New London 1836 - 1986
Courtesy of the New London Museum & Mollie Ward
Submitted By: Gloria B. Mayfield, Rusk County CC
Coordinator: Dolores I. Bishop
Rev. David W. Diller, March 1986
The community of London, or New London as it was sometimes called in early records such as Richardson’s 1859 Map of Texas, is about 12 miles NNW of the Rusk County court house in Henderson.
No one knows who first settled New London or how it got its name. I have found no indication of anyone from England in the area in the earliest records. As with many other old Texas communities, someone may merely have suggested "London" when a name was submitted for the post office in 1854 or 1855, but the 1860 census, early maps of Texas, and some old newspaper articles in the 1800s also call it "New London". The designation "new" may have been necessary to distinguish it from London, England, which judging from its frequent mention in newspapers in the 1860s and 1870s, was as important a trendsetter and newsmaker to early Texas inhabitants as New York or New Orleans.
After the Great International and Northern Railroad developed Overton nearby, London practically disappeared. When the community was revitalized by newcomers in the 1880s and 1890s, people remembered it simple as "old London". This became the designation of the old settlement along Highway 323 after the oil-field boom led to the development of "New London" to the north, in the Norfolk community. When a new school was built midway between "old London" and "New London" in 1932, it was simply called "London". When the post office was established again in 1938, it was called "New London".
Indians in the Timber Tribes had roamed this part of Rusk County in their seasonal migrations with the game and vegetation for thousands of years before the earliest European explorers, missionaries, and traders ever laid eyes on it. Remnants of Indian villages are scattered along Rabbit Creek to the north and Bowles Creek to the south. Both creeks were named for Indian chiefs living in the area when outlaws and settlers began drifting into northeast Texas after independence in 1836.
Rev. Allen M. Box, an early Methodist circuit rider describes the immediate vicinity in March, 1873. "The face of the country is beautiful to behold, being gradually undulated in most places. The timber on the uplands is hickory, black-jack, red oak, dogwood, and now and then ash, walnut and mulberry; and in some few sections, particularly about London and Overton, and abundance of excellent pine. The hickory and black-jack trees are frequently two feet in diameter; and as to the quality of hickory trees and bushes, I have never seen so many anywhere else in my life-time travels."
London is located about the center of the eastern half of the Cordova survey. On August 12, 1835, Francisco Cordova, a married man whose family of six resided in Nacogdoches, petitioned the Special Commissioner of the Government of the State of Coahuila and Texas for Possession and title of land on the Angelian River watershed. On August 26, he received on League of land (4428 acres) for $39.10, as specified by the frontier Colonization law of 1825. Cordova had one year in which to settle, cultivate, and erect landmarks on his "vacant land," but there was talk of war, so he sold his new possession on September 13 to Frost Thorn, also of Nacogdoches, for $50.00. On November 22, Thorn in turn sold the east half (2214 acres) to Samuel Jones for $1500. This east half was passed along until it belonged to James M. Bullock, of Shelby County, Kentucky, who, in 1851, authorized David Ayres, a Galveston attorney, to dispose of his possessions in Texas.
Meantime pioneers, in ox-driven covered wagons, living on smoked ham, cornbread, black coffee, and what games they might kill on the trail, headed for Texas in ever-growing numbers. Those who settled NW Rusk County came mainly from Virginia, Tennessee, Alabama, and Georgia, Kentucky, and the Carolinas. Someone has described those first settlers as "men of individual enterprise who hitched a yoke of oxen to a pecan tree dragged out the streets, flung a bearskin over a tree stump and called it a pulpit, and used the pockets of an old coat hanging on the public square as the first bank and postoffice."
Usually only the most robust and preserving were willing to pit themselves against the vicissitudes of the frontier. Roads were little more than game trails, which the Indians had followed. There were no bridges. Ferries served only the busiest crossings. There were no schools or churches or doctors when the first pioneers arrived. Indians, panthers, poisonous snakes and plague spread by green-neck flies presented hazards to health and life. A forest of trees must be felled so crops could be planted. Coming to Texas meant a leaving behind homes and families and probably never seeing either again.
