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Family of
Gabriel Presley Sturkey aka Jessie Patrick Chastun
Gabriel Presley Sturkey
was born in 1861 in Abbeville County, South Carolina to
Marion Benjamin Sturkey and Mary Logan Cox.
Marion Benjamin Sturkey
family were Swiss immigrant to South Carolina in the 18th
century and Mary Cox and her father Gabriel Cox were
French Hugenot immigrants from the 17th
century.
Marion Benjamin Sturkey
and three of his brothers were soldiers from South
Carolina during the war of Northern Aggression. Marion
Benjamin was wounded in Richmond Virginia, June 1864 and
sent home to convalence. Marion and Mary had a second
child Malcolm Lafayette born 24 December 1865 in
Brodeaux, Abbeville County, South Carolina.
After 1867, Marion
Benjamin Sturkey and wife Mary separated with Mary
taking Malcolm and Marion taking Gabriel.
During the war Marion
Benjamin and his Hampton Legion Brigade, was brigaded
with John Bell Hood’s Texas Brigade and Marion had
several old Army buddies in Texas. Before 1870, Marion
Benjamin went to Texas and worked on the state Capitol
and he left Gabriel with his brother Oscar Sturkey.
Prior to 1880 Oscar
Sturkey sent nephew Gabriel Presley Sturkey to Texas to
be with his father.
Gabriel was unhappy with
his father for abandoning his mother Mary Cox and
younger brother Malcolm Lafayette Sturkey in South
Carolina. Gabriel didn’t stay with his father and struck
out on his own finding employment with a railroad
recently chartered by the name of the New York, Texas
and Mexican and changed his name to Jesse Patrick
Chastun.
On 18 December 1884,
Jessie Patrick Chastun married Mary Jane Paull a young
English emigrant, at the Peach Creek Section House,
between Wharton and Hungerford.
When Jessie and Mary
Jane’s first child Mittie Mae Dillard was born in 1886,
they were living at the Section House in Kempner,
Lampasas County and Jessie was working for the Gulf,
Colorado and Santa Fe Railway and Mittie was born in
Temple at the railroad hospital. While he continued
working in Kempner a son James Patrick Henry Chastun was
born in 1889 in Sealy, while Mary Jane was in Sealy
attending her father's funeral.
By 1894, Jessie and Mary
Jane were living in Goliad County, at the Fannin Section
house and they had four more girls, Agnes Sarah, Mary
Beatrice, Jessie Harriett, Jessie Lucille.
On November 12, 1904;
Jessie P. Chastun and wife Mary Jane Chastun
bought 99-3/4 acres of land, in Ashwood, Matagorda
County, Texas. This became the home place for the
Chastun family and their family from then on. This plot
was the Northwest corner of the Austin - Perry
League. One can only speculate that Jessie was involved
in the construction of the railroad spur from Wharton to
Van Vleck, 1900 - 1904 about the time that the New York,
Texas and Mexican Railway and Southern Pacific
merged. How else would Jessie have found such a remote
area from Goliad County? In 1904, the Chastun Family was
the only white family living in Ashwood.
Jessie and Mary Jane had
three more children born in Ashwood. Marguerite Rosalie
in 1902, Marion Paull in 1902, and Thomas Joseph in
1909.
Jessie Harriett died as an
infant at Fannin and was buried in Victoria. Thomas
Joseph died as infant and Jessie Lucille died at the age
of eleven and both were buried in the family cemetery
established next to their home in Ashwood.
Marion Paull would live to
be 14 years of age before her unfortunate death, a horse
riding accident, and it was buried at Cedarvale Cemetery
in Bay City, Matagorda County, Texas in 1921.
The remaining children
were raised in Ashwood and married either there or in
Bay City. Mittie Dee married Anton Hansen, Sarah Agnes
married Fred Gernand, James Henry married Clara Bahr,
Mary Beatrice married George Walker and Marguerite
married Clyde DeRoche. James Henry divorced, remarry
twice more and moved to Bryan, Brazos County Texas.
Marguerite Rosalie and Clyde DeRoche would live in Bay
City. The other three girls lived in Ashwood the
remainder of their lives.
Jessie Patrick Chastun aka
Gabriel Presley Sturkey was born in 1861 in Abbeville
County, South Carolina died in Ashwood, 1 December 1936
and Mary Jane Paull Chastun was born 23 Nov 1867 in West
Camel, Somersetshire, England and died 14 December 1938
in Wharton, Wharton County, Texas. Both are buried in
Cedarvale Cemetery in Bay City, Texas.
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