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From THE ANNULS OF NEWBERRY: Down
the road from the Mendenhalls' Mill
lived James McCann. His house was in a flat near the spring surrounded
on three sides by
hills, which ran down near the house. McCann was an Irishman
and much given to making
mistakes. On one occasion when loading his rifle the ball stuck
fast, which he and his son
John attempted to remove. Finding all other means to fail they
attempted to melt it out.
John was holding the breech of the gun in the fire while the old man
stood by looking on.
At length an explosion took place and the ball entered the old man's
thigh and knocked him
down. John caught him in his arms exclaiming: "Father, father,
are you dead?" "No," said
he, "John, but I believe I am speechless."
From The Huntsville Item newspaper (date unknown):
BROOKS
FAMILY REUNION TO BE AN ANNUAL AFFAIR
A reunion of the Brooks family last Sunday
near Huntsville was the climax to a
correspondence which began four years ago with a letter simply addressed
to "The Brooks
Family, Prarie Plains, Texas". The correspondence began
when three sisters, Miss Mamie
Crooks, Miss Hattie Belle Crooks and Mrs. Bessie Crooks Crisp of Newberry,
South
Carolina, became interested in re-establishing correspondence with
relatives who migrated
to Texas in 1853. These were their cousin, Harriet McCann, and
her husband, Sam
Bookman, who brought with them to Texas Harriet's sister, Miss Mary
McCann and settled
at old Red Top in Grimes County.
When the letter addressed to "The Brooks Family"
reached Roan's Prarie, it was
delivered to Boone Brooks. Mrs. Brooks (the former Christine
Wilson of Shiro) answered
it and the outgrowth was Sunday's family reunion.
While in Texas, the Crooks sisters visited
relatives in Austin, San Antonio, Shiro and
Huntsville. J. Mickle Sandel was master of ceremonies of the
large reunion descendants of
Mrs. Mary McCann Brooks.
Despite her 80 years, Miss Mamie Crooks proved
herself an able spokesman for the
group, relating the family history and tracing the ancestry of Mrs.
Mary McCann Brooks
and her mother to England and Ireland...."
* Lieutenant JOHN CROOKS and Andrew Crooks were brothers who had lived
in Antrim
County, Ireland and in England. The came to the colonies of Virginia
and South Carolina
as British soldiers during the American Revolutionary War. After
the British defeat, John
settled in Virginia and Andrew settled in Pennsylvania.
* JOHN CROOKS was born 10 May 1762 in Antrim, Ireland. He died
26 April 1842 in
Newberry, South Carolina. John married * JANE HARRISON.
Jane was born 03 March
1758 in Virginia and she ran away to South Carolina to marry John.
She died 12 Aug 1840
in Newberry, South Carolina. Both John and Jane are buried in
the Suber Graveyard, 16
miles northeast of Newberry, South Carolina. They had 5
daughters and 2 sons. Three of
the daughters are unknown. The other four children were:
1. Thomas C. Crooks was married to Millie Buchanan
2. Euphemia (Euphany) Crooks, born in 1798, was married to James
Roger Wood
3. * SARAH ELIZABETH CROOKS married * SAMUEL WOOD, nephew
of J. R. Wood
4. John Andrew Crooks, born 11 May 1798, died 04 Mar 1754
*SAMUEL WOOD married * SARAH ELIZABETH CROOKS. A notation states
that
Samuel is the nephew of James R. Wood who married Euphemia Crooks.
If this is correct,
then James' father was * WILLIAM WOOD, who died after 22
Jan 1787 in Spartanburg
District, South Carolina. William had five children: James; Margaret
who married John
Young, the brother of *ELIZABETH YOUNG SALMON; William who died
between
1793 - 1797; Moses 1745-1812; John died before 1787. The Wood
family is extremely
interesting because it ties into so many of our family lines. (See
the WOOD chapter)
*SAMUEL and ELIZABETH had nine children, seven of which are known.
They were:
1. Annie Wood, a twin of Ambrose
2. Ambrose Wood, twin of Annie
3. Elizabeth Wood married Elisha Lyon. Her daughters were
Sarah "Sallie" Lyon and
Amanda Georgiana Lyon 1842-1905 who married
John B. Crooks. Her husband was
her mother's cousin. Amanda was the mother
of Mamie, Hattie Belle and Bessie.
4. William Wood remained a bachelor
5. Silas Wood married a Glymph and his daughter married a Mr.
Suber and his son
Samuel J. Wood married the daughter
of Lemuel Glymph.
