Gregg County's creator was lucky in war
By Van Craddock
Bluford Washington Brown, the man who created Gregg County, was 66 when he died in February 1897. Truth is, the part-time Methodist preacher was fortunate to live as many years as he did.
Brown was an officer in the 44th Alabama Infantry. He had survived such Civil War battles as Gettysburg, Manassas, Antietam and the Wilderness.
Born in Bibb County, Ala., in January 1831, Brown was just 17 when he married Nancy Cox. The couple had four children by the time Brown enlisted in 1862 and marched off to fight the Yankees.
Lt. Brown and his Alabama unit were sent to Richmond, Va. In August 1862, the regiment fought in the Second Battle of Manassas (Bull Run). Brown received a leg wound and was promoted when the regiment's captain was killed.
In September the unit took heavy losses at Antietam (Sharpsburg, Md.). An 1881 biography of Brown notes the unit's commanding colonel was killed "and his own company terribly cut to pieces, losing many killed, wounded and captured."
According to the bio, Brown "had 12 bullet holes through his clothes and five through his hat." It's clear Brown was indeed fortunate to survive the carnage at Antietam.
On July 2, 1863, Brown and his men found themselves at Gettysburg, Pa., where they faced the 4th Maine Infantry and captured Union cannons at the bloody Devil's Den.
The Confederate commander's official report said the 44th Alabama "sprang forward, over the rocks, swept the position and took possession of the heights, capturing 40 or 50 prisoners around the battery and among the cliffs." The Alabama regiment had 90 casualties.
Following Gettysburg, Brown's unit fought at Chickamauga, Knoxville, the Battle of the Wilderness, Spotsylvania, Petersburg and Chafin's Bluff.
The 44th Alabama Infantry mustered 1,094 men during the Civil War. At war's end in April 1865, the regiment had only 209 soldiers remaining.
Brown survived the war. In 1866 the Brown family relocated to East Texas, settling at the Summerfield community in what then was Upshur County. Brown was a cotton farmer and soon became a lay preacher for Summerfield Methodist Church.
In 1872 Brown was elected to the Texas Legislature. The following year he introduced a bill to create a new East Texas county carved from Upshur and Rusk counties. Originally to be called "Roanoke" County, Brown decided it should be called "Gregg" County to honor slain Confederate Gen. John Gregg.
Brown twice was re-elected to the Legislature and served as a delegate to three state Democratic conventions. In 1879 Brown built a Victorian home at 104 W. Whaley St. in downtown Longview.
A Texas newspaper announced Brown's death in February 1897: "Longview, Tex., Feb. 9 - Honorable B.W. Brown, about 65 years old, a well known Methodist preacher and the first representative from Gregg County when it was organized … and a member of the 13th and 14th legislatures, and afterward the chaplain of that body for some time, died at his home in this place at 9:10 this morning. Mr. Brown was known all over the state, having moved here in early life and taken a foremost part in the upbuilding of this section."
The man who named Gregg County is buried in Longview's historic Greenwood Cemetery.
The 1881 biography described Brown as "happily constituted in temperament … of large frame, frank and generous. His latchstring always hangs out, and he is deservedly a popular man."