Indian Wars and Pioneers of Texas Page: 256 of 894

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INDIAN WARS AND PIONEERS OF TEXAS.

Union at all hazards and trample what it considered
the heresy of secession to death; the South to retire
from what it no longer considered a fraternal Union
and seek that peace and security under a separate
government denied it within its limits.
Col. Caldwell was present, as a spectator, at the
meeting of the Secession Convention at Austin and
used all of his great personal influence to prevent
the framing of the ordinance providing for the
withdrawal of Texas from the Union. He coincided
with his friends, Gen. Sam Houston and Hon.
James W. Throckmorton, on the want of necessity
for and unwisdom of such a step. He saw nothing
but disaster in store for the people, whether they
lost or won in the coming struggle. He thought
the South had suffered many wrongs, but his idea
was to redress them within the Union. A greater
than any human power, however, had decided the
settlement of the questions involved (which could
have been settled in no other way) by the fiery
ordeal of war. The ordinance was passed and
soon there rang out the call to arms. Deeply
grieved at the woes which he saw that his beloved
country must suffer, Col. Caldwell, too feeble for
active service himself, sent four of his gallant sons
to the front to fight and, if need be, die, for the
Confederate States.
He also loaned the State or Texas a quarter of a
million of dollars in gold to carry on the government,
when the treasury was empty, and received
bonds therefor. These bonds, owing to the downfall
of the Confederacy, became worthless and he
never received a cent in return.
It is unpleasant to dwell upon the war period
and the period of reconstruction that followed it.
Both passed.
During the latter period, in 1866, when it was
attempted to rehabilitate the State under the plan
proposed by President Johnson, a Democratic convention
assembled for the purpose of nominating
candidates for State offices and a caucus-committee,
of which Hon. James W. Throckmorton
was a member, called upon Col. Caldwell and
formally requested him to accept the nomination
for Governor, stating that he was considered the
proper man to lead the way to the re-establishment
of honest government inthe State. Thanking them
for the honor conferred, he declined to accede to
their request and urged the nomination of his friend
and associate in the Senate in 1857-8, Mr. Throckmorton.
In accordance with this advice, Throckmorton
was given the nomination and subsequently
elected, only to be removed in a short time as an
impediment to reconstruction, by Gen. Sheridan,
military commander of the district, acting under

authority of the illiberal reconstruction laws passed
by Congress in opposition to Johnson's policy.
Col. Caldwell retired to his home near Bastrop,
where he spent in quietude the four remaining
years of his life. There he peacefully breathed his
last on the 22d day of October, 1870, surrounded
by his sorrowing family.
Death never gathered to its cold embrace a more
devoted patriot or stilled the pulsations of a truer
or more manly heart. His memory deserves ever
to be revered by the people of Texas, whom he
served in so many and such various capacities, and
his name deserves a place on the pages of the
State's history beside those of her bravest, and
brightest and best, from the days that preceded
the revolution down to those that witnessed the
close of his useful and illustrious career.
His beloved wife survived him for many years,
dying December 30th, 1895, in the city of Austin,
where she removed in the spring of 1871 to live
with her children. She was born in Knoxville,
Tenn., December 8th, 1809. She was a noble
Christian lady, distinguished for every grace that
endears to us the names of wife and mother. She
was a daughter of Rev. John Haynie, one of the
most famous and best remembered of the pioneer
preachers of the M. E. Church, who made their
way into the wilderness of Texas and blazed the
way for other and later Christian workers.
Rev. John Haynie was born in Botetourt
County, Va., April 7, 1786, and married Elizabeth
Brooks, May 23d, 1805. While he was young his
family moved to East Tennessee, and located near
Knoxville. In his twentieth year he married
Elizabeth Brooks. In 1815 or 1816 he settled in
the then village of Knoxville, where he carried on
a successful mercantile business and labored for
the establishment of Methodism. He spent about
fifteen years at Knoxville and then removed to
North Alabama, where he labored in the ministry
until 1839, when he came to the Republic of Texas.
He was admitted to the West Texas conference in
1840 and assigned to Austin. This was his first
year in the itineracy, although he had received
license to preach as early as 1811. The Austin
circuit, to which he was appointed, included the
new capital city and the counties of Bastrop and
Travis. Shortly after his arrival at Austin he was
elected Chaplain of the Texas Congress, a position
that he several times subsequently held. In 1846,
Rev. Mr. Haynie was assigned to Corpus Christi
and started for his field of labor, leaving his family
at their home in Rutersville, Fayette County. At
Goliad he was informed that it would be unsafe
for him to proceed without a guard and Capt.