DOGGETT, J. L.
COL. J. L. DOGGETT, PROMINENT CITIZEN CALLED BY DEATH
Weekly Democrat, April, 1921
Impressive funeral services were held at 4:00 o’clock Sunday afternoon April 24, in the First Methodist church over the remains of the late Col. J. L. Doggett, whose passing away at 12:15 p.m. April 23rd at the McKinney City Hospital was chronicled in these columns in our Saturday afternoon issue. His pastor, Dr. J. Sam Burcus, was assisted in the services by Rev. W. D. Thompson, presiding Elder of the McKinney district and by Dr. E. B. Fincher, pastor of the Presbyterian church next door neighbor and intimate friend of the Doggett family. Beautiful music was rendered for the obsequies of this distinguished McKinney citizen and former mayor for several terms, by a choir directed by Mrs. Gibson Caldwell. The ministers paid fitting tributes and eulogies to the long and useful career of the deceased as a worthy citizen, professional man, public official and active churchman and Christian. Interment followed in the family burying ground at Pecan Grove cemetery where his body was laid to rest b y the side of the grave of a little six-year-old daughter, who died thirty-five years ago and which was the only death in the family in that period of time until the death of her father. His new made mound, rested under a wilderness of floral offerings of varied and beautiful spring flowers, tokens of the esteem in which the distinguished dead was held by the numerous friends and admirers of the deceased and were fit expressions of sympathy for surviving loved ones.
The hymns sung were among the deceased favorites.
***
List of Pallbearers.
Active – Glenn Stiff, J. L. Chapman, J. L. Todd, F. C. Thompson, Walter B. Wilson and Gibson Caldwell.
Honorary – J. H. Ferguson, Gen. E. W. Kirkpatrick, G. R. Smith, Robt. L. Parker, Mayor H. A. Finch, J. Frank Smith, Clarence Merritt, Prof. J. S. Carlisle, Hon. Geo. P. Brown, L. A. Scott, W. B. Harrison, Judge J. A. Wolfe, K. R. Craig, J. S. Heard, S. D. Heard, and Henry W. Warden, and members of the Collin County Bar Association, officials of the Ex-Confederates and old Settlers’ Picnic and Reunion Association of Collin county and officials of First Methodist church.
J. L. Greer, J. L. Franklin, C. P. Heard and R. L. Waddill.
***
Obituary.
Col. J. L. Doggett was born March 6, 1848, near Fredericksburg, in Stafford county, Virginia, being 73 years, 1 month and 17 days old at the time of his demise. He was the oldest of thirteen children, ten of whom grew to manhood and womanhood. His father, LeRoy B. Doggett, was a soldier in the Confederate army and later a commission merchant under the firm name of L. B. Doggett & son at Fredericksburg, until the family’s removal in the early eighties from Virginia to the city of Chicago, where the other surviving children are now prominent and still reside.
Family In An Old One.
The Doggett family is one of the oldest of our nation. According to the history of the Doggetts compiled in 1894 by Samuel Bradlee Doggett, member of the New England Historical Society and also of the American Historical Association. The first record of the Doggett family was traced to the eleventh century in England. Its genealogical tree of descendents contained many distinguished personages of the name in the annals of England, Ireland and America. (Sir Walter Scott thought it a fit name for a Saxon, for he makes a Norman noble say: “Here thou Doggett – warder son of a Saxon wolf-hound.” The Betrothed.) On July 27, 1635, Thomas Doggett, aged 21, took the oath of allegiance and supremacy, before sailing from Gravesend, England, as a passenger for Virginia in the “Primrose.” he was the founder of the family in America and settled in the State of Virginia. From him came many descendents of distinguished and varied careers of several states of the Union. Many of them have been distinguished as planters, doctors, lawyers, educators, in warfare, as Episcopal rectors and Southern Methodist preachers. perhaps the most notable representative of the family was Bishop David S. Doggett, who was born in Virginia in 1810 and who died at Richmond, Virginia, February 19, 1882. As a bishop of the M. E. Church South, as well as one of the South’s greatest orators for nearly a half century, he was a foremost leader and factor in solving southern problems during the crucial period in which he lived.
Forty-Nine Years in McKinney.
The boyhood of the deceased was spent in Virginia where he attended various schools including the University of Virginia, and where he received his education in law. He commenced the practice of his profession in Fredericksburg in 1871. A year later his ambitious and energetic bent led him to decide to emigrate further west, when he came to Texas and settled at McKinney where he resided ever since, with the exception of a little more than a three-year period, beginning in 1893 when he temporarily resided in Dallas while serving as Internal Revenue Collector for the Fourth District of Texas under the second administration of Grover Cleveland. But at the end of his administration he returned to his home again in McKinney.
