“I Had a Real Good Time . . .” The Making of a Country Editor
The recollections of James M. Brice Of the News-Banner of Troy, TN (1862-1926), Edited and Published by Rebel C. Forrester & Betty B. Wood, © 1984 by Betty B. Wood & Rebel C. Forrester, Printed by Lanzer Printing Company Union City, TN

Permission granted for this excerpt to be prepared for the Obion Co. TNGenWeb page by R. C. Forrester, saying graciously “Appreciate your nice letter and comments regarding the book. We would be pleased for you to quote a chapter on the site.”
Dorothy Chance,  April, 1999  Pp 41- 66

Introduction: From the memoirs of James Moffatt Brice writing around 1925, the following excerpt tells his recollection of the 1879 return of the mother and children to Troy, TN from TX after the death of the father. Troy is the home town of the mother.

HOME TO TROY

    Our family took its last look at the old home in Longview (TX) about 9 o’clock one winter night in the latter part of Jan 1879. I saw for the last time the house dimly outlined, nor did I realize that I would never again see the old home.   We waited at the hotel for the train.  It seems that we came by way of Charleston, Missouri, crossed the Mississippi at Cairo, thence down the Mobile & Ohio to Union City.
    We drove then in a hack from Union City to Troy.  I noticed the terrible streets, even the main street of Union City was an almost bottomless quagmire and the road to Troy was of the same sort.  It was a raw winter day.  Having been used to the beautiful sand-clay roads of East TX, the horrible, deep mud roads of West TN made no faint impression on me.
    Troy was a small town near the center of the Co. and was founded in 1823.   From the date of its foundation to 1890, when the Co. site was moved to Union City, Troy had been the Co. site of Obion Co..  It was a struggling country town built, as are all the Co. seat towns in TN, around a central square which contained the courthouse. Troy never had much enterprise and was not much bigger 50 or 75 years after its foundation than it was when founded.
    A small body of strong and powerful men dominated the community, chief of whom were Dr. David Bright and James S. Moffatt.  Troy might have gotten, and probably would have gotten, both the Mobile and Ohio and the Illinois Central (first known as the Chesapeake & Ohio), if she had put forth any proper effort.  But the nabobs of Troy felt that the railroads entering the Co. had more, or at least as much, need of Troy as Troy had for the railroads, so they stood pat, looked pretty and said, “you must come to us and obey our behest.”  The consequence was that the railroads passed by Troy and built up Obion, Kenton, Rives and Union City, taking elsewhere the trade and prosperity that would have made Troy a thriving, growing town.
    We drove straight to the home of Dr. Walter Brice and Aunt Jennie Brice.   The Doctor was a stout, heavily-built man, rather low in stature and weighing about 225 or 230 pounds; a fine scholar, jolly and good humored and popular and highly respected.  One of their children was Bob, then clerking for the J. S. Moffatt Co., as long as he lived the best friend of my boyhood days.  The attachment between us was deep and sincere.  Hardly a week but that I stayed all night with him or he with me as long as he remained single.  Next was Mattie, who never m.; Maggie who m. Rev. Sidney Harris, an Associate Reformed Presbyterian minister;  Cammie, who m. Dr. W. C. Pressly (his second wife);  Bertie, who m. Frank D. Polk and has lived all her life on the old home place;  Dr. Walter Brice, Jr., who now lived somewhere in New Jersey.   He has a son named Gratian, the only Gratian I ever saw or read of except the Emperor Gratian who turned out so badly and was assassinated.
    There was my grandfather, James S. Moffatt, and his wife, who was his second wife and not my grandmother.  Mr. Moffatt had the largest store in Troy, what we would now call a department store.  He was a shrewd old man, bland and smiling and smooth and oily if things went his way, but at the same time a strong, forceful, dominating and determined man.
    Mr. Moffatt’s store then stood where the A.R.P. Church stands today, on the East Side of the Public Square.  Mr. Moffatt was looked upon as one of the richest men in the Co..  While close and economical, he gave liberally, in fact with exceeding generosity, to the construction of new schools and churches or to the unfortunate who had met Calamity.
    There was A. B. Enloe and his wife, Amanda, who was Father’s sister.   Mr. Enloe was an able lawyer; a grim, stern, forbidding man who looked not unlike the pictures of the old Romans. People generally, even the lawyers, had a healthful awe of Mr. Enloe.  There were three children: Chester, Walter, and Mayme.  Walter turned a disreputable vagabond and a ne’er-do-well.
    There was Aunt Mary Moffatt, also Father’s sister, widow of Israel Moffatt, Mother’s brother.  Their children were James R., nicknamed Shamp;   Maud, Dr. W. C. Pressly’s first wife and Pressly.
    There was Uncle Gus Moffatt, a partner in the J. S. Moffatt store, and at that time a widower with his son, Charlie, now in business at Tullahoma, TN, and his daughter, Sallie, who had but recently m. James B. Meecham.
    There was George B. Wilson, who had m. Eliza Green, Grandmother Moffatt’s own child by her first husband. I had the honor of being present at their wedding and went sound asleep under the bed before the supper and all were over.
    Out in the country were various families of Curries, Moffatts and so on that we never visited but saw every Sunday at church.  Out kinspeople, I soon learned, were of the most well-to-do and influential class.  They all received us with open arms and a rich and hearty and generous welcome.
    Mr. Wilson, George Bigtree, was a man of much polish and worldly wisdom.   He was a New York man who had come South and had fought in the armies of the Confederacy.  He came to Troy, taught school in the famous old Westbrook Academy, and, after marrying, put up a dry goods store on the north side of the Square, where he operated till death overtook him.  His son, Carroll P. Wilson, is still operating the business.  Carroll and I have been good friends all our lives.  Mr. G. B. Wilson also served as Clerk and Master of the Chancery Court for many years.
    I also got acquainted with the merchants and professional men on the Square.
