Posted on: Henderson County Biographies Reply Here: http://cgi.rootsweb.com/~genbbs/genbbs.cgi/USA/Tx/HendersonBios/10027 Surname: Bryant ------------------------- Lewis H. Bryant was born December 22, 1840 in Vermilion IL, to Solomon George Bryant and Solomon's second wife, Nancy Day Mitcheltree, who were married in Martin County, Indiana. In 1842 the family moved to Red River County, Texas and purchased 40 acres of land, where Lewis appears on the 1850 Census. In 1862, he was living in Bowie County at the outset of the Civil War. He enlisted in the C.S.A. in the early part of 1862, at Lamar County. He served in Co. H, Crump's First Bat. of Texas Cavalry, later known as the 32d Texas Cavalry. Due to illnesses, measles and pneumonia, he was returned to Texas from the war. He was discharged August 1862, but returned to service after recovery. In late 1862, he was in Nacogdoches County serving as an assistant to a Commissary Officer. He continued on for about six months after the war, during the second half of 1863, in Rusk, Cherokee County, Texas, assisting returning soldiers. From Dec. 1862 to close of war he acted as Acting Asst. Com. of Subsistence 2 Sub. Dist. of Texas, at Nacogdoches. He was recruited by a fellow soldier to move to Fincastle in Henderson County, after the war, to teach at the Fincastle School. It is believed that he married a Paralee Mount, date unknown, probably in late 1863 or 1864, in Cherokee County, before moving to Henderson. It is not known if they had any children. Lewis Bryant appears on Henderson County voter rolls in 1867 and on the 1870 Census in Athens Pct. 1, Henderson County. On the 1880 census, he was in Kaufman County. At some point, he returned to Henderson County. August 11, 1868, he married Catherine Jane "Kate" Everett, of Kaufman, in Cherokee, County. They had three children, Everett Lillian, Victor Hugo (died the day he was born, and Nelly Nash. Everett Lillian married Allie Crawford Hart. Nelly married Jessie Robinson. His wife, Catherine, died April 20, 1879, in Kaufman. August 1, 1880, Lewis Bryant married Sarah "Sallie" C. Platt. On December 7, 1914, he was a Justice of Peace in Henderson, when he applied for Civil War Pension. He died and was buried in Athens November 28. On his pension application, in 1914, he wrote: "I was living in Bowie County, Texas, when I joined the Confederate Army. I joined a company from that county made up by Captain W. E. Estes for R. P. Crump's 1st Battalion of Texas Cavalry which had a short time before gone to the army in S.W. corner of Missouri, commanded at that time by General Earle Van Dorn. This was in the early part of 1862. We joined the battalion at the close of the battle of Elk Horn Tavern. On the retreat from there our battalion and Brooks Ark. battalion were left at Cross Hollows as rear guards and pickets. This place is about 25 miles north of Van Buren, Ark. I was on vidette duty nearly all the time. We rejoined the brigade, Greer's 3d Texas Cavalry at Ozark, about 7 miles South of Van Buren. From this place our whole army started for Memphis, Tenn. We marched down the Arkansas river to Little Rock. I took measles two days before we reached Little Rock, but remained with the command. At Little Rock, I was placed in the hospital. In a few days, I took pneumonia and remained there for about six weeks and was then sent home on a sick furlough. In June all the Texas soldiers on sick leave of absence were placed in convalescent camps four miles East of Paris, Texas. In August, a board of physicians came to our camps and examined all of us. Upon their recommendation, I was discharged from the army. In the meantime our battalion having received two more companies was organized into a regiment, known as the 32d Texas Dismounted Cavlary. The former Adjutant of the battalion, Andrews (J. C., I think) was elected Colonel of the regiment. I do not know whether my name appeared on the rolls of the regiment, but do know that several months after I was paid $200.00 for services. The money was paid to Tom Hooks to whom I had given a power of attorney to draw that amount in payment of the horse I rode in the service and he surrendered to me the note I gave him. Enough more money was paid to my order to refund to my mess money advanced to me when I was sent to the hospital. In the fall of the same year I made application to be sent back to my old company. (We could not travel then without a passport) and after examination, I was assigned to some staff duty. By order of the Post Commandant at Tyler, I was assigned to service with Captain W. G. Thomas, A.A.Q.M. at Tyler. I acted as his sergent till the fall of 1863, serving the last six months at Rusk, Texas, where an army post had been established. I then got orders to join my command. On my way at Tyler, I met Captain J. B. Sydnor, who had been commissary at Tyler for some and had just been assigned to Nacogdoches, Texas, as Chief Commissary of the second sub-district of Texas. He made application to General E. Kirby Smith to have me detailed to him as an assistant. When he, Capt. Sydnor, arrived at Nacogdoches and found that Maj. (Captain) J. S. West had been assigned and he sent somewhere else, Capt. Sydnor transfered me to Maj. West, and I served with him to the close of the war. I was issuing sergent at Douglass, Nacogdoches county, when the break-up came. I remained there to furnish the soldiers going home for two weeks. I then went to Nacogdoches to take my final leave of Captain West and after we told each other what we would do. Captain J. M. Oliver, who had been there for some time asked me to go to Fincastle where he lived and teach a school for that place. This was soon after the "break-up". "In september, I think, the Federal authorities ordered all soldiers of the C. S. Army to go to nearest U.S. Post for that purpose and be paroled. In company with W. L. Faulk and James Parmer I went to Marshall, Texas and was paroled. I will add that I preserved as nearly all my army papers as I could but the family with whom I lived and I got separated, he died and his wife moved away again, and they have been all lost." 4th day of Dec. A.D. 1914. Pension witnesses on his application were : W. L.P. Leigh, Waxahachie, Texas, served with him. W. L. Faulk, remembers L. H. Bryant served with Capt. Oliver. Bryant came to school at Fincastle and taught there in fall of 1865 and 1866. Saw fed. officer issue parole to Mr. Bryant. Went to school with him at Fincastle when he taught there. Also taught with him in Athens. Mr. Faulk's comments, though written in 1914, would serve as a fitting obituary for Mr. Bryant, "I know him to be an honorable trustworthy citizen, but a man always of small means; he has been a successful teacher but like almost all teachers has not acquired much of this world's goods. He is a consistent member of the Baptist Church and while I am a Methodist I am willing to say for him that he is a good man." He died November 28, 1924, at Athens, Henderson, Co., Texas, in the home of Mrs. A. C. (Everett Lillian Bryant) Hart, his daughter, of cerebral hemorrhage. The doctor was R. H. Hodge, and the undertaker was J.R. Lehr.