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.

Shortly before Texas joined the United States, Wheelock surveyed new townships in Mercer Colony (later Mercer’s County), during which time Indians captured him multiple times. He expanded his business interests to include mining and traveled to Washington, D.C., to gather support for the venture with the North Western Mining Company.

William H. Wheelock, a relative of Eleazer Wheelock, served as sheriff of Robertson County (formed from Robertson’s Colony) in 1852 and justice of the peace in 1856. During the Civil War, he was an officer in the Confederate Army.

Sources:

Eleazer Louis Ripley Wheelock Papers, 1814-1935, Dolph Briscoe Center for American History, University of Texas at Austin.

Handbook of Texas Online, s.v. "Wheelock, Eleazar Louis Ripley," http://www.tshaonline.org/handbook/online/articles/WW/fwh12.html (accessed August 4, 2010).

From the guide to the Eleazer Louis Ripley Wheelock Papes 1912, 1913, 1925, 1931, 1935., 1814-1935, (Dolph Briscoe Center for American History, The University of Texas at Austin)