    At the northeast corner of the Square stood, and stands now, the hotel.   On the north side of the Square was James A. Rochelle, grocer;  Cave J. Crockett, dry goods;  Geo. B. Wilson and Co. (the company was always supposed to be James S. Moffatt, but no one ever knew);  E. S. Walton, a Civil War veteran and a former tailor, but then selling dry goods (or at least he had them to sell; but he was a peculiar man, didn’t give a damn whether he sold them or not);  W. S. S. Harris, the drug man, who never in his life said “thirty cents,” but always “three dimes.”  The last house on the northwest corner was the law office of Major James G. Smith, a very able, popular and successful lawyer.
    The entire east side of the Public Square was owned by the James S. Moffatt Company with their big store and several subsidiary buildings, two of the auxiliary being occupied by Uncle Mike Bright, harness and saddle maker and Ned Eddleman, shoemaker.
    On the south side, the chief business was John W. Bennett’s saloon and grocery, the livery stable, the Inman Hotel and several old stores in a disreputable stage of unoccupied decay.  On the corner of the Square formed by the angle of the east and south side, John E. Evans, for many years Register of the Co., was closing out his little store.  Nearby, Major LaMotte, a French tailor, was operating a small plant.
    On the west side in the center was Jess Bennett’s saloon, poolroom and bowling alley, a disreputable old livery barn, and at the northern end of the side was the law office of Cochran & Enloe and of Thos. R. Shearon and Mr. Shearon’s son in law, Wilkes Bonner.  At the Square corner angle of west and south side was the old John Erwin building which housed the small and obscure country paper called the Obion News, operated by Tom Batte.
    On the south side of the town, where the town stopped, blocked by the J. S. Moffatt farm and homeplace, a five acre tract had been cut out and given by Mr. Moffatt to the public school which they somewhat inconsistently called Obion College.  They had a crimson banner and on it, in letters of gold, were the words, “We Must Educate.”  This banner was carried in school processions.
    In the midst of the Square, grim, square and unadorned, was the old frame courthouse, its window casings gashed and gnawed and disfigured by the horses of the Federals who had therein been stabled during the Civil War.  There was no bank in Troy at that time and, we believe, but one in the Co., at Union City.  The physicians were David Bright, Alex W. Caldwell, E. A. Gardner, W. Brice and A. B. Weddington.   There is not today one man in business or practice of law or medicine who was there when I went around and made friends and acquaintances.
    On the road leading from the northwest side of the Square to Reelfoot Lake, on the edge of the village, stood the Associate Reformed Presbyterian Church and beyond the church, the cemetery where so many of my kinspeople sleep.
    I had not been in Troy but a few days till I developed a great friendship for my grandfather, James S. Moffatt, a close friendship that was never broken and that lasted till the day of his death.  I had on my jeans clothes that Mother had made me.   Grandfather fitted me out in a ready-made suit at the store, the first I had ever worn, and took me home to stay all night at his house.
    Two fine looking young ladies, Miss Walltrip and Miss Mary Hood, both from south-east Missouri, were boarding at his home, he merely keeping them because they were daughters of old friends and former Obion Countians.  I had a very nice time and, in my new suit, felt like a prince of the blood.
    We might add that Step-grandmother, though they never had any children, made Grandfather a mighty fine wife, even though she was in very humble circumstances.   She came of the well known and highly respected Caruthers family.  She was exceeding energetic, having sound good sense and practical worth and ability.  She kept from six to ten fine milk cows and sold vast quantities of milk and butter and, whilst always having something for the church and for charity, she was thrifty and had accumulated a goodly sum of money in her own right.  She was nice and friendly towards me and always seemed to think a great deal of me.
    On Mother’s recovery, we moved out to the farm that Grandfather had given Mother.  There were in fact two farms, know as the Allen Wright farm and the Billy McRee farm, out on the Troy and Hickman road about three miles from town.  What was know as the Centennial Road divided the one farm from the other, the Wright farm being the one towards Hickman and the McRee farm being towards Troy and aggregating about 110 acres.   Allen Wright and Billy McRee had both gotten badly in debt at the Moffatt store and in that way had lost their farms.
    Brother Edgar did not come out to live with us.  He remained in Troy to learn to make harness and saddles. Grandpa bought him (for he lived at Grandpa’s home), D’Auvugne’s History of the Reformation and McCauley’s History of England.  It is doubtful if Edgar ever read a dozen lines or even opened the books.
    So the family consisted now of: Mother; myself, aged sixteen; Walter, about fourteen years of age; Mattie, seven or eight; Will and Charlie, both small boys, Charlie being not more than five years old.  We lived in a small four-room frame house on the Wright place, not far from the Hickman road, the Tom McRee farm being between our home and the Hickman road.
    The land was rich, fresh, rolling, immensely productive.  Dead trees stood nearly all over the fields, showing that it had been but newly cleared.  These dead trees were huge giant oak and yellow poplar, representing a small part of the millions of dollars that the woodsman’s ax ruined in Obion Co..  The forest growth of Obion Co. was simply stupendous.  I have heard Colonel Catron, one of the pioneers and then nearly 100 years of age, say that the trees were so big and so thick on the soil and the cane-brakes so vastly luxuriant that men have been lost when only a few hundred yards from their own cabin doors.  The flat portion of Obion Co. is alluvial soil, the hill portion loess, both enormously productive and easy to cultivate.
    We soon found the people in the community to which we had moved to be exceeding friendly and neighborly, kindly and helpful to two lads that knew nothing whatever about farming.  They were nearly all small landowners, the same kind of people that President Roosevelt speaks of and describes in his Life of Thomas Hart Benton, who crossed the Alleghenies and, bowie knives and rifles in hand, built their cabins in the western lands and added them to our domain, wrested them from the wild beasts and wilder men; independent, liberty-loving, mostly illiterate (we mean not college bred), plain, hospitable and with none of the ideals of the old southern aristocracy running back in their blood lines.
