WILLIAM MADERSON CHAPMAN

The following bio was taken from page 146 of the book entitled "Rusk County History" compiled and edited and used with permission of the Rusk County Historical Commission.

Transcribed by Shirley Koym

Submitted by Gloria Briley Mayfield, Rusk County TX Coordinator

The rolling, red soil country of Rusk County so closely resembles that of Perry County, Alabama, that it is entirely fitting that William Maderson Chapman should settle here. William Maderson Chapman was born July 5, 1847 in Perry County, Alabama. He was the son of James Chapman, born in 1816 in Tennessee, and Mary Carter, born in 1821, also in Tennessee. James and Mary were married March 27, 1843 in Perry County, Alabama. William Chapman’s grandparents were Enoch Chapman, who was born October 16, 1783 in South Carolina, and died July 7, 1851, and Nancy Parker, who was born in Virginia in 1779 or 1780 and died August 18, 1852 in Perry County, Alabama. Enoch and Nancy are buried in a small family burial ground eight miles north of Marion, Alabama.

Sometime after 1850, James and Mary Chapman moved to Ashley County, Arkansas. In August 1864, when he was just seventeen years old, William Chapman enlisted in Company F, Arkansas Infantry, 1^st Arkansas Battalion, and served in the Confederacy as a private until the close of the Civil War, 1865. After receiving his discharge in Marshall, Texas in 1865, he returned to Arkansas, where he married Martha Jane Swinney in Hamburg, December 27, 1866. Martha was born in December 1848 in Coosa County, Alabama, the daughter of John Swinney and Sarah Baker, both born about 1824 in Georgia.

In January 1868, William and Martha Chapman moved to Rusk County, near Mt. Enterprise, and bought a 195-acre farm some sixteen miles south of Henderson, on land adjacent to that of the Swinneys, Martha’s parents. William Chapman became active in the community and was elected trustee of the Oak Flat School. Known as a good speaker, he was often asked to speak at local affairs and to introduce the candidates at political rallies. Being a farmer in the last years of the nineteenth century was not much easier than it is today. In 1873 William borrowed $120.00 for which he pledged his cotton crop that year as collateral. In November 1873 he bought a span of oxen, giving a note, at ten percent interest, for the sum of $59.94. In 1890 William and Martha sold eighty acres of their farm for $160.00.

William and Martha also started their family of seven boys and two girls: Joseph C., born in February 1868; Charles W., born in December 1870; Robert L., born in March 1873; Louella ("Sister"), born in May 1875, who married Asa Scruggs; John Henry, born in October1877; General H., born in December 1879; Mary Weaver, born in June 1882, who married H. L. McMichael; and Albert Pen, born in September, 1884; and Burt A., born in December 1887.

After Martha died May 10, 1902, William continued to live on the farm. It took three years of correspondence, filing of affidavits, etc., but finally, on March 1, 1914, William was granted a Confederate Veteran’s pension. But he did not have long to enjoy it. William died May 11, 1916, and was buried beside his beloved Martha in Holleman Cemetery, Oak Flat.

Of William and Martha’s children, Joseph, Charles, Robert, Louella ("Sister"), General, and Pen lived in Rusk County until their deaths. John Henry married Alma Pinkerton in Mt. Enterprise, July 14, 1904 and moved to Tyler, where they had four children: Oran, who died in 1911; Crystal, who married Lewis Russell and is living in Houston in 1981; James W., who married Mildred Perkins and is living in Houston in 1981; and June, who married Herman Trauernicht and died in 1973 in Houston.

John Henry died January 5, 1953, and Alma died November 15, 1960. They are buried in Forest Park Cemetery, Houston. Weaver and Burt were the other Chapman’s to leave Rusk County. Weaver McMichael was living in Houston in 1963, and Burt, the youngest of the Chapman’s, served in the U. S. Navy in World War I, then moved to Mt. Rainer, Maryland, outside Washington, D. C., where he lived until his death in 1944.

Submitted by James W. Chapman