REV. GARRISON HARRISON



Seated
(L-R) Luellen Parvin; Ephraim Parvin
Standing:
(L-R) Orville Bradley McCown, holding Orville Vernard McCown

NOTE: Orville Vernard McCown's younger brother, Eldridge B "Tot" McCown, was the minister of my parent's wedding in 1950.



1850
Tennessee Marriage Records
Garrison Harrison & Florida C. McGown



1860
Van Zandt County, Texas



July 1861
Pvt. Garrison Harrison



1867 - 1868
Voter Registration
Van Zandt County, Texas



1887
G. Harrison & Lou Vestal

Dallas Morning News
August 1, 1888

Another Account
 
Interviews With Relatives
Sherman, Texas, August 1 - A terrible murder and suicide took place at Cannon, a small place in this county 20 miles south of the city last night between 9 and 10 o'clock, in which one of the participants, Rev. G. Harrison, was a citizen of Sherman.   The facts in the case as well as could be gathered by the News reporter are as follows:
Last night about 9:30 o'clock Rev. G. Harrison, armed with buckshot, walked up to the residence of Ben Parvin, his son-in -law, and shot him dead just as he was finishing his bath preparatory to retiring for the night.  The charge of shot entered the neck and shattered the left shoulder blade, piercing the body and entering the heart.  Death was almost instantaneous, and the sight which met the young wife's gaze when, alarmed by the shots, she came to the door was indeed harrowing.  There, weltering in his blood and gasping out the few breaths spared him, lay her husband, while within a few feet of him, with smoke still curling out of the gun barrels, was her father.  She was prostrated with grief and has been unable to leave her bed today.  Immediately after the shooting of Parvin, Harrison raised a paper containing 20 grains of morphine to his lips and swallowed it down and, as coolly as if nothing had happened, laid the shotgun down and, placing a Smith & Wesson 38-caliber pistol to his left temple, pulled the trigger and the ball crashed into his brain.  He fell to the ground and was picked up and carried into the house and laid near the man he had killed.
No intelligence has been received from the scene since noon, when he was not dead, but with each pulsation or throb of the temple the brains oozed out and the wounds are necessarily fatal.
The causes leading to the sad affair are in substance as follows:
About 5 months ago Rev. Harrison sent for his son-in-law to come up from Bosque county and take charge of a grocery store which he had opened up in Cannon, a small trading place in Grayson county.  Parvin came up and shortly after his arrival Harrison made him a deed to one-half interest in the store and property upon the proviso that he should have a home with him.  Things rocked along smoothly until a few weeks since, when Harrison became dissatisfied and came to Sherman, and consulted lawyers about willing his wife who resides in Sherman all his property.  The will was drawn up.  Shortly afterward he came again to his attorneys and stated that he was not being treated as he deemed proper and wanted the deed made to Parvin canceled and all the entire property vested in his ("Harrison's") wife in Sherman.  He claimed that the deed made to Parvin was not legal on the ground that it had not been signed by his wife.  Parvin resented this and made counter allegations.  He refused to give up possession of the property deeded to him by Harrison.  This was the first intimation that attorneys of this city, whose client he was, had of the presence of another alleged wife in Lamar county.  They at once notified their client of the predicament he was in if Parvin could substantiate his assertion.  Harrison saw his lawyers and stated the facts in regard to the Lamar episode.  About 3 years before he married in Sherman, he came from Red River county to Lamar county where he met a widow lady.  Being a widower with a family which he considered needed the attention of some one in the capacity of a mother, he married her.  Their marriage life together was short, and in a few weeks after his wedding day he and his family were in Bosque county and his wife in Lamar.  Rev. Harrison had not found his second marriage agreeable and had left.  It was in Bosque county where, some 6 months later, Harrison's daughter met and married young Parvin.  They all remained happily together and Harrison left his home in central Texas on a visit to his old home in Red River county.  When within a few miles of Sherman a passenger train was wrecked and Harrison among the number of seriously injured.  He was confined to his bed here for some time, and during the time became acquainted with a widow lady names Vestal, whom he married on August 8, 1887.  They lived in the city for quite a while, and then moved to Cannon, where Harrison had invested part of the $1800 he received as damages from the railroad.  Their children didn't agree and a peaceable separation was effected, Mrs. Harrison coming to Sherman.  He had written word to the lady in Lamar county, in answer to a letter stating she intended suing for a divorce, telling her he had no objection.  He claims not to have heard from her for 3 years, and supposed time had divorced him.
