Description
Drowned. - Judge S. L. (Solomon Langdon) Leonard, of Platte County was recently drowned in one of the tributaries of the Arkansas River when returning home after taking his negroes to his farm in Texas.
He was attempting to cross on a raft while the stream was very much swollen by recent rains. The Judge was one of the oldest residents of the Platte Purchase and had held the office of Circuit Judge in that District some years ago.
He leaves a large family, but they are well provided for as he had a very fine estate.
(Researcher’s note: From Fannin County, Texas, Historical Commission, https://www.fannincountyhistory.org/leonard-history - Solomon Langdon Leonard, for whom the town of Leonard (Fannin County, Texas, northwest of Dallas/Ft. Worth) was named, was born November 11,1811, near Columbus, Ohio. He died from drowning Sept. 24, 1861, near Fort Gibson, Indian Nation (near now Muskogee, Oklahoma). He was well educated, having mastered both Latin and Greek while preparing himself for the legal profession.
School teaching led him to Tennessee, where he met Leanna Hall, one of his pupils. Following their marriage on Dec. 16, 1837, they moved to Northwest Missouri, where he took up surveying. When 500,000 acres of public land, the Platte Purchase, was added to Missouri, Solomon L. Leonard was appointed to survey it. The pay for this work enable him to buy a farm of 800 acres in Buchanan County, Missouri.
Leonard worked his land with slaves, and slavery was becoming unpopular in his part of Missouri. As a result, he decided to move to the south. His first trip to Fannin County was in 1843. A story is told by his descendants that on this trip, he traded a slave for a parcel of land. By 1861, Leonard had accumulated over 10,000 acres of land in Southwest Fannin County. While moving Fannin County in 1861, he drowned while crossing the Grand River in Indian Territory.
The Leonard heirs, at the time of Solomon L. Leonard's death, were Leanna Hall Leonard, his widow, Perilla Lenna Connett, Celina Ann Connett, Mary Euphora Connett, Sara Eugenia Leonard, Laura Virginia Leonard, Anna Victoria Leonard, his daughters, and John Langdon Leonard and William Henry Leonard, his sons.
From St. Joseph Museums Wiki https://stjosephmuseums.fandom.com/wiki/Connett_Family: Judge Solomon L. Leonard 1811-1861
Solomon Langdon Leonard was born in Ohio in 1811. His middle name was that of a forebear who served in the American Revolution. His parents died when he was very young and he grew up in Kentucky. He was an excellent Greek and Latin scholar and was a schoolteacher before he began the study of law.
He was married to Miss Leanna Hall and in 1839 they came to Platte County, Missouri, where they lived on a farm near Platte City and he practiced law. In 1841 they moved to Buchanan County and lived on a farm several miles east of St. Joseph. In 1844 he was appointed judge of the Circuit Court and held that position until 1852.
After that he joined General Bela M. Hughes in a law partnership. He was a hard worker and quite successful. In the first year of the Civil War, he made a trip south and was accidentally drowned in Indian territory, later Oklahoma, in October 1861.)Date(s) of Creation
11/29/1861
