DUANE
Duane's take
Here's how the official marker tells it, and I'll do my best to do it justice. Out here in Hamilton County, there's a gap in the mountains that carries a heavy story — and if you drive through it right, you can almost feel the weight of it. They call the area Martin's Gap, or at least they did for about twenty years, and the name came from a man named Jim Martin.
A frontiersman. The kind of man who pushed into country where Hamilton County had fewer than five hundred people total — fewer than five hundred souls spread across all that wild Texas land. Martin was killed here, in this gap, by Indians sometime in the 1860s.
That's the beginning of this place's story. A man buried in a mountain gap that then carried his name for two decades. Twenty years of folks passing through and saying his name without always knowing what it cost to put it there.
Then in 1873, somebody came along with intentions to stay. Captain Battle Fort — Confederate veteran, lawyer, a man who'd already lived through his share of hard history — settled here and started building something out of what had been frontier tragedy. A community began to take shape.
And by 1884, there was enough of a community to warrant a post office. Now here's where the story takes a turn that nobody could've predicted from the blood-soaked beginning. That post office needed a name.
And the name they chose was Fairy — to honor Mrs. Phelps, Captain Fort's beloved young daughter. From a frontiersman's grave in a mountain gap to a post office named Fairy in honor of a beloved daughter.
Hamilton County had come a long way. And it all runs right through this one gap in the hills.
What the marker says
Mountain burial site for frontiersman Jim Martin, killed here by Indians in 1860s, when county had fewer than 500 people. Gap bore his name for 20 years. Settled in 1873 by Capt. Battle Fort, Confederate veteran and lawyer. A post office established 1884 was named Fairy to honor Mrs. Phelps, Fort's beloved young daughter.