Col. Doggett began the practice of law here a year or two before the arrival of the Houston & Texas Central Railway the first railroad to be built into our city. En route to Texas, he came as far as Cane Hill, Ark. by rail and thence on to McKinney in a wagon. He returned to Virginia in 1876 to spend the summer and to visit relatives. At the close of his vacation there, he was happily married to Miss Bettie Wright, a highly educated young lady of Carolina county, Virginia and was accompanied back to his adopted Texas home in McKinney by his bride. In the spring of 1879, he was elected Mayor of our city, serving two terms of four years at that time as the city’s chief executive.
In 1892 he was elected as Floterial Representative to the State Legislature from the counties of Collin and Denton, serving one term as such when he received the appointment from President Grover Cleveland as Internal Revenue Collector for the Northern District of Texas with headquarters in Dallas. He resumed the practice of his profession in McKinney at the conclusion of his term as collector and was soon afterwards elected again to the position of Mayor of McKinney, serving three or four more terms in that position. At the time of his death, he was the senior member of the McKinney bar, and was president of the Collin County Bar Association. He was also president of the Ex-Confederate and Old Settlers Picnic Association of Collin County, a chartered institution that has annually brought together for three or four days each summer thousands of people to its own picnic and reunion grounds owned in the eastern portion of our city. For a number of years he served as a member of the McKinney School Board, and as Sunday School Superintendent of the First Methodist church of which church he was also trustee and otherwise prominent in leadership. Under his administration as Mayor some important improvements were made by the city which he was influential in bringing about. Some were: The securing of a union station built jointly by the two railroads running into our city; the first paving in the city, the paving of the public square; the present splendid City Hall building was also erected while he was mayor, and the municipal light and water plant was put into operation during one of his terms.
Had Courage of Conviction.
Col. Doggett’s work as a lawyer and public official has gone on record altogether to his credit. No man over occupied these positions with a higher sense of honor or a more sincere desire to serve his profession, his church or his city and State in official position than the decedent. His memory is untarnished by any questionable act reflecting on his splendid old Southern type of character and he passes to his grave with the utmost esteem and affection of his fellow citizens of McKinney and our entire county. He did not crave the accumulation of great wealth, but rather longed to serve and assist others. As a public speaker, he was in much demand. He had a splendid personality, was a courtly, courteous, vigorous and vivacious lawyer and public speaker. His portly, erect physique and eloquent tongue were always seen and heard on the public hustings in almost every campaign that has been waged in our State in the last forty years. He ever had the courage of conviction and was a fearless fighter, who scorned to resort to subterfuge or trickery. He openly and boldly advocated those things which he conceived to be right and best for people, party and country. No character in our city or county will be more missed than will the personality and familiar figure of Col. J. L. Doggett.
Surviving Family.
He is survived by his wife, who has faithfully walked by his side and been a helpmeet indeed, for forty-five years. His surviving children are: Edwin B. Doggett, a prominent business man of Dallas, Texas, and his only son; Mrs. C. E. Gabel, Charleston, West Virginia; Mrs. E. E. Huffines, Richardson, Texas; Mrs. Wilmer Threadgill, Laredo, Texas, and Mrs. B. E. Lovelady, Richmond, Texas. Edwin B. Doggett and Mrs. Gabel are twins. The splendid family of children that the deceased and his beloved and talented wife gave to the world is a matter of remark by all of his neighbors and friends. They gave the best of educational advantages to their children, two of whom are graduates of the State University of Texas, and another a graduate of the Northwestern University at Chicago. Mrs. Gabel, the oldest daughter, was for several years State Chemist of Illinois. She is now assistant State Chemist of West Virginia under her husband, Dr. C. E. Gabel, who is chief in that position. Mrs. Gabel also served the Federal Government for a year or two as chemist in the Philippine Islands. Another daughter of Col. Doggett’s, Mrs. Threadgill, is an attorney at law, practicing her profession with her husband under the firm name of Threadgill & Threadgill at Laredo, Texas. The youngest daughter is the wife of Rev. B. E. Lovelady, a pastor of Richmond, Texas, who is also filling the position as Superintendent of public schools at that place. Col. Doggett is also survived by the following brothers and sisters who are respected citizens of the city of Chicago: Hon. William L. Doggett, lawyer; Herbert Doggett, Arthur Doggett and Luther Doggett, who are substantial businessmen; Mrs. Eugenia S. Doggett, Mrs. C. G. Davis, wife of a physician and surgeon, and Miss Emma Doggett.