    In saying “illiterate,” we mean that they could only read and write and figure a little, although a few of the younger generation had considerably more education.  All of them were narrow-minded, all slow of speech and with faces mostly of solemn expression.   They were absolutely without any diversion, that is, the middle-aged and elderly people, while opportunities for diversion on the part of the young people were few and far between.
    All the homes were plain and humble and no articles of beauty or luxury enriched and adorned them,  but the citizens were men and women of good habits, they were hard workers and they paid their debts.  The were also much given to religion and “worked” hard at it, particularly while the “big meetings” were in progress.
    “Mt. Ararat” was the name of a Cumberland Presbyterian Church that went up near our home a short time after we moved.  It stood and still stands, on the Hickman Road.  It was built under the pastorate of the Rev. E. D. Farris, a Presbyterian preacher who for many years served as Co. Court clerk of Obion Co..  He was some smooth, gracious, pleasing hand-shaker and electioneerer.
    Grandfather had Uncle Sam Grimes cut fourteen or fifteen cords of firewood and the very first work Walter and I did was to haul it up.  Our first plowing was putting in about two acres of oats.  The previous year it had been cultivated for the first time and it was rough.  It consisted of two opposing hills that sloped from the common valley at an angel of about forty-five degrees.  The oats were sowed on the land by a young farmer helping us and we plowed under oats, cornstalks and a heavy coating of dead grass the best we could with one-horse turning plows.
    The fields where we were to plant our cotton and corn had many big fallen trees here and there that the winter winds had blown down.  Grandpa showed us how to get them into movable lengths of sixteen feet without having to saw them.  A big limb or broken part of the tree was placed on the body and a fire kindled beneath it. It was astonishing how quickly this burned right down through the tree.  When the work finished, there the trees lay, in saw log lengths with burnt gaps two or three feet wide between the lengths.
    A day was fixed, the neighbors invited and a big dinner prepared.  They came without price or money and with a great deal of wit, good humor and high spirits and piled the logs into heaps to be burned.  It was no uncommon thing for the fences, built for the greater part of dry poplar rails, to catch fire while the great heaps were burning and the high winds blowing, and sometimes a good deal of fencing would burn thus.
    I did not then realize how youthful was Walter.  He was less than fourteen, but well grown for his age; a bright, fair, active, gallant little fellow, every inch a man and doing a man’s work. He never complained. He took the hard work as a matter of course, though it was the first work of any sort that he ever did.  He never shirked even the hardest task.  It would have been far more appropriate if our grandfather and taken this bright and promising boy and placed him in school in Troy, for Walter was of unusual and extraordinary mental caliber and always full of gaiety, cheer, and good spirits.    
    In preparing our land for the cotton and corn crops, the stalks of the preceding year’s crop had to be removed.  The pulling of the corn stalks, also by hand, next raking them with a horse rake into windrows seemed to me very dreary work.   We plowed steadily till we had out fields ready for planting and went to grandfather’s gin for cotton seed to plant.
    Out in the middle of the gin yard was a gigantic heap of rotting cottonseed where all the seed not needed for the year was thrown to rot.  The seed was looked upon as a useless encumbrance (1879), no method then having been devised of pressing out the oil and using it as one of the standard products of commerce.  Anybody could come and get free all the seed they wanted but it is a remARable fact that the farmers never came and got the seed to feed their cattle.  The cottonseed oil and meal industry of the South is now one of its chief arms and indicates the trend of modern times to conservation as against the waste or resources in the older times.
    Grandfather insisted that the corn be checked, the rows four feet apart each way with two stalks in a hill.  We never had to hoe the corn.  He believed in deep plowing.  We not only plowed the corn and plowed it deep, almost turning it around while it was growing, but “unplowed" it after it began silking and tasseling.  In throwing the furrows to the corn and breaking out the middles, we tore the massed and matted corn roots to smithereens, but the seasons were so fine and the land so fertile that in spite of all the damage we did, we made fine corn, great big ears that stood up, as Walter said, like “Men of War.”
    Grandfather came out regularly about twice a week to direct us and see how we were progressing.  These visits were looked forward to with deep concern, as we felt that it might advance our chances of securing better opportunities in life if we gained his confidence and good will and made a good impression on him.  Though our work was hard and dreary, our hopes were high.  We talked mostly of the future and the mighty victories that must surely sometime be ours.  Grandfather frequently gave us good words of approbation and then we felt that we had been more than paid for any extra efforts that we put forth.
    The summer wore away and the crop was ready to harvest.  Walter and I picked the cotton out (and this seemed to me the hardest and most laborious of all the work) and hauled it to Grandpa’s gin.  What it brought (we never asked or knew anything about what it brought) was credited on our account at the store.  The corn and the hay were stored for the next year’s use in making the crop.  We never, from one moth’s end to the next, had a penny that was ours or that we could use for our very selves.  What things we actually had to have, we got at the store, though grandpa every now and then raised a great outcry about extravagance in general and ours in particular and delivered long lectures on people learning in youth to “wear the yoke” (whatever that meant), on people accepting their circumstances and helping themselves and not waiting for other people to help them.
