The Sherman
Courier
Wednesday, August 15, 1917
pg. 15 & 19
Fiftieth Anniversary Edition
Dan D. Dugan Relates Family Experience
as Far Back as 1836
One
of the first families to settle in Grayson
county were the Dugans, and
there are many descendants of these pioneers
in the county at this
time. The following interview was given
to a Courier
reporter by Dan D. Dugan of Sherman:
"My
grandfather, Daniel Dugan, came to Grayson
county in 1836 and located
his headright down here just below where
Whitewright now is. That
was when Texas was a Republic, and the
Republic gave to every head of a
family who settled here a league and labor of
land which was 4,588
acres. Each single man got one-third of
a league which was 1,476
acres and my father got that much and he
located down here near where
Bells is now located.
"Grandfather first located his land over on
bois d'arc near where Whitewright is, but the
first year he was over
there was a very dry year and water got
scarce, so he began to look
about for water and found a fine spring and
plenty of water over near
where Norton now is, so he lifted his
certificate from where he had
located and took up his land over northeast of
Sherman about twelve
miles. Wood and water was a great thing
with the old timers and
especially water. The reason that
Sherman was moved from where it
first was out here....miles west was this
Odneal spring down here and
some other springs that used to be along these
creeks and branches.
My
father was one of the first men in this county
to try to make money
farming. I think he had as much as fifty
to sixty acres in
cultivation down on the old home place near
Bells as early as 1850 and
by the time the war came on I think he must
have had 400 to 500 acres
in cultivation. He raised a lot of wheat
and I remember he
sometimes raised as high as 30 to 35 bushels
of wheat to the acre.
He raised lots of corn too. I
remember seeing them break a
lot of the land he put in cultivation in those
early days. The
grass was then lots of it waist high and
higher and the worst turf a
man ever saw, and to break the sod they would
hitch five or six yoke of
cattle to a big plow and one man would hold
the plow and another drive
the steers. They did not feed the steers
but would round them up
of a morning and hitch them up and when they
quit at night they would
turn them loose on the grass.
When my Grandfather first came here
and for several years after there were Indians
in this county and
plenty of buffalo. My father killed a
buffalo calf down here
right about where the compress in Sherman is
and that creek down there
called Calf Creek was so named because he
killed that buffalo calf on
it. The Indian depredations in this
county were serious in 1838
to 1841. Josiah Washburn, a brother of
J.D. Washburn who lives
near Bells and who was one of the
commissioners of this county a few
years ago was killed by the Indians in 1838
not far from where
Whitewright now is and an uncle of mine,
Daniel V. Dugan and a young
man by the name of Kitchen was killed by the
Indians in 1841, down here
near Wharton, which is about twelve miles
north east of Sherman.
You talk about a hard time, those old
early settlers had it and
people of today don't realize half the
hardships those old pioneer went
through with, not only my family but several
others who were here then."
