This is a story about the Austian side of my family, my mothers side. My mothers maternal Grandfather was Henry Clay Hunt( 1844-1936) . Henry served in the Civil war with the Union forces as a member of the 69th Indiana regiment. Though he was not wounded in his three years' fighting, he twice was captured by confederates, once at the battle of Vicksburg and another time in Kentucky. He was, at one point, a member of an expeditionary force which went up the Red river on the Texas side. Hunt had enlisted from Randolph county, Ind. There is a family legend that at the war’s end he WALKED home...to Indiana from somewhere in the deep south.
There is another family legend that he carved his initials on a tree in Indiana in 1883 and then returned to Indiana from his home in Oklahoma late in his life (1927) and had his photo taken next to the tree. His 1883 initials were still visible in 1927 (see photos). H.R. Hamblen, a family friend wrote a poem about Henry's return to Indiana (see photos to read the poem).
Yet another family legend was that, just prior to the Oklahoma land rush in 1889, Henry was employed as a hunter and/or a scout by the U.S. Army, helping to feed the troops present to support the land rush and serving as a guide for some people who were looking for land to homestead. The Tull family is one of the families he helped find land and, he later married Ruth Jane Tull. The land designated for homesteading in Oklahoma was opened for settlement on April 22, 1889 and there was a, literal, “rush” starting that day. Henry and his wife (Ruth Jane Tull Hunt) and their family made the run into Oklahoma from the Kansas line and filed his declaratory claim April 28 1889. He homesteaded 160 acres cornering on NW50 and Council road. He was one of the few pioneers who continued to live on his homestead. until his death in 1936. 15 years later, on April 22, 1904, Henry's granddaughter, my Aunt Winnie (Winnifred Gladys Austian) was born to Henry's oldest daughter Armina Hunt Austian (my maternal grandmother). Perhaps because her birthday was on the anniversary of the land rush, Winnie always seemed to have a connection to the land rush and a special fondness for her Grandpa Henry. In 1948, I was born on Aunt Winnie's 44th birthday (and the anniversary of the land rush). I feel this connection to Henry, through Winnie. Vicariously, I’m a sooner. Even though I was born in California... maybe I should buy an OU football jersey. In 1992 my grandson Dillon Neighbors, was born on MY 44th birthday and Winnie's 88th (see the photo of the three of us).
OBIT from Indiana Newspaper (Brown County Democrat) 08 Oct 1936