Yet those who came were educated and cultured. They brought spinning wheels and Bibles, feather beds and pump organs, as well as an assortment of agricultural implements and tools. They organized lodges, businesses and churches. Most of them were farming families living in isolated log cabins. A few established plantations with slave labor and built spacious homes such as they had known back in the old south. Racism was imported too. Black people were sold by age, sex, and first name only, just like mules and horses. They were not counted in the census until 1870.
Rusk County was separated out from Nacogdoches County in 1843. Smith and Cherokee counties were organized from Nacogdoches County soon after Texas had become the 28th state in 1846. By 1850 this tri-county area was dotted with settlers’ homes and small villages, that grew up around a cross-roads general store, a fresh spring, or a way-station on an overnight stagecoach.
Old maps, deed records, and post office information all point to London as being a few years younger than the nearby community of Bunker Hill, which is about 2 miles NE of what later residents would refer to as "old London" (the stoplight on Hwy 42 and Hwy 323). Settled in the 1840s, Bunker Hill was one of "the most public places in the county of Rusk" by July 1851. (Deed Records Rusk County Volume 4, p234)
Some of the earliest known settlers in the Bunker Hill - London area were William and Dicey Brown, ca 1844; John C. and Isabella (Thompson) Miller, ca 1844; George Clough, ca 1845; Cornelius and Rutha (Wims) Cooper, ca 1845;Bennett and Susan (Vannoy) Smith, ca 1847; Edward and Caroline Vinzent, ca 1849; Simeon and Frances Florence ca 1849.
A post office was established at Bunker Hill with the appointment of Edward Vinzent as postmaster, August 20, 1852. He was succeeded by Thomas Wilson on December 22, 1854. That the post office was changed to London with the appointment of William W. Baker on March 22, 1855, indicates the emergence to prominence and priority of London by the mid-1850s. John T. Pace became postmaster August 30,1858. He was followed by Samuel G. Smith, December 9,1859. The latter three men ran businesses in the old village of London.
The German merchant, Edward Vinzent, of Bunker Hill has a special place in the London story. He was a Freemason. In May, 1852, he donated Lot No. 5 on the north side of East St. in Bunker Hill to Rocky Mount Lodge No. 63, AFAM, on the condition that the lodge never permit "spirituous liquors or malt liquors" to be vended there. A Lodge Hall was constructed that year with the Masons using the upper floor while the lower floor served as an academy or school room.
Rocky Mount Lodge No. 63 had been granted its Dispensation August 9, 1849 by Deputy Master Samuel McClarty of Henderson. Edward Howell was Master; Jesse R. Nowlin, Sr Warden: William C. Lee, Jr Warden. Others associated with the Lodge included Robert W. Smith, James N. Brown, Silas Baggett, J.D. Hamilton, James E. Lee, Thomas L. Wellshire, Samuel Gaut, C.P. Eskridge, George W. Clough, A.B. Collins, Bennett Smith, and H.J. Gray. These would have been among the prominent business and civic leaders of the community, which embraced roughly the present Turnertown - Joinerville - Pleasant Hill - Jacobs - Leverett’s Chapel - Overton vicinity, in the 1840s and 1850s.
In March, 1852, Edward Vinzent gave to Obadiah Belcher "all the houses, lots and gardens belonging to the mills" rent-free, if Belcher would run a Steam Engine on the premises. (Rusk Co. Deed Records, Vol. G, p 80) This is as close as we can come to the origins of London. On Jan. 1,1856, Belcher sold two lots, "being the same on which I reside and have a Steam mill," to Charles F. McClarty, son of Samuel McClarty of Henderson. McClarty’s store and stable were something of a landmark in early London. The McClarty lot is repeatedly mentioned in the Deed Records.
