1845 – 1918
Contributed by Stephen Eddleman of Victoria, Texas
The following is a short biography of my great-grandfather David H. Eddleman. Much of the information was given to me by Scott McKay historian and biographer of the 10th Texas Infantry C.S.A.
Private David H. Eddleman – Age 17 upon enlistment with Co. C, 10th Texas Infantry, at Ft. Hebert, Virginia Point, Galveston, Texas, on January 3, 1862.
Private Eddleman was discharged for disability at Shreveport, Louisiana, on May 15, 1862, by order of Col. Allison Nelson; because “… he is incapable of performing Military duty because of natural deformity of the right leg.” According to Pvt. Eddleman’s discharge certificate, he was a native of Mississippi, and a farmer, who stood 5’9″ tall with black eyes, dark hair and a fair complexion.
From the 1895 book, Hood County History, the following was written:
“I am indebted to D. H. Eddleman for many important items of early times. His father, David Eddleman, was a pioneer of this section, having first settled in Parker county in 1853 while D. H. was a small boy; he removed afterwards to Buck creek, Palo Pinto county, where he resided until 1859, when, with others, he was driven back upon the Brazos by the hostility of the Caddo Indians, occasioned by their camp having been attacked with indiscriminative slaughter of their men, women and children by whites.
David Eddleman [Ed: the father] died in Hood county about 1883. D. H. Eddleman, the son, now a citizen of Hood, grew up amid scenes of frontier life; as a boy he often played with the Caddo Indian children prior to their hostility. He helped in the building of the noted Barnard’s mill, which occurred about 1860. Up to that time of the aforesaid assault upon their camp, the Caddos were not only friendly with the whites, but were in dead enmity with their traditional foes, the savage Comanches. One of the old men of the Caddos related to Eddleman how at one time long anterior to the white settlements, a droth of such magnitude and duration prevailed in this section that sufficient water for a horse to drink could not be crossed in territory between the Red river and Colorado.”
At age 63, David H. Eddleman applied for a Soldier’s Pension at Tolar, Hood County Texas on January 11, 1905. He owned ½ an acre of land with a $200 house on it. He had been disabled “by a rail road injury with general senile debility.” His old comrades-in-arms, Ad Huffstutler and Burrel H. Morris, testified on his behalf, at Hood County Texas, on March 4, 1908. His application was approved on September 28, 1908.
David H. Eddleman died of “Prostatic Hypertrophy” in the home of his son, James A. Eddleman, near Tolar, Hood County, Texas, on August 8, 1918; he was buried in Mt. Pleasant Cemetery, Mt. Pleasant, Texas. The cemetery is south of Tolar on the connecting road between Highway 377 and Farm Road 51.
David H. Eddleman’s son, James Asbury Eddleman at age 81, died on May 12, 1955. He was buried in the Tolar Cemetery, which is a short distance south of Tolar, Hood County, Texas.