    While we were plowing back in the spring, there was one time that made a gustatory impression on us that we have never forgotten.  The meat that grandfather had put up for us was of a very inferior quality.  It was hard, gristly, poor and greaseless.  Mother bought a ham from our neighbors, the Sikes.  It was a real TN ham of the very highest, most toothsome, most flavorous quality.  I can never forget the thrill of solid delight I experienced on eating this ham.
    The Sikeses were a curious people.  The mother was a dwarf, at that time old and blind.  She was 34 inches tall. Her fingers were knotted and twisted with rheumatism and she always was knitting.  Her countenance was inexpressibly sad.   There were two daughters, Kate and Mollie, each the same height as their mother.   There was one son, who was a “whale,” He weighed a little over 300 pounds.  There were other sons and daughters of ordinary height.     
    I loved to visit at the Sikes home.  They gave me the pick of the peaches, the plums, the apples and strawberries. They had, in season, the finest, nicest cider and always gave me something good to eat.  I thought Mollie maybe had “designs” to surprise and capture my cardiac apparatus, but she never succeeded.      Walter and I went to Troy every Saturday to procure things we needed for the farm or for the family, to get the mail and to hear the light gossip around the store.   We went to the Associate Reformed Presbyterian Church nearly every Sunday to hear Rev. Thomas Peden Pressly preach.  He was not very much of a preacher.  There was no brilliance, no oratory, no influx of fresh thought; an eternal sameness, the identical monotonous channel.  He had less enthusiasm than any other minister we ever heard.  Yet, he had a fine, strong, powerful influence.  He felt, and deeply felt and plainly showed, an eternal interest in the spiritual welfare not only of his own church members, but of all the community.  He was about the best and most pious man I ever knew.  He was pastor of the church for over fifty years.  It is true that in his old age the church deteriorated considerably in strength and membership, but they never had the courage to discharge him, though they would have been mighty glad if he had retired.
    The good old preacher, for more than half a century, buried the dead members and said a kindly word of and for them.  He lived to see the old church hard by the cemetery torn down and a nice new modern structure go up on the public square on the site of the original James S. Moffatt store; the latter having, when he built his brick store (we believe in 1889), placed it on the opposite side (south) of his side of the Square.   The old preacher d. in 1923, a sweet, happy, triumphant Christian’s death.   He told his weeping family not to weep, that it was the happiest, the crowning, the supreme day of his life, the day for which all other days were made.  He d. singing a psalm and, a little before the song, asked the family to rejoice and be glad.    
    From the church, we generally went home with some of our kinspeople to dinner, most frequently with Uncle Walter Brice or with Grandfather Moffatt.  We rode in a small no-top, hack-like contraption with our two work mules hitched to it.  Every now and then some one of the kinspeople (generally one family at the time) came out and spent the day.  A great feast was spread and I generally wound up with a case of “cholera morbis.”  I had a great day of it, and later on, a greater night.
    Occasionally, Walter and I went to parties where there were games played and a fair of fun enjoyed.  Sometimes we went to magic lantern shows, in a way the precursors of the moving picture shows, and hugely enjoyed them. Now and then there were debates and a good deal of interest shown in them.
    But the chief vehicle of interest and attention for the summer was the big meeting, held frequently under a brush arbor.  Literally thousands of people came, came with every mode of conveyance.  Every class and condition of people were represented.  The utmost courtesy, good will and neighborliness prevailed.  Any stranger that wanted to attend the meeting could get all he wanted to eat, a place to sleep and the kindest of treatment.  The young people from neighboring towns, the “swells” as it were, were there to laugh and sneer and poke fun when the shouting began.  They were frequently indicted for disturbing public worship.
    The congregation was terribly in earnest.  Their faces wore a sober and serious aspect.  No flippant conversation was indulged in.  When the rousing and thrilling and appealing sermon had been delivered, sometimes with telling and terrible and convincing force, the leader might start:
   “On Jordan’s stormy banks I stand And cast a wishful eye, To Canaan’s fair and happy land, Where my possessions lie.”
    “I am bound for the promised land, I am bound for the promised land, Oh, who will come and go with me, I am bound for the promised land.”
   The voices of the assembled thousands caught up the song and it seemed to fill the earth and the sky and the hearts of those present with awe and suppressed excitement.   It must be a hard and flinty person whose soul does not respond to a scene like this.
    About this time, some good old sister will arise and, with face and eyes shining and glowing and maybe with muscles, will give a scream and cry, “My soul’s happy!” and proceed in a disjointed, broken way to tell why she is so happy.  Dozens of men and women might follow her example.  There might be some confusion, or apparent confusion, but the mighty volume of song continues and the sinners, conscious of guilt, affected by the songs, deeply touched by the agonizing voices of those, perhaps near and dear to them, shouting the praises of Jehovah and praising Him vehemently for the magnitude and infinite number of His blessings, crowd up to the altar for the reception of comfort, instruction and admonition.
    These things may have passed away in this generation, but they will live forever in the mem0ory of anyone who ever heard them and a sweet, pleasing, sacred, reverent memory it is.
