1892 :: Death of Rev. Dr. James H. Stribling

Dallas, Aug. 15. -- [To The News.] -- The announcement in yesterday's News of the death of the Rev. Dr. James H. Stribling of Rockdale at Eureka Springs, Ark., on the 12th instant, recalls to my mind the old aphorism, that when "a good man dies the people mourn." 

Having known and loved this man for fifty-two years, none will gainsay my right to mourn -- the more so as I knew and loved his father and mother, his brothers and sisters. 

Born in Alabama, he came with his parents to Washington county, Texas in 1837. He was one of the first students of Baylor university, and in his youth resolved to be a minister of the gospel, in which service he died fifty-two years later. He was not only intensely religious, but intensely patriotic.

When but twenty years old he and his cousin, John Tremier, were the only men from east of the Colorado valley who participated in the battle of the Salado on Sept. 18, 1842. He was in the subsequent pursuit of the Mexican army under Gen. Wool, and was in the charge on its artillery on the Arroya Honda on the 22d of the same month. Late in the same year he was in the famed Somervell expedition against Mexico, and only abandoned it when his command returned home. 

Resuming his studies he persevered until about 1845, when he received ordination as an elder in the Baptist church. He has since been a pastor at Gonzales, Tyler, Rockdale and other places, and everywhere by the people and all the different churches has been held as a pure and spotless man.

His father, Benjamin H. Stribling, was one of the first judges of Lavaca county. His mother was truly a "mother of Israel." His brother, Thomas H. Stribling, died a distinguished lawyer in San Antonio. A younger brother, Cornelius K. Stribling, has been county judge and representative from Shackelford county. All of the brothers and sisters have been worthy of him. 

The good he has done in these fifty years will be his passport to the life to come.

As a printer boy in Missouri in October, 1844, the first paragraph I put in type read: "The United States sloop of war Peacock, Commander Cornelius K. Stribling, has arrived at Norfolk, Va., after a three years' voyage around the world." That commander was a brother of Mr. Stribling's father. When the war between the states began in 1861 he was Commodore Stribling of the United States navy in command of the navy yard at Pensacola.

Blessed be the memory of James H. Stribling. 

John Henry Brown. 
Dallas Morning News, 
August 16, 1892