About 1846 Samuel H. Walker and his wife and four children migrated to Texas from Chickasaw County, Mississippi. They came first into Upshur County, and later to Parker, Jack, and Wise County. Many of the Walker clan migrated with them.
Texas had become a state in 1845 and land grants were available in the rich, open land, offering the oportunity for a better life. Many who were brave and hardy faced the very real Indian problems and the hardships of frontier life.
Among those born in Mississippi and traveling to Texas with the family was our George Washington Walker (1) age 3; and Martha Matilda (Aunt Sis) age 6 years old. Also a son, Robert and another daughter.
Samuel and his family settled in Parker County and filed a land patent for a 160 acres of land on the South Fork of Walnut Creek, as attested by land records filed on Sept. 16, 1859, in Parker County. This land is in the southern part of Parker County, very near the Wise County Line.
By the 1860 Census, the family had 8 children; two sons, and six daughters, the youngest being six months old. Samuel was 47 and Emma was 42. According to estate papers (filed by their son, George), Samuel died in July 1863, and Emma Walker died about 1865, both in Parker County, Texas. Neither had ever been married to anyone else.
The WALKER children as best I can find out were:
MARTHA MATILDA (f) born Jan.1, 1840, died Nov. 28, 1915 (Aunt Sis)
ROBERT MILTON (m) born 1838 (or 1841)
GEORGE WASHINGTON born Dec 24, 1842, married Mary Hefley, died Feb 10, 1918
M (Elmira ?) married Henry Plaster
BH married B.B. Roberts
SE or A married W. Matlock
R / L E (Ellie(?) married H. S. Bruton
ANGELA/ Amanda (?) married W.A. Long had one son, W.A. Long, Jr. and died about 1868
By the 1870 Census, George W. and his bride of less than a year, Mary S. Hefley, occupied the family homestead and were caring for his sisters... Martha Matilda (crippled by a tree fall according to census records) and the youngest child, Ella. George W. was 26 and Mary was 19.
By the 1880 Census time George, 36, and Mary , 29, have produced 5 little Walkers.
ATLANTA (f) was 10, and named for Mary's mother, Atlanta Adlanto Carraway, who died when Mary was a toddler, in Mississippi.
EMMA RUTH (f) 8, named for George's mother.
JAMES MILTON (m) 5, named for great Grand-father(?), uncles(?)
GEORGE WASHINGTON (m) 3, named for own father.
JOHN MARTIN (m) 1, named for Mary's father.
1900 Census would add:
ALICE (f) born about 1881, may have been named for Mary's half-sister
JULIE BELL (f) born 1883
SAM HARVEY (m) about 1885, named for George's father.
WILLIAM RICHARD (m) born July 4, 1890, named for Mary's brother
DOLLIE (f) born April 21, 1895.
Mary lists 12 children born to her by 1900, with 10 of them still living.
Alice seems to have died before 1910, and James Milton died in 1911.
Atlanta married Charles Thomas Jackson. They are both buried in Veal Station Cemetery.
Emma Ruth, who married George Randolph Miller, spent a number of years in the State Hospital in Terrell, Texas, She and G.R. are both buried in the Boonsville Cemetery.
James Milton married Maggie Calhoun (daughter of Cloud Barton Calhoun) After the birth of two daughters, Ada and Esther, they divorced before 1905.
George Washington married Allie Bell Calhoun, sister of Maggie,* and they lived in Boonsville all their lives. The are buried in the family plot in the Boonsville Cemetery.
* Mittie Ida Calhoun, another sister of Allie and Maggie, married John Allen Miller.
John Martin married Bettie (Elizabeth) Bishop. They had two sons, Iva and George, before Bettie died in 1905. John lived until 1967, and is buried beside her in the Boonsville Cemetery.
Alice M. married and died early...perhaps to a Hobbs or Hobson??????
Julie Bell married Limuel Linder Evetts, from another well-to-do family near Willow Point. He deserted her and they divorced. She is buried in Eastland (1943) and lies beside her daughter, who died at age 25 in 1935.
Sam Harvey married Bobbie Cora Glass and they are both buried in the Megargle, Texas Cemetery. He died in an accident in 1939 (truck or train), and she died in 1971.
William Richard married Minnie Gregg, and they produced a son and two daughters, before he left. They are buried in separate plots in the Boonsville Cemetery.
Dollie, the family beauty, was also doomed to an unhappy marriage. She lost her only son in a fire at age 5, in 1919. There was one daughter, Twilight. Dollie and her son share a tombstone, in the Boonsville Cemetery. The children's father, Arlie Stewart, lies in another plot not too far away.
***end of part 1****