Bunker Hill had developed along an old road from Henderson NW to the Smith County communities of Summergrove and Starrville, but London grew up along the more important Henderson to Tyler Road. Rusk Co. Deed Records, Vol. I, p 58, indicate this road was in use as early as late 1853. This original road was probably the present Hwy 323, which swings north to Overton today. Another road running south from near Belcher’s Steam mill toward Knoxville (founded in 1846) and Griffin (settled in 1845) in Cherokee County is mentioned in Smith County Commissioners Court Records, Vol. B, p 99, May 21,1855. This was possibly Hwy 838 to Hwy 2089, then going south.
Belcher’s steam engine and the mills were beside a natural pond just north-east of the present Hwy 42 and Hwy 323 stoplight. Just what "the mills are is not specified. London may have originated as a saw mill town, or Belcher’s steam mill may have powered a grist mill or a cotton gin, such as was later run by William Burris on this site.
London became a welcome first stop on a bumpy stagecoach two-horse hack by the mid 1850s. J.R. Allen contracted for the route from Henderson to Waco. Stages left Henderson at 6 A.M., Monday, Wednesday and Friday to arrive at Waco on the fourth day at 10 P.M. (Texas Almanac for 1861, p 225)
John Nelson was the village blacksmith in the 1850s. Samuel G. Smith was a carriage maker. James Dobbins ran a shoe shop. Hart Miller, another young merchant in town, and his wife Amelia were from Hamburg, Germany. Stephen P. Hollingsworth, a lawyer and two medical doctors, Thadus B. Collier and C.P. Eskridge, made London their home.
In the 1860 census, Rusk County was the second most populous county in Texas. London and the surrounding countryside were thriving. Some 130 families numbering about 850 residents were listed under New London in the census that year. Roughly 100 men gave as their occupation "farmer" or "farm laborer". There were only three "overseers" so family farms predominated.
In January 1857, James L. Ridgley Lodge No. 67 of the I.O.O.F. was organized in London. Within a year, a meeting house had been built, "the upper part whereof belongs to the Odd Fellows and the lower room to the Baptist Church. (Rusk Co. Deed Records, Vol. L, P 416) S.G. Smith and John Deal were trustees for the Odd Fellows; Peter Tipps and Jeddidia Blackwell, for the Baptists.
London Baptists were part of the Cherokee Baptist Association at least by October 4, 1856, when a petitionary letter came from "New London" delegates William Hulcey and G.B. Malone. James Foreman was pastor and there were 25 Baptists in the church. (Chronicles of Smith Co. Vol. 3, p 16) For unknown reasons in the year 1859 the Missionary Baptists of London swapped sites with the Pleasant Hill Cumberland Presbyterian Church some 3 1/2 miles east of old London on the road to Henderson.
The Cumberland Presbyterians had been given 9 acres for a church and cemetery at Pleasant Hill by Robert W. Smith in 1845. By 1856 or 1857 worship was being held there and a CPC was built on the land Robert and his wife Mary (nee Watkins), sister of Rev. R.O. "Uncle Dick" Watkins, Cumberland Presbyterian pastor, had donated. Now, June 7, 1859, a CPC was organized in London with James S. Hamilton and James B. Dobbins, elders, and Rev. D.C. Nevills, the first pastor. "London was at one time one of the strong churches in this section of the country." (History of the CPC in Texas, Thomas H. Campbell, 1936, p 51.
The story of the London Methodists is unclear. There is a tradition that the Methodists were here as early as 1856. Rev. Neill Brown was appointed to the Henderson Circuit from November 1856, until October 1860. The census done in the summer of 1860 lists Neill and Margaret (Johnson) Brown as "New London" area residents. Where the Methodists first met is uncertain.
We cannot tell from the 1860 "New London" census, which one of the three teachers, D.A. E. Anderson, James W. Emery (residing with Neill Brown), and L.R. Johnson (staying with James McWilliams), taught at London and which at Bunker Hill. The old London school was north of the Henderson - Tyler road on "the School House Lot". Samuel G. Smith purchased from Belcher about 1860. The 1876 Texas Almanac reports a High School in London. This makes questionable the tradition that a professor Smith organized the London School in August 1877.
