Musician, Composer, Publisher, Teacher, and Minister of Music
Religion and music were already well established cultural features of the diverse people who poured over the Blue Ridge and Appalachian mountain ranges in the late 18th century into the valleys and coves of the land area to be later known as East Tennessee. They came, following the footsteps of explorers and long hunters such as Walker, Boone, Wallen, and Brooks, seeking new lands and new opportunities. Of predominately English, Irish, Scottish, and German ancestry, they traveled from homes in the eastern colonies of the Carolinas, Virginia, Pennsylvania and others with their women, their children, their religious beliefs, and what farming implements and musical instruments that could be loaded onto a horse or carried in a cart to a wilderness and a life of hard work punctuated at intervals by the terror of Indian raids. Some claimed land and settled along the rich river bottoms and in the coves and valleys of the land areas later to be known as Washington, Sullivan, Greene, and Hawkins counties of the future State of Tennessee while others moved on to the West in a migration that extended well up into the 19th century.
One family group that immigrated from Brunswick County, Virginia and remained in the future Hawkins County land area was Castleton Brooks, his brothers Littleton, George, and Thomas, and sisters Leah Brooks Kyle and the wife of Samuel Wilson, Sr. While living in Virginia, Castleton was a long hunter in the Tennessee lands and in 1774 discovered the land area northeast of present day Rogersville now known as the Hickory Cove. He liked it so well that he claimed 500 acres, cleared land, built a cabin, and raised a crop of corn. The others followed him and several settled near his claim in Hickory Cove. Castleton was killed by Indians in May 1777 leaving only one heir, a daughter named Mary. However, Thomas and Littleton married and raised large families who remained in Hawkins or one of the surrounding counties. Thus, the surname Brooks became well established in Hawkins and Hancock counties and many people today can trace their ancestry to Thomas, Littleton, or both.
Secular music entertainment in these early days was often accompanied by the fiddle and dulcimer brought across the mountains by the pioneers and took the form of ballads sung from memory with or without accompaniment or adaptations of the traditional wild Irish and Scottish reels and hornpipes so beloved at square dances and corn shuckings. Religious music was quite another thing, being vocal. Since few could read, the preacher at religious gatherings would "line out a hymn" by singing a verse to which the congregation would respond by singing the same verse and continue in that manner until the hymn was committed to memory. However, in 1801 William Little and William Smith published The Easy Instructor describing a musical notation system using four shaped note heads designating pitch which were associated with the syllables fa, sol, la, and mi. The syllables themselves, as a method of singing music, date back to Elizabethan England but the association with shaped note heads probably was invented in the late 18th century. The idea behind shape-note music is that it enabled many untrained singers of the day to sight-read music without having to understand key signatures and it immediately became popular in the New England area, stimulating expansion of the singing school movement, and quickly spread south to the mountains of Tennessee. The shape-note system was further improved in 1846 when Jesse B. Aiken published Christian Minstrel using a seven-shape notation, a unique shape for each note in the scale, which soon became the standard for shape-note notation. Singing schools and shape-note singing flourished in the 19th century and well on into the 20th century in various parts of the South.
Another development which influenced religious music was the growing popularity and affordability of the pump reed organ which was predominate in the late 1800's and early 1900's for both church and home. Many parlors were graced by the often ornate instruments, such as the one shown on the front cover illustration, which were made by a variety of American and European manufacturers. One of the most prolific was the Estey Organ Works of Brattleboro, Vermont which turned out over 500,000 organs before the phonograph and player piano put most of the reed organ builders out of business after 1920.
As the 19th century matured, Hawkins County remained the home of several families who sprang from the early pioneers and settlers in the region, kept their traditional heritage, and grew in prominence with their contributions to community life and the region as a whole. One such family was that of Stokley Deadrick Brooks, grandson of the pioneer Thomas Brooks. Born June 23, 1825 on Cloud's Creek in the household of his parents Anthony and Hannah Price Brooks, Stokley married Elizabeth Jane Lipe February 9, 1845 and they raised a large family. When the dark clouds of the Civil War came upon the land, Stokley left his family, enlisted, and served in Company H, 8th Tennessee Volunteer Infantry Regiment, of the Union Army. After peace was restored, Stokley was elected to the 40th Tennessee General Assembly (1877 - 1879) as a representative from Hawkins County. At the age of 69 years, Stokley made his Will, distributing his property among his wife and children, and died at his home on Cloud's Creek December 12, 1894. Elizabeth Jane followed on April 18, 1899. Both are buried on the peaceful hillside of the Brooks-Harrell Cemetery on Cloud's Creek. The Stokley D. Brooks house, where they lived, still stands.
