Smith County

     This county was created in 1846 from Nacogdoches County and was organized in the same year. Its settlement had begun about the time the Texas Republic was established, and before the war it contained a relatively large population, had a large area cultivated in plantations, worked by slave labor, and even at that time Tyler was one of the leading towns in population, trade and culture in east  Texas. The products of the plantations were sent to market chiefly by the Sabine River, which forms the northern boundary of the county, or by the Neches, a portion of the western boundary. Even before the war the population had grouped around a number of small church, post office and trading centers, and in 1856 the post offices credited to Smith County bore the following names: Belzora, Berrien, Clopton, Flora, Garden Valley, Gum Springs, Hickory Grove, Jamestown, Mount Carmel, Ogsburn, Seven Leagues, Starrville, Summer Grove and Tyler.
 

April 19, 1916

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