My Grandfather Elliot was the captain of the ship "Lady Cecilia". Grandmother Elliot often went with Grandfather when he went on long trips. She went with him to India, and when the ship was near India it was found one of the passengers had Small Pox, and the ship was quarantined and not allowed to dock. They were at sea many weeks. While waiting to be allowed to dock, my father, William Jackson Elliot was born on board ship off the coast of Good Hope. Grandfather Duff was an ambassador from Scotland to Turkey. Mother was born in Constantinople, Turkey.Mother and Dad both grew up and graduated from Gordon University in Aberdeen, Scotland. Dad came to Espuela as bookkeeper for Espuela Land and Cattle Company. He managed the commissary, and when the government put in a post office in the commissary he was to be postmaster. While filling out the necessary papers it was found he was "a man without a country", and had to file for citizenship for himself, Mother and all 7 children. I was almost 6 when I became an American citizen.
My brother Bill and I got to do the "outside" chores on the farm and ranch. We "broke" the horses and calves to ride, helped brand, vaccinate, and mark cattle and horses. Fun to us! When I finished 7 grades at Spring Creek school, I worked my way through high school in Spur by keeping children for 25¢ an hour. I went to WTSC at Canyon, received my Bachelor and Master degrees of science at Tech and TWU. I taught at Spring Creek, Spur, Justiceburg, Post, Cross Roads, and Girard, 41 years in all.
Aunt Margaret Elliot, a rather wealthy doctor in South Africa (Johannesburg), came to America when she retired and took my sister Dorothy to London and sent her through college there. Every few years she sent me money for a new car, provided I agreed to take her, Dad, and Dorothy wherever they chose on their visits in America. We went to every state in the union except Vermont and Maine. We saw the Golden Gate Exposition, World´s Fair in Chicago, and one year at my choosing, we went to Mexico, Panama, Central America and most of South America.
She gave me my choice of a year in college or a year in Europe. Europe, of course! We saw England, Scotland, Ireland, Wales, then to Germany. The Germans used cows as beast of burden because they could milk the cows, eat the calves and ride and work the cows; while they could only work horses. I liked German people better than any other Europeans. We also went to the Holy Land.
I married Louis G. Williams. He passed away in 1969. We had a daughter, Elizabeth (Beth) Lucille, and a son, William (Bill) Louis Williams, a lovely daughter-in-law, Maurine Parker Williams and 2 granddaughters, Janet Kay and Christy Annette. All my sisters and brother are dead. I am the only living member of the W.J. Elliot family.
The Espuela Land and Cattle Company bought many sections of Texas school land for $1 an acre. Dad bought 3 sections, and I bought 300 acres from him. I plan to pass the land on to Bill, a tradition in Scotland, to pass the home and land to the oldest child. With all my travels, I still have never ridden on a train.
Written by: Virginia Elliot WilliamsSource: Dickens County History...its Land and People © Dickens Historical Commission; Printer: Craftsman Inc. Lubbock, Texas 1986
Submitted by Gerald Farley
Funeral services for Mrs. Elizabeth Wilson Duff Eliot, wife of the well known West Texas Pioneer, "Scotch Bill" Eliot, were held Sunday afternoon at the Spur Episcopal church. Mrs. Eliot died at her Spring Creek Ranch home Saturday morning at 3:00 a.m. She had been ill for several months of high blood pressure and a heart ailment but had left unusually well the evening before her death.Mr. Eliot was born October 24, 1873, on an island near Constantinople, Turkey. She first came to the United States in 1888 to visit a brother in New York. In 1898 she came to Texas to marry "Scotch Bill" whom she had known sine childhood. She was met in Fort worth by Mr. Eliot, who drove her back to the Spur Ranch behind a team of horses. They operated the old company store at Espuela located on land now owned by Mr. J. L. Karr. Shortly after the founding of the city of Spur, they moved to their Spring Creek Ranch and Farm Home. They had seven children: Margarite, Elizabeth Wilson, Dorothy Mae, William Jackson, Audrey McPherson, Virginia Adell, and Ola Sarah Isabell who died in 1925.
Pallbearers for the funeral were Cecil Fox, Buford Johnson, F.W. Jennings, Jack Sening, Charles Sening and C. McMahan. Flower girls were Verna Fox, Mrs. Coy McMahan, Mrs. V.V. Parr, Mrs. Jack Sening, Mrs. F.W. Jennings and Carol Cobb.
©The Texas Spur, January 11, 1940 From the records of Lillian Grace Nay
This is so especially true of one of Dickens county all time great men, W. J. (Scotch Bill) Elliot. A historian second to none, a lover of Dickens county second to none. A husband, a father second to none. After 59 years of work filled with love of the Spur country, he has passed to the future.
It would be impossible to take up and cover in a new release the full history of the 59 years to Dickens county, so lets confine the statements here to only two subjects. His contribution to the knowledge of the memorial museum material that he has collected and recorded through the years. Hundred of collections of the early birds, animals and plant life of this region in the form of petrified limbs and tree trunks and bones have been collected by Ms. Elliot and made into one of the greatest laboratories of all of Texas. Much of this material has been presented to the University of Texas, The University of Michigan, and to West Texas State College at Canyon where his daughter obtained much of their collegiate training. Geology material was also presented to the Museum of Natural History at London, England.
Next in important to the outstanding work on the early wildlife of this region, as his work with hundreds of early settlers. Many of them are still living and working in the region. In fact all of them that are here now and were here before the turn of the century were close and appreciative cooperators of "Scotch Bill."
Mr. Elliot was associated with the Spur Ranch people in merchandising at the old ranch farmstead in the Espuela community long before the turn of the century, and many, many years before the first railroad train entered the region and before the original townsite of Spur was established. It was here the beautiful little Scotch wife, Elizabeth Wilma Duff, started their life together and started the wonderful little family that they are now leaving in the country.
"The Spur," a 274 page book written by Mr. Elliot in 1959 and published by the Texas Spur Publishing Company of Spur, is a fine rich record of the early pioneers and the early living of the region.
Mr. Elliot was born off the coast of South Africa, December 6, 1868 in the sailship, Lady Cecilia, of which his father, William Elliot, was captain. He was He was educated in Aberdeen, Scotland, the latter of his education was in Gordon College in Aberdeen. He was an apprentice in the office of a steamship company where one of the officials was a stockholder in the Espuela Land & Cattle Company and through this acquaintance he came to Texas. He was on the Spur Ranch several years before taking charge of the Espuela store and post office. After Spur was established and the Espuela post office discontinued, he moved to his small ranch on Spring Creek southeast of Spur where he lived until October, 1946 when he moved to 302 East Harris Street in Spur. For many months he had been ill and went to Nichols General Hospital on Tuesday, May 2, where he died late in the afternoon, Saturday, May 14.
Funeral services were conducted in the Spur Presbyterian Church, Sunday, May 15 at 3:30 p.m. Rev. Foster of Lubbock officiated. Interment was in the Spur Cemetery.
Mrs. Elliot died suddenly on January 4, 1940, also two daughters preceded Mr. Elliot in death. Isabel died on January 28, 1925 and Dorothy died in London, England January 8, 1948 after a short illness.
Survivors are Margaret A. Elliott of Spur, Mrs. H. H. Terry, 4627 San Jacinto Street, Dallas; Mrs. Laster Hensley of Guthrie; Mrs. Lois Williams of Spur; and W. J. Elliott, Jr. of Crystal City, Texas. Also Miss Margaret Elliot, a sister of London, England and a brother, James Elliot of Blackpool, England.
©The Texas Spur, May 26, 1949
From the records of Lillian Grace Nay
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