***
Bar To Act.
A meeting of the Collin County Bar Association was held in the district court room this morning at 10 o’clock H. L. Davis was selected temporary chairman. The chairman then appointed a committee composed of the following: L. C. Clifton, Sam Neathery and W. R. Abernathy to draft resolutions on the death of Col. J. L. Doggett, president of the Bar Association at the time of his demise. The Association will meet again Saturday at 10 o’clock.
J. L. DOGGETT
Newspaper, July 1921
To Hon. Wallace Hughston, President, Officers and Members of the Collin County Ex-Confederates and Old Settlers Picnic and Reunion Association:
We, your committee appointed to draft resolutions of respect to the late Col. J. L. Doggett, the honored President of this Association for many years, report as follows:
Since our last assembling together it has pleased the Supreme Ruler of the universe to remove from the walks of men our beloved leader and President, Col. J. L. Doggett, who departed this life at 12:15 o’clock April 23rd, 1921, in McKinney at the age of 73 years, and,
Whereas, the deceased was a native of Virginia, the descendant of an old and distinguished family, and soon after receiving his education as a lawyer at the University of Virginia in the year 1872, located at McKinney, for the practice of his profession, where he has since resided for practically half a century, during which time he took an active interest in the public affairs of this city, county, and State, having served his city as mayor a number of terms, represented his county in the State Legislature, and his country as Internal Revenue Collector for the Fourth District of Texas, under President Cleveland, and at the time of his death was the president of the Collin County Bar Association, in all of which capacities he served with distinguished ability, and
Whereas, he served this Association as its president for many years, with the utmost fidelity and great success, and
Whereas, he lived an exemplary life before his fellow men, portraying in his daily life his Christian faith, possessed of the noblest traits of character, true to the South and its glorious traditions, patriotic and loyal to his country, it can truly be said of him:
“His life was gentle, and the elements
So mixed in him that Nature might stand up
And say to all the world ‘He was a man.”’
Therefore be it
Resolved, that in the death of Col. J. L. Doggett, our city, county and state has lost one of its most worthy, outstanding, patriotic citizens, this Association its most honored and faithful official. Be it further
Resolved, That a copy of these resolutions be furnished the family of our deceased president, a copy be spread on the minutes of the Association, and a coy furnished the press for publication.
Respectfully submitted, E. W. Merritt, Martin Kindle, Carl Gallagher, Committee.
Weekly Democrat, April, 1921
Impressive funeral services were held at 4:00 o’clock Sunday afternoon April 24, in the First Methodist church over the remains of the late Col. J. L. Doggett, whose passing away at 12:15 p.m. April 23rd at the McKinney City Hospital was chronicled in these columns in our Saturday afternoon issue. His pastor, Dr. J. Sam Burcus, was assisted in the services by Rev. W. D. Thompson, presiding Elder of the McKinney district and by Dr. E. B. Fincher, pastor of the Presbyterian church next door neighbor and intimate friend of the Doggett family. Beautiful music was rendered for the obsequies of this distinguished McKinney citizen and former mayor for several terms, by a choir directed by Mrs. Gibson Caldwell. The ministers paid fitting tributes and eulogies to the long and useful career of the deceased as a worthy citizen, professional man, public official and active churchman and Christian. Interment followed in the family burying ground at Pecan Grove cemetery where his body was laid to rest b y the side of the grave of a little six-year-old daughter, who died thirty-five years ago and which was the only death in the family in that period of time until the death of her father. His new made mound, rested under a wilderness of floral offerings of varied and beautiful spring flowers, tokens of the esteem in which the distinguished dead was held by the numerous friends and admirers of the deceased and were fit expressions of sympathy for surviving loved ones.
The hymns sung were among the deceased favorites.
***
List of Pallbearers.
Active – Glenn Stiff, J. L. Chapman, J. L. Todd, F. C. Thompson, Walter B. Wilson and Gibson Caldwell.
Honorary – J. H. Ferguson, Gen. E. W. Kirkpatrick, G. R. Smith, Robt. L. Parker, Mayor H. A. Finch, J. Frank Smith, Clarence Merritt, Prof. J. S. Carlisle, Hon. Geo. P. Brown, L. A. Scott, W. B. Harrison, Judge J. A. Wolfe, K. R. Craig, J. S. Heard, S. D. Heard, and Henry W. Warden, and members of the Collin County Bar Association, officials of the Ex-Confederates and old Settlers’ Picnic and Reunion Association of Collin county and officials of First Methodist church.
J. L. Greer, J. L. Franklin, C. P. Heard and R. L. Waddill.
***
Obituary.
