ELECTION IRREGULARITIES
It was Crockett Hendricks, Hamp McCain, and Berkley, who were indicted
for miscount of votes, probably out at Lanham (toward
Twin Mountains), but
they never were tried. (I had given a list of criminal cases from the
court dockets for Mr. Williams’ perusal and comment.) He said with
reference to this record, that Colonel Potts, who represented the Western
factions, was really elected sheriff, but that they counted him out and
that Dave Smith won by one vote.
He said that Dave Smith would have been all right as sheriff if he
could have acted independently. He said that Old Man Jim Rice was one of
the rulers but that he ... was ... ...twenty years old when first elected.
He was the first really elected sheriff. They were all appointed before
that time. When Ezekiel Manning was appointed the first sheriff by Sam
Houston there were not enough people here to amount to anything. Bill
Manning, lately the bank president, has a framed commission to him from
Houston, the governor. Buthead Wilson and such sheriffs did nothing in the
way of enforcement. Sam Gholson, (later the great cowman, the man who was
with Ira Aten in the affray with the Spikes man) was an appointed sheriff
and served only a short time. They could not do much in the way of law
enforcement and were not expected to..
(Mr. Sam Gholson was the brother of my friend, Uncle Frank Gholson, who
lived in the old rock house in the edge of Lampasas County, just south of
Gholson Pass. Felix and I got his story of the Pease River battle with the
Comanches in 1868, later published in the State Historical Journal, also
his part in the Confederate army when under General "Gentleman"
John Bankhead., they took Galveston Island back from the Yankees; (Not
Bankhead,) General McGruder.
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CHESLEY'S HAMILTON COUNTY INTERVIEWS
BY
HERVEY EDGAR CHESLEY, JR.
Born: 21 November, 1894
Died: 17 July, 1979