William M. Lopp

In that year a wagon train of eighty one people left St. Joseph, Missouri, bound for California.  Their horses and wagons were of the finest and were equipped in a manner luxurious for that time.  Unfortunately, these adventurous travelers were not sufficiently wise in the ways of survival.  After months of difficult travel, they reached the Donner Pass in the Sierra Nevada Mountains of California, where the altitude was 7,135 feet.  Though they were not far from their goal, which was the Sacramento River Valley, they were blocked by heavy snows and forced to spend a tragic winter in the pass.  Their cattle, horses and even leather harness provided a meager supply of food for only part of the winter.  The last resort was cannibalism.  Only forty five of these pioneers survived.

Among those who died was a Mr. Williams.  Finally when the snow melted and rescue came, his young widow, Eliza Ann Baker Williams and her two children, Jim and Lottie, went on with the wagon train to the valley which later became the focal point of the gold rush of 1849.

It was in this year that William M. Lopp, a young emigrant from Holland, joined a mid-west caravan and made the trek to the Truckee River area in California, where he found not only gold, but an attractive wife, the young widow Williams.

After four years of panning gold in the Sacramento River, William Lopp decided that he had made his stake and was ready to return to the Mid-west.  The family now included a baby girl named Martha Ellen, born July 26, 1851, in the Old Dutch Flat Mining Camp.

Planning a long journey was not a new experience for this family.  They knew that most material possessions had to be left behind.  Because banking facilities were not available, their baggage included three half bushel baskets of twenty dollar gold pieces.

The trip was made by ship down the coast of California to the Isthmus of Panama, which was crossed by mule caravan to another ship in the Gulf of Mexico.  The last lap of the journey led up the Mississippi River as far as Missouri.  Here, William Lopp bought eight hundred acres of land and sufficient number of slaves to care for a plantation of that size. 

This location continued to be home until 1856, when adventure called again, this time to Texas.  The trip was made by prairie schooner, first to Palo Pinto County, then to Parker County.  Due to inadequate protection against Indian massacres, the Lopp family moved from Parker County to Tarrant County where they felt more secure near the U.S. soldiers stationed at Fort Worth, on the banks of the Trinity River.  They remained there until 1866, when the father bought a farm fifteen miles north of the Fort in the Mt. Gilead Community.  He became an extensive land owner. 

William Lopp possessed skills and abilities which made him useful as a pioneer.  In addition to being a master farmer, he was a builder in wood and stone.  Many of the hand-hewn sandstones in Mt. Gilead Cemetery bear the marks of his sledge manner and chisel. 

He was appointed and served as the first postmaster of Double Springs, Texas from January 1, 1871 to April 23, 1873 during the administration of President Ulysses S. Grant.

He served the community as an unlicensed, unpaid doctor, which was a common practice in areas where a licensed doctor was not available.  A well worn notebook in possession of his descendants contains some of his medical recipes.  Six of them are copied here:

For Errisiplis

2 grane doses of Sugar lead

Inn lard spoonful at a time

Grees well, reduse the Sistom with purgative medison

Continue till cured

            Wm. Lopp

Fitts

Take 2 quarts Sasaparilla to 1 quart good Whiskey

For a dose, 1 gill three times per day.  Don’t bleede.

If the head should ache, give 2 teaspoonfull of Pulverised Sulpor on going to Bead.

Keep dry and don’t exersuse.  3 mounths will cure.

A shur cure for Snake bit

Indigoe pulverized and spirits Camfier

1 pint rainwater

1 ½ oz. bluestone (one & a half)

3 quarters coppress

3oz alum

Half oz Shugar lead

15 drops Iodine

Arsnick 12 granes

Dark salve

1 oz casteel soap

1 spoonful Salt

2 of honey

Resipt for curing The Poiles

5 granes of Pulvrised opium

The same of Shugar lead

Pulverise them will

Jimson leaves single handful

Stew them in 1 pint of lard

then strain the lard well

Grees of a night

The children of William M. and Eliza Ann Williams Lopp were:

1)      Martha Ellen, born July 26, 1851 and died September 13, 1939, married David A. Price.  Their children were:  Nancy Rebecca, W. Lewis (Dick), Eliza, Laura and Bessie Bell.

2)      Brook married Frances Blythe of Holly Springs, Mississippi.  Their children were:  Philip Oliver and a twin, who died in infancy.

3)      Mary married Nathan Vick.  They moved first to Whitt and later to Throckmorton, Texas. 

4)      Tom married Emma Ledford, daughter of Silas and Viannah Ledford.  Their son, Everett, was born September 7, 1889.  The mother died eight days after the birth of this child.  Everett grew to manhood in the home of his paternal Aunt, Martha Ellen Lopp Price.

5)      Ann Frances, born in 1862 and died in 1936, married Thomas Jefferson Jarvies.  Their children were:  Minnie Frances, Thomas Lewis and James Ernest.

The mother of these children, Eliza, died when Ann Frances was born.  She was buried in Mt. Gilead Cemetery.  William Lopp died and was buried beside his wife.

Lottie Williams married Tobe Hartsfield.  They made their home in Tucson, Arizona.

Jim Williams remained in Tarrant County until he was perhaps forty years of age.  He went to California to visit an uncle named Baker.  He died suddenly on the uncle’s ranch near Bakersfield.

There are two more pioneers who have a place in the history of this family.  They are

W. Sim Richey and his wife Nancy J.  They came from the small mining town of Monett, Missouri and are believed to have been in this area of Texas as early as the 1850’s.  She was a sister to William M. Lopp.  Having no children of her own, it became a pleasure and privilege to help in the upbringing of her brother’s children when their mother, Eliza, died in 1862. 

The Richeys were farmers.  Their home was a story and a half house at the north east corner of what in now the intersection of Main and Price Streets.  Descendants of the Lopp family, many of whom are in their eighties, have pleasant memories of times spent in the home on Uncle Sim and Aunt Nancy.

A tall weather worn grave stone in Bourland Cemetery bears the following inscription:

W.S.Richey     born August 26, 1824

                        died August 26, 1910

N.J. wife of W.S. Richey

                        born August 4, 1830

                        died April 18, 1904