Pioneers of Ellis County
William L. Hancock
Contributed by Jean Caddel
William Hancock, early settler and prosperous farmer of Ellis County, was born in Coffee County, Tenn. in 1839. He came to Texas with his parents in 1853 and to Waxahachie in 1861 where he worked as a carpenter. He enlisted in the CSA in the 18th Texas Cavalry, Co. I., but was discharged in 1864 for health reasons. Returning to Ellis County, he worked in a saddle and shoe shop and then began farming some ten miles east of Waxahachie where he lived until 1872 when he moved to his present home. He has held the office of Assessor, Justice of the Peace and Commissioner and is a member of the Methodist Episcopal Church. In 1864 he married Miss June A. Stout, born in 1844 in Ellis County, a daughter of Peter and Elizabeth Stout, natives of Texas and North Carolina. The Hancocks have three children: Peter Lee, Sarah A. (m. Dr. J. L. Everett of Palmer) and Willie P. (attending school in Waxahachie).
William Hancock was a son of Lee Hancock who was born in Ga. in 1802. He moved to Wilson County, Tenn., and in 1853 to Lamar County, Tex. In 1873 he moved to Palmer in Ellis County where he died in 1880. He was a farmer and stock raiser and a member of the Methodist Episcopal church from early childhood. In 1827 he married Katie Maxley, the daughter of Joseph Maxley and Prissa Hearn. They had the following children: Francis H.; Samuel H.; Joseph P. (decd); Elizabeth M. (widow of John Good, prominent Presbyterian minister); James (lives Tarrant Co. Tex); Mary (d. young); William L (see above); Malissa (m. M. C. Fewell, farmer and stock raiser in Hill Co. Tex.); John P. (lives Lamar Co. Tex); Robert P. (lives Wolfe City, Tex); Mattie P. (m. N. C. Everett; now decd); Aphelia (m. A. J. Sanders of Palmer) and one child who d. infancy.
[Source: Memorical and Biographical History of Ellis County, Lewis Pub., Chicago, 1892]
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