Re: Rebecca Collins 1880 census Erath County, TX
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In reply to:
Rebecca Collins 1880 census Erath County, TX
Roger Robison 9/06/07
I may have worked out the ancestry of Isaac Newton Collins, a brick wall that I have faced for the past ten years.
I spent the entire day at the library yesterday scrolling through miles of microfilm of tax records from various Texas counties. It may have paid off. I am in the process of updating my website, but I am in no rush to do so just yet. The link is NOT proven, but the evidence is beyond circumstantial as far as I am concerned. Here's what I think...
The parents of Isaac Newton Collins are likely John George Collins and Rebecca Satterwhite. The 1860 census for Harrison County, TX, shows a male, age 1 year, born in Texas, with five siblings and the initials that I construed to be I. N., the child of J. G. and R. Collins. Unfortunately, I have been unable to find this family in the 1870 census, but I did find parts of it on the 1880 census in Erath County, TX. It shows Rebecca Collins and two of her sons, her eldest, William M., and her youngest, named NEWTON, age 21. If this is my Isaac Newton, he would have been about age 25-26 when he married Emma Butts in Taylor County, TX, in 1885. The 1890 census was destroyed, so that's all I have from census records about him. He died in 1894, probably in Mason County, TX, and Emma remarried in 1896. Fortunately, unlike the census taker, the tax collector came around every year!
In 1856, the tax roll of Upshur County, TX, shows Jno G. Collins as agent for the estate of L. Collins, so that leads me back one more generation to Levin Collins, but I am getting ahead of myself. John George Collins appears in the role of administrator again in 1857. I'm not sure how long he stayed there, but his next appearance on tax rolls is in Bosque County, TX,for 1874 and 1875. In 1876, he appears in Erath County, TX. He is listed there until 1879, the year he died. In 1880, his widow appears on the roll as Mrs. R. Collins, and the abstract number matches that of her husband's property in previous years. In 1881, part of her property, with matching abstract number, appears as being paid by I. N. Collins! Other parts are paid by other siblings. I need to see the land transaction records of various counties to work out the details. Perhaps there is a will for John George Collins or his wife Rebecca in Erath County... They appear to have died within a couple of years of one another.
The parents of John George Collins are Levin Collins and his wife Anna, whose maiden name is unknown. There is fairly decent info about them and their children at this URL: http://newsarch.rootsweb.com/th/read/COLLINS/1998-10/0909678966http://newsarch.rootsweb.com/th/read/COLLINS/1998-10/0909678966
I have been correlating the locations of all their other children with the movements of John George Collins. They were always close by, if not in the same counties, so that might yield even more information. I have about 20 pages of notes, but haven't sorted them all out yet.
If you can confirm or refute any of this information, please contact me.