DUANE
Duane's take
Here's how the official marker tells it, and I'll do my best to do it justice. Solomon Ruffin Perry. Born June 2, 1810, in Louisburg, North Carolina.
Came to Texas in 1833 — which, if you know your Texas history, means he arrived early enough to see just about everything unfold. Now, the marker doesn't say much about those years between his arrival and the 1840s, but it says plenty about what kind of man he was when things got rough. Because things got very rough.
Harrison County in the 1840s was home to the regulator-moderator feud — one of those blood-in-the-dirt, neighbor-against-neighbor affairs that left bodies where they fell and good sense nowhere to be found. Solomon Ruffin Perry lived right in the middle of it. And here's the thing that'll stay with you: he never carried a gun.
Not once. Now in that time and that place, that wasn't just unusual — it was a statement. A quiet, daily, stubborn statement.
But unarmed didn't mean uninvolved. When Robert Potter was shot by an enemy — Robert Potter, the first Secretary of the Navy for the Republic of Texas — Perry risked his life to help bury the man. Risked it.
That's the marker's word, and it earns its weight. Then comes 1848. Perry's predecessor as county sheriff had been assassinated.
The office was vacant the hard way. And the county turned to the man who never carried a gun and elected him sheriff. He served twenty-seven years in that office — and from 1878 all the way to 1895, he served those years consecutively.
He was married to Mary Susan James. He had a son and two daughters. Solomon Ruffin Perry died January 13, 1895 — still serving.
The man who walked unarmed through a feud, buried the fallen, and kept the peace for decades. Harrison County remembered him. Now you will too.
What the marker says
(June 2, 1810-Jan. 13, 1895) Born in Louisburg, N. C.; came to Texas 1833. Never carried a gun, though he lived in locality of 1840's regulator-moderator feud, and risked life to help bury Robert Potter (first secretary of Navy, Republic of Texas), who had been shot by an enemy. Was elected county sheriff in 1848 after his predecessor was assassinated. Served 27 years-- consecutively from 1878 to 1895. Married Mary Susan James. Had a son and two daughters.