1892 East Feliciana, Louisiana

PIONEERS OF THE FIFTH WARD.

I am so habituated, Mr. Editor, to chronological arrangement that I think I would not begin writing a history of Rome before making close and critical search for vestiges of the wall, to build which, Romulus cut down the reeds of Tiber, nearly three thousand years ago. My present search is limited to the inquiry "Who made the earliest blazings of civilizations in the fifth ward of East Feliciana?"

Tradition carries us then back, in answer to this question, to the closing years of the last century; when the three Yarborough brothers from Georgia, and Joseph Felps, from the same State, in company with his brothers, James, Thomas and David; and as part of the same immigration movement, those sturdy old frontiersmen, Isaac Tsiylor from Pennsylvania, and Robert Nettles and Thomas Albritton from South Carolina, who commenced to make their hatchet clearings, to lay off fence rows and to build log cabins with puncheon floors in the heart of the primeval forests and cane brakes, the dark green curtains of the watercourses, which irrigated and fertilized the lovely valleys of the Fifth Ward, in the year 1798.

And two years later came into the same community another colony from Elbert County, Georgia, which included several well-remembered pioneers, who figured conspicuously in shaping our civilization, namely: Charles Ingraham, James Higginbotham, Matthew Edwards, Natt Cobb and William Blount.

Mr. Ingraham, who cleared the place now owned by Mr. I. T. Felps, was a worker in wood, possessing a large and active mechanical genius, and to him the settlers were indebted for the first grist and saw mill, and he was likewise the owner of several slave mechanics, workers both in iron and wood, and Ingraham's mill and blacksmith shop were leading land marks for many years, of which there are still some vestiges.

His old Elbert County neighbor and friend, James Higginbotham, who likewise was a slave owner, was the Master of the first lodge of Masons organized in East Feliciana. He lived and died on his first clearing, but his son, John B., on his father's death, moved eastward into the Sixth Ward, near Nat Cobb and William Blount and the Briants, who had migrated from the banks of the Comite river, in the Fifth, to the valley of the Amite, in the Sixth. Throughout his long and active life, John B. Higginbotham was a strong pillar of the Methodist Church, an earnest and devout class leader. It is one of the traditions of the Elbert County colony, along the Comite, that young Charles Ingraham was the first Anglo American to die, and that his father put him away in a solid lightwood coffin, which was made air tight by ingenious devices without corroding nails.

As the Felps and Yarborough brothers certainly came into the wilds earlier than the Elbert County colony, those earliest leaders of the column of civilization have had so much influence in shaping the societies which they founded that each may claim a short biographical paragraph.

James Felps founded the ancestral seat, seven miles east of Clinton, on the Greensburg road, in the Eighth Ward. His brothers, Thomas and David Felps, founded their family seats two miles south of him, on the banks of Bluff Creek, in the Sixth Ward.

The fourth brother, Joseph, whose descendants still cling in large numbers around the "clearing" which their ancestor made in 1798, a little south of the present site of Clinton, chose his home in the Fifth Ward.

The three Yarborough brothers, who came from Georgia with the Felps, founded their homes along the banks of Pretty Creek, in clannish proximity, in the Fifth Ward. Lewis Yarborough made his hatchet clearing and built his log cabin (which I have seen standing in good repair, in 1825) just between the present store of Mr. R. Carow and the new residence of Henry Hartner. His descendants, not long ago, under the advice of Judge J. B. Smith, contemplated bringing suit for all the land on which the town of Clinton now stands.

James Yarborough founded his seat on the heights west of Pretty Creek, within 200 yards of the present residence of Mr. H, A. White; and his descendants, of whom Mrs. A. Levi, of New Orleans, is one, have contributed their loyal quota to the social development of their neighborhood.

The third brother, Stephen Yarborough, was perhaps the most energetic and successful of the brothers. He founded his seat and handsomely improved the heights, on which Hon. T. S. Adams now lives, from which there is a pleasant prospect of green, fertile valleys and forest-clad hill. The career of Stephen was prosperous without any adverse break for years, during which he added a water saw and grist mill and gin to his possessions, until he planted his numerous broad and fertile acres of Pretty Creek bottoms in sugar cane.

He lost his crop in the futile endeavor to express the juice from his canes with water power, which was totally inadequate. This costly failure and the loss of his first wife suggested to the lonely widower of Pretty Creek the need of a partner to share his sorrows. Nature abhors a void, and so did Stephen, the uxorious widower, who, inspired with the resolution to find a suitable partner to fill the void, spruced up one fine Sunday morning in a glossy broad cloth suit, spotless linen, shiny beaver, tight buckskin gauntlets and patent leather boots, and rode upon a showy charger, prancing and curvetting, to the fence around the mansion in which Judge Brame now resides. Inside the building were the bright black eyes of the very pretty brunette Widow Morgan, who sat in widowed meditation, fancy free, biding her time. To accompany the bright eyed widow to church was the objective point of Stephen, and to that same object the widow cheerfully co-operated. The acquaintance thus initiated soon ripened into a rapid exchange of notes, in which the widower's words, carefully selected from that casket of sighing lovers "the complete letter-writer," fairly sparkled with the Pomethean fire, to which the widow, with experience of thirty winters and a former surrender, was coy and very shy, without a soupeon of gush or any of those traps into which soft and silly maidens often fall. As the correspondence developed the furnaces on the "Heights" became hotter and blighter. In the course of time, when the fire grew dim for want of fuel, and when the flashes from Pretty Creek ceased to illuminate the widow's casket of epistolary jewels, the thrifty widow unmasked a battery from behind the columns of Judge Brame's brick house, which struck terror to the heart of Capt. Adam's uxorious predecessor in his lofty tower on Pretty Creek. The artless, coy, bright-eyed widow filed with the Clerk of the District Court a suit for breach of promise, and $10,000 damages to salve a broken heart, and founded her suit on twenty odd carefully folded, labelled and numbered proposals of marriage.