Col. J. L. Doggett was born March 6, 1848, near Fredericksburg, in Stafford county, Virginia, being 73 years, 1 month and 17 days old at the time of his demise. He was the oldest of thirteen children, ten of whom grew to manhood and womanhood. His father, LeRoy B. Doggett, was a soldier in the Confederate army and later a commission merchant under the firm name of L. B. Doggett & son at Fredericksburg, until the family’s removal in the early eighties from Virginia to the city of Chicago, where the other surviving children are now prominent and still reside.
Family In An Old One.
The Doggett family is one of the oldest of our nation. According to the history of the Doggetts compiled in 1894 by Samuel Bradlee Doggett, member of the New England Historical Society and also of the American Historical Association. The first record of the Doggett family was traced to the eleventh century in England. Its genealogical tree of descendents contained many distinguished personages of the name in the annals of England, Ireland and America. (Sir Walter Scott thought it a fit name for a Saxon, for he makes a Norman noble say: “Here thou Doggett – warder son of a Saxon wolf-hound.” The Betrothed.) On July 27, 1635, Thomas Doggett, aged 21, took the oath of allegiance and supremacy, before sailing from Gravesend, England, as a passenger for Virginia in the “Primrose.” he was the founder of the family in America and settled in the State of Virginia. From him came many descendents of distinguished and varied careers of several states of the Union. Many of them have been distinguished as planters, doctors, lawyers, educators, in warfare, as Episcopal rectors and Southern Methodist preachers. perhaps the most notable representative of the family was Bishop David S. Doggett, who was born in Virginia in 1810 and who died at Richmond, Virginia, February 19, 1882. As a bishop of the M. E. Church South, as well as one of the South’s greatest orators for nearly a half century, he was a foremost leader and factor in solving southern problems during the crucial period in which he lived.
Forty-Nine Years in McKinney.
The boyhood of the deceased was spent in Virginia where he attended various schools including the University of Virginia, and where he received his education in law. He commenced the practice of his profession in Fredericksburg in 1871. A year later his ambitious and energetic bent led him to decide to emigrate further west, when he came to Texas and settled at McKinney where he resided ever since, with the exception of a little more than a three-year period, beginning in 1893 when he temporarily resided in Dallas while serving as Internal Revenue Collector for the Fourth District of Texas under the second administration of Grover Cleveland. But at the end of his administration he returned to his home again in McKinney.
Col. Doggett began the practice of law here a year or two before the arrival of the Houston & Texas Central Railway the first railroad to be built into our city. En route to Texas, he came as far as Cane Hill, Ark. by rail and thence on to McKinney in a wagon. He returned to Virginia in 1876 to spend the summer and to visit relatives. At the close of his vacation there, he was happily married to Miss Bettie Wright, a highly educated young lady of Carolina county, Virginia and was accompanied back to his adopted Texas home in McKinney by his bride. In the spring of 1879, he was elected Mayor of our city, serving two terms of four years at that time as the city’s chief executive.
In 1892 he was elected as Floterial Representative to the State Legislature from the counties of Collin and Denton, serving one term as such when he received the appointment from President Grover Cleveland as Internal Revenue Collector for the Northern District of Texas with headquarters in Dallas. He resumed the practice of his profession in McKinney at the conclusion of his term as collector and was soon afterwards elected again to the position of Mayor of McKinney, serving three or four more terms in that position. At the time of his death, he was the senior member of the McKinney bar, and was president of the Collin County Bar Association. He was also president of the Ex-Confederate and Old Settlers Picnic Association of Collin County, a chartered institution that has annually brought together for three or four days each summer thousands of people to its own picnic and reunion grounds owned in the eastern portion of our city. For a number of years he served as a member of the McKinney School Board, and as Sunday School Superintendent of the First Methodist church of which church he was also trustee and otherwise prominent in leadership. Under his administration as Mayor some important improvements were made by the city which he was influential in bringing about. Some were: The securing of a union station built jointly by the two railroads running into our city; the first paving in the city, the paving of the public square; the present splendid City Hall building was also erected while he was mayor, and the municipal light and water plant was put into operation during one of his terms.
Had Courage of Conviction.
Col. Doggett’s work as a lawyer and public official has gone on record altogether to his credit. No man over occupied these positions with a higher sense of honor or a more sincere desire to serve his profession, his church or his city and State in official position than the decedent. His memory is untarnished by any questionable act reflecting on his splendid old Southern type of character and he passes to his grave with the utmost esteem and affection of his fellow citizens of McKinney and our entire county. He did not crave the accumulation of great wealth, but rather longed to serve and assist others. As a public speaker, he was in much demand. He had a splendid personality, was a courtly, courteous, vigorous and vivacious lawyer and public speaker. His portly, erect physique and eloquent tongue were always seen and heard on the public hustings in almost every campaign that has been waged in our State in the last forty years. He ever had the courage of conviction and was a fearless fighter, who scorned to resort to subterfuge or trickery. He openly and boldly advocated those things which he conceived to be right and best for people, party and country. No character in our city or county will be more missed than will the personality and familiar figure of Col. J. L. Doggett.