A partial list of the children of Stokley and Elizabeth Jane includes:
Henry Clay Brooks was born March 14, 1859 and married Catherine Jane Webb, daughter of David Webb, who died in the great smallpox epidemic that raged through Hawkins County in 1883, and Mary Ann Kenner. Following in the footsteps of his father, Henry was the politician in the family, serving in several local county capacities including Road Commissioner. He was elected to serve as the representative from Hawkins County in the 56th Tennessee General Assembly, 1909 - 1911.
William Anthony Brooks was born April 29, 1848 and married Annis Brooks, daughter of William Brooks, a descendant of the pioneer Littleton Brooks, and Frances Mayo. W. A. or Billy, as he was called, did not enter public service but was a pillar of the community and very active in church affairs. He first belonged to the Cloud's Creek Baptist Church, now known as the Choptack Missionary Baptist Church, but later moved to the Pleasant Hill Baptist Church near his home on Cloud's Creek. At Pleasant Hill, William was ordained as a deacon and served as the church treasurer. He also served as Assistant Sunday School Superintendent. In 1900 his daughter, Lady Alice Brooks, who had married Ralph "Boss" Wright, died in childbirth leaving two small children, George Etter and Lida Mae Wright. W. A. and Annis took them in and raised them. As she grew older, Lida Mae became interested in family history and preserved old postcards, pictures, and other documents of genealogical value, a tradition that has been continued by her daughter, Alma Ruth Brooks, to this day.
Doctor Huston Brooks was born November 12, 1860 and received a fine education for the times. Doctor Huston, D. H. or Hugh, as he was called never married. Hugh became a public school teacher; serving at the Eureka School on Cloud's Creek, a school at Spruce Pine, and perhaps other places. His great love, however, was music and he conducted singing schools at Pleasant Hill and other places, teaching students to sight-read shape-note music. A picture of one of his schools at the Pleasant Hill Baptist Church appeared on the front cover of the July 2001 issue of Distant Crossroads. Huston is standing at the extreme left of the picture and his brother, William Anthony, is seated at the right side of the second row.
Robert Franklin Brooks was born January 8, 1852 and married Sarah J. Brooks, the younger sister of Annis Brooks who married William Anthony Brooks. Robert became a Baptist minister. Originally, he and Sarah were members of the Cloud's Creek Baptist Church, located in the Choptack community. The first mention of the community name "Choptack" is found in the church records dated May 1871 but it was not until August 1918 that the church name was officially changed to Choptack Missionary Baptist Church. In 1877 several people asked to be dismissed from the Cloud's Creek Church in order that they might form a new Baptist church on Cloud's Creek. The new church was organized Saturday, July 14, 1877 under the name "United Baptist of Christ at Pleasant Hill" with 22 charter members. In August 1891 the name was changed to "Baptists of Pleasant Hill" and later to Pleasant Hill Missionary Baptist Church. Robert Franklin and Sarah were among the charter members as was Doctor Huston Brooks. When it joined the Mulberry Gap Baptist Association in 1878, the church had 35 members. Robert Franklin was the 4th pastor of the Pleasant Hill church. Delegates from Pleasant Hill to the 63rd Annual Session of the Mulberry Gap Association of Baptists held at the Sneedville church September 17 and 18, 1901 included Elder R. F. Brooks, R. H. Brooks, J. Carpenter, and H. Brooks.
Robert Franklin and Sarah were married May 18, 1873 and started their family while living on Cloud's Creek as the 1880 Hawkins County census shows. They were still living there in 1900 but by 1910 had moved to Civil District 1 in Hawkins. Sometime between 1910 and 1920 they moved to the village of Witt's Foundry in Civil District 2 of Hamblen Co., TN. When they were away from Cloud's Creek, Sarah kept up a lively correspondence with her sister Annis and grandniece, Lida Mae Wright. The authors are indebted to Alma Ruth Brooks for allowing us to view and study unpublished postcards from this period.
