Rev. William Daniel Ward

Dan Ward, as he was called by his family, was the second child of Thomas H. and Penelope Taylor Ward. He was born on May 26, 1844, in Fayette County, Alabama. When he was about five years old, the Ward's moved their young family to the Talibonella area of Pontotoc County, Mississippi. Dan grew up in the beautiful wooded hills there until 1862; when he, along with other family members and neighbors joined the Confederate forces in the great War Between the States.

On March 1862, he enlisted with Company A, 41st Mississippi Infantry. Records show that he was wounded at Chickamauga on September 20, 1863. His children remembered that he had a musket-ball scar on his shoulder and a leg injury which caused him to walk with a cane. It is also remembered that he and his brother-in-law, Dock Stegall, would reminisce about having fought in some of the hardest battles of the War. In 1864, Dan stated that he transferred to Company I, 56th Alabama Partisan Rangers, from which he honorably surrendered to Union Forces at the end of the war. The Ward family suffered two terrible losses during the war - Dan's father, Thomas Ward, died before May 1863, and his older brother, Charles Thomas, died in the field hospital at the Atlanta fairgrounds in May 1863.

After the War, Dan married a childhood friend, Martha Ann Margaret ("Mattie") Morrow, daughter of James Morton Morrow and Catherine White Peden Morrow. The Morrow's and Ward families' friendship went back to Fayette County, Alabama. Dan & Mattie were parents to three children: 1.) Mary Catherine, 2.) James Thomas, and 3.) William Earnest. It is believed that Mattie died during or shortly after the birth of their last child William Earnest who was born on September 28, 1870. In the early 1870's, Dan's mother & other family members had headed for Texas. After the death of Mattie, Dan decided to take his three young children & head for Texas also. They all settled in and around Cooke County, Texas. We do know that they were leasing land in the Indian Territory and in fact, the family eventually settled in the Loco area of Indian Territory, Oklahoma.

On April 9, 1880, Dan was married a second time to Mary Adeline Whitener in Cooke County, Texas. Mary was the daughter of Martin and Elizabeth M. A. Cody Whitener. Although Dan was a farmer, he was also a Baptist "Home Missionary" to the Indians and served as a Baptist preacher for his entire life. Dan was ordained to preach on May 20, 1883. He had two brothers, Jesse and John, who were also Baptist preachers. He and Mary eventually settled in Pottawatomie County. In 1900 when he filed a Homestead Land Grant application, he stated that he arrived in the Territory in December 1891. He established residence in February 1892, and stated that he now had a hewed log house, two tenement log houses, his place was entirely fenced, crib and stable, smokehouse, a dugout, two wells, 5 or 6 acres of orchard, improvements costing about $1,300.00. He had cultivated about 8 acres the first year, was cultivating 110 acres at the time of the application and had made a crop each season. Homestead Proof for S-W-4-S-35-T-8-N-R-2-E was given at Tecumseh, Pottawatomie County, Oklahoma. His application was approved 8 May 1901.

Dan & Mary had seven children – 1.) Daniel Elbert; 2.) Amy Bell; 3.) Emma Caroline; 4.) Sarah Elmira; 5.) Jesse Franklin; 6.) Carrie Adeline; and 7.) Ethel Edna Maye.

Rev. Dan Ward was one of the first ministers in South Pottawatomie County, Oklahoma, at the New Moral Baptist Church located 3 miles south of Tribbey. He was also a member of the Moral 114 Masonic Lodge.

Dan died on October 12, 1918, in Tribbey, Pottawatomie County, Oklahoma, and is buried in the Prospect Cemetery there.

SOURCE: Find A Grave.com