William Clayton Sparks 1815 - 1897
Older relatives have identified William C. as William "Clayton" Sparks, although this researcher has not yet found any official documentation that confirms his middle name. William was obviously named for his uncle William C., a brother of his father, Nathan Sparks. To distinguish the younger from the older William C., we will here refer to the younger as William Clayton. The older William C. arrived in Texas earlier and settled his family in the Nacogdoches, Texas area.
William Clayton Sparks was born in Wilson County, Tennessee October 6, 1815 to Nathan and Nancy (Hancock) Sparks. There is a record of Nathan and his family in Wilson County, Tennessee in the Census records for years 1820, 1830, and 1840. Nathan died there in 1844.
William Clayton Sparks was married to Sarah Justice on May 16, 1848 in Wilson County, Tennessee, by the Reverend J. B. Moore. Sarah had been born on December 16, 1821 in Tennessee. There has been some confusion about the spelling of Sarah's last name, but the following census information may help to identify her family.
The eldest son of William C. and Sarah, Samuel Nathan, (at first called Samuel Joseph, was born in Wilson County. The remaining three children were all born in Arkansas. The children of William and Sarah were:
Samuel Nathan (1850 - 1940)
Mary Elizabeth (1851 - 1935)
William Isaac (1853 - 1940)
Robert Donnell. (1855 - 1943)
See the 'Census Records' link on the home page to view this information for 1850.
William Clayton Sparks, like two of his brothers, was an ordained Cumberland Presbyterian minister. He and Sarah were in Wilson county, TN, when the 1850 census was taken, but after selling William's share of his father's estate to Samuel H. Porterfield on May 27, 1850, they moved to Arkansas. Their last three children were born in Arkansas. The grandson of William C, Robert 'Don' Sparks, stated that his father Robert Donnell, the youngest child, was born in Rolfe, Arkansas. No birth documentation in Rolfe, Ashley county, Arkansas has been found for the Sparks family. William and Sarah remained in Arkansas until about 1858 when they moved northward to Union County, Illinois, where they were enumerated on the 1860 census of that county. They remained only a short time in Illinois before moving to Atchison, Kansas, and then on to Texas.
By 1870 William C. had moved his family to Paris, Texas, in Lamar County where they were enumerated on the census. He and his brother likely moved together, and chose Lamar County because of the many other Sparks family members located there. According to an account by his oldest son, the family remained in Lamar County only a few months before moving on to Brown County. It was in the area of Brown County where the family finally remained for a longer period of time. William C. and his sons became ranchers in the area, and William resumed his work as a preacher. (See home page menu for 'Religion and the Sparks Family')
It was in Texas, in and around Brown County, where the four children of William C. and Sarah married and began raising their own families. In 1880, the family was enumerated on the census in Callahan county. (Callahan was once a part of Brown county.) Their oldest son, Samuel, had married and was living with his wife and two young children, John William, age 2, and Mary Idella, age 1, on the property next to William C.
The family of Martin Sparks was again living very close by. Martin had died prior to the 1880 census, but his wife, Jenette, or Jenilee, is found there with the children. Haywood B., Martin's son, was married and living on the next property with his wife and three children.
Despite the growing population, the threat of attack from hostile Comanches continued around Callahan County during the early 1870's. In 1874, United States troops under Col. Ronald S. Mackenzie defeated the Comanches at Palo Duro Canyon, and the same year Company E of the Frontier Battalion of the Texas Rangers, under the command of William J. Maltby, was sent to the area to drive the remaining Indians away. William and Sarah's two oldest sons joined the Texas Rangers in 1873 and one of their main duties was to protect the settlers from Indian raids from near their home in Callahan County west to the edge of Texas. It is likely that during the rides through the western areas William Isaac decided, after completing his time with the Rangers, to move to the area around Midland, Texas. He took up cattle ranching there, married M. E. Peoples January 5, 1887, and they began raising a family.
Robert Donnell “Bob”, born November 3, 1855, was the youngest child of William C. and Sarah Sparks. Bob grew up learning the cattle business as did all of the Sparks children. It was about 1883 when Robert Donnell “Bob” Sparks married Talulah Harriett "Lou" Nance in adjacent Eastland County. Bob and Lou had eight children, born in Texas and Oklahoma Territory.
William C. owned property in Midland County as well, and there is record of a transaction with J. C. Peoples, presumably a relative of Will's wife, Mary E. Peoples.
Sometime after 1887, William C. and Sarah moved to Springer, Pickens county in the Chickasaw Nation, Indian Territory. That area would eventually become Carter County. But Sarah died prior to statehood in December of 1896, and was buried in the Springer Cemetery in Springer, now Carter County, Oklahoma. William C. moved east to nearby Jefferson County to Ryan, to be near his daughter, Mary Elizabeth Montgomery and granddaughter, Birdie. William C. died just nine months later, in September of 1897, and was buried in the Ryan Cemetery. His stone reads "Rev. W. C. Sparks", and displays an emblem showing that he was a Mason.