6. Mary Ann Wood, known as "Aunt Polly" was born circa
1810. She married John
Fielding Glymph. Family charts state that
she lived in "Walton S." They also lived in
Winston-Salem, North Carolina. Her nieces
Harriet and Mary Ann McCann were
educated there in a Moravian school for young
ladies. In the 1850 North Carolina
census, both girls were living in the home
of John Fielding Glymph.
7.*SARAH ANN WOOD was called "Nancy", a nickname for Ann. She
is said to have
married Hector McCann but the author believes
she married William McCann, son of
James of Newberry, South Carolina. His
full name could have been a combination of
the two names. Her children were * MARY ANN
McCANN who married * ROBERT
LOGAN BROOKS (see BROOKS chapter), Harriet
1827-1851 who married Samuel
Bookman, Cornelia, William and John.
* MARY ANN McCANN, also called "Polly", was born 24 August 1934 in Newberry,
South Carolina. She and her sister Harriet were reared by their
Aunt Polly Glymph in
Winston-Salem, North Carolina. The reason is unknown. Perhaps
their parents were
deceased or possibly it was an opportunity to further their education
while living in their
Aunt's home. Harriet married Samuel Bookman of Newberry, South
Carolina in 1851 and
moved to Texas. Mary Ann came to Texas to visit them in 1853.
Her brothers William
and John and her sister Cornelia also settled in Texas.
Mary's Chapel Methodist Church, South, was a member of the Prarie Plains
Circuit serving
southwestern Walker County and northwestern Montgomery County, an area
known as the
Loma Community. The church was established in 1883 and services
were held in the
Masonic building just south of the Huntsville-Shiro road near the Grimes
County line. In
1908 Thomas Henry "Bud" Sandel donated land for a new church and it
was named for
Mary McCann Brooks, wife of Reverend Robert Logan Brooks who had been
the pastor of
the church while in the Masonic building.
Mary Ann McCann Brooks bought property from her brother-in-law Samuel
Bookman for
$685.00. The deed was dated 14 April 1862. Though she was married
to Robert Brooks at
the time, that portion of land remained in her name. After
her death, her children received
her property. Her son Robert Mann Brooks purchased the property
from his siblings and
upon his death, a portion was deeded to his daughter, Mary Edith Brooks
Mitchell. Mary
Edith divided the property among her three daughters. The land
has been owned by Brooks
descendants for more than 133 years.
Mary Ann's middle name is sometimes seen as Jane but in her own documentation
it was
"Ann". Mary Ann and Robert Brooks had nine children. They
were:
1. Harriett Cornelia (1855-1871) named after her Mary's
sisters, she died at age 16.
2. James Henry (1857-1936) married Mary Jane Cotton.
3. Angelina F. "Ann" (1859-1919) married Marion Smith
4. Sirena (1862-1942) married John Luther Sandel
5. Georgia Ann (b.1866) married Sterling Owens
6. Robert Mann (1863-1949) married Lillah Guerrant
7. Willey McCann (1863-1932) married Alma Hinkle
8. John Logan (1870-1932) married Lucy Driscoll
9. Ella Wallis (1873-1943) married Charles David
McCulloch
Mary Ann McCann Brooks died at Loma, Texas on 11 July 1905 at the age
of 70 years, 10
months and 9 days. She is buried at Red Top Cemetery. Her
husband remarried 10 months
later and is buried at Oakwood Cemetery in Huntsville.
Testimony of Mrs. Bessie Crisp, Mamie Crooks, Hattie
Bell Crooks taken in South
Carolina by Cleve Leshiker, transcribed in 1986 by Sue
(Trant) Reinhart and Linda
(Mitchell) Parish
The Huntsville Item newspaper "Brooks Family Reunion To Be Annual Affair", undated
ANNULS OF NEWBERRY by John Belton O'Neil, published 1858.
NEWBERRY SC HISTORICAL AND GENEALOGICAL ANNULS, by Sumner,
1950, not
documented
1800 SC CENSUS
1850 NC CENSUS
1860 TC CENSUS INDEX
INDEX TO SC WILLS
NEWBERRY CEMETERY BOOK, Vol I, Glymph listings
WOOD WORKS, Vol I, compiled 1971 by Mrs. J. M. Wood, Lubbock,
Texas, documented
more than 1100 descendents of William Wood, will dated
1787, Spartanburg District, SC
