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Was this BS too?
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My family settled in what is now Brazos county in 1833, my great great Grandfather Samuel B. "Grandsir" Barnes, and his nine sons and their families came out by wagon from Iredell County N.C. They were sharecroppers that came out west to get some free land of their own, instead of working for a small share of the crop and not owning the land in which they lived on.
They settled out on what is now known as DIlly Shaw Tap Rd on the edge of where the town of Kurten now is. Boonville was the main borough on the Austin Colonies, what is now what we know as BCS. Each Soon received a section of land via Spanish Land Grant for pledging their allegiance to the Republic Militia. Those nine section still makeup the Dairy out on Dilly Shaw Tap Rd that is still in family operation today. My great Grandfather Frederick Whitfield Barnes and his 8 brothers fought in numerous skirmishes. My Great grandfather was wounded in the skirmish on the Sabine, when they were defending the port area at the mouth. Supplies were brought in at the mouth of the Sabine and Buffalo Bayou often and had to be protected. His life was saved from his wound, due to a farrier hammer he carried in his ruck, because he was a blacksmith. The lead ball left the impression of the hammer head in his back, and was still there when he died years later, from old age, he was reportedly 118.
http://texags.com/forums/34/topics/2604017/2
Guaranteed bull****.
For starters:
A) In 1833 that part of the world was Mexico, and while there was American immigration in to the area at the time, it was illegal (as Mexico had banned immigration by Americans in 1830), and the land was most assuredly not free at that point in time.
B) Assuming these ancestors did serve in the military of the Republic, the earliest that would have happened would have been 1835 and the earliest they would have been granted a land bounty was 1836.
C) Why would their land have been granted via Spanish land grant considering that they supposedly arrived under Mexican rule and served under the Republic of Texas?
D) Even if his dates are an "honest mistake" the land bounties given to soldiers who served wasn't quite as simple as a "section for pledging to serve". There were various mechanisms which would have granted them a section of land, but the odds that all 9 of them fell into one of those categories are somewhere between slim and none.
E) According to the documents available from the General Land Office's on line records, the only Barnes' to have been granted land in Brazos County by the Republic of Texas were named John, Moses, William, and Samuel. Note that the Samuel listed in the records is Samuel L. while MF Barnes lists Samuel B. as his great-great-grandfather. In his story Samuel B. Barnes is not one of the men who served, they were his nine sons.
F) He lived to 118 years old.
