Brownlow, Kansas

Brownlow, Kansas is a town which has never appeared on a map. 

The few references are confusing and contradictory. For instance, the Butler County Directories, 1878 Gazetteer and Business Director, R. L. Polk Company describes Brownlow as: “A settlement on Hickory creek, in the southeastern part of Butler county, 10 miles from El Dorado, the county seat and shipping point.” If accurate, this would suggest that the town was on a railroad, none of which existed in this area at the time. 

Then the obituary of Alexander Baker says he “came to Butler county in 1888 at the age of 17. The family settled on a 360 acre farm in the Brownlow community - halfway between Leon and Latham.” Further that Mr. Baker was a member “of the old Brownlow Methodist Church, the congregation of which later transferred to the Latham Methodist Church when the Brownlow church closed.” 

Detail of Butler County, Kansas map 1885

Perhaps the best designation of where Brownlow comes from is the school district designation – “23 Brownlow Leon Rt. 3.” This places the schoolhouse known as Brownlow, no. 23. At a location halfway between Leon and Latham as Mr. Baker’s obit suggests, but a few miles past the ten miles given in the Gazetteer. 

Where does the name Brownlow come from? 

Best guess is that the community was given the name by T.R. Purcell in nearby Walnut Township. Purcell, a Tennessee native, gave his service to the Union cause, enlisting in the First (Union) Tennessee Cavalry, under command of Colonel James P. Brownlow, and serving two years and nine months. Col. Brownlow is remembered for his crossing of the Chattahoochee River near Atlanta, Georgia on July 9, 1864. What made the event noteworthy was that the Northern soldiers who crossed the river and attacked the Confederate defenders on the south bank did so in the nude. 

The Brownlow village and community disappeared in time, but the cemetery remains. It can be found with the help of Google at 135 se and Hickory road to the south of Hickory Creek.

Fred B. Van Huss

Fred was born in 1894, Parents: John Finley Van Huss and Josie E. (Brewer) Van Huss and Siblings: Bula, Luva, Elmer E., and Lois O.. In 1927 he married Beulah M. Phillips in Chase County. They had two children: James and Robert.

Dr. William James Phillips

Dr. William James Phillips was a rural doctor and surgeon for the Frisco Railroad in Beaumont, Kansas. In 1885 he came to Kansas, moved to Beaumont in 1895 and lived there until his death in 1929.

This article is based primarily on the two sources mentioned.

[Dr. William James Phillips' daughter Beulah married Fred Van Huss, and so is the maternal grandfather of Robert Van Huss, my father-in-law.]

The country doctor of the 1880’s and 90’s was a general practitioner delivering babies, setting broken bones, pulling teeth, tending snake bites, and wounds from gun shots and farm equipment. The country doctor might live on his own farm to make ends meet, and so would travel by horse or buggy to treat patients in outlying farms. They likely delivered every child within miles, and sat with the dying as they left this world for a better place, and these happenings often required a doctor to get up in the middle of the night to attend his patient. As cash was short on the prairie, the pay for a doctor might be a basket of eggs, a bushel of corn, or a side of beef.

 


WILLIAM JAMES PHILLIPS, M. D.

[source: http://skyways.lib.ks.us/genweb/archives/1918ks/biop/philliwj.html]

The Phillips family originated in Wales. William James Phillips' paternal grandmother was Irish, coming to America at the age of nine. This paternal side of the Phillips’ family came to America in colonial years, later moving west  to Ohio, then Iowa, and finally, with William James Phillips to Kansas.

William James Phillips (1856-1929) was born in Washington County, Iowa on October 2, 1856. He was the second son of George Phillips and Susanna (Deen) Phillips.

William grew up near Iowa City. He attended public schools and an academy. In 1874, at the age of 18, William spent 15 months working on a farm along the Little Blue River near Washington, Kansas, (north of Manhattan and Clay Center and west of Marysville).

Six years previous, Cheyenne and Arapahoe had made a raid in the county. Four years previous, the Kansas Pacific Railroad completed its line along the Smoky Hill River from Kansas City to Denver.  Buffalo still roamed western Kansas.

http://www.kancoll.org/books/cutler/washington/washington-co-p1.html

In 1885 William graduated from the College of Medicine, State University of Iowa. [Announcement of the College of Medicine, the State University of Iowa, 1885-1886,
 https://archive.org/details/announcementof8586stat.] After graduation, Dr. Phillips settled in LaCrosse, Kansas to practice medicine, marrying the same year Maggie Z. Redman (1867-1958), (daughter of A. J. and Mary (Wright) Redman).

