My Genealogy Hound

Capt. John W. Cullins, a prominent farmer and stock raiser of Greenbriar Township, Independence County, purchased his present farm of 320 acres, which is situated near Jamestown, in 1855; there was at that time little improvement on the land, which is now one of the best farms in the county. Mr. Cullins was born in Abbeville County, S. C., in 1828, and, receiving a limited education, he hired out on a farm at the age of fifteen, in which capacity he was employed until 1846. In the latter year he enlisted in Company C, Col. Coffee’s regiment of Alabama Infantry, and served twelve months in the Mexican War, participating in the battle of Vera Cruz; he was honorably discharged at New Orleans in June, 1847, and after spending some time in Alabama, went to Mississippi, two years later returning to South Carolina, where he married and lived until his emigration to Independence County, Ark., in 1855, where he has since made his home. He devoted his entire attention to farming until 1867, when he built a store on the present site of Jamestown, and for twelve years engaged in merchandising in partnership with Jacob Pate. Mr. Cullins has accumulated considerable property, owning in all 540 acres, about 220 acres of which are under cultivation, beside real estate in Jamestown. During the Civil War Mr. Cullins served about four years in the Confederate army; the first year as captain of Company C, Desha’s battalion, operating in Alabama and Mississippi, and subsequently assisted in organizing Company C, Arkansas Cavalry, of which he was appointed captain, in which capacity he served until the close of the struggle. He was in the battles of Marks’ Mill, Big Blue, with Gen. Price on his raid through Missouri and Kansas, surrendering at Jacksonport in June, 1865, after four years of the hardships of war. Mr. Cullins first married in 1851, Mary Ann, daughter of Johnson and Margaret Simms, of South Carolina, who moved to Tennessee, in 1852, and three years later to Independence County, Ark., where Mr. Simms died before the war. Mrs. Cullins, who was also a native of South Carolina, died in 1856, leaving two sons, John S. and William S. In 1857 Mr. Cullins married Mary, daughter of Job Starks. Mrs. Mary Cullins was born in Independence County, where she died in 1867, the mother of three children, Henry N., Francis M., and Estella, wife of William D. Hatton. Mr. Cullins next married, in 1868, Martha M. Davis, daughter of Jesse and Margaret Flinn. She is a native of Guilford County, N. C. One daughter, Ida, has blessed this union. Mr. Cullins was the only child of Elijah and Mary (Swain) Cullins, both natives of Abbeville County, S. C., who removed to Georgia when he was only a year old. There the mother died soon after, and the father was subsequently twice married, having three children by his second wife and three by the third. He was a farmer by occupation, and spent the latter part of his life in Alabama, where he died soon after the war, a member of the Baptist Church. Capt. Cullins belongs to the Neill Lodge, of Jamestown, of the A. F. & A. M., and he and wife are members in good standing of the Cumberland Presbyterian Church.