Corpus Christi History by Murphy Givens

Missing pieces from the past

(This is the second of two parts. Sources include: "City by the Sea," by Eugenia Reynolds Briscoe; "Handling the Mails at Corpus Christi" by Jim Stever; "Indian Wars and Pioneers of Texas" by John Henry Brown; "Pathfinders of Texas" by Mrs. Frank DeGarmo; "Mustangs and Cow Horses" by J. Frank Dobie; and Caller-Times archival articles.)
  
   As I wrote last week, there were individuals in our history with interesting stories who are just out of reach.
   One intriguing question is how Charles G. Bryant, an architect from Maine under a death sentence in Canada, came to be scalped near Corpus Christi.
   Bryant, his wife and children came to Corpus Christi in 1848 from Galveston, where they had lived for 10 years. Bryant organized a theater group here and bought the Union Theater, built in 1845, with plans to turn it into a hotel. Bryant was mustering officer for three companies of Rangers and, in connection with his duties, he left Corpus Christi on Jan. 11, 1850, for Austin. After crossing the reef road, he was attacked by hostile Indians. An unarmed traveler hid and watched while Comanches killed and scalped Bryant.
   The gap in this story is from Bryant's past life in Bangor, Maine. He took part in a rebellion in Canada in 1838 and was caught and sentenced by British authorities to be hanged. The night before his scheduled hanging, friends helped him escape and provided a relay of horses to take him from Montreal to Bangor. After a large reward was posted for him, British Canada had become an inconvenient neighbor. He took ship for Galveston and then moved here. It's a strange story that a man escapes hanging in Montreal only to end up being scalped by Comanches near Corpus Christi.
   Another colorful chapter is the story of Thomas A. Dwyer, a barrister in London who gave up law to breed horses on a ranch near Corpus Christi.
   Dwyer came here in 1847 aboard the steamship "Fanny." He was one of the passengers who wrote a letter commending the captain for an easy voyage. Dwyer later gave the welcoming address when Henry L. Kinney returned to Corpus Christi in 1858 from his failed attempt to conquer Nicaragua.
   Dwyer sold his horses and ranch on the Nueces at the beginning of the Civil War. But he stayed in Texas, somewhere. He published a pamphlet in 1872 about taming mustangs. He explained in that article why he gave up the practice of law: "Eleven years at law in London and Dublin, with few briefs," he wrote, "and just forty guineas in fees (equal to $200 of our American money) in four years' practice at the Irish bar, had given me a big disgust, not only of law but of civilization at its crowded centers, fenced in by all kinds of restrictions, conventionalities, infinitesimal etiquette, artificiality and 'red tape.' "
   Here was a man who gave up his life's training to move to a strange new land. Here was a man of true grit. What happened to Dwyer - failed lawyer in London and successful mustanger in South Texas?
   Another missing chapter is the story of "Little Bob" Thompson, a slave owned by Zachary Taylor. When Taylor reached the Rio Grande at the onset of the Mexican War, in 1846, the general gave Thompson, his valet, his freedom.
   "Little Bob" married a woman from Mexico and returned to this area. He had been here with the army in 1845. He settled in Nueces County west of Banquete. In time, he had a large family. His nickname was changed to "Uncle Bob." He died, date unknown, in an accident when he fell into his fireplace. After Reconstruction, there was always one solid Republican precinct in Nueces County, that of Thompson's settlement near Banquete.
   I wish I knew more about "Little Bob," but some stories have no tidy endings. History is like that, though. It's composed of fragments, added to other fragments. We add a detail here, a detail there, to a mosaic that will never be complete.
   More on Laura: Last week, I wrote that Laura Baskin was listed as a ship's captain in the 1850 census. Charles L. Baskin of Corpus Christi, a descendant of that family, tells me this was a mistake, that Laura, younger sister of Esther Mann, was never a captain. The census, under item 52, clearly lists the captain of the schooner Ranchero as William Roberts. Somehow, because her name appears above that listing, Laura Baskin was mistakenly identified as the captain of that schooner. Whoever Laura Baskin may have been, she apparently was not a pioneer in women's liberation. That's one little mystery cleared up.
  

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