The Mysterious Disappearance of A. G. Stuart

One hundred and twenty-five years ago, one of my great-great-grandfathers decided to disappear.

He succeeded so completely that no one in the family ever knew what became of him.

Albert Gallatin Stuart was born in 1865 in Kaufman County, Texas, just southeast of Dallas. He married my great-great-grandmother in 1887, and three daughters quickly followed.

Young Stuart was ambitious, hard-working, and likeable, with his eyes set on a political career. By 1890, he was the editor and owner of the Rockwall County News, a rural newspaper serving the county north of Kaufman County. In 1891, at age 26, he moved one more county north to found the Collin County News in Farmersville, Texas. The next year, he continued his circumnavigation of what is now the Metroplex, going to work at the McKinney News. By 1893, he had moved on to the Taylor Journal, and dipped his toe into political waters, putting his name forward unsuccessfully to serve as sergeant-of-arms of the Texas House of Representatives.

Stuart's career peaked in 1894-95, when he served as a Kaufman County delegate to the Texas State Democratic Convention and was selected for the political sinecure of calendar clerk of the Texas House of Representatives, the latter a mark that he had powerful friends.

Yet by 1897, Stuart's star was fading. His attempt to be selected again for calendar clerk failed. He put his name forward as a candidate for lieutenant governor and got no response.

The story the family told the world about what happened next was that Stuart died. My great-great-grandmother presented herself as a widow for the remaining 56 years of her life; a life marked by poverty, hardship, and shame during the decade immediately after her husband's disappearance.

But if Stuart died, there is no death certificate.

The story the family told itself about what happened next was that Stuart ran away and stayed away; that he had joined the colors in 1898 to fight in the Spanish-American War and never found his way back to Texas.

But if Stuart enlisted, there is no record of his service.

There is simply no known visible trace of the life of Albert Gallatin Stuart after 1898.

What he did leave behind were four women deeply scarred by his departure, each of whom survived his disappearance from their lives by more than a half-century.