Robert Franklin Brooks retired from the ministry and died February 21, 1927 in Hamblen County. According to his death certificate, he died of mitral insufficiency, incomplete closure of the mitral valve in the heart, and influenza. He was buried February 22, 1927 in Jarnigan Cemetery. After her husband's death and the subsequent death of her only remaining child still living in Tennessee, Sarah moved to Bloomington, Illinois to live with her son, James Stokely Brooks. She died there February 12, 1929 and is buried in Park Hill Cemetery, Section K, Lot 509, Space 4. Robert and Sarah had the following children:
William F. Brooks was born February 23, 1874 in Hawkins County and married Lida Seal January 10, 1899. To them were born two children, Anne and Harry. William moved his family to Bloomington, Illinois where he worked for the C & A Railroad. Lida died in 1928 and William died in Bloomington October 8, 1944 and is buried in Park Hill Cemetery beside his mother.
James Stokely Brooks was born September 26, 1876 in Hawkins County and, after military service, married Lillie Belle Cobb June 18, 1902, the daughter of Dr. Jesse Cobb and Mary Bean. To them were born 7 children; Jesse Walters, born March 27, 1903; James Edgar, born June 8, 1904; Edith Eleanor, born about 1906; Lillie Mae, born December 10, 1906; Maggie Grace, born July 15, 1908; Roberta Elizabeth, born August 21, 1911; and Robert Giles, born July 25, 1917. James moved his family to Illinois, first to Arrowsmith Township in McLean County where he worked as a farm laborer and then to Bloomington where he worked as a boilermaker for the C & A Railroad and in the C & A roundhouse in Bloomington. James died February 22, 1949 and is buried in the Park Hill Cemetery, Bloomington, Illinois. Lillie followed him in death April 22, 1950.
Laura M. Brooks was born June 14, 1878 in Hawkins County and died July 16, 1879. She is buried in the Brooks-Harrell Cemetery on Cloud's Creek, Hawkins Co., TN.
Lula A. Brooks was born November 15, 1879 in Hawkins County and died December 16, 1898. She is buried in the Brooks-Harrell Cemetery on Cloud's Creek although Hawkins County Cemetery Book 1 does not list her grave. However, the authors personally verified that her grave is there and that the gravestone is inscribed with the above given dates.
Robert Huston Brooks, who appears on the front cover of this issue, was born November 26, 1884 in his father's household on Cloud's Creek, Hawkins Co., TN and spent his early years there. The 1900 Hawkins census shows him working on his father's farm as a laborer but he evidently developed an early interest in music, particularly religious music, which became a career that he pursued throughout the remainder of his short life. There is significant evidence that he was heavily influenced by his uncle, Doctor Huston Brooks, who he may have been named after. Certainly he attended the singing schools taught by Uncle Hugh and may have been taught to play the organ by him. The picture of the Pleasant Hill Singing School that appeared on the front cover of the July 2001 issue of Distant Crossroads shows Robert seated near the center in the second row holding a large open book. Family tradition has it that he sang in quartets with his brothers William and James and his sister Lula during this period. Robert joined the Pleasant Hill Baptist church and was selected, at the age of 16, as one of the delegates to the Mulberry Gap Baptist Association meeting in Sneedville, TN September 17-18, 1901, so it is evident that he became prominent in church activities at an early age.
By the turn of the century, Robert was composing hymns, occasionally in collaboration with his uncle. The authors have seen a copy of the original, handwritten, version of the hymn The Golden Shore with the words written by Doctor Huston Brooks and the music by Robert Huston Brooks. This was an early work that was later published as sheet music.
