Jim thanks for your explanations on Patton. Since that is where the B. Landrum and family was obvoiusly located as it is in the book that lists the 1900 storm victims. They were my ggrandparents and their siblins (my grandfathers parents and siblings). I was not aware of where Patton was located but it seems that they were either found or recorded as missing from Patton. As far as I remember - it was always known that he did not find his parents or siblings and he was in Beaumont for the day - that is why he was saved. Jackie Deffes At 06:24 PM 8/14/99 -0700, you wrote: >deffes@acadiacom.net wrote: >> >> Where is Patton TX where the Landrum family was listed as either being >> from or found? Jackie Deffes > >Jackie, > >Patton was on the Bolivar Peninsula, about midway down the peninsula. >There was a hotel there, the Patton Hotel, owned by Charles R. Patton. >Also nearby was Patton Beach and Patton's Grove. > >Every Saturday in the summer of 1900, the Gulf and Interstate Railroad >ran a "Gulf Coast Special" from Beaumont to High Island, Rollover, Patton >and Galveston (crossing the Galveston Bay Channel on a barge). > >On Saturday, September 8, the morning of the Great Hurricane, the train >reached Bolivar Point, but the water was too rough to load the cars onto >the barge. It was turned around and, shortly after noon, started back >east toward High Island. When it reached Patton Beach, it stopped and >picked up a large group of adults and children. The train then continued >on to Rollover where the water was so high that further progress was >impossible. The engineer backed the train to Patton, waited there about >three hours, then attempted to go back to Bolivar Point. But the water >by then was even higher and the train had to return to the Patton depot. >The passengers waited on the train from Saturday afternoon until >six-thirty Sunday morning with breakers crashing against the cars, >howling wind, and driving rain. During the height of the storm, huge >waves washed high over the train, completely submerging it at times. >Passengers described watching as all the homes along Patton Beach were >washed out sea, one by one. > >This account and other stories about the impact of the Hurricane around >Patton Beach can be found in the book, They Made Their Own Law: Stories >of Bolivar Peninsula, by Melanie Wiggins; Rice University Press, Houston, >1990. Although many names are mentioned, I did not see the name of >LANDRUM. > >Jim Turner > > >