Although the Texas Almanac for 1871 lists London as the third of the chief towns in Rusk County, after Henderson and Mt. Enterprise, the Civil War must have drained its manpower. In the fall of 1861, James A. Howze, just north of London, had formed a Confederate Company. Many of the London area farmers joined.
J.W. Nelson was appointed postmaster by the Confederate States government on July 21, 1861. S.G. smith replaced him October 18,1864. After the war Mrs. Sarah F. (Penny) Wood was appointed April 20, 1866. She was followed by Lucy F. Towns on July 22, 1867, but the post office was discontinued September 6, 1867, during the Reconstruction Era.
The London Post Office was re-established October 4, 1869 with the appointment of William Truitt. He was succeeded by John Vinson on February 6, 1871; Gilbert W. Wilson, April 1, 1872; and Abner L. Towns, November 3, 1873. The Post Office discontinued November 27, 1876 and mail was sent to nearby Overton, the railroad boomtown.
As late as March, 1873, Rev. Allen Box, could describe London as "a very quiet and healthy little town. We have here a good steam saw and a grist-mill, in half a mile of the place, three business houses, a cabinet shop, a blacksmith shop, a tan yard and saddlers’ shop, one good physician, a good school, taught by Prof. J.B. Henderson, and one house of worship, occupied by Methodists and Cumberland Presbyterians. The Methodist Church here numbers about seventy-five members. I do not know the exact strength of our Cumberland brethren, but suppose it is about the same as our own. There is here the hall and roof of a fine house, built last year for school purposes, (40x60 feet), on a beautiful eminence overlooking the town and surrounding country, and quite near a magnificent spring of splendid water. This is about a quarter of a mile from the town; by special enactment of the Legislature no liquor is allowed to be sold near the place. Dr. Eskridge, our town physician, and an old settler of the place, tells me that the place is remarkably healthy…" (Texas Christian Advocate, Apr 23, 1873 p 1 col 2)
But the I&GN RR, laid in the early 1870s from opposite Fulton, Arkansas to Laredo, missed London by some three miles and almost depleted the community. Rocky Mount Lodge No. 63 moved to Overton in 1873, as did the original Fountain Head Methodist Church, which became the nucleus of the mew Overton Methodist Church. The Odd Fellow, apparently from London, joined the Masons in building a new school and lodge hall in Overton. Purportedly, by a letter written in 1875, the Odd Fellows gave the Methodists and other denominations permission to use their abandoned facilities for religious purposes. The Cumberland Presbyterians held on until March of 1895, when their church in London finally disbanded. Only the Methodists remained. They alternated between the Troup - Overton and the Church Hill circuits. In 1890 London Baptist Church was organized as the Norfolk Baptist Church. It stood on the west side of Highway 323. Both Methodists and Baptists were served by itinerant preachers until the 1930s. Usually the preachers came on alternate Sundays. Methodists and Baptists worshipped together, and then met separately for Sunday school instruction.
A few residents in and near London in the late 1800s were George and Sinae Ann Turner, Joe and Mary Lee, Sr., Sebe and Margaret Stone, Arthur and Jeffie Rayford, Polk and Lucy Maxwell, Walter and Alice Alford, Robert and Mary Silvey, Calhoun and Mary Whittington, J.H. and Irby Silvey, A.C. and Amanda Barksdale, Joel and Stella Shaw, M.L. and Inez Thompson, Monroe and Caroline Wooley, Robert and Lula Neal, Erasmas and Stella Thrash, M.M. and Mattie Barksdale, J.C. and Emma Dickerson, John and Martha Green, William and Angie Mullikin, Columbus and Missouri Pilgreen, Tillman and Pamelia Turner, J.A. and Ada Birdwell, James and Allie Arnold, John and Martha Green, James and Elizabeth Brown, Matthew and Nancy Estes, H.P. and Sue Hale, Monroe and Caroline Wooley, John and Dicey Crane, Prof. T.L. P. Holloman, Prof. A.M. Wooley, Elbert and Martha Reagan, Samuel and Almedia Plowman, Daniel and Lucy O’Quin, George and Martha Eaton, Frank and Mattie Wooser, Romaldus and Ida Holt, Ben and Eliza Milstead, Will A. Craven, A.G. Couplance, Mary Atkins, L.S. Sartain, Robert Neal, Ardesia Holt, and F.M. Rust.