On the morning of September 24, 1904 a local train from Bristol, bound for Knoxville and carrying passengers attending the Knoxville Fair, was traveling west on the Southern Railway track near Morristown, TN. At about the same time, another train left Knoxville east bound on the same track. When the west bound train pulled into Morristown new orders were given to the conductor and engineer to pull off the main line onto a siding at New Market and wait for the east bound train to pass. For some reason the new orders were ignored and the west bound train pulled out of the station at New Market and continued west. The two trains collided on a curve between New Market and Hodges at a combined speed of about 110 miles per hour causing great loss of life and many injuries. Robert Huston immortalized the tragedy in the song The New Market Wreck that was published in a pamphlet containing pictures of the wreck.
By 1905, Robert Huston had moved to Whitesburg in Hamblen County busily engaged in making and repairing organs, writing and publishing music, and teaching vocal and instrumental music in churches, singing schools, and private homes. Many of his hymns can be seen in old shape-note hymnals published by a variety of publishers including the Eureka Publishing Company and the George W. Sides & Co. Huston often wrote music in collaboration with others always published under the name R. H. Brooks.
On February 17, 1907 Robert Huston was married in Hawkins County to Bertie Hilton, who was born in Virginia, by Rev. Elbert Brooks with William A. Wells serving as the bondsman. The 1910 Hamblen census shows them living in Whitesburg with two children Ernest C., born October 30, 1907, and Sarah F. Brooks born in 1908. Other children came later; Venoy about 1911, Jessie about 1914, Ruby about 1918, and Bert Hugh about 1920.
Tragedy struck the Brooks household in 1922 when their oldest child, Ernest Cuthbert Brooks, was drowned in a lake. According to an article appearing in the Morristown Daily Gazette and Mail September 11, 1922, young Ernest was coming home about 4:00 PM Friday, September 8, 1922 from the Junior High School where he was a senior and decided to take a swim in the S. M. Holtsinger lake near the packing house. It was thought that he was seized with cramps and, being alone, sank to his death. His body was not recovered until 4:30 PM Sunday. He was buried in the Bent Creek Cemetery September 11, 1922. At the time, the family was living on South Cumberland Street in Morristown and Ernest was a member of the First Baptist Church where his father was Minister of Music. Survivors include two sisters, Jessie and Ruby, and two brothers, Venoy and Bertie Hugh. Sarah is not listed, indicating she may have died young.
At some point in his life, Robert Huston was stricken with Bright's disease, a chronic inflammation of the blood vessels in the kidneys, which often leads to kidney failure. According to his obituary which appeared in the Morristown Daily Gazette and Mail, Monday, May 30, 1927, Robert Huston Brooks died at his home on Springvale Pike at 8:30 PM May 29, 1927 after a prolonged illness. His death certificate states that he lived 42 years, 6 months, and 3 days and died of Nephritis, an inflammation of the kidneys. He was buried in Jarnigan Cemetery May 31, 1927. Thus ended the life of a talented man who kept the faith and heritage bequeathed to him by his forefathers.
The authors wish to extend their appreciation to those who provided information for this article including Ralph Williams of Rogersville, Frances Mooney of Kingsport, and Robert G. Brooks, Jr of Joppa, Texas. Of special note, however, are the contributions of Alma Ruth Brooks of Clouds Creek, Hawkins Co., TN who provided the picture of Robert Huston Brooks at age 19 appearing on the front cover and many unpublished postcards, documents, and recollections of past events and people, often passed down by her mother, Lida Mae Wright Brooks, who knew Huston. Many thanks to a gracious lady who has preserved the family history and been willing to share it with us.
Sources:
1910, 1920, and 1930 Hamblen County Census Reports.
1850, 1860, 1870, 1880, 1900, and 1910 Hawkins County Census Reports.
1910, 1920, and 1930 McLean County, Illinois Census Reports.
TN Death Certificate - Robert Franklin Brooks.
TN Death Certificate - Robert Hugh Brooks.
TN Death Certificate - Ernest Cuthbert Brooks.
Postcard collection and other documents owned by Alma Ruth Brooks.
Morristown Daily Gazette and Mail - May 30, 1927.
Morristown Daily Gazette and Mail - September 11, 1922.
Morristown Citizens Tribune - December 9, 1975.
Morristown Citizens Tribune - August 2004.
Family History of Robert G. Brooks, Jr.
Submitted by Haynes W. Alvis and N. Charles Brooks
