Alexander Howard Berry, son of John Berry and Mary Howell Berry#
Ancestors:#
- Generation Robert and Mary Williamson Berry
- Generation Robert and Elizabeth Cate Berry
- Generation Robert Jr and Mary Camp Berry
- Generation George and Susan Berry
- Generation John and Mary Howell Berry
On April 17th 1877 Alexander married Josephine Priscilla Gregory in Henrietta, Clay County Texas.
Josephine P. Gregory was born on July 7th 1858.
Josephine Precilla Gregory Berry died in Amherst, Lamb County Texas on July 9th 1930.
Alexander Berry and Josephine Gregory’s Marriage License. There are six known children born to this union.
Children:#
- Mary Etta Berry b. Jan. 15, 1878 Henrietta, Clay Tx d. Oct 27 1958 Casa Grande Pinal, Arizona
- Willie Howell Berry b. Feb. 22nd 1882 Henrietta, Clay Tx d. Nov 7th 1958 Amherst, Lamb Texas
- John Cleveland Berry b. Aug. 6th 1884 Henrietta, Clay Tx d. Oct. 11th 1961 Draw, Lynn, Texas
- Mack Griffin Berry b. Jun. 6th 1888 Pottawatomie, Indian Territory d. Jul 29th 1952 Amherst, Lamb Tx.
- Rosetta (Rosie) Berry b. 1892 Indian Territory d. 1895 Indian Territory
- Leona (Onie) Berry b. Nov. 19th 1894 Indian Territory d. July 20th 1971 Lubbock, Lubbock Tx.
Alexander Howard Berry went from Texas to Colorado by way of wagon and railroad boxcar. Alexander Howard Berry was born in Rusk Co. Texas and died in Lamb Co. Texas.
Census Information:#
“Alexander Howard Berry listed in Oklahoma in the 1900 census but in Texas for all other Census”
| Census Image | Description |
|---|---|
 | Alexander H. Berry listed in the Texas 1880 Census |
 | Alexander H. Berry listed in Oklahoma in the 1900 |
 | Alexander H. Berry listed in the Texas 1910 Census |
 | Alexander H. Berry listed in the Texas 1920 Census |
A.H. Berry’s Travels#
The story of Alexander Howard Berry and his family, from Oklahoma to Berry Flat, Texas, as told by Hettie Berry Clark.
The Berry Family Comes to Texas#
A.H. Berry, his wife Josephine (Gregory) with four of their six children, Willie, John, Griff and Leona, and two passengers, O.B. Williamson and Hugh Morrow, a nephew of Josephine’s, came to Borden County, Texas. They came the first of December, 1906 in a wagon pulled by horses from Hastings, Oklahoma to Gail, Texas. They had been in Oklahoma since 1884 where they participated in the Oklahoma Land Rush and received a patent on the land in the Indian Territory on July 15, 1904. They sold the land in 1906 to move to Borden County. They moved to Oklahoma from Henrietta, Clay County, Texas.
A.H. (Alexander) Berry’s father, John, had moved to Rusk County, Texas from North Carolina with a stop in Alabama to marry a woman named Mary Howell. They had two children while still in Alabama, but the next four were born in Rusk County. They arrived in Texas in 1844 or 1845.
When A.H. arrived in Texas, he rented a house for his family in Gail where they lived until Christmas Eve, 1906. They then rented the Jeff Crawford farm which had a two story frame house and was three miles north and three miles west of property he had purchased on an earlier trip to the area. His son, Willie, had also purchased a quarter section, but there were no houses on them. A.H.’s piece was a half section which he paid $2.50 per acre for. The land was in the northwest part of Borden County. With lumber brought from Big Springs, a small two room house was built on each of the parcels and the families moved there in September of 1907.
Berry Flat, Texas#
The following spring, 1908, a school was organized with A.H. Berry, Asa Jones and James E. Benham as trustees. The first school teacher was Miss Hancock, the maiden aunt of Homer Hancock.
Other teachers through the years included Brown Bishop, Mr. Stephenson, Blanton Street, Mrs. Sammie Pierce, Miss Juanita Parker, Mr. and Mrs. Hambrick, Miss Anna Griffith, Mr. and Mrs. Otis Parr, and many more.
The school and the community were named for A.H. Berry and for Willie Berry who donated the land on which the first school and the first Baptist Church were built. It was called Berry Flat, Texas. Other families in Berry Flat at that time were the Riley Rains, Jim Parkers, Milt Simpsons, Millers, Tom Smith (father of Ned Smith).
In the summer of 1908, the Baptist Church was organized at the old Plainview school and moved to Berry Flat in 1913. Josephine Berry, her son Willie, Mr. and Mrs. Doc Howell and Mrs. Howell’s parents were charter members. A.H. Berry was Methodist, but joined the Baptist Church in August 1910 with his children, Griff and Leona (Onie), and some others.
