Wheelock, Eleazer Louis Ripley

Eleazer Louis Ripley Wheelock (1793-1847) served in the United States Army, seeing combat in the War of 1812.

Following the war, he became a successful businessman, and, in 1818, married Mary Pricket of St. Clair County, Georgia, with whom he had five children: George Ripley, Anneta Woodward, William Billman, David Pricket, and Thomas Ford. In 1832, Wheelock returned to military service to fight in the Black Hawk War, during which he rose to the rank of colonel.

Throughout the 1820s, Wheelock had been making surveying trips to Texas, and in 1833, moved to Independence, Texas.

He joined Sterling C. Robertson's Colony, acting as assistant surveyor. By 1834, he had laid out the town of Wheelock, which was named three years later for Wheelock, Vermont, which had been named for Eleazer Wheelock, the founder of Dartmouth College and Wheelock's grandfather.

Wheelock's military service earned him an officer's commission in the Texas Revolutionary Army, where he organized and captained a company of Texas Rangers.

In the Republic of Texas, he served as land commissioner, advised or led all the expeditions against the Indians from Robertson and Milam counties, and served President Anson Jones as Indian commissioner, defending Indian rights even after his son-in-law was killed during an Indian raid.