Ellison Springs

The fight at the springs belongs to a militia company that existed because of a law. In February 1864 Eastland, Shackelford and Callahan counties had to turn out every man from eighteen to forty-five to reach the forty a company required. Members served ten days in every thirty, scouting from Nash's Spring, and the settled edge ran through Flannagan's Ranch, McGough Springs and Jewell. The company disbanded after Lee's surrender. The 1870 census counted only eighty-eight people in Eastland County.

What the plaque says

Ellison Springs Used for centuries by Indians inhabiting the region. Named for James Madison Ellison (1840-1923), a native of Alabama, who was the first settler in this section of Eastland County, erecting a cabin near the springs in Oct. 1958. He soon married Eliza McGough, a member of another pioneer family, and had 3 children. During the Civil War, frontiersmen organized militia companies for mutual protection against the Indians. Ellison joined the company mustered from Eastland, Shackelford, and Callahan Counties. On Aug. 9, 1864, a group of 12 scouts from the company was attacked near the springs, and took refuge in Ellison's cabin. The commander, Capt. Singleton Gilbert, and Leroy "Button" Keith were killed, and Ellison, Tom Gilbert, and Tom Caddenhead wounded. Ellison was disabled for life. After cessation of Indian activity, Ellison Springs became the center of social and cultural functions for the scattered settlers in the area. Picnics, community gatherings, and brush arbor camp meetings were held at the site. In the early 1870s, a Baptist church was constructed, with the Rev. C. Brashears as minister. A cemetery was begun in the mid-1870s. The present frame house at the springs was built by Ellison in 1886. (1974)

Where it stands

Worth the stop nearby

• Old Rip at the Eastland County Courthouse — 16 mi
  A horned lizard in a glass-topped casket in the 1928 Eastland courthouse, the creature said to have come out alive from the old building's cornerstone after thirty-one years.
• Dublin Bottling Works — 20 mi
  The Erath County plant that bottled Dr Pepper with cane sugar from 1891 until a 2012 settlement ended its Dr Pepper license, and that still makes its own sodas the same way.
• Conrad Hilton Center and Mobley Hotel — 23 mi
  The 40-room oil-boom hotel in Cisco that Conrad Hilton bought in 1919 when a bank deal fell through, now a museum of the Hilton start and of Cisco's 1927 Santa Claus bank robbery.

More markers nearby

• Site of Blackwell Hospital — 3.1 mi
• Old Shinoak Springs — 4.4 mi
• Desdemona Cemetery — 4.8 mi
• Fort Blair, C.S.A. — 5.1 mi