Dr. William Chamberlayne Jones

Duane's take

The official marker tells it this way, and I'll do my best to give it its due. Now, some men pick one life and stick to it. William Chamberlayne Jones was not one of those men.

Born on August 31, 1829, in Alabama, he made his way to Texas in 1852, settling in near the Monkstown settlement up in northeastern Fannin County. And he came prepared. The man was trained as an attorney.

That alone would have been enough for most folks to hang a shingle and call it a career. But Jones had other ideas. When the Civil War ended, he sold his Red River plantation, packed up whatever a man carries when he's reinventing himself, and headed down to New Orleans to study medicine.

Think about that for a moment. Most people, after a war, after selling off land they'd worked, would sit down and rest. Jones sat down in a lecture hall.

He came back to Fannin County a physician, and he served the Grove Hill and Leonard communities in that capacity. So the county got a lawyer turned doctor, which, depending on your ailment, might be exactly what you needed. And through all of it, the relocating, the reinventing, the years of study and service, he and his wife Ellen O'Meara Jones, born Birmingham, were raising a family.

Fifteen children. William Chamberlayne Jones departed this world on June 11, 1903. One county, two careers, fifteen children.

That is a full life by any measure.

What the marker says

(Aug. 31, 1829 - June 11, 1903) A native of Alabama, William Chamberlayne Jones migrated to Texas in 1852 and resided near the Monkstown settlement in northeastern Fannin County. Trained as an attorney, he sold his Red River plantation after the Civil War and began studying medicine in New Orleans. He later served this area as a physician in the Grove Hill and Leonard communities. Jones and his wife Ellen O'Meara (Birmingham) had fifteen children.