In 1895 the couple moved to Butler County and Beaumont where Dr. Phillips worked as surgeon for the Frisco Railroad. They bought a 130 acre farm at the southwest edge of town.

Page 32, 1905 Butler County Atlas, Glencoe Township

Dr. Phillips served as town clerk. He operated a drug store and acted as pharmacist. He was a Republican, and a member of Beaumont Lodge No. 465, Ancient Order United Workmen.

The Phillips family grew to eleven sons and daughters.

Clarence M. farmed 3 1/2 miles southwest of Beaumont; Hubert W. worked as a brakeman with the Grand Trunk Pacific Railway and lived at Biggar in Saskatchewan, Canada; Edith Fern was the wife of A. L. Milliken, station agent for the Frisco Railway at Altamont, Kansas; George A. drove an auto stage at Brawley, California; Pauline, the fifth child, died at three years of age; Helen M. is the wife of J. H. Nichols, an express messenger in Wichita; Beulah M. was a school teacher and would marry Fred Van Huss; as of 1918, Paul W. was attending a school of automobile instruction at Wichita and the three youngest Alwilda, Wendell and Ruth, were attending public schools in Beaumont.

Beaumont Cemetery, William J. Phillips and Margaret Z. Phillips

William died in 1929 at Beaumont and is buried in the Beaumont Cemetery just north of Highway 400. His wife Maggie died in 1958 and is buried next to him.

George Phillips

William's father, George Phillips (1814-1873), was born in Ohio on February 10, 1814. He was an early pioneer of Washington County, Iowa and died in Daytonville, Iowa on February 6, 1873. His career included farming, general store and hotel owner. He was a member of the Methodist Church and served both as steward and trustee. In politics he was an active republican.

[I find nothing of the family history of the Phillips before George.]

George Phillips married three times. He first married Elizabeth Deen, a native of Ohio. She died in Illinois and was the mother of ten children.

His second wife Susanna Deen (1831-1856) was a half-sister of his first wife. She died at Daytonville, Iowa, October 9, 1856, one week after the birth of William J. Phillips. She had one other child, W. S..

George Phillips married his third wife Judith R. Downing. Her only child, Thomas A. L., died at seventeen months.

Brownlow Cemetery, Butler County, Kansas

The name Brownlow is a mystery, but there is a clue in a short bio of Hickory Township by J.O. Evertson, in Mooney's History of Butler County, Kansas.

Among the next arrivals [in Hickory] were J. A. Armstrong, who bought out Mr. Myers, and established a general store at Old Brownlow.

Id. page 160.



Brownlow cemetery lies on a bluff between Hickory and Honey Creeks. It is a bit tricky to get there and the turn off of 135th street is not marked. Take Highway 400 east of Augusta and Leon until you come to Munson Hill Road. Turn south on the gravel and make your way to 132nd street. Turn left on 132nd street and then right on Grove Road, a quick right on Hickory Road. The cemetery is off to the left.

Brownlow Cemetery, googleMaps

Brownlow Cemetery

Brownlow Cemetery, looking east

The cemetery is the resting place of many early settlers in Hickory Township.

Brewer Family

Include are the Brewer family that arrived in 1881. James Madison Brewer and Margaret Faubion Brewer came to Kansas by way of Allentown, Missouri, where they had lived 20 years; and they settled not far from Latham, Kansas.

When they came to Butler County (Kansas)-they came in covered wagons--three families together: Mary Jane & Joseph T Wright, Margaret & James BREWER, and Hephzibah "Aunt Hippy" & Mathew Hightower. The Hightower's son Otto took sick on the way, and they camped at Eureka (Greenwood County, KS) with him for 'quite a while.' The other families stayed with them for about a week before moving on. Otto died and was buried in Eureka Cemetery before the Hightower's wagon left camp to join the others in Butler County.

Brewer family history.

Wright family, Brownlow Cemetery

Brewer family, Brownlow Cemetery

Sensenbaugh family

In 1873 Paul and Sarah Sensenbaugh settled in Hickory Township, Butler County. Their son Henry was included in Mooney's History of Butler County at page 833.

