This article was submitted by Virginia Easterling to the Cracker Barrel Journal and appeared in its February 1990 issue.

In the year 1910 an artist completed a picture started in 1906 and the picture, now owned by Mrs. E. W. Easterling, is mounted on an easel in the front office of the chamber of commerce in Beaumont. Joseph Verde was the artist's mama. His inspiration came from a photograph taken some time between the 6^th and 14^th of December, 1906, of the Beaumont Gang on their ninth annual hunt and the scene was set in the deep piney woods of southern jasper county.

Beaumonters come to the chamber of commerce to view the picture, a worthy product of a famous Italian painter. Old timers scan the faces done in oil and point out friends and hunting companions long gone from the earth. Ardent deer hunters, remembering that they too had been "in on" some of these hunts of the Beaumont gang, sigh when they think of the great kills of those days and bemoan the scarcity of game today.

To fix the identity of those old timers n the picture Beaumont has been combed for all its "I remember when talent". Even at that there are some in the painting that will remain unknown. That they are not merely an artist's fantasy is known, for W. A. Slocum, a Beaumont photographer, took the picture from which the painting was made, and in his time, Slocum had said that the reproduction was almost without deviation.

The naturalness of the scene, could be duplicated in many spots in Jasper County today. The "completely at east" pose of the hunters, the kill which is being celebrated is yet lying on the ground horses await in the background, skins of predatory animals, and the carcasses of squirrels are strung along the hut, and birds hang ready for the ministrations of the Negro attendants.

Many Beaumonters, some not so old, recognize this scene. It is symbolic of an age and a sport fast fading.

The occasion was the ninth annual deer hunt staged by the Beaumont "gang" at Camp Fred Weller, December 14, 1906. For nine years this sound had been ritual when the gang got together. This camp had been named n honor of Colonel Fred Weller, A New Yorker, an ardent sportsman and good fellow, who have been making Beaumont his home. He was the guest of honor on this particular night. The "Gang
did not always have the same personnel. It changed as the years passed. Some times a score or more men answered the annual roll call. At other times but eight or then could make the trip.

On this particular occasion nine Beaumonters were present. They were E. A. Fletcher, then mayor of Beaumont, Malley Eastham, Judge D. P. Wheat, T. H. Bass, O. K. Clarke, George Leach, Bob Farmer, J. T. Gossett and Judge A. T. Watts, Arriving later in the evening were Homer Chambers and W. A. Slocum, a Beaumont photographer. Mr. Chamers alone, survives all who answered that roll call. He still lives in Beaumont. Walter Connally and James Loftin, both of Tyler, Texas, checked in late that night along with Col. Weller, and still later e./. R/ Spotts and W. L. Colemna were brought into camp, while George Thomas and J. T/. Joy, who lived near the campsite, joined the gang. Dr. C. T.. Cobb of Beaumont was the last to arrive.

This hunting camp was in a real sportsman's paradise. It was set up on high ground in virgin pine territory, and those were the days when the term virgin pine meant something. The piney woods area was criss-crossed by bay-galls, marshes and thickets, running a score or more miles to the east, while to the west lay the dense swamps flanking the Neches River. Here were squirrels in countless numbers, and fleet-footed doe and antlered bucks flitted from thicket to thicket.

The men who gathered once each year were real sportsmen, lovers of guns and dogs. Woe betide the tired chap who fell asleep before "curfew". The men were grown pranksters, boys on a lark. Poker was a diversion of the penny-ante variety, used chiefly as the peg about which to spin yarns - funny stories. Liqour, while not taboo, was trotted but as a rule in celebration of some fellows good luck. For example, on this particular night, Colonel Waller had, from a commanding position, fired four shots from an automatic, and had bagged a deer with each shot. That called for baptism in "Murray Hill" and "Black and White."

Judge D. P. Wheat was elected scribe for the ninth meet. There was a new scribe selected each year. Mr. Wheat must have been inclined toward good eating for this account of the "gang's doins" is liberally sprinkled with tales of the good eating.

For example, a Friday morning breakfast was recorded in this wise; Fresh fried pork, spare ribs, cold hogs head, country chitlings, broiled fresh kid, and breakfast bacon with cornbread and biscuits.

This was voted a "very fair" meal, but the narrator goes on to say that each meal surpassed the former one, and that each also surpassed the feast of Belshazzer, and that the dinners finally consisted of such things as juicy venison, fried, broiled, stewed and baked; suirrel, fried broiled, stew and in pie; barbecued and roasted kid and pork , and a sausage composed of fresh pork and venison.

Hot biscuit, pan corn bread, red and white potatoes, turnip and mustard greens cooked with backbone cold boiled and fried ham and broiled breakfast bacon; puddings, custards, and the best of French drip coffee, with a nit of Blue Ribbon Schiltz from the ice box to perk up the appetite."

The chef of all this cooking cunning seemed to be T. T. Pollard, the principal of the Charlton-Pollard school. Pollard, according to the old timers, was always on these hunts, raised and ran a few dogs of his own and had been teaching school around this area ever since. One of the best known of all the Negroes n this area, he had an able aid Fred Dickinson, of Lake View. Pollard is still alive, and still teaching.

During the week or ten days of these hunts the "gang" usually devoted the mornings to the chase, while in the afternoon squirrel and quail were hunted. Some of the party did not care for deer hunting, but there was always in the savor of the sport in everything they did.

In discussing these "gang" meetings, Homer chambers, now retired, but maintaining offices in the Gilbert building, has added a word to what Judge Wheat has written.

"The hunts were really an inspiration. I did not attend all of them, but the most of them. I was a traveling salesman then, working for Wilson Hardware company, and I remember most of these men mentioned by Judge Wheat. There was Ogden Johnson, former postmaster, who used to attend these hunts, and George Caswell. There was Will Carroll who was with the Neches Canal company, and Bob Wilson who was county judge when pat Wheat was city persecutor. There were more of them and the complexion of the gang changed from year to year. As one member moved form the area, or died, others took the places."

The pines, for the most part are gone. There is still an abundance of game in jasper county, but not the surplus of bunting pleasure that marked the old days. No longer do the menus of the hunting parties include half a dozen meats. The Big Thicket still has its lure, but the incentive is not there. Tales from the "gang" hunts were amusing; Great jurists, big bankers, industrialists, met and talked of trivial things over a slow-dying pine knot fire. Disputes were settled out of court. Friendships were made, but there is no record of any friendships having been broken when the "gang" got together

The End

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