A Brief Account of the Hetherington and Broughton Families

Compiled by Charlie Tillery

Edward Nathaniel Hetherington was born at Monroe County, Alabama, December 20, 1870, and was the second child of John Monroe and Margaret Ann Hetherington. He came to Reagan, Texas, with the Hetherington family December 28, 1894, a few days after his fourteenth birthday. His parents purchased a farm one mile south of Reagan. He went to school at Teagan, and worked on the family farm and learned something about carpentering and construction work.

0n October 7, 1894 Ed Hetherington and Lillie Valerian McCants were married in the Reagan Baptist Church. She was born January 13,1877. Her father was James McCants, who was wheel chair bound invalid when I knew him, suffering with very painful rheumatism. Her mother was Rosialena Snell, a daughter of William Snell. Who was Margaret Ann Hetherington’s uncle. Thus Ed Hetherington married the grand- daughter of his great Uncle William Snell, who was the brother of Mary R. Broughton, the mother of Margaret Ann Hetherington. Lillie McCants Hetherington was the dutiful daughter and nursed father until her death, March 10, 1910, of pneumonia. James McCants survived only a short time after the passing of his daughter being March 18,1910.

Perhaps just prior to his wedding Ed Hetherington built a two room house for his father about 100 yards west ot the Hetherington family residence. He and his bride were permitted to live rent free in this house one year, as payment for the labor of building the house.

During this year on his father’s farm, he was busy building a house on seventy acres of new ground, his share of a larger tract of land which he and his cousin, Jimmy Hetherington, had bought a few years before. This land was just west of the William Snell place and a few hundred yards north of the Little Brazos River. He also dug a well and cleared the land of postoak timber and brush. When the house and well were completed, he and his wife and oldest daughter moved into their new place, expecting to earn their living from this piece of land. And for four or possibly five years they raised cotton and corn, milked cows, raised hogs and chickens, and improved their farm. But Ed Hetherington and his wife were not meant for the country, and in the fall of 1899 he sold this farm to John P. Tillery, his brother-in-law, and moved his family to Reagan.

During the year, 1900, he farmed on the old Rogers place just north of Reagan. This farm is now known as the Bargineer place. Then he quit farming, and bought a house and perhaps an acre of land on the High Bank road. This place is now known as the Henry Robbins home. For the next several years he worked as a carpenter in and around Reagan.

In 1906 he moved his family to Teague, Texas, at which place there was something of a building boom. He had sold his house in Reagan. By this time there were four children. For three years and about three months he worked as a carpenter at Teague. Then Lillie, his wife, contracted pneumonia and passed away, and it was necessary for him to move back to Reagan, where he might have some assistance from his relatives in taking care of his four children.

During the summer of 1910 he built a two bedroom house west of Reagan on an acre of land and set up house-keeping with his children. The oldest girl was now almost fifteen years of age. It was not an ideal arrangement, but the house-keeping and cooking somehow got done, and the youngsters went to school, and the father worked most of the time as a carpenter and as a watch repairer.

Three years later, which would have been in the summer of 1913, he married Mrs. Dorcus Clawson, who had two daughters, Lillie Bee and Blanche. These girls were perhaps ten or twelve years of age. This new wife and her daughters lived with the Ed Hetherington family until the girls were through school and had married and then she went to live with them.

Ed N. Hetherington had a great deal of natural talent along mechanical lines, and was almost a genius in the field of motors and engines. He was an excellent builder, but he was not too successful as a manager, and did not always receive the money he was capable of earning. He was a good father and did the best he could for his children. He was strictly honest as a man and as a workman. He could do fine cabinet work or a rough construction job, lay brick and build chimneys, paint and hang wall paper, dig a well and curb it, repair a watch or overhaul a gasoline or steam engine. And he did all these operations with more than average skill.

In his later years his sight and hearing became very bad, and he lost his health. His daughter, Rosia moved into the house with him, and was very faithful in looking after his needs and nursing him. He died March 14, 1952, and is buried in the Covington Cemetery by his first wife, Lillie McCants Hetherington.

Below is a list of the children of Ed N. Hetherington and his wife, Lillie:

1. Rosialena ]ames Hetherington was born October 6, 1895. She married Benjamin Gresham December 14, 1911. Their children are Benjamin Franklin, born September 17, 1912, and died May 4, 1923; Ishmael Nathaniel, born December 26, 1915; Ida Mae and James Ray, twins, born August 10, 1918.

Ishmael Nathaniel married Annie Mae Johnson June 7, 1935. Their children are Luther, born July 10, 1936, and Alice, born March 10, 1939. Ishmael’s second wife was Josephine Wichkoski, to whom he was married in April of 1946. To this marriage have been born the following children: Martha Elizabeth, born January 4, 1947; Mary Ann, born December 14, 1947; Ishmael Nathaniel, Jr., born July 27, 1949; and Steve Joe, born March 27, 1951.

Ida Mae Gresham married Venter Louis Frankum August 22, 1936. They have two children, Margaret Loraine, born January I, 1939; and Wilbur Lewis, born September 14, 1944.

Ida Mae and Venter Lewis Frankum were divorced June 5, 1953. She married First Lt. D. D. Presley shortly thereafter.

James Ray Gresham married Vida V. Ivy August 21, 1937. They have three children: Edna Ann, born June 30, 1938; James Ray, Jr., born November 28, 1943; and Marca, born April 15, 1949.

2. Myrtle Augusta Hetherington was born May 16, 1897. She married Barcus J. Knowles of Waco, Texas, November 5, 1916. He was born October 10, 1891. They have two children, William Jefferson, born June 7, 1918; and Robert Neal, born October 15, 1931.

William Jefferson (Billie) went into the Harley Davidson Motorcycle Agency with his father when he was through school. He married Myrtle Lee Robertson June 8, 1940. Their children are William Michael, born August 12, 1942, and Linda Carol, born February 27, 1947.

Robert Neal (Bob) is a junior at Baylor, and a first string tackle on the Varsity football team. He made all-state tackle while a senior member of the Waco High School football team.

3. Dora Mae Hetherington (Dolly) was born May 5, 1903. She married Charles Edwin Jennings March 19, 1921. Dolly and Edwin live on a farm near Graham, Texas. They have five children: Louise, born September 25, 1926; Margaret Leona, born June 19, 1938; Edwina Marie, born October 6, 1940; and Mary Thelma and Charles Delma, twins, born April 2, 1942. .

Louise married Wiley Wilson Dixon January 29, 1944, and they have two children: Thomas Edwin, born May 22, 1945; and Glenda Louise, born November 18, 1947.

4. Prince Edward Hetherington was born September 19, 1904. He married Thelma Rhodes in July, 1922. They have two children: Edward Alton, born February 8, 1924; and Lillie Virginia, born February 4, 1926.

Edward Alton Hetherington married Audrey Mae Canter of Houston February 14, 1942, at Houston, Texas. There were two boys born in this family: Alton Dave Hetherington, born November 7, 1949; and Mark Dennis Hetherington, who is deceased.

Lillie Virginia Hetherington married Bob Woods, and they have two girls and one boy. They live at Houston, Texas.

A number of Ed N. Hetherington’s grandsons were in the armed services during World War II. William Knowles, James Hay Gresham, and Ishmael were in the Navy.

Ed N. Hetherington, at the time of his death, had four children, two step-children, twelve living grandchildren, and twenty great grandchildren.