A Short Biography of Montreville Willis - but a really long post!

Montreville Willis was my fathers grandfather. He was the subject of a brief biography that appear in a book entitles Biographical Souvenir of the Sate of Texas, published in 1889. This is a collection of brief biographies of the common man. In 1941, one of his sons Thomas Jefferson Willis took the unusual step of writing an affadivit that was signed by him and notarized. The sole purpose of this document was to state his knowledge of his father's, Montreville's, family. These two documents, along with other genealogical research, enables me to write a brief biography considering Montreville as an ancestor.

Montreville was born in Clay County, Missouri on November 12th, 1833. He was the son of Geroge and Anna Rose Willis, both natives of North Carolina. Thomas Jefferson's affadivit says that George "was born in the latter part of the eighteenth century, was the son of an Irish gentleman who fought for the independence of the United States, and who in early life, was a school teacher". However, the book "Kith and Kin of Eastern Carteret County" by Thelma Pike Sampson and Rebecca Willis Sanders, the most in depth research of original documents of Carteret County , North Carolina, shows that George's father was a man named Benjamin Williston who was born in Carteret County between 1745 and 1750. Benjamin is at least the third generation American in the Williston family and there is, in fact, a town named Williston because they were the earliest settlers there. So the Irish lineage, at least as stated in the affadivit, is incorrect and calls into question, then, the additional George Willis information.

Montreville had three brothers; Levaston, Lewis Hamilton, and Caswell. George died when Montreville was only six years old. Thomas Jefferson's affadivit states that Lewis Hamilton was a Captain in the Confederate Army and was killed in battle. He also states that it's believed that Caswell was also killed in that conflict, leaving only the two brothers Montreville and Levaston. We know for certain that both of these also served in the Civil War but more about that later.

Montreville lived in Clay County, Missouri until 1853, when he was twenty years old. He then went west to Sacremento, California. This was four years after the discovery of gold at Sutters Creek, California which is near Sacremento but it's not known if that contributed to his decision to go there. He stayed in California until 1859 when he returned home to Missouri.

Within a couple years, the War Between the States began. Missouri was a border state between the north and the south was one of the two states that had pro-southern and pro-northern govenments. Clay County is very near the southern border of the state and that's probably why both Montreville and Levaston joined the Confederacy. They both enlisted in the Fifth Division of the Missouri State Guard, Company B, Shank's Regiment, Shelby's Brigade. It is said that Montreville took part in numerous battles including Lexington, Oak Hill, andPea Ridge as well as other battles in Texas and Arkansas.

The following is a story from another Montreville descendent, Mary Louise Shultz:

"My Father, Louis Willis, told me that his father related to him that Montreville joined the Civil War early and then after a time quit and rejoined. Dad said that when Montreville was questioned about this he would get upset but never would explain. Another tidbit was given to me by a cousin in OK was that the Willis boys rode with Quantrell for a short time. That makes sense because of another story my father told me. LouAnn, my cousin in OK, told me that when our Aunt Gladys was a child about 4 years old she woke up one night thirsty. This was in Denton County, TX. She got up and went into the kitchen for a drink and saw one of the James boys, Frank I think. She remembered it because it was in the dead of night and she remembered him saying he did not want to come in the daylight because he did not want to shame the family."

Both of these stories could be true. By the end of 1861, the Missouri State Guard had moved into Arkansas and was fighting there. Montreville married Francis "Fannie" Womble Burkhead in 1862 in Arkansas and their first child, Anna Laura, was born in October, 1862. So it doesn't look like Montreville was fighting the war in 1862 and it does look like he might have been doing something he'd rather not talk about later on.

Francis (Fannie) Womble Burkhead Willis

As for riding with Quantrill and the "James boys" (Google "Quantrill's Raiders" if you need to and see the Wikpedia entry.) - both William Quantrill and the James boys as well as the Younger boys, were all from southern Missouri. William Quantrill "developed a style of guerrilla warfare that terrorized civilians and soldiers alike" and some of the tactics used would be considered atrocities. He operated along the Missouri-Kansas border. The James-Younger gang did ride with Quantrill and that's where they learned some of the tactics they later employed as outlaws. In 1861, Quantrill was considered a hero. In 1863, with a raid in Lawrenceville, Kansas, it came to an end and the group was disbanded. We know that Montreville was released from the Confederate army in Little Rock Arkansas in May, 1865. So it's possible that between 1861 and 1865, Montreville joined the Missouri Guard, ended up in Arkansas and married, left the Guard and joined Quantrill riding with him for some unknown period, left Quantrill and rejoined his old unit, and fought to the end of the war when members of the southern army were "paroled".

By 1869, Montreville had moved to a farm about four miles west of Denton, Texas where he lived until 1906. A daughter Cassa (Cassie) who was born in 1867, died and is buried in the I.O.O.F. cemetery there. Another daughter, Mary, born in August, 1875 lived only six days is also buried there. The other children were John Lewis, 1870; Thomas Jefferson, 1873; Francis Elizabeth,1876; and, finally, James Monroe, my grandfather, 1878.

In 1878 Montreville served as a juror in the murder trial of Robert Morrow in Denton County, Texas. The verdict must have been "guilty" because his brother Levaston was a witness to the execution.

In August, 1882, both Montreville and Levaston traveled to Sherman to attend the Ex-Confederate Missourians Association of Texas" 2nd annual meeting.

By 1900, all of the children had left home. Anna, whose last name was now Scott, had returned home with two daughters, Lucrecia and Winnie. Montreville was 67 and was still listed as a farmer on the census.

Levaston died in 1905 in Clay County, Texas but was taken to Denton for burial.

Montreville and Fannie were said to have moved to Olustee, Oklahoma in 1906 but by 1910, they were in Quanah, Texas. The two towns are only about twenty miles apart. This continues to be something of a puzzle - why Quanah? It does appear that at least one grandchild lived there but it was also the home of the father of James Monroe Willis's wife Addie, B.C. Goodner - my other great grandfather and another Confederate veteran of the Civil War.

Fannie died in Quanah in 1910 and Montreville died the following year. Both are buried in the Quanah cemetery.

1900 Census for Montreville Willis