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[242] from the red men. His father was Alexander McCulloch, who won distinction as an aide-de-camp of Gen. James Coffee, under General Jackson, in the Creek and British wars of 1812 and 1815. Ben McCulloch spent his early life in Dyer county, Tenn. He seemed to have a natural love and talent for woodcraft, and became an expert hunter, raftsman and flatboatman, an experience which was useful in his later military career. In 1835, when about to join a party of trappers and hunters to the Rocky mountains, he heard of Gen. David Crockett's expedition to aid the struggle for the independence of Texas, and immediately started for Nacogdoches, the place of rendezvous. He arrived too late, but pushed on alone as far as the Brazos river, where he was taken ill and did not recover until after the fall of Alamo. Upon his recovery he joined the army of Gen. Sam Houston, on the eve of the battle of San Jacinto. During this battle, being placed in command of a gun in the artillery, his cool and daring bravery won the highest commendation. It was at the battle of San Jacinto that he met, and formed the life-long friendship of Tom Green, W. P. Lane and Ben C. Franklin. General Houston had known him from boyhood. After the army disbanded in 1837, he settled in Gonzales and engaged in surveying and locating lands on the frontier. In 1839 he was elected to congress in Texas. During this period of his life he was conspicuous in numerous skirmishes with the Indians, notably the fight at Plum creek, and the following encounters with the Comanches and Mexican raiders. It was during his election to the Texas congress in 1839 that his altercation with Col. Reuben Davis occurred, which terminated in a duel, in which he received a wound in the arm, the full use of which he never regained. He rendered invaluable service as scout in the Indian raid of 1840. When Texas was admitted to the Union, he was elected to the first legislature, and was appointed major-general of all the militia west of the Colorado in 1846. At the opening of the
Atlanta, Ga. 1899.
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