Tom Caraway—Pioneer

By Mary E. Kelley, Beaumont, Texas

[From Hunter's Frontier Times Magazine, April, 1934]

ADVENTURE LIKE a theme song, runs through the story of Tom Caraway 's life. Sitting in his one-room apartment out near the Magnolia Refinery in Beaumont, he gives a graphic description of pioneer days in East Texas. He was born at Burr's Bluff, in Newton county, 81 years ago. Although he has been a resident of Beaumont and Jefferson county for the last 20 years, the greater part of his life has been spent in Hardin county, near Silsbee.

At scarcely a point in his interesting narrative does "Uncle Tom," as he is known to his friends, hesitate for a name or a date. His mind is clear as his hand is steady. He has a nephew 74 years old, so he has been "Uncle Tom" for a long time. He is a man of powerful physique, with slightly graying hair, and a soft drawl in his speech, which makes his conversation all the more delightful. Few men living in East Texas today can lay claim to a life filled with as much color and action as Uncle Tom's.

Uncle Tom tells how, at the age of 11, he killed a panther; how he hunted bear; how he invested his first earnings; how he learned to set up a sawmill; how he learned to read and to write—these and a score of other interesting tales from an old man, rough-hewn but dependable, cause his listeners to draw nearer and to lose all account of the passing of time.

When settlers from all parts of the union were turning to the new state of Texas, Tom Caraway's father and mother left their home in Georgia, and journeyed to Burr's Bluff in Newton county. Here they lived for three years, but after a visit to relatives at old Hardin, they decided to cross the Neches and locate six miles north of the present site of Silsbee. The elder Caraway did not live long after this move, and his wife and six children were left to run the farm as best they could. Uncle Tom's father had purchased the grant of Bullock Hilliard, a Mexican war veteran, in 1855, and it was three years later that the county of Hardin was organized.

Every member of the Caraway family had to work long and hard, according to Uncle Tom. "But we were a happy and contented family," he adds. In addition to the ordinary farm work, the care of the live stock included protecting them from wild beasts.

Dramatically, Uncle Tom relates the story of how he killed the panther, while searching for a missing hog. "I was goin' through the woods late. My dog acted queer, and I stopped just in time. You should a' seen that panther—crouched there ready to spring on me—his eyes shinin' like two polished marbles." Uncle Tom knocked the ashes from his pipe. "But the old muzzle-loader finished him. Yes sir. An' I reckon there ain't many boys that age could notch their guns for a panther," Uncle Tom chuckled.

"And how did Bear Man's Bluff receive its name? " was often asked. then he told the story of Randel West, a pioneer, and a famous bear hunter who lived on a bluff near the Neches River. Mr. West killed bear, not for sport, but for a livelihood. He sold the skins and cured the meat just as he did hog meat. The bear meat was packed in hogsheads and sold to the rivermen, or exchanged for other needed supplies. It must have been greatly in demand at that time, because the river men always wanted to stop at the "Bear Man's" on the bluff, hence the name Bear Man's Bluff.

"I've killed some powerful big bear in my time," said Uncle Tom, "But I never sold bear meat. It was not uncommon for us to kill two or three wild-cats a week—they ate young pigs in the woods."

Two things that have always given Uncle Tom great pleasure are hunting and talking. In telling of one of his hunting trips he said: "One of the members of the party, from another city, who had listened to my yarns for eight days and nights offered me a home for the rest of my life if I would live with him, and just talk to him and his wife. Sorter like a court jester I suppose," he smiled . That life would have been too tame for Uncle Tom. He must work as well as play.

With the first money he was able a set of tools, and with this modest equipment, he became the chief mechanic of his neighborhood. He has always been interested in machinery, and he likes to experiment with it. A smile lights the face of the old man as he tells of his experiments with it while his young wife looked on and encouraged him. From the experiments made with the toy flutter-mill there grew a steam sawmill, a grist mill, and a gin.

His sawmill was the first in the vicinity of Silsbee, and with lumber sawed at this mill he built the first house in Silsbee. His mill cut the first plank flooring in his community. Puncheon floor had been used prior to this.

Uncle Tom's wife was his staunch helper in the mill venture. "She could set blocks as well as I could," he proudly relates. "Why, the only cradle one of my boys ever knew was the carriage of my saw."

When the Texas Pineland Association built its first mill at Silsbee, it was Uncle Tom who cut the foundation timbers for the mill; who cleared the right-of-way, and who cut the cross-ties for the tram road. Prior to this he had helped build the first tramthrough the piney woods for a man by the name of Van Meter who had a saw mill at Yellow Bluff, later known as Cairo—another town which is no more . The rails of Van Meter 's tram were a part of the old East Texas Railroad at Sabine. They were hauled up the river on the steamer "Laura, " and Uncle Tom and Mr. Van Meter laid the first rail on the new tram. A railroad in the thicket! Truly an amazing sight to many East Texas children of that period.

