My Genealogy Hound

WILLIAM T. McKEE, born in Jasper county, Mo., Aug. 26, 1849, and has lived mostly in this county all his life. His father, Andrew, carne from Tennessee about 1850, settling first at Sarcoxie and then near where old Sherwood now stands. For many years he acted as the supply agent for the Indians, and died upon the old McKee farm in August, 1852. He entered a large tract of land near where Joplin now stands, of about 700 acres, and finding mineral used to smelt it upon a scooped out rock, which can be seen to this day. He was among the first white men who found lead in Jasper county, and was the first who made discoveries at Leadville. The supplies for his station had to be hauled from Sedalia by teams, as this was the frontier town for a number of years. Senior Jackson built flat-boats and floated produce down Spring River to Van Buren. By trade he was a blacksmith, and was also among the first judges of Jasper county. There were twelve children in his mother’s family, she dying on the farm in 1878. The subject of our sketch married Lila Golden, in Oct., 1871, who was born in Indiana and raised in Iowa. The names of the children are Annie, Electa, and one deceased. Mr. McKee lived at Carthage during the war and was an eye witness of many of the stirring scenes of the war. He saw Carthage burned, and Price when he made his raid. But a mere lad, young McKee assisted in burying two Confederate soldiers; he remembers well, the burning of the negroes at Carthage by the populace before the war; he saw Captain Baker and twelve men captured at Sherwood, aud the town burned; when hunting horses on the prairie he was captured and taken into camp by the Federals’, least he should inform against them; he saw twenty-five negroes and one white man shot and burned in a log hut. He recalls the following Southern sympathizers who were shot near or in Carthage: Dr. Griffith, Joe Bradbury, Huston, Chancy Jackson, and many others. Mr. McKee owns a part of the original farm of 80 acres; about 23 acres in wheat, averaging 18 bushels; and 10 acres of corn, averaging 40 bushels. Mr. McKee lives in the suburbs of Smithfield, and recalls with vividness many incidents and scenes of the last war, and is a good and worthy citizen.