Page 19 - Foy

FOYS WHO CAME TO TEXAS..........

ots of Foys came to Texas beginning in the early 1800's, but this book was
Lnot intended to account for them all. This work was initially intended to
trace those FOYs who came to Texas who were the ancestors of JOHN ELON FOY,
the patriarch of a group of FOY descendants we will hereafter affectionately refer
to as the Cisco Clan.

The Cisco Clan is a happy group of FOY descendants who meet each year for a
FOY family reunion near Cisco, Texas. This tradition began more than twenty years
ago, and the gathering gets better each year. There will be a little about the history
of those reunions in later chapters, but it is this clan that has inspired the work you
will see on the following pages.

NOT A COMMON NAME

FOY is not a common name. There are significantly fewer families named FOY
in phone directories for all the towns and cities in the state of Texas when
compared to other surnames such as Smith, Brown, or Miller. Being a
uncommon name, there are scarcely any references to the name FOY found in
Texas historical records.

Early Texas history tells us settlers from Alabama, Louisiana, Mississippi, and
Tennessee began coming to a colony in Tejas (Texas) which had been
established by Stephen Austin through an agreement with Mexico in 1821. By
1832 there were over 20,000 Americans living in the lower Brazos region. How
many, if any, Foys were among them is not known.

In 1835 the Americans living in Texas started a revolution against Mexico and
in 1836 Mexico was defeated by the Texas army led by SAM HOUSTON. Texas
then became a republic.

Nine years later, 1845, the United States of America annexed Texas making it the
28th state, but the following year Mexico, festering over her losses to the
American upstarts, declared war in an effort to reclaim Texas and other
territories which had previously belonged to them. This conflict was called the

Preface 8