Bertha McReynolds

Notes:

note: Bertha listed as dau in 1900, showing born Nov 1875; so, why isn't she shown in 1880?

Bertha married John H. Higy (Highley) in 1898 in Sabine Pass, Jefferson Co, Texas. John was born in Jan 1870 in Missouri; died after 1900 in of, Sabine Parish, Louisiana. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Other Events and Attributes:

• Census: 1870, Sabine Pass, Jefferson Co, Texas
• Census: 1880, Sabine Pass, Jefferson Co, Texas
• Residence: Between 1891 and 1892, Victoria, Victoria Co, Texas
• Census: 1900, Sabine Pass, Jefferson Co, Texas

Notes:

MCREYNOLDS, FELIX C. (1835?1912). Felix C. McReynolds, Confederate officer and businessman, was born in Tennessee in 1835 to Isaac and Sarah (McGonigal) McReynolds. It is probable that Felix McReynolds came to Texas near the time of the Civil War.

During the Civil War McReynolds served as an executive officer for Col. William H. Griffin of "Griffin's Battalion." Four companies of Griffin's Battalion were then consolidated with six companies of the Eleventh Battalion to create Spaight's Regiment of the Twenty-first Texas Infantry. Although McReynolds was not the original executive officer of the battalion, he was a major by early 1863 and in October of 1863 was placed in command of Fort Manhassett and charged with the defense of Sabine Pass. He commanded the fort through the invasion scare of October and November and immediately thereafter married a local woman, Laura Magill, the younger daughter of Kate Dorman, of Sabine Pass fame. As the commandant of the fort, McReynolds presumably remained at the fort through the winter, although troop strength at the fort was reduced due to the invasion at Brownsville.

Although troubled by desertions in the early spring, Major McReynolds led a battery in an attack on Union gunboats, the Wave and the Granite City, at the battle of Calcascieu Pass on May 6, 1864. After the ninety-minute battle, Major McReynolds personally accepted the surrender of the Wave. In November 1864 Griffin's Battalion was transferred to Houston where it remained until it was decommissioned in 1865.

Following the war, Felix McReynolds returned to Sabine Pass. He was engaged in various business enterprises, including railroads, clerking at H. S. Grocery, and farming. The "Early Victoria Home," a historical landmark located on Craig Street in Victoria, Texas, lists Major McReynolds among its notable owners. He apparently resided in that city from 1891 to 1893. Felix McReynolds died in Jefferson County, on February 7, 1912, and is buried in Magnolia Cemetery with his wife Laura. The couple had two children, a son and a daughter.

BIBLIOGRAPHY:
W.T. Block, A History of Jefferson County, Texas, From Wilderness to Reconstruction (M.A. thesis, Lamar University, 1974; Nederland, Texas: Nederland Publishing, 1976).
https://tshaonline.org/handbook/online/articles/fmcdi

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On May 6, 1864, the date that McReynolds led the Sabine garrison of seven infantry companies to victory at the Battle of Calcasieu Pass, Louisiana, a fellow Beaumonter, Capt. Joseph Brickhouse, described the major as one "of the bravest officers who ever drew sword," who rallied "his men in such terms as no one who heard him could ever forget." Both McReynolds and his wife are buried within a few feet of the main office of Magnolia Cemetery in Beaumont.
http://www.wtblock.com/wtblockjr/catherin.htm

Census:
1870 Sabine Pass, Jefferson Co, Texas
residence 17
F.C. McReynolds 34 clerk, H.S. Grocery Tennessee
Laura Mcreynolds 24 Georgia
R Arthur Mcreynolds 5 Texas
J W Dorman 45 Pilot Delaware
Catharine E Dorman 41 keeping house Georgia 1200, 250
Effie Shaw 12 Texas (g-d of Niles Smith)
C H Alexander 54 wholesale grocery 3,000; 10,000 NC
William Allison 30 retail merchant Ayr Scotland 4,000; 5,000

residence 18 (blank)

residence 19 (widower of Helen Smith, aunt of Effie Shaw))
Wesley Garner 47 clerk W.S. Grocery Louisiana
Niles Garner 17 clerk W.S. Grocery Texas
Claud Garner 12 Texas

residence 20
Harris T.P. 29 dry goods merchant Texas
Delia 24 Texas
Richard 7 Texas
McGaffey Otis 49 merchant, 5000, 5000; Ohio
Mary Jane 48 New York
Charles 16 Texas
Otis 11 Texas


Census:
1880 Sabine Pass, Jefferson Co, Texas
F. C. Mcreynolds 44 1836 Tennessee
Laura (McGill) Mcreynolds 35 1845 Georgia
K.(R.) A. Mcreynolds 15 son
S.A. Mcreynolds 4 dau

(note: Bertha listed as dau in 1900, showing born Nov 1875; is S.A. Bertha?