Surviving Family.
He is survived by his wife, who has faithfully walked by his side and been a helpmeet indeed, for forty-five years. His surviving children are: Edwin B. Doggett, a prominent business man of Dallas, Texas, and his only son; Mrs. C. E. Gabel, Charleston, West Virginia; Mrs. E. E. Huffines, Richardson, Texas; Mrs. Wilmer Threadgill, Laredo, Texas, and Mrs. B. E. Lovelady, Richmond, Texas. Edwin B. Doggett and Mrs. Gabel are twins. The splendid family of children that the deceased and his beloved and talented wife gave to the world is a matter of remark by all of his neighbors and friends. They gave the best of educational advantages to their children, two of whom are graduates of the State University of Texas, and another a graduate of the Northwestern University at Chicago. Mrs. Gabel, the oldest daughter, was for several years State Chemist of Illinois. She is now assistant State Chemist of West Virginia under her husband, Dr. C. E. Gabel, who is chief in that position. Mrs. Gabel also served the Federal Government for a year or two as chemist in the Philippine Islands. Another daughter of Col. Doggett’s, Mrs. Threadgill, is an attorney at law, practicing her profession with her husband under the firm name of Threadgill & Threadgill at Laredo, Texas. The youngest daughter is the wife of Rev. B. E. Lovelady, a pastor of Richmond, Texas, who is also filling the position as Superintendent of public schools at that place. Col. Doggett is also survived by the following brothers and sisters who are respected citizens of the city of Chicago: Hon. William L. Doggett, lawyer; Herbert Doggett, Arthur Doggett and Luther Doggett, who are substantial businessmen; Mrs. Eugenia S. Doggett, Mrs. C. G. Davis, wife of a physician and surgeon, and Miss Emma Doggett.
***
Bar To Act.
A meeting of the Collin County Bar Association was held in the district court room this morning at 10 o’clock H. L. Davis was selected temporary chairman. The chairman then appointed a committee composed of the following: L. C. Clifton, Sam Neathery and W. R. Abernathy to draft resolutions on the death of Col. J. L. Doggett, president of the Bar Association at the time of his demise. The Association will meet again Saturday at 10 o’clock.
J. L. DOGGETT
Newspaper, July 1921
To Hon. Wallace Hughston, President, Officers and Members of the Collin County Ex-Confederates and Old Settlers Picnic and Reunion Association:
We, your committee appointed to draft resolutions of respect to the late Col. J. L. Doggett, the honored President of this Association for many years, report as follows:
Since our last assembling together it has pleased the Supreme Ruler of the universe to remove from the walks of men our beloved leader and President, Col. J. L. Doggett, who departed this life at 12:15 o’clock April 23rd, 1921, in McKinney at the age of 73 years, and,
Whereas, the deceased was a native of Virginia, the descendant of an old and distinguished family, and soon after receiving his education as a lawyer at the University of Virginia in the year 1872, located at McKinney, for the practice of his profession, where he has since resided for practically half a century, during which time he took an active interest in the public affairs of this city, county, and State, having served his city as mayor a number of terms, represented his county in the State Legislature, and his country as Internal Revenue Collector for the Fourth District of Texas, under President Cleveland, and at the time of his death was the president of the Collin County Bar Association, in all of which capacities he served with distinguished ability, and
Whereas, he served this Association as its president for many years, with the utmost fidelity and great success, and
Whereas, he lived an exemplary life before his fellow men, portraying in his daily life his Christian faith, possessed of the noblest traits of character, true to the South and its glorious traditions, patriotic and loyal to his country, it can truly be said of him:
“His life was gentle, and the elements
So mixed in him that Nature might stand up
And say to all the world ‘He was a man.”’
Therefore be it
Resolved, that in the death of Col. J. L. Doggett, our city, county and state has lost one of its most worthy, outstanding, patriotic citizens, this Association its most honored and faithful official. Be it further
Resolved, That a copy of these resolutions be furnished the family of our deceased president, a copy be spread on the minutes of the Association, and a coy furnished the press for publication.
Respectfully submitted, E. W. Merritt, Martin Kindle, Carl Gallagher, Committee.
