Dr. W.C. Holmes was a pioneer North Texas physician, Confederate soldier, and member of the Constitution Convention of 1875.
William was born Tuesday, November 10, 1840 in Abbeville District, South Carolina,  the 4th child of 8 children born to son of Wyatt C. Holmes and Barbary Ann Mabry.  He moved with his parents and siblings from South Carolina to Holmes County, Mississippi at the tender age of 8 years; the family settled in Dark Corner Beat of Holmes Co.  The elder Mr. Holmes owned 12 male and 14 female slaves in 1850 Slave Holder Holmes Co., Mississippi census.  In the 1860 Slave Schedule Wyatt C. Holmes owned 29 slaves.   Wyatt sent his slaves to be educated in a Mississippi College.
William attended the Mississippi country schools and worked on the family farm until 1854 when he academies (private secondary education institutions) in order to enter college in 1859.

Abbeville District, South Carolina

Holmes Co., Mississippi

Barbary Ann Mabry Holmes died June 2, 1859 at the age of 45 years in Holmes Co., Mississippi and is buried in Spring Hill Cemetery along side her youngest daughter, Caroline C. Holmes.  According to the 1860 Mortality Schedule, Barbary died of typhoid.

William C. Holmes attended the University of Virginia near Charlottesville, and was a student of the medical department 1860-1861.  When the Civil War broke out, he joined the "student body", a volunteer company organized at the University in 1860. Dr. Holmes the "Red Rebels", a company organized at Lexington, Mississippi and was mustered into the State's service on May 16, 1861 and into the Confederate service at Memphis, Tennessee.  His unit was in  the battle of Shiloh, Tennessee, Corinth Mississippi, Baker's Creek, Mississippi, and Jackson, Mississippi, 1861-1864 where he was seriously wounded at New Hope Church, Georgia - the large bone of his right shoulder being shattered and never returned to full usefulness.   Holmes was Captain of his company at that time and 26 others were wounded; all but 4 of the wounded died.  On a night in July 27, 1864, he escaped from enemy lines, entering Confederate lines, reaching the railroad at Oxford, Alabama.  From there he received medical attention at a hospital in Shelby Springs, Arkansas.  He received a furlough, being retired from service for 6 months on account of his wound.

Retired from service on account of his wounds, William entered the University of Virginia again and studied law, 1864-1865, at which time the University was broken up by the Federals.  He left home at once, walking from Newnan, Georgia to Columbus, Missouri.  He then taught in a country school for a few months in 1865 and a high school for a few months the following year.

Leaving to make Texas his home, W.C. Holmes reached the port of Galveston on November 1, 1866.  He proceeded to New Orleans where he attended the New Orleans School of Medicine and graduating March 12, 1867.  He then rode the river boats to Jefferson in East Texas, then on to Bowie.  Getting off the boat in Bowie County, he purchased a pony and saddle and moving west, reached Pilot Grove, Grayson Co., Texas, April 27, 1867, where he lived and practiced medicine until 1882.  After settling in Pilot Grove, Dr. Holmes returned to Mississippi to marry Eliza Ann Hamilton, 1867.  The union was blessed with two daughters, Pearl and Eliza Ann.  Mother and namesake daughter died from cholera while on a trip to Mississippi after September 30, 1870.   (1870 US Federal Census - Precinct #4, Grayson Co., Texas)
Later Dr. Holmes married Laura Abigail Hamilton, December 30, 1874, in Grayson Co., Texas. (niece of his first wife).  They were blessed with seven children.
He built a gin in 1878 at Gray Bill, a village named for the gray pony he rode.  Dr. Holmes was a member of the Texas House of Representatives.  He was opposed to the calling of a new Constitutional Convention in 1875 while in the midst of Reconstruction.
Dr. Holmes moved to Trenton, Fannin County in 1882 where he built the first suction feed gin in North Texas and practiced medicine until he retired in 1888.  He laid out the town and named the streets after his children and early settlers -   Hamilton, maiden name, for both of his wives; Pearl, Daisy and Carrie were named after his daughters; Augustus St. was named for his son, John Augustus "Gus" Holmes; and Mabry - his mother's maiden name.  His son, Thomas Hamilton Holmes started the Tribune in 1909.

Dr. Holmes and The Trenton Tribune issue of December 8, 1911endorsed Sam Rayburn for Congress of the 4th District of Texas composed of Fannin, Grayson, Collin, Hunt and Rains counties.  In fact, Dr. Holmes bought Mr. Rayburn his first store-bought suit of clothes when he ran for the State Legislature in 1907.

The University of Virginia at Charlottesville held a reunion of the Confederates of the Confederate Army who were ex-students June 12, 1912 on the school campus.  Capt./Dr. William C. Holmes was the 113th registrant.

Laura Abigail Hamilton Holmes, wife of Dr. Holmes for 40 years, died in Trenton, Fannin Co., Texas Christmas Eve 1914, at the age of 74.  She was buried in the family cemetery on the northwest corner of his farm.  She was later removed to Burns Cemetery.  After his wife's death, Dr. Holmes lived with his daughter, Pearl Connelly.  

