Benjamin Rush Milam was born in Frankfort, Kentucky in 1788 to Moses and Elizabeth Boyd Milam. He was named for Dr. Benjamin Rush, who had served soldiers including Moses Milam in the American Revolution at Valley Forge. Ben enlisted in the Kentucky Militia as a private and eventually rose to the rank of Lieutenant during the War of 1812. He remained in the army until his enlistment was concluded in 1815.
James H. Perry was a long time detractor of Sam Houston. Perry (unrelated to the Naval officer, Oliver Hazard Perry, as far as we can tell) was born in June of 1811 in New York. He had wanted to attend the United States Military Academy at West Point but his appointment was not immediately secured. In the meantime, he studied law, began practicing as an attorney and also married. He was finally admitted to West Point in 1833 but resigned during his third year there and relocated to Texas.
Sam Bass was born July 21, 1851 in Lawrence County, Indiana and died on his 27th birthday, July 21, 1878 in Round Rock, Texas He had lived a life that had made him famous to the point that he had become a folk hero to some. Sam had been orphaned at the age of 13 after which he began to live with an uncle who was stern and strict with him. As soon as he could, young Bass left his uncle and relocated to Rosedale, Mississippi where he worked for about a year in a saw mill. In the summer of 1870, he set out for Texas, traveling with a family named Mayes who were returning to their home in Denton County, Texas. He had heard about Texas and the cowboy life and wanted to try it.
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Crone Webster Furr was the founder of the Furr Food Store chain, a familiar group of stores in West Texas and Eastern New Mexico. Furr was born May 8, 1878 in North Carolina into a family that included five brothers and four sisters. In 1894, when he was still a teenager, his family moved to Collin County, Texas. Two years later, he married Annie Furr, whose family was unrelated but bore the same last name, and shortly thereafter he began farming a rented farm a few miles out of McKinney, Texas. Furr was industrious and opened a small grocery store at a crossroads near his farm.
Bonham, Texas (33°35′2″N 96°10′54″W) is the county seat of Fannin County and is named for James Butler Bonham (1807-1836), one of the defenders who died at the Alamo. He was born to James and Sophia Butler Bonham on February 10, 1807 in Red Banks, South Carolina. Bonham was raised in South Carolina and attended but did not graduate from South Carolina College. He then studied law and began a law practice in South Carolina in 1830 where he would remain until about 1834 when he moved west to Montgomery, Alabama, where the family also had relatives.
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