    We sometimes went to Mr. Ararat to hear Rev. John A. McIlwayne preach.  He did not have much education, but he had a soul brimful of good, pure religion.  He had much enthusiasm;  a pleasing, alluring, enticing, friendly way that invited and maintained the respect and confidence of the community.  Two of his boys became ministers.  Bro. McIlwayne developed into the ablest and most successful revivalist in the Cumberland Presbyterian Church. Throughout all these years, our friendship has remained unbroken, stronger and firmer now than ever.  When I was at work in West TN in May 1924, in the interest of the re-election of Senator John K. Shields, I was at Dyer, TN.  While there, I visited at the home of Bro. McIlwayne.  We had a prayer service that was far and away the sweetest and most satisfying that I ever remember having heard.
    Along about this time I had my first and last experience in the histrionic art.   Mrs. T. P. Pressly had the management of the play which was called “Crazy Phil” or “Above the Clouds.”  The part of Crazy Phil was given to the writer of this.  Mrs. Pressly, Miss Jennie Moffatt of Rives (daughter of Captain T. B. Moffatt), Robbie Brice, John Whitesides and Miss Jennie Erwin all took part in the play.
    I do not remember very much about the play except that Phil was seized with certain phantasmagoric hallucinations that obsessed him to seek the remote solitude of distant mountain peaks, nor did he return till after certain chivalric and picturesque experiences.   In plain language, Phil was nutty, and remained away (as he should have done till matters were straightened out.
    We put on the play at Troy, at Rives and at Hornbeak.  My acting, or alleged acting, was praised highly, nor was much praise needed at that callow stage to make me feel very, very important.
    We always enjoyed going to the mill.  After Walter and I had shelled enough corn and had sacked the wheat, we went either to Faulk’s Mill beyond Troy or to the mill at Woodland Mills owned by Cato Davis, a former Virginian and a man of broad mind and wide reading; of pure, noble and lofty character and of inflexible fidelity to the Democratic party.  Squire J. H. Sanders was his miller.  Mr. Sanders was Justice of the Peace.  We sat with him many years in Co. court and never once heard him make a speech.
    Once, while waiting on a busy day for our grist, we whiled away the time going over to the schoolhouse and hearing a debate between Hon. Rice A. Pierce and Hon. Alex. N. Moore, the former advocating prohibition, the latter opposing it.  I thought that Mr. Pierce had the best of the argument.  He was a teetotaler, never having tasted a drop of whiskey throughout a brilliant service of twenty years in Congress.
    The Faulk’s mill was owned and operated by Joel B. Faulk, an honest and sterling Confederate soldier.  The mill was picturesquely situated on the bank of the creek.  Later it became idle, gloomy, forbidding and unoccupied. Its timbers were finally used in the construction of additional school buildings at Troy.
    Walter and I put in the long winter nights reading; not trashy, light novels but good, solid, formative history and biography and classical works of fiction.  We talked over, at odd or resting times during the day, what we had read at night.   Every chapter of every book was pretty thoroughly digested.  Among others we read: Gibbons’ Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, McCaulay’s History of England, Bayard Taylor’s Travels, Josephus, History of the emperor Charles V., Romola, The Scarlet Letter, Shakespeare, most of the works of Dickens, Scott and Poe and many others that I cannot remember as I write.    
    Walter and I both worked on the farm in 1879.  Walter attended, for a few weeks, the school at Wells’ schoolhouse taught by John C. Morrow, a scholarly, knightly and princely gentleman and a good teacher.  He had served in the armies of the Confederacy and a minie ball at Shiloh had taken off the most of his right jaw, considerably disfiguring his face.
    Walter, so the plan was made, attended Obion College in the fall of 1880 and I remained on the farm and worked for another year.  My time came speedily and I began attending Obion College in the fall of 1881.  Walter had made rapid and easy progress and I was ambitious to do as well as he did, if not to excel him.  I rode horse-back every day, three miles coming and going, and ate dinner at grandfather Moffatt’s, whose home was near the school.
    I studied in literature, Evangeline; in mathematics, higher arithmetic and algebra; and in Latin, Caesar’s De Bello Gallico and Sallustius’ De conjurations Catilina and De Bello Jugurtho.  James H. Blanton, Miss Mattie Farris and I constituted the Latin class and there was considerable rivalry and some fine work accomplished.  I neglected to state that the three Latin students also read Xenophon’s Anabasis.  I will be candid enough to say that, while Blanton and I read the Latin equally well, he had a quicker perception and a readier comprehension of the Greek than I had.  In order to “astonish and paralyze,” as I put it, I frequently arose long before daylight and poured over the day’s lessons and this never failed to give me a lead that eventuated in a great victory --- for that day.
    We must add that the primary department was under the very able, active and vigilant superintendence of Miss Mattie Stephens, afterwards Mrs. James H. Blanton.
    Rev. R. W. Erwin, a Methodist minister, was principal of the school, which was then under the care and control of the Memphis Conference.  Prof. Erwin was a graduate of Vanderbilt University, in the first flush of his noble young manhood; good-looking, polished, his mind highly trained, his soul full of love and religion.   He acquired and kept the profoundest respect, good will and obedience of the pupils.  He was profoundly conversant with the fundamentals of the Latin language and he was patient, diligent and energetic enough to drill them into his pupils. We believe he was the most consummate disciplinarian we ever saw in the schoolroom.     
    Professor Robert Harrison, who was also a Vanderbilt man (who afterwards practiced law), was Prof. Erwin’s co-adjutor in the school, but we do not think that he was as good and as great a man as was Mr. Erwin.
    Mr. Erwin boarded at Grandfather Moffatt’s and m. during the school year. He afterwards became pastor of the M. E. Church at Union City and was thereafter stationed at Memphis where he d.; his rare, exalted and transcendent spirit lost to Earth while thousands of bums, toughs and bullies in Memphis lived on to old age to curse and cumber, to damn and pollute the Earth.
    Ancestors of James Moffatt Brice