"How did you used to travel, and where did you go"" Uncle Tom was asked. Here the story takes on more color as he describes the river transportation, from the days of the keelboat to the proud day when the first side-wheel steamer stopped at old Concord, Uncle Tom's postoffice. This town, like the keel-boat and the sidewheeler, is only a memory, but in a cemetery near this historic spot sleep many of Concord's first citizens.

"The keel-boat moved up the river only as fast as a man could walk," explained Uncle Tom. "The last one I remember, operated by man-power, was in 1867, and it belonged to a Captain Wilson. For a few years longer steamboats towed the keel-boats, but they soon disappeared entirely from the river trade."

An accident prevented Uncle Tom's finishing the only school term that he was ever privileged to attend. L. D. Scarborough, later county surveyor of Jasper county, came into the settlement to teach a three month's school term and the Caraway children attended. In a game of "cat," during recess, young Tom reached too far for the ball, and was struck on the head "But got as far as 'horseback.' in the Blue Back Speller," Uncle Tom proudly proclaims.

He heard his brothers and sisters read so often from the McGuffey Readers that he memorized many of these stories and poems. He is still able to repeat the "Old Oaken Bucket, " and says the sentiment of this poem means more to him each year as he grows older. Uncle Tom is something of a verse maker himself, and he often entertains his friends with this "foolishness, " as he calls his verse.

While looking among his keepsakes for a picture, he brings forth a rusty tin box filled with tax receipts of many years past, and finally from the bottom of the box he produces five silver coins bearing the date of his birth; and an Indian spear which he plowed up on his farm years before, and a madstone which his father had taken from the stomach of a white deer more than 100 years ago in Georgia. "I used to soak this stone in warm sweet milk and cure many cases of snakebite and hydrophobia, back in old times," says Uncle Tom. "I would apply it to the wound and it would stick until the poison was all drawn out." But the stone has been put away as it is no longer needed. There are more popular snakebite remedies today, and Pasteur Institute takes care of the hydrophobia patients.

Uncle Tom was not old enough to fight in the Civil War, but he saw many soldiers as he used to go to Sabine Pass to visit his brother, C. B. Caraway, who was stationed there. He tells of the "pony telegraph system" in use between Beaumont and Sabine Pass

"I had to go to army headquarters in Beaumont to get a pass before I could go to see my brother, and while waiting there, I often saw a rider take his dispatches, mount a broom-tail pony and ride as fast as he could to Taylor's bayou. Here at the end of a rickety wooden bridge a soldier met him with a fresh horse, and after a hurried exchange the man was on his way again. My pass was always examined at this bridge by one of the three soldiers camped in a shack nearby."

Uncle Tom was asked if he was not rather young to take this trip alone. "Yes," came the quick reply," but the war made men out of us early. I was doing a man's work long before the war ended."

Uncle Tom is still interested in machinery, and says that he finds no difficulty in handling it. He operated his last sawmill nine years ago. " Why did I quit? Because I was always asked to state my age in the first letter applying for a job. A man past 70 cannot be used, they say, but I am still able to find work. I shipped as storekeeper on boats of two of the major oil companies after I was 71. I often assisted the engineers on the boats and enjoyed this work. I had never mended shoes, but I opened a shop in Port Neches after I had been forced to leave the boats, due to illness. After a month there, I had an opportunity to get this place, and here I have been for the last seven years, mending shoes."

Uncle Tom's wife died during the World War, and though his children often urge him to retire, he has no thought of doing this for many years yet. "If it is a case of matching muscle, I am as good as any of them, he says.

Today few young people would be willing to milk 40 cows and then ride eight or ten miles horseback to a dance, but Uncle Tom and his wife did not think this an unusual achievement. The 49 cows astonished his listeners, until he explained that it took several prairie cows to furnish a pound of butter. The Caraways had a market for all the butter they could produce. Uncle Tom remembers Grandma Calder of Beaumont as one of his customers, for it was at her home he saw his first sewing machine. He was so interested in it that the old lady had her daughter demonstrate its wonderful possibilities to him. From this family one of the principal streets in Beaumont received its name.

To his wife Uncle Tom gave credit for what education he possesses. "She was Mary Perryman of Town Bluff, and she'd had a right smart schooling. At the time of my marriage, I didn't even recognize my name when I saw it written. She taught me to read and write and with that help I have been able to read my Bible, and I now enjoy the daily paper. We had 11 children, and we worked hard to take care of them. My wife was a true pioneer mother. But all in all, I've had a heap of satisfaction out of life."

No pessimist in Uncle Tom as he sits in his room, with his greatest treasures—the family Bible, and the daguerro-types of his wife and children.

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