Hannibal Honestus Boone (1834-1897), son of Joseph Greene and Harriet N. (Latham) Boone, was born in Tipton County, Tennessee, on February 24, 1834. In 1842 he moved with his parents to Mississippi; after his mother's death, his father moved the family to Austin (now Waller) County, Texas. Boone attended Mountain Academy in Tennessee, studied law at Austin College, then began his legal practice at Hempstead, Texas, in 1859.
In February 1861 he enlisted in John Ford's regiment of the Confederate Army; while in service he married Susan H. Gordon of Washington, Louisiana, in 1862. On September 29, 1863, he lost his right arm and the thumb and first two fingers of his left hand at Fordoche, Louisiana. He was transferred back to Texas, where he served post duty for the remainder of the war.
After the war, Boone and his wife moved to Anderson, Texas, where he practiced law in partnership with I. G. Searcy. In 1876 Boone was elected attorney general of Texas on the Democratic ticket and served one term during the governorship of Richard Coke, the first governor elected after the end of Reconstruction. In 1877 Boone moved to Navasota, where he resumed his law practice. He organized one of the first camps of Confederate veterans there and was elected commander of the Division of Texas in May 1895.
Boone and his wife had a number of children, including Gordon, who also became a lawyer and took over the management of the family's legal and business affairs after his father's death in 1897. Gordon Boone was elected judge of the Twelfth Judicial District of Texas in 1904.
Legal documents, correspondence, financial documents, printed material, and maps, 1831-1917 (1 ft., 3 in.), created or maintained by Hannibal Honestus Boone and his family, particularly his son Gordon, chiefly document personal business and legal affairs. The collection bulks with legal records (1870-1890) documenting land sales and purchases in Grimes, Harris, Anderson, Haskell, Montgomery, Cherokee, and Brazos counties, supplemented with correspondence, survey and field notes, and plat diagrams and maps. Of special note is a complete set of surveys, legal records, and correspondence pertaining to the Jesse W. Stoddard League in Grimes County.
There are few documents relating to Hannibal and Gordon Boone's legal practices, and none pertaining to Boone's term as attorney general. Exceptions include correspondence and legal documents relating to a land dispute (1913-14), A. B. Frank Company vs. Charles Clarke, et al. (including Gordon Boone's clients Minnie, Lulu, and Katie Ward) and a judge's charge to the jury from a murder trial (1906), the State of Texas vs. Clabe Dickey. Other documents of special interest are a copy of a translation of a letter from Spanish official Miguel Arciniegu to the settlers at Austin's colony (March 1838) and a copy of a Spanish land title to Jessee Denson (1803).
Unrestricted access.
Unrestricted use.
Alice J. Rhoades, April 30, 1987
Hannibal Honestus Boone Papers, 1831-1917, Dolph Briscoe Center for American History, The University of Texas at Austin.