Joseph Skiles Scuyler Cowan

Died 4 May 1926 according to Cowan ancestor charts, prepared by Alma (Pyle) Cowan (Mrs. Harold Sumner Cowan).

COWEN, J.S. – The following story concerning the late Eld. J.S. Cowan, was written by M.A. Meacham and originally appeared in a paper near his old home in Tennessee. It will no doubt be of interest to the many friends of Mr. Cowan in this section, where he made his home many years. At Sayre, Oklahoma, May 4, 1926, Elder J.S. Cowan died in his 78th year. Elder Cowan is survived by his widow, who before her marriage was a Miss Witherspoon of Maury County, and six children, all left in affluent circumstances. Mr. Cowan will only be recalled by a few of the old citizens of Williamson County as “Skiley Cowan,” who had such a hazardous career here during the civil war, with the Yankees. He it was who owned and rode “Match,” the horse that was never passed or even caught up with by any other horse and thought to have been the fastest horse ever foaled in this county up to that time. To secure the horse, the Yankees tried more than two years to capture young Cowan, who was only a boy at the time; the Yankees ran him and shot at him many times, but Match always carried him to safety without a wound. It will be remembered by many that after the Yankees took all the horses except an old mare and two weaning colts from his father, Grimes Cowan, who owned and lived on a farm in Sweeney Hollow, where young Cowan was born and raised, that in retaliation, young Cowan planned and executed a raid on the Yankee livery stable in Franklin, with six others to help him, and got six cavalry horses, five good ones and one no good. The Yankees in a short time killed two of the seven men and got two good horses back and ran the man on the no good horse and young Cowan more than a mile when the no good horse fell down and caught his riders leg under him and held him fast while five or six Yankees were shooting at him at a distance of ten or twenty steps. Young Cowan could have been out of sight long before this but was holding back to try to save his comrade. When he saw the Yankees were sure to kill his friend, he turned back and gave the Rebel yell and hollowed “charge in behind them, boys,” and began shooting at them, and the Yankees, thinking from young Cowan’s boldness that there was a whole company there, they skiddadled back up the road and young Cowan got off his horse, got his friend from under his horse and told him to run for life, while he kept the Yankees back, which he did and got away. Young Cowan only had to let Match have rein and he was out of sight in a few minutes. When the war ended young Cowan went West for a while and came back and married and went to Washington County, Northwest Arkansas about fifty-nine years ago, when prosperity crowned his efforts and he amassed much wealth, owning fine farms in Arkansas, Texas and Oklahoma. Young Cowan, after living in Arkansas twelve or fifteen years, attached himself to the Primitive Baptist Church and began preaching and became one of the most prominent ministers of that denomination in the State, and preached for about fifty years until his health failed. What became of Match? Well, while young Cowan was gone West before he married he left Match on his father’s farm in the Sweeney Hollow on the pasture. Some human fiend poisoned Match, the mare and the two colts now most grown, above referred to, all lying dead, close together. Had it been as well known at the time, who poisoned them, as it became later, I have no doubt but that young Cowan’s gun would have shown another notch on the handle but I am glad it was no worse and that Elder Cowan lived to be an honor to his church, to his family and to his connection. [The Springdale News 10/10/1926]