Milam County Historical Commission
Milam County, Texas
Milam County, Texas
All articles from the Temple Daily Telegram are published with the permission of the
Temple Daily Telegram.
All credit for this article goes to
Jeanne Williams and the Temple Daily Telegram
Temple Daily Telegram.
All credit for this article goes to
Jeanne Williams and the Temple Daily Telegram
Milam Co. Community Honors Civil War Battle
by Jeanne Williams, Telegram Staff Writer
Temple Daily Telegram - July 26, 2010
VAL VERDE COMMUNITY — Vicksburg, Miss., Chattanooga, Tenn., Manassas, Va., and Gettysburg, Pa., are recognized as famous landmarks of the Civil War.
Though few sites in Texas are associated with the War Between the States, the Val Verde community in northwest Milam County stands today as a permanent monument to the local men who fought with Brig. Gen. Henry H. Sibley in his famed New Mexico Campaign of 1862.
Among Milam County volunteers in the Confederate Army was Mississippi-born James Pittman Whittington, who enlisted June 25, 1862, in the 4th Texas Cavalry, Co. D, San Andres Light Horse Co., and fought with Sibley’s Texas Brigade in the victorious Battle of Valverde, the first clash with Union troops in New Mexico.
Sibley, a U.S. Military Academy graduate, was commissioned by Confederate States of America President Jefferson Davis to seize the New Mexico Territory, conquer the American west and control its gold and silver mines. Confederate troops could not be spared so Sibley mustered three regiments of volunteers.
Among the more than 3,000 men joining him at San Antonio were four companies of volunteers from Milam, Falls and Williamson counties. In Milam County, Charles M. Lesueur resigned from the Texas Legislature, where he served Milam and Williamson counties, to organize Company D 4th Texas Cavalry. Charles Buckholts — a Cameron lawyer, former Milam County clerk and brother to the town of Buckholts’ namesake John Abel Buckholts — organized Company E, 4th Texas Cavalry in Cameron.
Volunteer soldiers such as Whittington supplied their own weapons and mounts.
Sibley’s Brigade troops were expected to subsist off the land and seize supplies when possible from Union troops posted in New Mexico. Sibley’s sharpshooting soldiers were armed with squirrel guns, bear guns, sportsman guns and shotguns both single and double barrel, according to a soldier’s diary.
Ultimately, the New Mexico Campaign failed at the Battle of Glorietta Pass and has gone down in history as the Gettysburg of the West. Whittington was among those in Sibley’s Brigade who were captured by the Union Army, made prisoners of war and released under a POW exchange in December 1863 in Louisiana.
Whittington, returning home to Milam County after the Civil War, ensured posterity for the local men who fought in the Battle of Valverde, N.M., by donating land for a church and cemetery in a west Milam County community and naming the settlement Val Verde, words that translate from Spanish to English as “Green Valley.”
Whittington died in 1909 and is among the nearly 700 people buried in the immaculate and orderly Val Verde Cemetery, a pioneer graveyard adjacent to the picturesque, white framed and steepled, First Baptist Church of Val Verde. A Texas Historical Marker stands sentinel today in front of the church as a tacit proof that Milam County residents were involved in a major event of U.S. and Texas history. Norinne Holder Holman’s “170 Years of Cemetery Records in Milam County, Texas” stated that the first burial in Val Verde Cemetery was in 1873, while the earliest recorded gravesite is from 1889.
The Handbook of Texas On-Line described Val Verde in one short paragraph, including its founding and later history. In 1903, Val Verde boasted a one-teacher school that served 26 students. Val Verde School consolidated with Sharp in 1941, but withdrew for unrevealed reasons from Sharp in 1961 and divided the district between Holland and Rogers in Bell County.
One newspaper account from 1930 reveals that the community curiously once answered to two names: Val Verde on public school grounds; and Crush on the opposing side of the road where a general store stood.
Although the town of Crush — named in honor of a teacher who sought to sink permanent roots in the Blackland soil by establishing a town with store and post office named after him — fought for recognition, it withered and died. Val Verde, however, has beaten ghost town status.