By 1900, London consisted of a school, a cotton gin, a saw mill, a general store, two churches and several farming families. A reference in the Henderson Times (Vol 36, No. 47, Nov. 21, 1895) to the ordination of Br. J.L. Mims, "for some years principal of London High School at Norfolk", to the Baptist ministry, indicates that London was surpassed by Norfolk a switch in importance, Indeed, for a time, Norfolk, on the Henderson and Overton Branch Railroad (chartered April 1874 and completed in May, 1877), was prosperous enough for a post office. Ida Eaton was appointed in November of 1892; Abraham A. Silvey, September 14, 1899; and James P. Maxwell, February 5, 1902. Then the post office was closed January 31, 1903 and mail was delivered by horse drawn carriage out of Overton.
From time to time, various other families lived in the London vicinity before the oil boom. Some of them were James and Lottie Brown, George and Aurelia Avery, Erasmas and Stella Thrash, John and Ollie Belle Wheelis, William and Lela Chappell, Lemuel and Union Pinkston, Andrew Goodlett, J.A. and Ada Birdwell, John and Hardie Cohagen, Robert and Melinda Harris, the Pools, Wesley and Annie Dean, I.M. and Mossie May, the Giles, J.E. Glover, Elliott Gee, A.P. Finney, Claud Ashby, Ed Domino, the Hensons, Jess Thompson, John Bell, C.W. Mullins, E.M. Beale, W.P. Brett, W.L. Beasley, J.D. Galloway, Beall and Sallie Thompson, W.P. McDavid, B.J. Bagwell, O.E. Kennedy, Lois Naul, Birdie Fite, and Margie Watkins. Although outsiders had always married into old London families, until the means of travel improved in the 1930s with new roads and automobiles, children of old-timers were likely to marry children of other old-timers.
But the story of London changed abruptly with the discovery of "black gold" on the Daisy Miller Bradford farm a few miles SE of old London on October 3, 1930. Gen. Andrew Miller had bought this land in 1840 and built a lovely home there. His son, Dr. Henry L. Miller inherited it. In 1901 his daughter, Daisy Miller, wed Dr. William Bradford and they settled into the Miller residence. After Dr. Bradford’s death, Daisy stayed on and in 1925 she met C.M. "Dad" Joiner and leased her land to him for oil exploration. After two dry holes, the old wildcatter brought in Daisy Bradford No. 3.
Until the "oil boom" got underway in January 1931, Rusk County had languished for a decade in the Great Depression. London farmers were living off cotton, sweet potatoes, corn and some poultry, cattle and hogs. Farmers were known to attach a lantern to their mule-drawn plow and work until midnight. Conditions were almost as difficult as they ha been during pioneering days. A wagon trip to Henderson for supplies was made once or twice a year. The round trip took a full day.
But with the scent of oil in the air, hundreds of "boomers" began pouring into the area; Extra rooms in private homes were transformed into apartments. Until simple "shot-gun" houses could be built, families lived in tents and cars. Humble Oil developed a large "camp" pf company owned houses NE of Norfolk. Phillips Petroleum had a camp just north of the old London school. Well-known as well as smaller independent companies were soon drilling wells from south of Carlisle as far north as Gladewater and as far east as Longview; The East Texas Oil Field was nicknamed "The Black Giant". Over a period of 50 years it produced billions of gallons of crude. Land dealers and speculators were everywhere. Titles were "cured" and old court house records came up missing. Many poor, illiterate, black farmers were swindled out of mineral rights worth millions for a few thousand dollars cash.
