Nesbitt Memorial Library Journal
heirs as Abel Beeson, Leander Beeson, Polly Ann Sapp (presumably the
same woman as Mary Ann Sapp), and James and John Berry (see
Probate Minute Book C, page 58, Office of the County Clerk, Colorado
County, Texas). Evidence of the state of her marriage to William B.
Dewees is provided by his omission from the list of her heirs, by his
September 28, 1847 appearance before the probate court to waive his
rights to any part of her estate (see Probate Minute Book C, page 70,
Office of the County Clerk, Colorado County, Texas), and by his almost
immediate second marriage to Angelica Besch.
Dewees states that he "built me a little log cabin on the west
bank of the Colorado" in the same "letter" in which he first mentions a
wife, that dated January 2, 1830 (see Letters From an Early Settler of
Texas, page 119). He does not say anything about an influx of families
at that time. He does, however, in several earlier "letters," report that
settlers were arriving. Readers might infer from Zumwalt's text that
Dewees lived in the Columbus area from 1823 on. Dewees' own book,
however, places him in Mexico and San Antonio for much of the time
between 1823 and 1830.
Zumwalt apparently concluded that the settlers returned to the
Colorado after the revolution because one of the Dewees "letters" is said
to have been written in Columbus on May 15, 1836 (see Letters From
an Early Settler of Texas, page 160).
On account of a drought in 1823 the settlers suffered privations for food. The crops were
short and game left the country.
Again based on Dewees' recollections, here in the opening paragraph of
his "letter" dated December 1, 1823 (see Letters From an Early Settler
of Texas, page 43).
During 1824 ocurred [sic] the massacre by robbers of a prominent Mexican horse trader
by the name of Corasco. Corasco was driving a cavalcade of horses from the interior of
Mexico to Louisiana when he and all his drivers, with the exception of one man, were
killed. The horses and other belongings were stolen. This one survivor, badly wounded,
made his way to the settlement, then at the point now known as Columbus. A party
of six or seven men followed the tracks of the cavalcade north until they caught up with
the robbers just as they were about to swim the Brazos river. All but one of the robbers
were shot and killed in the water. Crasco creek, the scene of the murder and robbery,
was named for Senor Corasco.
Again Zumwalt gets his information from Dewees, this time from the
"letter" dated November 5, 1824. Dewees' story varies only slightly
from the one related by Zumwalt. Dewees states that all but three of the
robbers were killed before they got into the river, and that two of those
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