Hannah Payne Anderson

Hannah English Payne Anderson, original land grantee in Northeast Texas, including Wood County, was born in Blount County, Tennessee, on March 27, 1797, to parents James and Elizabeth (Denton) English. She had a total of ten siblings, including frontiersman William English and notable Texas Ranger Joshua English. Hannah English was widowed from her first marriage to a Mr. Payne (possibly named John Chesley Payne, who reportedly died in 1821). The couple had at least one son, John C. Payne, by 1817, but family genealogy listings report two sons and possibly a total of three children. By the mid-1820s Hannah Payne was married to widower Jonathan Anderson and, according to land grant records, had moved to Texas in 1825. Hannah Anderson (under the name Hannah Payne in land grant documents) was initially granted approximately one league and labor of land—an amount traditionally given to heads of families—in Wood County by the Republic of Texas in 1838. She and Jonathan Anderson lived in Shelby County and had at least seven children together. In 1849 the family moved to Panola County, where Anderson spent the remainder of her life. The year before they moved, the Andersons donated 100 acres of their own land to create a town to serve as the Panola County seat. Hannah English Payne Anderson died on March 14, 1863, in Carthage, Texas. She was buried in Anderson Cemetery near Carthage.