Boasting 25 proud residents in the 2000 U.S. Census, Val Verde today is recognized on websites as one of Texas’ small communities where nothing ever happened to put it in the state spotlight. Whittington, however, ensured this backroads community would at least have a name no one would easily forget.
jwilliams@tdtnews.com
by Jeanne Williams, Telegram Staff Writer
Temple Daily Telegram - July 26, 2010
VAL VERDE COMMUNITY — Vicksburg, Miss., Chattanooga, Tenn., Manassas, Va., and Gettysburg, Pa., are recognized as famous landmarks of the Civil War.
Though few sites in Texas are associated with the War Between the States, the Val Verde community in northwest Milam County stands today as a permanent monument to the local men who fought with Brig. Gen. Henry H. Sibley in his famed New Mexico Campaign of 1862.
Among Milam County volunteers in the Confederate Army was Mississippi-born James Pittman Whittington, who enlisted June 25, 1862, in the 4th Texas Cavalry, Co. D, San Andres Light Horse Co., and fought with Sibley’s Texas Brigade in the victorious Battle of Valverde, the first clash with Union troops in New Mexico.
Sibley, a U.S. Military Academy graduate, was commissioned by Confederate States of America President Jefferson Davis to seize the New Mexico Territory, conquer the American west and control its gold and silver mines. Confederate troops could not be spared so Sibley mustered three regiments of volunteers.
Among the more than 3,000 men joining him at San Antonio were four companies of volunteers from Milam, Falls and Williamson counties. In Milam County, Charles M. Lesueur resigned from the Texas Legislature, where he served Milam and Williamson counties, to organize Company D 4th Texas Cavalry. Charles Buckholts — a Cameron lawyer, former Milam County clerk and brother to the town of Buckholts’ namesake John Abel Buckholts — organized Company E, 4th Texas Cavalry in Cameron.
Volunteer soldiers such as Whittington supplied their own weapons and mounts.
Sibley’s Brigade troops were expected to subsist off the land and seize supplies when possible from Union troops posted in New Mexico. Sibley’s sharpshooting soldiers were armed with squirrel guns, bear guns, sportsman guns and shotguns both single and double barrel, according to a soldier’s diary.
Ultimately, the New Mexico Campaign failed at the Battle of Glorietta Pass and has gone down in history as the Gettysburg of the West. Whittington was among those in Sibley’s Brigade who were captured by the Union Army, made prisoners of war and released under a POW exchange in December 1863 in Louisiana.
Whittington, returning home to Milam County after the Civil War, ensured posterity for the local men who fought in the Battle of Valverde, N.M., by donating land for a church and cemetery in a west Milam County community and naming the settlement Val Verde, words that translate from Spanish to English as “Green Valley.”
Whittington died in 1909 and is among the nearly 700 people buried in the immaculate and orderly Val Verde Cemetery, a pioneer graveyard adjacent to the picturesque, white framed and steepled, First Baptist Church of Val Verde. A Texas Historical Marker stands sentinel today in front of the church as a tacit proof that Milam County residents were involved in a major event of U.S. and Texas history. Norinne Holder Holman’s “170 Years of Cemetery Records in Milam County, Texas” stated that the first burial in Val Verde Cemetery was in 1873, while the earliest recorded gravesite is from 1889.
The Handbook of Texas On-Line described Val Verde in one short paragraph, including its founding and later history. In 1903, Val Verde boasted a one-teacher school that served 26 students. Val Verde School consolidated with Sharp in 1941, but withdrew for unrevealed reasons from Sharp in 1961 and divided the district between Holland and Rogers in Bell County.
One newspaper account from 1930 reveals that the community curiously once answered to two names: Val Verde on public school grounds; and Crush on the opposing side of the road where a general store stood.
Although the town of Crush — named in honor of a teacher who sought to sink permanent roots in the Blackland soil by establishing a town with store and post office named after him — fought for recognition, it withered and died. Val Verde, however, has beaten ghost town status.
Boasting 25 proud residents in the 2000 U.S. Census, Val Verde today is recognized on websites as one of Texas’ small communities where nothing ever happened to put it in the state spotlight. Whittington, however, ensured this backroads community would at least have a name no one would easily forget.
jwilliams@tdtnews.com
Photo by Shirley Williams
A Confederate verteran donated land for a church and cemetery in exchange for this Milam County village to be named Val Verde in honor of a Civil War battle
A Confederate verteran donated land for a church and cemetery in exchange for this Milam County village to be named Val Verde in honor of a Civil War battle