Imagine Falstaff before Henry the Fifth's Chief Justice, defending himself from the clamorous asseverations of Dame Quickly, alleging that the oleagenous old scamp had deceived her into various and sundry money loans, and broken her susceptible heart by numberless promises to make her his wedded wife. Imagine the placid and rotund Mr. Pickwick defending himself from the matrimonial aspirations of Mrs. Bardell, and you will have a "fac-simile" of the fat widower of Pretty Creek before the court in .Clinton, on the trial of the suit styled "The widow Morgan vs. Stephen Yarborough." Of all the lawyers, jurors and witnesses in that celebrated case none that I know of are left to tell the tale, except the ex-Chief Justice Merrick and this writer. Recalling the ludicrous incidents of that memorable scene, in which the two most conspicuous champions of the much damaged widow were the late Thomas Green Davidson, of Livingston, and the late Henry Marston, Esq. The first proclaimed himself to be the volunteer defender of injured innocence; the latter a knightly old gentlemen from under the shadow of Faneni Hall, who promenaded the lists, ready to break a lance with whoever presumed to sneer at the aggravated wrongs of the wounded dove, who was seeking salve for a broken heart. As the venerable Tom Green Davidson would extract a letter from the bulky package on which the widow's case rested, leaning on his crutch, and holding the letter in the other hand appealing "Gentlemen of the Jury, I crave your close attention while I read to you another chapter of "Stephen on Love," a scene so rich was presented which beggars the numerous presentations of Falstaff and Pickwick defending themselves from Widows Quickly and Bardell. The jury gave Mrs. Morgan $1000 damages, which was only realized after a hard fight in the Supreme Court, but the widow died before the decree was rendered and Mr. Marston, her chivalrous and steadfast friend, administered her estate, which was kept unsettled by the claim of her volunteer counsel for a fee of $500, which claim was resisted by the administrator on the ground that the volunteer had put his hand on his heart and solemnly avowed before God and the jury he had no pecuniary interest, and old Tom died a few years afterwards, kicking himself because he had once in his life forfeited $500 in good money to impalpable gush.

Before closing this sketch I desire to add that the water courses that form the eastern and western boundaries of the Fifth Ward and Pretty Creek which courses through it diagonally from N. E. to S. W., afford large bodies of fertile meadow land, that its soil on hill and valley can be easily and cheaply rejuvenated, and therefore in its reproductive capacity and splendid pastoral advantages, it is the equal of the most favored wards. That its area of cheap, idle, waste and abandoned lands is large, owing to the scarcity of laborers, and that in the matter of good society, good churches and good schools, it possesses inducements which are very attractive to the roving body of home-seekers, for whom this sketch has been written. Hoping it will reach them and attract them.

I remain, yours, etc.,
H. SKIPWITH.

Sillman Collegiate Institute for young ladies, Clinton, Louisiana.

BOARD OF TRUSTEES.

Rev. M. B. Shaw, President - Clinton, La.
Hon. D. W. Pipes, Secretary - Clinton, La.
Hon. W. H. Pipes, Treasurer - Clinton, La.
Dr. L. G. Perkins - East Feliciana, La.
Judge J. G. Kilbourne - Clinton, La.
Rev. J. Y. Allison - Baton Rouge, La.
W. R. McKowen, Esq. - Jackson, La.

OFFICERS AND TEACHERS.
SESSION 1890-91.

GEORGE J. RAMSEY, A. M., President, Ancient Languages and Modern Science.
MRS. GEO. J. RAMSEY, Acting Lady Principal, Vocal Music and Art.
REV. F. W. LEWIS, A. B. (W. & L. Univ'ty), Mathematics, Mental and Moral Science.
MRS. T. S. STEVENS, History and Composition.
MISS SUSIE G. KILBOURNE, English Language and Literature.
MISS EMMA KILBOURNE, English. Modern Languages.
MRS. J. A. WHITE, Primary Department.
MISS O. E. HARDESTY, Instrumental Music.
DR. JAMES KILBOURNE, Attendant Physician and Lecturer on Physiology and Hygiene.
MISS JENNIE SCOTT, Stenography and Typewriting.
MRS. S. P. SAUNDERS, Matron.

BUILDINGS.

These were erected at a cost of $30,000. They are of brick, large, well ventilated, and present a very handsome appearance. The grounds embrace ten acres, a large part of which is densely covered with beech and magnolia, and used only for play grounds and rambles. The water is from underground cisterns, caught from slate roofs, and therefore of the purest quality. The buildings have been, during the past three years, placed in thorough repair and furnished anew throughout, and the rooms will always contain every comfort and convenience.

HEALTH.

The town of Clinton, situated in the "hill country" of Louisiana, is one of the healthiest in the State. No local cause of disease exists. No epidemic has visited the town since 1855. On the contrary, the beneficial effect of the genial climate and pure atmosphere upon persons afflicted with pulmonary or malarial diseases has been clearly demonstrated by the experience of a large number of pupils during past years. In the interior management of the school attention to the health of the pupils is made a matter of the first moment.

Extracted 09 Aug 2019 by Norma Hass from East Feliciana, Louisiana by Henry Skipwith, published in 1892.