 |
| Bastrop County |
With the birth of her last child and the death of her husband in 1844, Margaret McElroy Cassidy (b. 1810) became head of her family on their farm in Bastrop.
In 1846, her oldest child, Catherine Agnes (b. 1828), married an Irishman named John Horan (b. 1815) at Placid Creek, Bastrop. By 1850, the Horans had moved to nearby Austin, the State Capital, a community at the edge of American Anglo settlement. John was a liquor dealer, owner of restaurant saloon, and a billiard parlor.
Margaret's oldest son, Stephen, (b. 1832), also moved to Austin, and the other children followed suit. On 11 Apr 1852, Sarah Jane (b. 1833) married Thomas Cassidy (b. 1824), a sometime business partner of John Horan. By mid-decade, he disappeared, faced with legal questions arising from shady business dealings.
In April 1855, Margaret rented out her farm and moved in with children in Austin.
By October 1855, local creditors decided that she had abandoned her family homestead and the County of Bastrop promptly sold her property at auction to James W. Shepherd. She sued in district court that she had not abandoned her homestead since she had not purchased a new place to reside, and was only visiting her children.
According to trial testimony, Margaret told one of her creditors that
...she intended moving to Austin, that she wanted to live with her children, society was bad in Bastrop, and that she would not live in any such place. (p. 26)
Her negative comments about Bastrop did not seem to bother the court.
Texas has always had strong protections even in bankruptcy for one's personal homestead from being seized, and the County's actions were overturned. Mr. Shepherd appealed.
The case, Sheperd v. Cassidy went to the Texas State Supreme Court. The Court found that she had bought no new residence, and that she had the right to visit her family without abandoning her homestead:
We are satisfied with the findings of the jury. They were acquainted with the parties and were the judges of the weight to be given to the petulant observations of this old lady, made, some of them, when she was in very bad humor. (p. 31)
Margaret Cassidy was 45 years old at the time.
SOURCE: 1850 US Census, Bastrop and Travis Counties. Court citations: Texas. Supreme Court., Oliver Cromwell Hartley, and R. K. Hartley. Reports of cases argued and decided in the Supreme Court of the State of Texas, during Austin session, 1857, and part of Galveston session, 1858. Volume 20., Book, 1882; (http://texashistory.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metapth28554/ : accessed March 16, 2015), University of North Texas Libraries, The Portal to Texas History, http://texashistory.unt.edu; crediting UNT Libraries, Denton, Texas.
Copyright by Donald R. Temples, 2015
No comments:
Post a Comment