By 1935, the days of boom and bust were over. Senator Tom Connally’s Hot Oil Act began to take effect. Law and order came to the East Texas Oil Field. Some London residents had made a fortune. Others has sold out and left, unable to abide the noise, pollution and fire hazards. Old London had become New London.
The London Baptists built a new brick building on their own site in 1935. By 1944 a new educational unit had been erected there, but this was later moved to the Pinkston Addition where it became a part of the new church house built here and dedicated March 1951. It was renamed the London Baptist Church when the move was made in 1949. Another expansion took place in 1983 when more class rooms and a new fellowship hall were added. Meanwhile, many newcomers to London wanted their own Baptist church so they began First Baptist Church of New London at Norfolk. But membership dwindled as the field automated and declined during the 1950s and eventually it merged into the London Baptist Church. The First Baptist Church facilities were sold in 1965 to the Grant Thompsons, who were joined in 1966 by the Cecil Stokelys, and the building was remodeled and turned into the Sunshine Nursing Home.
The London Assembly of God Church began in the Carlisle community during the boom days. Sister Callie Cleghorn Coyle was the first pastor. In 1963 the congregation relocated on Hwy 323 W, the site of the old London school until 1934.
The Methodists managed to build two new brick buildings with the income from over a dozen wells on their 2 acre plot one, in 1933, on the original site they had occupied at least since the 1870s; the other, in 1949, on land just north of the New London school campus. A lovely new parsonage had already been constructed there in 1935.
In the spring of 1931, London was still a Common School District under the county superintendent. Four teachers taught in the old rural school house built back in 1872. It had outdoor toilets and no electricity. By September 1931 London had become an Independent School District with seven trustees, who erected a new frame building at the old site and another at Norfolk. By September 1932 a new brick building had been built for Junior and Senior Highs and the old buildings were used for Elementary classes. After May 1934 the older buildings were removed and lumber from them was used to construct a new brick Elementary Building on the north side of the campus. It was ready for use September 1934.
On March 18, 1937, the new High School building blew up. 297 students, faculty and visitors were killed. Every family in the community was touched by the disaster. After the shock came anger. School Superintendent, W.C. Shaw, barely saved from mob violence, resigned. Although churches were filled the following Sundays, it took almost a whole generation before the community could begin to work through its grief. United by sorrow, the old and the new residents came to a new appreciation of and respect for one another. They erected a new building on the same location for use the following September.
Enrollment peaked in 1940-41 with approximately 1300 students. By 1950, the area had begun to decline in population. The Bunker Hill School had merged with London in 1935. In April 1965, London and Gaston school districts consolidated to become the West Rusk County Consolidated Independent School District. The program is divided between the two campuses. At one time the wealthiest rural school district in the nation, today West Rusk is striving to control rising costs in the face of a shrinking oil tax base.
The New London Lions Club was chartered shortly after the Second World War. The Lions sponsor a Cub Scout troupe and maintains a small park and scout hut. In 1958, the Lions sponsored the New London Volunteer Fire Department. The Department. The Department was incorporated in 1961.
September 16, 1963, a group of residents met at the Community Building to consider incorporating New London as a city. A survey revealed about 750 residents in the proposed area, and an election October 22 found most of them in favor of incorporation. A special election was called for December 3, at which William Hall was elected Mayor and B.H. Iles, J.B. Vernon, D.F. Pevehouse, Fred Curry, and T. Roy Tyner were elected the first aldermen. T. Roy Tyner became Mayor in 1966 and held that position until 1969. D.L. Burnett succeeded him from 1970-1976. He was followed by Charlie McConnico, who has served from 1976 until the present time.
Today, besides the three churches, nursing home, school campus, city hall and fire department building, post office, community center and Cub Scout hut, New London has two service stations, two convenience stores, a gift shop, a dance studio, a barber shop, a beauty shop, a garage, two oil field lease services, and a trucking company.
Having weathered all changes of 130 some years, New London keeps on pulling through and it remains in the words of Rev. Allen M. Box way back in March, 1873, "this quiet, healthy, temperate, moral, religious and pleasant little village" nestled in the rolling hills of East Texas.