Generation No. 1

1. James Moffatt Brice, b. July 06, 1862 in Montecello, AR; d. Nov 17, 1926 in Nashville, Davidson Co., TN. He was the s/o 2. James Simonton Brice and 3. Elizabeth Strong Moffatt. He m. (1) Artie Lee Crockett Oct 21, 1899 in ARP Church, Troy, TN. She was b. Abt. 1870 in Obion Co., TN. She was the d/o Archebald W. Crockett and Mattie M.

Generation No. 2

2. James Simonton Brice, b. Sept 16, 1824 in Fairfield Co. SC; d. June 1877 in Longview, TX. He was the s/o 4. Robert Brice and 5. Margaret Simonton. He m. 3. Elizabeth Strong Moffatt July 1854 in Troy, Obion Co., TN. 3. Elizabeth Strong Moffatt, b. 1835 in SC; d. in McAlister, OK. She was the d/o 6. James Strong Moffatt and 7. Martha Moffatt.

Children of James Brice and Elizabeth Moffatt are:
i. Martha Lee Brice, d. in McAlister, OK; m. Unknown Huff
ii. Robert Edgar Brice, b. Dec 06, 1860; d. Dec 02, 1916; m. Minnie Bell Phillips Sept 05, 1886. 1
iii. James Moffatt Brice, b. July 06, 1862 in Montecello, AR; d. Nov 17, 1926 in Nashville, Davidson Co., TN; m. Artie Lee Crockett Oct 21, 1899 in ARP Church, Troy, TN.
iv. Walter Brice, b. 1865.
v. William Bonner Brice, b. Nov 22, 1873 in Longview, Gregg Co., TX; m. Anna Miller Mar 31, 1902; b. in Colorado Springs, Colorado. vi. Charles Strong Brice, b. 1877 in TX.

Generation No. 3

4. Robert Brice, b. Oct 08, 1791 in Fairfield Co., SC; d. April 02, 1871 in Fairfield Co., SC. He was the s/o 8. James S. Brice and 9. Jane Wilson. He m. 5. Margaret Simonton Dec 25, 1817 in Fairfield Co., SC. 5. Margaret Simonton, b. June 20, 1801 in Fairfield Co., SC; d. Feb 13, 1843 in Little River, Fairfield Co., SC. She was the d/o 10. John Simonton and 11. Margaret Jeanette Strong.

