died and the others had married, except Jim, and my younger brother, Cal. I had a very happy life on the farm, and learned a lot as my mother was not well, and taught me all the essential things I should know about housekeeping, sewing, cooking.

After we moved to town, the children stayed in school until they married. In the meantime, I married Carter A. Childs and we all had families of our own. My father and mother moved to the farm east of town and Carter and I lived in their little house until we bought one of our own. My mother died Thanksgiving Day, November 30, 1911. My father lived with my brother, Jim, for a while, then came to live with us. He was an invalid for two years before he died in 1917.

All of the J. H. Lattimore family. Minnie Pearl (Mrs. C. A. Childs), second from the right.

This ad was in the Progress for the 50th Jubilee, dated July, 1922. Mr. and Mrs. J. H. Bolin operated the Bolin Drug Store on Commerce near Main, from the early years of Jacksonville until his death in the middle thirties. "Miss Willie," as she was affectionately called by many, was a niece of W. A. Brown. She served as organist for First Methodist Church for a generation, and was well known in the community. She left her homeplace to Lon Morris College, now the site of Scurlock Center, and was a patron of the school many years.