Jefferson jimplecute. (Jefferson, Tex.) 1907-1926, 1913-06-12
INTERESTING Letter
FROM OLD resident
Tells q First Iron Ore Development
In Ore Qty-Furnace Built In
l1Sj, Which Was Located
Wlthin 4 Stones Throw
Of Present Location

Hon. w. o. Stamps received
the following letter from Mr..
John NJ. Duncan OF Comfort,
Texas, in which he recites some
very interesting history of this
section of the country in the ear
ly days:
Honorable w. o. Stamps,
Ore City, Texas.
Dear Sir
Your recent interview printed
in the Dallas News was peculiar
ly interesting TO me.
My father was by trade a
wrought iron maker, known in
the old days as a Zimmerman,
that is TO say a maker OF bar iron
from the crude ore through what
was knows as forge in 1856
as he was returning by steam
boat from Valley Forge, Mis-.
souri,, near the famous Iron
Mountain. to our home to Har-
din county, Tenn, he met one
David Browder, a capitalist from
Kentucky who had heard of the
ore deposits in East Texas. He
engaged my father to come to
Marion county, Texas, to test
these ores and report to him as
to their nature, percentage OF
iron, etc. On Sept. 18th 1857,
my father arrived at Nash farm
eighteen miles West Of Jefferson
on the Jefferson and Coffeeville
road. He there erected a small
temporary testing furnace and
melted from the ore the first
pound of iron ever made in Tex
as, so far as | am advised.
He made favorable report to
Mr.. BrOwder, who Immediately
came to Texas, and in conjunc.
ton with Nash, contracted with
my father to build and operate a
forge on the Nash land near his
fnrm. The forge was built in
1858 and operated about one year
making bar iron and blooms"
The latter were simply chunks of
pure iron hammered down under
a trip hammer tc uniform shape,
but retaining too much foreign
matter to be used in a black
smith shop. These were ship.
ped and sold to rolling mills in
st. Louis and other distant cities
The venture not proving prof
table was abandoned and substi.
tuted by furnace for the manu-.
facture of pig iron and ofvarious
articles such as salt kettles,
plows, pillow points, ovens, skill
let's, etc. This furnace had been
in operation only short time
when the Civil War broke out,
and it was soon afterward sliced
by the Confederate Government
and by it operated until the close
of the war
My fathers family joined him
ut the Nash Works in the winter
of 1858 while | was in my seventh
year, and we lived there practi-
cally all the time until late in
1866. My father, after the fur
mace Was built, became an iron
moulder and | was his helper
until | became sufficiently expert
at the trade to make pillow points
skillet lids and other simple cast
ings when l became a moulder
on my own account and as such
worked for the government until
the break up"
1t was of course charcoal fur
mace. There were about one
hundred white men employed in
and about the works, and from
two hundred and fifty to five
hundred negro slaves engaged in
making the coal There was no
ore at all mined for this furnace
during the entire five years it was
operated but it was supplied alto.
gether from surface ore. In
fact my recollection is that in
that section no. veins of any ore
of sufficient richness and thick
ness to warrant mining had been
discovered. 1t is probable, how.
ever, that no very close search
was ever made for such ore, as
there was plenty of it of fine
quality on the surface.
am considerably puzzled by
the statement that iron ore is to
be mined at and shipped from
Ore City which is OF the site of
the old Murray League Institute
| remember that Institute well
and as | recall, it was about four
or five miles south of Nash's fur
mace and acoss Big Cypress from
it. | never knew of any iron ore
deposits near such institute nor
on that side of Rig Cypress.
| have been under the impress.
sion that Ore City was the termi.
nus of the railroad from Long
view, but | note on the Railway
Commission map of 1913 that the
line is marked as extending north
from Ore City across Big Cy.