Residence:
The "Early Victoria Home," a historical landmark located on Craig Street in Victoria, Texas, lists Major McReynolds among its notable owners. He apparently resided in that city from 1891 to 1893.
(Texas handbook online)

Census:
1900 Sabine Pass, Jefferson Co, Texas
F C Mcreynolds 64 widow
Laura Mcreynolds 14 1886 daughter
Bertha Higy 24 daughter
John H Higy 30 son in law

Note: apparently divorced or separated instead of widowed because Laura didn't die till 1935 in Throckmorton, Texas.

Felix married Laura Magill on 24 Oct 1863 in Jefferson Co, Texas, and was divorced. Laura (daughter of Arthur Magill, chief engineer and Catherine "Kate" (..) Magill-Dorman) was born in 1845 in Georgia; died on 16 Feb 1932; was buried in Magnolia Cem, Beaumont, Jefferson Co, Texas. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Isaac married Sarah McGonigal. Sarah was born about 1800. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Notes:

Arthur Magill was the chief engineer aboard the T. J. Smith, a Neches River mail packet built in 1857 at Bevilport, Jasper County, and owned by Capt. Henry Clay Smith of Orange. In 1858, while riding the 100-foot steamer to Sabine, Henry R. Green, a Beaumont correspondent of Galveston Weekly News, wrote that the T. J. Smith ran "like lightning with a thunderbolt after it."5 Green also wrote that "Magill is scientific in his line, very careful, and experienced." Nevertheless, the engineer was killed on November 2, 1859, when the vessel's boiler exploded. The T. J. Smith was later repaired and in 1862 was confiscated by the Confederate States government when its owner, H. C. Smith, defected to the Federal forces. Probate records reveal that Kate Magill soon sued Capt. Smith to collect her dead husband's wages.
http://www.wtblock.com/wtblockjr/catherin.htm

Arthur married Catherine "Kate" (..) Magill-Dorman in 1844 in Columbus, Georgia. Catherine was born on 7 Oct 1828 in Georgia; died on 24 Dec 1897 in Sabine Pass, Jefferson Co, Texas; was buried in Sabine Pass Cem, Sabine Pass, Jefferson Co, Texas. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Other Events and Attributes:

• Other-Begin: Sabine Pass, Jefferson Co, Texas; friend Sarah Vosburg
• Property: Catfish Hotel, Sabine Pass, Jefferson Co, Texas
• Census: 1860, Sabine Pass, Jefferson Co, Texas
• Census: 1880, Sabine Pass, Jefferson Co, Texas

Notes:

Other-Begin:
Article about Kate Dorman mentions her friend Sarah Vosburg.

Oblivious to the Federal shells bursting around them, Kate and her friend, Sarah Vosburg, labored over a hot stove in the Catfish Hotel, cooking meat, doughnuts, and hot coffee. In the heat of the battle, Kate Dorman went outside, hitched up the same horse and cart, and carried a hot meal to the grimy gunners in the fort.

When the hotel tenants and the town's populace fled, Kate turned the Catfish Hotel into a temporary hospital, for there was then no Confederate medical facility in the city. Mrs. Dorman and two friends, Sarah Vosburg and Sarah Ann King, were among the Sabine women who remained to nurse the victims, and all three were fortunate to escape death. Actually, Vosburg, who was the first person to recognize the symtoms of the disease, had survived yellow fever at New Orleans, and as a result was immune to it.8

source: 8 Dr. George Holland, "Epidemic at Sabine Pass," Houston TELEGRAPH, Sept. 10, 1862; Keith, "Memoirs," pp. 57-58; Confederate Veterans Column, Galveston DAILY NEWS, March 11, 1900.


Sarah is not listed in this file, but she is found in the 1870 census with her husband and son.

1870 Sabine Pass, Jefferson Co, Texas
W.H. Vosburg 55 cabinet maker New York
Sarah Vosburg 52 keeping house White Haven
William Vosburg 26 boatman Louisiana

Census:
1860 Sabine Pass, Jefferson Co, Texas
John W. Dorman 35 hotel keeper
Catherine G. 32 housekeeper
Laurah MaGill 15 student
hotel patrons


Census:
1880 Sabine Pass, Jefferson Co, Texas
J.W. Dorman 55 pilot
C.E. Dorman 51 wife