The lawyers told him he had made a grievous mistake, and the it developed that he had already been threatened with imprisonment by Parvin.  To this threat, he laughingly told the lawyers, he would attend and that no one would ever go to prison.  The lawyers investigated and found his wife in Lamar county was still alive.  In the meantime he had taken possession of the books in the store at Cannon and with a loaded shotgun in his hands it is said threatened Parvin's life.  He was informed yesterday of his Lamar county wife's existence, and in a few hours killed Parvin.
The News reporter learning that Mrs. Harrison was at her residence, 604 East College street, repaired at once to the grief-stricken home, and found Mrs. Harrison prostrated with grief.  She had just heard of the sad affair, and for some time after the arrival of the newspaper man was unable to speak of the matter.  The first inquiry was as to the cause of the sad affair and how it came about.  The reporter told her the facts in as few words as possible.  During the recital Mrs. Harrison sobbed and moaned out her grief in a most piteous manner.  She brightened up, however, when she was told that at last account her husband was not dead, but she broke down again when his condition was told her.  Mrs. Harrison told the following story:
"Mr. Harrison and I met in the latter part of the spring of 1887.  The result of our acquaintanceship was our marriage, which took place in this house on August 8, 1887.  We lived here for some time, then we moved out a mile and a half from the courthouse and tended a little farm in the edge of town.  Mr. Harrison and myself both conceded it would be better to go further into the country, and went to Cannon, where Mr. Harrison owned a storehouse and lot.  The children - my own and his - could not agree and it seemed likely to be the cause of a disagreement between us, and we decided without a harsh word to separate.  I left Cannon on the 13th day of March and brought my children home to our house on College street.  Mr. Harrison has been here often since I left Cannon, and he has often talked to me about seeing if we could not get the children to agree and all live harmoniously together, and we had about decided to move out west of the city and take up farm life.
"I do not know much about the trouble which caused the difficulty last night, but I do know that Mr. Harrison has been in trouble a great deal of late about his treatment.   When I left Cannon he deeded his son-in-law, a young  man by the name of Parvin, a half interest in the store and property at Cannon, which included a half interest in a stock of groceries at that place.  No name but Mr. Harrison's was ever signed to the deed.  Mr. Harrison's will was good to do as he promised, but he said he was treated with so much indifference and contempt by his son-in-law that he determined to take the property back.  He has told me that he could not stand the way he was being treated and that he intended to kill Parvin if it were persisted in and he has told  me that he could not at the best have much longer to live and that he would kill himself if forced to this extremity.  I talked to him of the foolishness of such a policy and I really thought it was trouble weighing on his mind that caused him to talk so.  He was 61 years of age, and had been in bad health ever since he was injured in a railroad wreck just west of the city, from injuries received in which he was confined to his bed at the residence of G.W. McDonald, Brockett and Throckmorton streets, for some time.  He received $1800 in the suit he brought, and it was with this that he purchased the property at Cannon.
"About his having a living wife I know just w hat he told me and that was substantially that about 3 years before he and I were married he met a lady in Lamar county and they were married.  This was his second wife, his first having died some years before.  He lived with his second wife but a few days and he left her and went to Coleman county.  There he got a letter from her from Lamar county stating that she intended to sue for a divorce.  He answered her letter and told her that she had his consent.  He never got an answer, although he wrote repeatedly to find out if she had secured it.  Three years rolled around and after living in Bosque county for awhile he met with the railroad accident and had decided to live in Sherman.  He thought that the law presumed death by 3 years silence and married again without a divorce.  This was found out by his son-in-law and was the reason he contested the matter, when he was asked to give back the property which Mr. Harrison thought he had forfeited the right to by his treatment of him at Cannon.
"I will go down to Cannon this afternoon by the first train, and if my husband is not dead I intend to take up my place by his bedside and care for him.  If he has died (and here the poor lady broke down again) I will bring his remains to the city and have them interred where I can care for his grave.
"I have his will, which vests everything he leaves at death in me.  He was a good, kind-hearted man and has been driven to this terrible thing."
His son, Brown Harrison, was next seen and said:
"I saw my father in Van Alstyne yesterday morning and he talked just a little about his trouble with me, but I had no idea anything like this would happen.  My brother, the eldest one, was at Cannon at the time of the killing."

Probate
Grayson County, Texas
November 1, 1888

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Biography Index

Susan Hawkins
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