My Genealogy Hound

Robert W. Pruet, a well-known and successful farmer of the county, was born in East Tennessee in 1825, and is the third in a family of fifteen children born to Willis and Mary (Williams) Pruet, who were also Tennesseans, the paternal and maternal grandparents being from North Carolina and Virginia, respectively. Grandfather Pruet was a participant in the Creek war, and was at the battle of Horseshoe Bend. The maternal grandparents lived to be very old, reaching the age of ninety and one hundred years. Willis Pruet was an extensive land holder in Tennessee, and dealt in stock, being a prominent and influential citizen of his time. He died in August, 1850. Robert W. Pruet was reared to farm labor, attended the common schools, and after attaining his majority engaged in stock dealing, and also kept a country store for some time. In 1851 he was married to a Miss Stuart, a native of Illinois, and in 1853, in company with three brothers, came to Northeast Arkansas and settled in Greene County, where he entered 120 acres, on which he at once located and began improving. In 1858 he sold his property with the intention of going to Texas, but instead purchased 160 acres of wild land in St. Francis Township, 100 acres of which he now has under excellent cultivation, furnished with good buildings and orchards. He devotes the most of his land to general farming, and raises cotton, corn, and the smaller grains, the land yielding a good average. He is trying to improve his stock and is going to cross his cattle with Jersey. In 1872, in partnership with his brother, C. D. Pruet, he opened a general store on his brother’s farm, and they carried on an extensive business for many years. In 1862 he and two brothers, with several brothers-in-law, enlisted in the Twenty-fifth Arkansas Infantry, but he served only seven months, when he was discharged on account of illness, at Georgetown, Ky. In 1870 Mrs. Pruet died, and for several years Mr. Pruet resided with his brother. In 1877 he married Frances Owens, who was born in West Tennessee, though reared in Arkansas, to which State she was brought by her father, Dr. Owens, who practiced in this vicinity for a number of years, and died from an accidental fall from his horse. Mr. Pruet is an active worker in church and school matters, and is a member of the Methodist Episcopal Church, South, the building in which he worships being on ground donated by himself; this was erected by means contributed mostly by the Pruet brothers. Mr. Pruet is one of the original members of the first church organized in this section in 1858.