Thomas Stalworth Henderson Family at Farquhar Cemetery

Grains from the Sandbar By Betty Dunn

November 30, 2022 - 00:00

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This week we learn of the Thomas Stalworth Henderson Family History at the Old Farquhar Cemetery. He had two wives and several children buried in this historic cemetery.

Henderson was born at Abbeville, South Carolina. As a young boy he became deaf from an ear infection. Deafness kept him from being ‘mustered’ into the local militia, but his attempt led to his meeting his first love, Nancy Harriet King Red. They were married in April 1840 at ages 20 and 16. In 1846, they along with two young children and several slaves headed for Texas along with several of Nancy’s siblings.

Arriving at Washington-on-the-Brazos, Henderson purchased a tract of land along the Old Independence Road that was the same as the Farquhar plantation. He continued to purchase more land to build a two-story frame house, slave quarters and outbuildings. Between 1846 and 1859 the Henderson’s had five more children. Nancy died a few weeks following the birth of the last on February 12, 1859. A gravestone marks her burial in the Farquhar Cemetery.

In March of 1860, Henderson married the widow Virginia C. Hardwick of Grimes County. Family histories described her as a “nervous, unhealthy woman who kept the house closed and hot.” Virginia died May 9, 1864 with a gravestone marking her burial in the Farquhar Cemetery. Before her death two children were born: son, James E. A. B., on April 11, 1861, who died a year later in 1862, and a daughter, Bettie C. born on June 29, 1863, who died Aug. 29, 1864. Both these children have gravestones with their birth and death dates in the Farquhar Cemetery.

Next, in December 1866, Henderson wed Ann E. Baxter Hatfield, widow of a Washington-on-the-Brazos cotton planter, who, like Henderson, had a cotton gin and press driven by horses. The newly married Hendersons are listed in the 1870 U. S. Census record living next door to the Robert and Ivah Jean (Wells) Hendley Moore family. Wife Ann died between the time of the 1870 U. S. Census and 1874. She is buried in another unidentified local cemetery.

Henderson, now thrice a widower, took a trip to Marshall, Texas to visit a sister, Eleanor Henderson Lake. Here he met Sue Eastland Hill, a fellow South Carolinian. They were married in April 1874 and are recorded in the 1880 census as living at Marshall with no children in the household.

Three of Henderson and his first wife Nancy’s sons gained prominence in Texas. John became a judge of the Texas Court of Appeals. Son, Thomas S., living at Cameron, served as chairman of the board of University of Texas regents, and Honorable Samuel Henderson served Brazos County in the Texas Legislature.

Son, John, had a connection with Baylor University at Independence as both a student and teacher. At the end of John’s junior year at Baylor in 1860 he enlisted as a private in the Fifth Regiment of the Texas Brigade for military service in Virginia. At the 1862 Battle of Sharpsburg (Antietam) he lost an arm and returned to Independence.

Photos of all three Henderson sons now hang on the east wall of Independence Baptist Church.

Henderson had to be a trusted friend as well as a good neighbor to the Farquhars, as he is a witness to both James Lockhart Farquhar and his wife, Huldah (Wells) Farquhars’ wills. The 1870 U. S. Census finds the Farquhars living in the Henderson household.

Henderson died at Marshall on April 19, 1900 at the age of 81 years. In the Daughters of the Republic book, Patriot Ancestor, a Brenham, Texas newspaper refers to Henderson’s death as “removing from the walks of men one of the oldest landmarks of Texas…of fine intellect, correct principles and sterling worth.”