He located on 160 acres of land and after getting four ponies, one of which was a spotted one, he proceeded to break his prairie land. His outfit might have seemed more appropriate in a circus parade, but he succeeded in tilling the soil and raising a crop with them. He also used oxen in the early days and frequently drove to dances with his ox team outfit. ... 

Miles, Charles Dallas

Brownlow Cemetery is also the resting place of Major Charles (Charlie) Miles (1921-2001) who served during World War II in China.

Major Charles (Charlie) Dallas Miles

Charles Dallas Miles, 1921-2001

William L. Webster

William L. Webster is my wife's great-great-grandfather on her mother's side. Neither my wife nor anyone else in her family had ever heard of him until I found the connection.

One of William Shakespeare's most quoted passages is uttered by the chronically melancholy Jacques De Bois in As You Like It,  Act II Scene VII.

 All the world's a stage, And all the men and women merely players: They have their exits and their entrances; And one man in his time plays many parts, ...

William L. Webster's time on the stage of Kansas history was brief, from 1857 until sometime shortly after 1860. During that time he participated in the Free State Movement, joined in the Constitutional Convention, farmed, fathered, and survived a violent time. Then, his trail goes cold. I can not find any records of William or his family, until his daughter Fannie marries Charles Miles many years later.

William L, Webster

William L. Webster was originally from New York. The 1860 census tells us that. (Page 27, entries 7 through 12.) He was 41 years of age at the time of the census and married to Julia, who was 13 years his junior. He must have lived in California at or near the time of the California Gold Rush, for a daughter Martha was born there. In all, there were three daughters living at the time of the census, Martha, Fannie, and Josephine, ages 5, 3, and 1. (Fannie is my wife's ancestor.) The census tells us that too.

From California, we can surmise, he and his young family moved to Kansas. For in 1857, he appears in Anderson County, Kansas near Garnett. Anderson county is undulating, farmland, divided into bottom land, timber and rolling upland, bordered by the branches of Pottawatomie Creek.

The census of 1860 records that he owned 4,000 acres, although the county records can confirm only 640 acres. The exact location of his homestead is just to the north of Garnett, along Highway 169 on the way to Osawatomee. (Between roads 1900 and 2000). In the Spring of 2012, the fields are green with new wheat. The corn crop has yet to be planted. Small gatherings of cattle graze the grass. The Pottawatomie Creek runs full, and along the banks walnut, cottonwood, oak, hickory, hack-berry, elm, sycamore, and maples trees are plentiful. The presence of deer is evident today and in 1857, game would have been bountiful.

William Webster figured prominently in the settlement of Anderson County. At one time or another he was a delegate to the Free-State Convention, County Treasurer, and Supervisor of Buildings.

In 1857 or 1859, a daughter, Fannie was born, and two years later another daughter Josephine. Fannie and her two sisters would survive the Indians, the Ruffians, the sickness and disease that took far too many lives. Fannie would later marry my wife's great grandfather, Charles Dallas Miles. This Charles Dallas Miles had a son named Frank Ottley Miles. He, in turn, had three children, one of whom was Mary Miles. She married Robert Van Huss, and from this union was born by wife, Robin.

Bill, if I may call him that, I suppose his wife Julia called him by that name, fought against the Border Ruffians from Missouri who terrorized the Free-Staters. He must have been an acquaintance of John Brown, who fought against the Missourians, with whom he shared the stage. He was steadfast in his views of a Free Kansas. He was County Treasurer, delegate to the Free State Convention, farmer, father of three young girls.

And then, after the U.S. Census of 1860, he again disappears from the stage of history. There is no record of him, either before or after.

Back to Shakespeare's As You Like It. There are seven stages to this life.

          [The seven parts are listed. Read it you wish to find your stage in life.]

Last scene of all, That ends this strange eventful history, Is second childishness and mere oblivion, Sans teeth, sans eyes, sans taste, sans everything.

At one time or another, I suppose we have all felt like a bit player in a stage show . So, Bill was pretty much spot on in looking at life as a progression from mewling and suckling infant to doddering fool, sans teeth, sans eyes, sans taste, sans everything, with a moment or two center stage. I am writing this as American Idol plays in the background. Somebody is saved, to go on another day. Somebody is singing to be saved, not knowing if his day in the sun is done. "One save", if it were only so easy to keep our hopes and dreams alive.