The Children’s Paths#
John Cleveland Berry, also the son of A.H. and Josephine Berry, along with his sister Etta and her husband Hal Johnson and their children went to Grady, New Mexico in early 1907. John Berry and Hal Johnson filed for homestead rights on Government land there. The Hal Johnsons remained, but John Berry returned to Texas. While in Texas he met a young woman by the name of Georgia Beach, who lived in Lynn County about six miles north of the A.H. Berry farm. On May 19, 1907, John Berry and Georgia Beach were married after a whirlwind courtship. They went on their honeymoon (by covered wagon) back up to Grady, New Mexico where John had filed for the homestead land.
That winter both families, the Hal Johnsons and the John Berrys, became very ill. There was no doctor nor medicine of any kind available and the sickness was very hard on them. The Hal Johnsons lost two small sons within one week of each other from the measles.
In the spring of 1908, John and Georgia Berry moved back to a little place in Lynn County called “Draw.” There they bought a quarter section of land and lived on it, about six miles north of the A.H. Berry place.
Willie Berry married Sarah May Benham, daughter of James E. Benham, in February 1909. They moved to Post, Texas where the Hal Johnson family was. Willie’s first son, Alexander (Alec), was born there in December 1909. Sometime before the birth of their second child, a daughter named Hettie, born on April 9, 1912, the Willie Berry family returned to Berry Flat.
Mrs. Nettie Gregory, mother of Josephine Gregory Berry, also an Indian of either the Cherokee or Shawnee tribes, came to live with her daughter after the death of her husband, Griffin Gregory, in 1909. She had previously lived out in the country about five miles from Oklahoma City with her son, Jeff. Her children Maude, Griffin (Jeff), and John went back to the Indian Reservation in Oklahoma, claimed their Indian heritage, lived out their lives and were buried there. Nettie Gregory died in Borden County August 29, 1912 and was buried in the old Plainview Cemetery.
Griff Berry married Minnie Suits, daughter of Henry Suits, April 6, 1911 and lived on a rented farm between Berry Flat and O’Donnell for a year. A.H. Berry gave them the quarter section north of his own place and they built a house on it and lived there until 1920.
Leona (Onie) Berry married Ben Summers, January 4, 1911 and moved to Dermont, Texas where they lived until December 1913, at which time they moved to the A.H. Berry place.
The Journey to Colorado#
The drought had begun. In 1918, the A.H. Berrys, the Willie Berrys with son Alec, daughter Hettie and a second son Willie Howell Jr. (born June 2, 1917), the Ben Summers family with three children, the Hal Johnsons with seven children, and the C.L. Johnsons all loaded into covered wagons and went to Pueblo, Colorado.
When they arrived at Pueblo, the Hal Johnson and Ben Summers families loaded their belongings into boxcars and continued on to Rifle, Colorado. A.H. Berry was not well and decided to continue on in the wagons, accompanied by the Willie Berry family. The C.L. Johnson family stayed in Pueblo.
Rifle was across the mountains from Pueblo and when A.H. and his group reached Salida, Colorado, the altitude was too high and he could not breathe. They backed the wheels of the wagons into the river to turn around as the road was too narrow, and returned to Pueblo. A.H. became homesick and wanted to return to Texas. The A.H. Berrys and the Willie Berrys did so in August 1918, but the Johnsons and Summers families did not return with them.
Those who stayed in Colorado all came down with the influenza and Ben Summers died. So many people were dying that it was almost a week before he could be buried in Pueblo.
A few months after Ben Summers’ death, Hal Johnson and his family and Leona (Onie) Berry Summers and her children loaded their livestock and belongings into a boxcar and rode the train back to O’Donnell in December 1918.
Later Years#
In 1920, A.H. Berry and his wife Josephine built a small house on the east side of their property and moved into it, letting Leona and her children live in the original house. On November 27, 1920, Leona (Onie) Summers married Montgomery (Dick) Simpson in Tahoka, Texas.
Willie Berry and his family moved to Amherst, Texas in 1924. Hal Johnson moved his family there in 1925. A.H. Berry died in 1926 while visiting his son, Willie and is buried there.
Josephine (Gregory) Berry was bitten twice by a diamond-back rattlesnake while picking wild plums near Pampa, Texas. She died the next morning, July 9, 1930 and is buried beside her husband in the Amherst Cemetery.
John and Georgia Berry moved to Lynn County in 1908 where they lived until she died August 23, 1954. He lived with his daughter in Lubbock until his death October 13, 1963. Both died of coronary heart failure. He is buried in the Draw Cemetery.
The above correction to the article from Berry Flats 1976 comes from Hettie Berry Clark and WillEtta Johnson Comer, May 1986. Both lived in Phoenix, Arizona. Both have passed on.
Note: Willie Berry did not come from Indian Territory with A.H. and Josephine. He went back and got them. Willie moved to Sterling City, Sterling County, near San Angelo in 1900. He went back to Hastings in 1906 and helped the family move to Borden County. It became Oklahoma in 1907. — W.H. Berry Jr. (Dub)