The Humphries "Texas" Money: A TRUE Family Legend

My maternal grandmother's maiden name was Humphries.  All my life I've been told the story of the Humphries Money.  Sometimes it's called the Texas Money, but it is all the same money.

The money is real.  Hundreds of billions of dollars.

It all started with Pelham Humphries or William Pelham Humphries, as he's sometimes listed.  He was half Native American.  Born out of wedlock.  He moved to Texas from the Appalachian Mountains in the 1830s and was killed in a bar fight there leaving no heirs, which would not have mattered to any of his family back home in the hills if he had died with no land, but that was not the case.

In the mid-1830s Pelham Humphries was granted just over 4500 acres of land in what was then still Mexico but is now a few miles south of present day Beaumont, Texas on the west side of the Neches River.

Nobody thought a thing about it.  The land was pretty worthless at the time.  Mainly swampy grassland that nobody else much wanted.

Sixty-six years later on January 10, 1901 a well was drilled on that swampy grassland.  Black gold.  Texas tea, my friends.  Spindletop.  The first major gusher of the Texas Oil Boom.



Word travels fast, and it wasn't long till the Humphries family discovered that oil was being pumped from dear ol' Pelham's land.  

Hey.  Wait a minute! That land is rightfully ours! Pelham died with no heir.  The family cried in unison, "Give me my land!!!"

Can you guess what the oil companies profiting from that oil said?  Yup.  I'm betting your guess was right.

"Prove it's your land."

Spindletop just kept pumping and pumping money straight into the pockets of the oil companies, while ownership of the land has been fought in the courts for over a century now.

Possession is 9/10ths of the law.

Many newspaper and magazine articles have been written about this case, but they all mostly just spur arguments instead of settlements.  Google "Pelham Humphries" and you'll see.

The problem is with so much money at stake, there have been a LOT of fraudulent "family" claims, as you can imagine.

One of the more interesting comments I've read about it on blogs and/or forums came from a Charlotte, NC McCullar cousin's post in 2010.  It says:

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Question: Why did the family of Elijah Humphries (son of Uriah of Clarke County, GA.) file and win on Pelham Humphries' land per case 512 CL90 in 1901? Could it be because they were the legal heirs and had PROOF as to who Pelham actually was?

Why had the Governor George T. Wood of Texas already signed for the heirs of Jesse Humphries who fell at Refugio, Texas (Goliad time frame) to receive land in VanZandt, Texas per their claim as heirs of Jesse (brother of Pelham)?

Why did the judge down in Alabama become suddenly ill and die just prior to retiring from the bench and filing as administrator of the estate of Pelham Humphries? The same judge that as a young attorney had prepared the Revivor to Case 512 CL90 back in 1972? 

Why have the McCullars not been notified of any court action and when they received an anonymous phone call their attorney was found dead 45 min. after he stated on phone that he was leaving for Carter Co., TN. the next morning to STOP them? Many questions...

Just follow the money and you will get some of your answers. Start at Old City Bank in Houston in 1901, then check out The Federal Reserve and Jekyyl Island meetings 1912-13 (Warburgs, Rothschilds, Aldriches etc.) KW, SF, RL, VL all were trying to follow the money and EXPOSE this...they are all resting in cemeteries across the South this afternoon! 

Sad story of money, greed, lies, forgeries, fraud and just plain out meanness. The McCullars own a used tractor. What does WH and HP drive? 

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It is true that I've never been able to link Pelham Humphries in my family tree.  Of course, since he was born out of wedlock, I'm fairly certain my family would not have a record of him even if he was absolutely a half-brother. 

There are brothers named William Humphries and Jesse Humphries in my family tree from that time period, but no illegitimate siblings are listed at all.  

My Humphries family did come down from Virginia into the North Carolina mountains.  In fact, my GGGGreat-Grandfather, William Humphries, was one of the Over Mountain Men who fought at the Battle of Kings Mountain in the Revolutionary War, so we are definitely related to all those Virginia Humphries who are claiming Pelham, but I still can't prove a connection to any illegitimate children.

I guess we will have to wait until someone identifies a true descendant of Pelham Humphries without a shadow of a doubt and the rest of us will have to submit DNA to get our share. 

Now, I'm wondering how many Native Americans can legitimately claim that Humphries money through their DNA?  Pelham was half Native American if the history I've read is true.  They say he was not Cherokee, but they never said the tribe he was. 

I'd truly love for this to be solved via DNA.  It would warm my heart for the Native Americans especially to get their part of that money.  That would make me happy.  😊

It would also make me very happy to see big business have to give money to the heirs of Pelham Humphries since they actually never owned the land that filled their coffers with so very many billions of dollars.

Seriously.  History is more amazing than fiction.