Sale of Horses

Transaction for sale of horses between Grantors John H. and L.D. Lafferty and Grantees L.D. Yarbrough and C. C. Davis. Note that Lafferty and Yarbrough are both named “Lorenzo Dow”.

State of Texas
County of McMullen
Know all men by these presents, that I John H. Lafferty have this day sold and delivered to L.D. Yarbrough and C. C. Davis a certain Stock of Horses as they run in the Range, Some in Live Oak – Karn – Wilson Atascosa and McMullen Countys of the following brands to with (brand marks here — see image below). Except 1 dun mair and 1 Blew Roan and perhaps a spring colt. The above 2 colts is running in the Rang near James Dialls – for the consideration of Sixty Dollars to me in hand paid by the said L. D. Yarbrough and C. C. Davis before the sighning and Delivering of this Bill of Sale this the 22 day of August 1878.

The State of Texas
McMullen County

Before me W. A. Lowe County Clerk in and for McMullen County Texas, on this day personally appeared. W.P. White whose name is subscribed as a witness to the instrument on the reverse hereof and after being by me duly sworn on oath says that he saw John H. Lafferty & L. D. Lafferty the grantors or persons who executed the foregoing instrument subscribe the same and that he signed the same as a witness at the request of said grantors. Given under my hand and seal this 1st of October 1884. W. A. Lowe, County Clerk McMullen County.

The State of Texas
Atascosa County

I A. G. Martin Clerk of the County Court in and for said County and State, do hereby certify that the foregoing instrument of writing dated on the 22 day of August 1878 with its certificate of authentication, was filed for Record in my office the 3rd day of August 1884 at 12 o’clock N and duly recorded the 9th day of October A.D. 1884 at 11 o’clock A.M. in the records of said County in Book K, No 1 on pages 253 + 254.

Given under my hand and seal of said Court at office in Pleasanton this 9th day of October A.D. 1884.
A. G. Martin Clerk C. C., Atascosa Co, Texas

Background Information

The Historical Resources document for the Choke Canyon Reservoir area in McMullen and Live Oak Counties is a great resource for archeology, as well as the people. This area was part of the land called “Wild Mustang Desert” on an early Texas map. An area along the Frio River was called Yarbrough Bend. It was originally settled in 1858 by John Swanson Yarbrough and his extended family. John was shot and killed in his own corral during an argument over a horse, and he was buried in the Yarbrough Bend Cemetery.

His son, L. D. Yarbrough, lived on the Frio River somewhere between the Live Oak County line and the mouth of San Miguel Creek.  At approximately the date of the sale of these horses, he lived on land rented from Leonidas Wheeler upstream on the Frio River.

During the late 1850s and early 1860s the primary means of becoming a stockraiser was by rounding up and selling wild cattle and mustangs. Many of these animals were strays from ranches in the area; others were descendants of Spanish livestock lost during the preceding centuries. Large herds of horses and cattle roamed the prairies of southwestern Texas.

No one has found record of the L.D. Lafferty family on the 1870 Census. The Abney book states that he took his stock and left the Eagle Pass/Fort Clark area in 1865 and moved his operation to “about 50 miles south of San Antonio” — Atascosa County, fits the bill.

From Find-a-Grave Bio of Lorenzo Dow Yarbrough

Born January 1840, probably in Houston Co., TX, the son of John Swanson, Sr. and Cynthia Unknown Yarbrough. In 1861 he enlisted in the Confederate States Army at Fort Brown, Brownsville, Texas on 23 September. He served first in Captain William G. Gobin’s Company, 2nd Regiment, Texas Mounted Rifles, stationed at Helena. He was then transferred to Company K, 2nd Texas Cavalry, under Captain John Donaldson. He is found to be listed on the 2nd Reg’t Texas Mounted Rifles Rolls for years 1861 and 1862 and 2nd Reg’t Texas Calvary Rolls for the years 1863, 1864, & 1865. Notes on the rolls say that the 2nd Regiment Texas Calvary was also known as the 2nd Regiment Texas Mounted Rifles. The Second Texas Cavalry was originally organized in the spring of 1861 under designation of the Second Texas Mounted Rifles. It was reorganized with all the same officers and enlisted men and at that time it was redesignated the Second Texas Cavalry. Dow appeared on a list of killed and wounded, in an engagement on the Nueces River, near Fort Clark Texas, August 10, 1862, as having a wound in the left hip, a wound that would continue to give him trouble until his death. He was home on furlough in 1863, when on November 30, he married, in Live Oak County, Miss Nancy Parilee White. Yarbrough died January 5, 1907 and his grave is marked with a civil war military stone.