Children of Robert Brice and Margaret Simonton are:
i. Jane Wilson Brice, b. Oct 15, 1818 in Fairfield Co. SC; d. Oct 04, 1886 in Chester Co. S.C; m. David Hemphill July 14, 1836 in Fairfield Co. S.C; d. 1842.
ii. Margaret Strong Brice, b. July 29, 1820 in Fairfield Co. SC; d. Jan 29, 1842; m. S. Laughlin McDonald Jun 17, 1840 in Fairfield Co. S.C; b. Oct 03, 1810 in Hart Co., GA; d. Mar 26, 1874 in Fairfield Co. SC
iii. John Alexander Brice, b. Nov 08, 1822 in Fairfield Co. SC; d. Nov 1890; m. (1) Margaret Caroline Bell Apr 07, 1846 in Fairfield Co. S.C; b. 1825; d. 1848; m. (2) Nancy McGinnis Aug 19, 1851; b. 1831; d. 1878; m. (3) Rebecca Jane Brice Jan 15, 1879; b. Sept 06, 1844 in Fairfield Co. SC; d. July 04, 1901. 2
iv. James Simonton Brice, b. Sept 16, 1824 in Fairfield Co. SC; d. Jun 1877 in Longview, TX; m. (1) Celia M. Bell May 11, 1850; m. (2) Elizabeth Strong Moffatt July 1854 in Troy, Obion Co., TN.
v. Rev Robert Wilson Brice, b. Jul 02, 1826 in Fairfield Co. SC; d. Mar 14, 1878 in Hopewell Church, Chester Co. S. C; m. Anna Maria Steele Mar 19, 1850; b. May 21, 1829; d. July 09, 1901.
vi. Christopher Simonton Brice, b. Apr 25, 1828 in Fairfield Co. SC; d. 1900; m. Margaret Gooch Dec 04, 1855.
vii. Walter Brice, b. Feb 07, 1830 in Fairfield Co., SC; d. Nov 09, 1895 in Troy, Obion Co., TN; m. (1) Jane Bonner Moffatt; b. 1840 in SC; d. 1902 in Troy, Obion Co., TN; m. (2) Mary E. Anderson Feb 07, 1854.
viii. Charles Strong Brice, b. Oct 19, 1831; d. 1878; m. Fannie Hinton
ix. Martha Brice, b. August 23, 1833 in Fairfield Co. SC; d. 1922 in Tuscaloosa, AL; m. Joseph Frances Lee Dec 23, 1853 in Due West, SC.
x. Sarah Amanda Brice, b. Sept 15, 1835 in Fairfield Co., SC; d. Nov 07, 1894 in Troy, Obion Co., TN; m. Abraham Bodee Enloe Jan 09, 1872 in Troy, Obion Co., TN; b. Apr 06, 1827 in Troy, Obion Co., TN; d. Mar 18, 1888 in Troy, Obion Co., TN.
xi. Mary Elizabeth Brice, b. May 18, 1838 in Fairfield Co., SC; d. July 12, 1905 in Troy, Obion Co., TN; m. Israel Putnam Moffatt Aug 31, 1858 in Troy, TN; b. Oct 16, 1837; d. Sept 23, 1873 in Troy, Obion Co., TN.
xii. Thomas Scott Brice, b. Sept 16, 1840 in Avon, Fairfield Co., SC; d. Mar 05, 1913 in Shelby, NC; m. (1) Frances Eliza Adams May 02, 1871; m. (2) Frances Eliza Adams May 02, 1871.

6. James Strong Moffatt, b. Mar 10, 1808 in Chester Co., SC; d. Dec 18, 1890 in Troy, Obion Co., TN. He was the s/o 12. John Moffatt and 13. Elizabeth Strong. He m. 7. Martha Moffatt 1829. 7. Martha Moffatt, b. 1795; d. Jul 01, 1852 in Troy, Obion Co., TN. She was the d/o 14. Samuel Moffatt and 15. Polly Curry.

Children of James Moffatt and Martha Moffatt are:
i. Augustus Peden Moffatt, b. Mar 03, 1830 in Greenville, SC; d. May 25, 1885 in Troy, Obion Co., TN; Stepchild; m. (1) Nancy J. McClurkin; b. Mar 17, 1827; d. July 22, 1858; m. (2) Sally Maxwell; b. Feb 19, 1829; d. May 02, 1905 in Troy, Obion Co., TN; m. (3) Jane C. Lathan Feb 17 in Fairfield Co. SC; b. 1838; d. Oct 29, 1878 in Troy, Obion Co., TN.
ii. Mary L. Moffatt, b. May 08, 1831 in Troy, Obion Co., TN; d. Dec 22, 1852 in Troy, Obion Co., TN; Stepchild; m. James Penny Weed; b. Apr 06, 1820 in Abbeville, S. C.; d. Jan 27, 1892 in Troy, Obion Co., TN.
iii. William Samuel Moffatt, b. 1833 in Greenville, SC; d. Jan 18, 1899 in Wheeling, Fulton Co., AR.; Stepchild; m. (1) Martha Jane Wilson Apr 17, 1856; d. August 13, 1887 in Centerview, MO; m. (2) Paden Livingston (Mrs. J. E. ) June 1888. 3
iv. Elizabeth Strong Moffatt, b. 1835 in SC; d. in McAlister, OK; Stepchild; m. James Simonton Brice July 1854 in Troy, Obion Co., TN.
v. Israel Putnam Moffatt, b. Oct 16, 1837; d. Sept 23, 1873 in Troy, Obion Co., TN; Stepchild; m. Mary Elizabeth Brice Aug 31, 1858 in Troy, TN; b. May 18, 1838 in Fairfield Co., SC; d. July 12, 1905 in Troy, Obion Co., TN. 
vi. Jane Bonner Moffatt, b. 1840 in SC; d. 1902 in Troy, Obion Co., TN; Stepchild; m. Walter Brice; b. Feb 07, 1830 in Fairfield Co., SC; d. Nov 09, 1895 in Troy, Obion Co., TN.
vii. Barbara L. Moffatt, b. Nov 1842 in Troy, Obion Co., TN; d. May 03, 1844 in Troy, Obion Co., TN; Stepchild.

Generation No. 4

8. James S. Brice, b. 1768 in Co. Antrim, Ireland; d. Jan 09, 1845 in Fairfield Co., SC. He was the s/o William Brice and Jennie McClure. He m. 9. Jane Wilson Abt. 1787. 9. Jane Wilson, b. 1764 in Columbia, SC; d. Sept 08, 1804. She was the d/o of Robert Wilson and Agnes Carnahan.

