I was about eight years old when Henderson burned. I went to town with my father the day after the fire. It burned every house as well as I recollect, except the Flanagan Brick Building. I remember I was barefooted and careful not to burn my feet. My father said at the time they thought a fellow named Green Herndon, a union man, had hired a negro woman to burn Henderson. Herndon was a northerner and was a pronounced opponent of secession. On the negro woman's testimony, a mob gathered, threw a loop around his neck, tied it to a saddle horse which went around the public square dragging Herndon to death. Then they hung the body to a tree and shot it full of holes ... War was in preparation and people were in fits of anger. When the war broke out, the men got all the files they could find and went to the blacksmith shops and made knives and swords. There was much laughter and I remember they said, "We'll whip those damn Yankees with axes and butcher knives. Everyone was anxious to go."John Crow was John Stephen Crow, born in Henderson, TX on 5 Mar 1852 and died there on 19 Oct 1952. He is buried at Maple Grove Cemetery. His father, Moses Melton Crow, was part of a large group of family, friends and neighbors who left the area of Henry and Clayton Co, GA and were early settlers in Rusk Co. The surnames of these early settlers include Burks, Cates, Crow, Mitchell and others.