1857 – 1954
From Texas Under Many Flags – Published in 1930
Transcribed by Tex Dendy
ASHLEY W. CROCKETT, editor and publisher of the Granbury Tablet, is the only living grandson of the famous Texas hero, Davy Crockett. Davy Crockett, it will be remembered, after playing a notable part in the history of Tennessee as a scout and Indian fighter, member of the Legislature and Congress, came to Texas to join the patriots in the war for independence and lost his life in the battle of the Alamo on March 6, 1836. David Crockett was a son of John and Rebekah (Hawkins) Crockett, John Crockett coming from Ireland and Rebekah Hawkins from England. John Crockett saw service in the War of the American Revolution.
Ashley W. Crockett is a grandson of Elizabeth Crockett, the second wife of the famous David Crockett. She was born in Buncombe County, North Carolina, May 22, 1788, and was married to David Crockett in Lawrence County, Tennessee, in 1815. She died in Johnson County, in what is now Hood County, at the age of eighty-two. Many years later efforts were made to commemorate in appropriate manner the last resting place of this Texas pioneer woman. On May 30, 1913, a monument was dedicated to her memory, and one of the chief figures in the unveiling ceremony was her descendant, Elizabeth Deering of Ft.Worth. One of the speeches was made by Senator Ward of Cleburne, Johnson County, who had introduced the bill in the Senate to appropriate money for the purpose of erecting the monument. The chief address of the day was made by that distinguished Texas educator, Randolph Clark of Ranger, Eastland County. The bill for the appropriation was introduced into the House by Jesse Baker, and it was Governor Colquitt who signed the bill. The monument stands in Acton Cemetery.
The oldest child of Elizabeth and David Crockett was Robert Patton Crockett, who was born in Tennessee in 1816. He came to Texas with his mother, and after the death of David Crockett settled on a league of land granted by the Republic of Texas. This land was seven miles east of Granbury. They located only 1280 acres, the rest of the league never being located. There Robert Patton Crockett engaged in farming. Accompanying him and his mother to Texas was her daughter, Mrs. Elvira Halford, who is also buried in Acton Cemetery in Hood County. That was the first burial ground in what was then Johnson County. Robert Patton Crockett died in 1889, as the result of an accident caused by his horses running away. He was then seventy-three years of age. Of his eight children three are now living: Mrs. T. H. Hines, whose husband is in the real estate and bonding business at Granbury; Mrs. William Henry Crockett, of Bay City, near Neadville; and Ashley W. Another son, John Bell Crockett, was murdered and robbed late one evening by a negro, who was subsequently caught and hanged.
Ashley W. Crockett was born in Johnson County, August 6, 1857, and was reared practically on the frontier of north Texas, having very limited advantages in schools. One school he attended was kept in a log house in Hood County and taught by Capt. William E. Doyle of Freestone County, Captain Doyle’s brother being now a veteran dry goods merchant at Granbury. In 1871, at the age of thirteen, Mr. Crockett began an apprenticeship to learn the printer’s trade in an office at Weatherford, Texas, and subsequently was employed by Bond and Garland, owners of the Granbury Vidette at Granbury. In 1883 Mr. Crockett bought this newspaper, becoming its sole owner and editor, changing the name to the Granbury Graphic. After more than a quarter of a century of experience as a newspaper man in one town and connected with one establishment he sold out in 1907, and during the next four years was in newspaper work at Glenrose, and then for three and a half years was with the Granbury postoffice. He resigned and again put his capital into the old newspaper, reestablishing it in 1919 under the name Granbury Tablet, and continues to derive a great deal of satisfaction from newspaper work and the service opportunities it offers, and has been fairly successful in a material way. Mr. Crockett is a democrat, member of the Knights of Pythias and the Methodist Episcopal Church, South.
He married in 1876, Miss Nollie Haynes, whose father, Major J.C. Haynes, was a pioneer of Coryell County, Texas. Mrs. Crockett lives in North Texas, being the mother of three children: Chester A., born September 26, 1878, for fifteen or twenty years has been a salesman with a large furniture and carpet company, and was manager of one of the company’s stores for five years, and since the business was closed out has made his headquarters at Oklahoma City. He married Miss Virginia Bell. Clarence J. Crockett, the second child, born January 28, 1882, is associated with the Southern Security Company of Des Moines, Iowa. He married Eunice Peck, of Denison, Texas, and has two daughters, Mary Stuart Crockett and Evelyn Crockett. Ada Clara Crockett, born October 18, 1885, died in 1887.
Mr. Crockett on December 22, 1893 married Miss Anna Walkup, who was born in Mississippi in 1870. Her father was a school teacher, civil engineer and surveyor, and died as a result of contracting malaria while surveying in Arkansas. Mr. and Mrs. Crockett became the parents of seven children: Harold A., born in 1894, and died in 1916; Ilva Maurine died in infancy; Gladys, wife of R.W. Hendricks, agent for the Magnolia Petroleum Company at San Angelo, is the mother of one child; William Walkup, who changed his name to David William, and was associated with the Northern Traction Company at Ft. Worth, married Miss Laura King, of Ft. Worth, and their two sons are named David William, Jr., and Donald King; Elizabeth is the wife of R.G. Deering, an employee of the R.G. Dun Mercantile Company of Ft. Worth, and they have two children, Robert Deering, Jr., and Winifred; Miss Margaret, who is associated with her father’s newspaper; and Helen Annette, a student in the Polytechnic College at Ft. Worth.
| Ashley Wilson Crockett was born August 6, 1857 and died May 31, 1954. He was buried in Granbury Cemetery in Hood County, Texas. |
SOURCE
Texas Under Many Flags, Volume III.
Clarence R. Wharton, Author and Editor.
1930: The American Historical Society, Inc.,
Chicago & New York.