Children of James Brice and Jane Wilson are:
i. James Brice, d. 1844. 4
ii. Robert Brice, b. Oct 08, 1791 in Fairfield Co., SC; d. April 02, 1871 in Fairfield Co., SC; m. Margaret Simonton Dec 25, 1817 in Fairfield Co., SC.
iii. John Brice, b. 1795; d. 1869.
iv. William Brice, b. 1793 in Fairfield Co. SC; d. Mar 09, 1872 in Fairfield, Co., S. C; m. Mary Simonton Oct 06, 1829 in performed by Rev. John Hemphill; b. Dec 16, 1809; d. June 20, 1890 in Fairfield, Co., S. C..
v. Nancy Brice, b. 1802 in Fairfield Co. SC; d. Jun 28, 1864; m. John Simonton, Jr.; b. Nov 08, 1797 in SC; d. May 13, 1880.
vi. Walter Brice, b. Sept 05, 1804 in Fairfield Co. SC; d. Dec 07, 1871 in Fairfield Co., SC; m. Martha Emeline Moore April 28, 1831 in Columbia, SC; b. Sept 21, 1811 in Columbia, SC; d. Feb 20, 1898 in Fairfield Co. SC

10. John Simonton, b. 1760 in Rowan Co., North Carolina; d. Jan 31, 1841 in Fairfield Co., SC. He was the s/o Robert Simonton and Mary Ross(?). He m. 11. Margaret Jeanette Strong Jul 01, 1785 in Fishing Creek, Chester Co., SC. 11. Margaret Jeanette Strong, b. 1768 in Co. Antrim, Ireland; d. Mar 11, 1828 in Fairfield Co., SC. She was the d/o Charles Strong and Jeanette Gaston.

Children of John Simonton and Margaret Strong are:
i. Robert Simonton, b. July 19, 1786; d. Nov 12, 1862 in Salem, Tipton Co., TN; m. Margaret McQuiston WFT Est. 1817-1851; b. Sept 29, 1794; d. Feb 02, 1884.
ii. Charles Strong Simonton, b. Mar 02, 1788; d. 1835; m. Elizabeth Ross
iii. William Simonton, b. Feb 03, 1791; d. 1844 in Salem, Tipton Co., TN; m. (1) Margaret Galloway 1812; b. 1792; d. Oct 13, 1817; m. (2) Mary McDill 1818; b. 1791; d. Dec 06, 1825; m. (3) Katherine Ferguson 1826; b. 1806; d. Nov 09, 1869 in Salem, Tipton Co., TN.
iv. Christopher Ross Simonton, b. Oct 27, 1792 in SC; d. Oct 27, 1792.
v. Sarah Simonton, b. May 06, 1795; d. June 29, 1861; m. David Wilson
vi. John Simonton, Jr., b. Nov 08, 1797 in SC; d. May 13, 1880; m. (1) Ellen Kirkpatrick; m. (2) Nancy Brice; b. 1802 in Fairfield Co. SC; d. June 28, 1864.
vii. Jennie Jeannette Simonton, b. Sept 08, 1799; d. Jan 03, 1873; m. Alexander Douglas 1826; b. Sept 13, 1799 in Fairfield Co., SC; d. Jul 22, 1863 in Fairfield Co., SC. 5
viii. Margaret Simonton, b. June 20, 1801 in Fairfield Co., SC; d. Feb 13, 1843 in Little River, Fairfield Co., SC; m. Robert Brice Dec 25, 1817 in Fairfield Co., SC.
ix. James Strong Simonton, b. May 22, 1803; d. Oct 31, 1820.
x. Martha Simonton, b. Sept 08, 1805; d. Sept 10, 1824 in Fairfield Co., SC
xi. Alexander Gaston Simonton, b. Dec 12, 1807; d. Feb 01, 1816 in Fairfield Co., S. C.
xii. Mary Simonton, b. Dec 16, 1809; d. June 20, 1890 in Fairfield, Co., S. C; m. William Brice Oct 06, 1829, performed by Rev. John Hemphill; b. 1793 in Fairfield Co. SC; d. Mar 09, 1872 in Fairfield, Co., S. C.

12. John Moffatt, b. Jan 17, 1783; d. Jan 27, 1859 in Troy, Obion Co., TN. He was the s/o William Moffatt and Barbara Chestnut. He m. 13. Elizabeth Strong  b. 1784; d. 1859 in Obion Co., TN.

Children of John Moffatt and Elizabeth Strong are:
i. Letitia Moffatt, b. Oct 01, 1804; d. Oct 25, 1824 in Chester Co., SC; m. William Moffatt Strong; b. 1806; d. Nov 14, 1822 in Chester Co., SC.
ii. Charles Strong Moffatt 6
iii. James Strong Moffatt, b. Mar 10, 1808 in Chester Co., SC; d. Dec 18, 1890 in Troy, Obion Co., TN; m. (1) Martha J.; m. (2) Martha Moffatt 1829.

14. Samuel Moffatt He m. 15. Polly Curry, Child of Samuel Moffatt and Polly Curry is:
i. Martha Moffatt, b. 1795; d. July 01, 1852 in Troy, Obion Co., TN; m. James Strong Moffatt 1829.