ABIGAIL BONNER-GARRISON

The following bio was taken from page 207 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, Cemeteries of TX

There are graves without markers, but in the Caledonia Cemetery in Rusk County is a monument without a grave. The woman responsible for that was Abigail Bonner, a name that means little to Rusk County citizens today. She was the wife of James Freeborn Garrison, a familiar family name in that area. These two were the parents of ten children whose lives have touched many.

The only visible reminder of this spirited and independent lady is the tall moss-covered monument in the rocky soil of the cemetery of this rural community.

On one side of the monument is Abigail’s name; while on the opposite is that of her husband’s. There is no grave for James F. Garrison, buried somewhere near Carrolton, Georgia. In his treatise on the Bonner family, James C. Bonner said, "The cedars, the old Garrison home in Georgia, also known as the Hays’ Mill Place, is a quaint story and a half structure, nearby which is the Garrison Cemetery, now plowed up and under cultivation. I’ve often wondered what became of the fine Italian marble monuments I used to see there as a school boy."

The six sons of Abigail and James all served in the Confederate Army and all survived except John, who was killed in the Battle of Atlanta.

The sons, one by one, migrated to Texas where they married and settled down. Caleb, the eldest, called Cale or C. J., married Antoinette Devereaux; Zadock, Zed or Cap’n Zed, married Elizabeth Hinton Lacy; John H. married Mary Ann Timmons, who died shortly after; Smith, or T.S., married Sarah Elizabeth Avery; James Freeborn Garrison, Jr., called Devereaux Jim, married the widow, Sarah Ann Devereaux, and William Barnett Moss, Big Bill, married Laura H. Higgs.

Sarah Ann, the oldest daughter, married Ruffin Anderson Willis; Susan Mandeville, known as Mallie, married Hubbard Carter; Margaret Mariah, or Riah, married W. Jerome Johnson; and Ruth Eliza Baxter Garrison married Sedonius Asbury Daniel while they were still in Georgia.

After the death of James F. Garrison, September 24, 1860, when the homestead was sold and the sons were in Texas, Abigail decided to join them. A wagon train was organized, including Abigail, Ellen, daughter of John, and her new son-in-law, out of the Civil War, Sedonius Daniel, married to Ruth, Abigail’s youngest daughter. The trip lasted forty-three days; the party arrived in Caledonia, December 11, 1866. There Abigail settled with her family.

Across the way from the Smith Garrison home lived the William Warren DeKalb Richards family – his wife, Viola Awtrey, whom he married in Georgia, and his children, Minnie Capitola, Oliver Lee, Bernard Noble, Lola May, Lula Beatrice, Annie Laura, William Mitchell, and Merrill Richards.

Minnie (Minnie-Cap) Richards and William Fleming (Flem) Daniel, oldest child of Ruth Garrison-Daniel, met, married, and started a family. To them were born Ethel Clare, Mabel Ruth, Awtrey Fleming, and Lois Morine Daniel.

Abigail Bonner did not live to see the first child of her youngest daughter as she died September 19, 1980, less than a month before the birth of Ethel Clare.

Monuments and markers of both families, the Garrisons and the Richards, dot the Caledonia Cemetery; but the one for James Garrison may be the only one without a grave. Abigail Bonner-Garrison remained loyal to her husband and the father of her children by erecting a monument in his honor, even though his remains were presumably scattered somewhere in Georgia.

Submitted by Lois Daniel