OLD ROCK CHURCH OR ROCK HOUSE

There never was a town at Rock Church. It was built about 1871 or ‘72, or ‘73. It was built for the Masonic Lodge. Old Man Stout did most of the work himself. It might have taken him three years. Mr. Williams said he had gone by lots of times and seen the old man at work smoking his pipe. There was a frame school house near by, across the road. Uncle Tom Pierson was assistant teacher there one year or more. Mr. Williams himself went to school there and would ride behind Uncle Tom.  Pulltight was the town, which was I think where the McDermott place was later not far away. This was down in the Leon River country. He didn’t know when the village started. (The Hamilton Masonic Lodge is still named the Rock House Lodge.)

He did not think that Mr. Beekman was a Civil War veteran. He married a Bullman.  Rachael Bullman. A cousin to Lat Beekman. (Mr. Latimore Beekman was a close friend of mine. He was a bachelor and lived at the old Blansit place, the house still down the road leading northeast from town. Mr. Beekman had a flowing moustache, had interesting travels in an early day, and was a great reader, often borrowing our books.)

The record shows that Ault Ferguson, presumably after my father brought him back from Arkansas, on a requisition from Governor Hogg, and sought a writ of habeas corpus. C. W. Cotton was chosen special judge to hear the proceedings. Probably in those days it took too long for the regular judge to get here, Judge Stranghen from Stephenville.

Mr. William Snell lived at or near Pulltight.

(Major Cyrus W. Cotton came in an early day, possibly from east Texas, for he represented a lady there in looking after her land in the west part of the county, called the Cotton Lease. He first stayed, according to Mr. Williams, in a boarding house where the present Baptist Church is located, a structure which had wooden chimney at the fireplace. He was county attorney and county judge at the time the courthouse, the original part of the structure was built in 1886, as shown by the corner stone. He started an abstract plant the one later named so many years by Mr. Tom White, who came from Missouri, an able man. The Major was distinguished looking, had a goatee beard, a deep voice, and generally respected. Had three girls and a young boy. Later went to west Texas and was in the telephone business, later in Houston, where he put in the River Oak Addition. His home here was a two-story house out the present Main Street. An old Confederate friend of mine told me his general, Joseph E. Johnson, looked like him.)

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