The Southwestern Historical Quarterly, Volume 43, July 1939 - April, 1940 Page: 323

FOLK LIFE IN EARLY TEXAS:

THE AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF ANDREW DAVIS
Contributed by R. L. JONEB
PART II
CANE-BREAKS OF THE TENEHA
Soon after the death of my mother, on account of Indian
troubles, my father moved to what is now Shelby County. The
move from Jonesborough to the settlements in Eastern Texas, the
region of Nacogdoches and San Augustine, had to be made by
the use of pack horses, with the Mexican ciax, a large saddle-
bag made of rawhide, which I have described elsewhere. There
had never been a road made for any kind of wheeled conveyance
across this country. Some years before Mr. Tramel cut a bridle-
way from Jonesborough to Nacogdoches and moved his family
and a considerable amount of stock. My father used the Tramel
trail, or Tramel trace, as it was generally called. He moved about
one hundred head of cattle and about fifty head of horses.
On reaching Nacogdoches, he learned that over towards the
Sabine River there was a wilderness country and fine ranges and
good room for the stock. Having struck camp and arranged
everything so that the family would be comfortable in his ab-
sence, attended by a trusty servant, he started out into a perfect
wilderness, seeking a new home. He finally settled down on
Teneha, a tributary of the Sabine River. Father opened a farm
on Teneha, clearing up a large cane bottom, which gave him
the nick-name, or sobriquet, of Cane-break Davis. This name fol-
lowed my father through life. This was great country for hogs.
Water was plentiful-most abundant and of great variety. It
was here that I became animal enough myself to eat beechnuts,
hickory nuts, and many other kinds of nuts and wild fruits. My
father had a stock of hogs--fifty or seventy-five head. All they
had to do was to eat and grow fat. They did not have to root
here for a living, and would, if possible, have dispensed with
their long, sharp noses as useless appendages. It was but a short
distance to the Sabine. These large canebrakes abounded in bear,
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