Dr. Holmes, 84, died peacefully at the home of his daughter, Mrs. Pearl Connelly in Trenton, Fannin County, Texas at 6:30 p.m., March 8, 1924, following a brief illness of pneumonia.  Funeral services were held at the Connelly home Sunday afternoon; Rev. W.L. Brumlow, assisted by Rev. E.L. Silliman and Mr.... paid tribute to the life of the deceased.  Interment followed Burns Cemetery, located at the northwest corner of his farm.  Pallbearers J. Routh, T.W. Ayres,  J.W. Huff, Ira F. Barrett, J.C. Harshaw and Walter P. Connelly.   Glen Earnheart, funeral director, was in charge of services.  The grave was massed banked with a mass of beautiful flowers.
Dr. Holmes was survived by his daughters, Mrs. Pearl Connelly of Trenton and Mrs. Daisy Lemmon of Manila, Philippine Islands; and four sons, Gus, farmer of Trenton; Tom Mc Holmes, publisher of the Trenton Tribune; Fred Holmes, in management of the Tribune and employee of the Garland Daily News; and W.C. Holmes, Jr. with the Rock Island Railroad at Mannsville, Oklahoma.

Daisy Holmes was born October 29, 1875 in Pilot Grove, Texas.  Waldo Nathaniel Lemmon, M.D. was born March 20, 1873 in the old brick home - the first one built in the southwest corner of Missouri - near Morrisville, Polk Co., Missouri.   At the age of 17 his family moved to Trenton, Fannin Co., Texas where his father had a drug store and where Waldo served as druggist.
Daisy and Waldo married in a double wedding on May 6, 1894 in Trenton; she was 18 and he was 21.  The other couple was Ina Connelly and Beeson Southerland.

Dr. and Mrs. Lemmon, were blessed with four children:
Jefferson Ralph Lemmon, M.D. (1894-1967)
Emma Theresa L. Grosshans (1905 - ?_)
Laura Maureen Lemmon (1901-1905), buried at Commerce, Texas
Waldo Nathaniel Lemmon, Jr. (1920-1923), buried at Lubbock, Texas


Waldo decided to become a medical doctor and enrolled in the Medical School of the University of Texas in Galveston.   He later transferred to and graduated from Barnes Medical College in St. Louis, Missouri on April 12, 1899.  The family moved to Commerce, Texas where Dr. Lemmon set up his practice.  In 1907 the family moved to Greenville, Hunt Co., Texas where Dr. Lemmon was associated with Dr. Joe Becton.
Dr. Lemmon answered the call of Foreign Missions and relieved Dr. C.L. Pickett who was coming from Philippines to the States on furlough in 1910 from Laoag, Ilocos Norte, Philippines.  At that time there was only a clinic and dispensary; a few beds were set up in one of the huge rooms on the 2nd floor of the Mission house; using Daisy's sheets, they were able to care for a few patients. 

In 1916 the Lemmon family came to Texas from the Philippines to visit her father.  For many years Daisy worked alongside her husband, doing things a woman could do.   She supervised hospital kitchen, bought food in the market and ordered from the Chinese grocers, walked the streets of the Escolta and bargained for materials to make the linens for the hospital beds and the uniforms for the nurses.   She made the linens and uniforms herself on a Singer foot peddle model.

Needing a hospital Dr. Lemmon found a large Spanish home and with money donated by Miss Mary Chiles of Independence, Missouri, he was able to purchase the the house and converted into a hospital.  Dr. Lemmon served as Director, Surgeon and Chief of the medical staff of the Mary Chiles Christian Hospital in Manila from 1913 until he contracted Sprue and eye trouble in 1925 when the couple left Manila.

As a result of many moves related to his many projects, he worked in Dallas, a Brownfield hospital, Plainview, Lubbock; Liberal, Kansas during the Dust Bowl Days of the 1930s and finally back to Hereford, Texas, Deaf Smith, County where he was the first to have his office and treating room in the front part of his home; other doctors said that would not work, but when a man had been gored by a mad steer out on a ranch, the family knew they could reach Dr. Lemmon any time of day or night, because his home was his office. 

Dr. Lemmon developed cancer of the bone in 1942 and died 2-1/2 years later on January 1, 1944 in the Hereford hospital.   He was buried in Llano Cemetery, Amarillo, Randall Co., Texas.  Daisy Holmes Lemmon outlived her husband by 25 years, dying on October 22, 1969 and is buried beside her husband.

When the Holmes home place was sold in 1964, the monuments for Dr. and Mrs. Holmes and infant  son, Mack Holmes, were moved from the corner of the Holmes property field at the corner of highways 121 and 69 in Trenton to Burns Cemetery, east of Trenton, Fannin Co., Texas, along with other family members buried in there (formerly Rose Lawn Cemetery).