Dallas History Items: Mayor William L. Cabell

William Cabell was born in Danville, Virginia, January 11, 1827 to Benjamen W.S. and Sarah Epes  Cabell. He graduated from West Point Military Academy in 1850 with the rank of Lieutenant. He resigned from the United States Army in 1861 and was commissioned major in the Confederate Army. After serving in the Army of the Potomac, he was transferred to the Trans-Mississippi Department, serving as brigadier general on the staff of Earl Van Dorn. In the fall of 1862 he was wounded at the battles of Corinth and Hatcher's Bridge in Kansas. In 1864 he was captured in a skirmish near Mine Creek, Kansas, and he remained a prisoner of war until August 28, 1865.

Cabell married Harriet A. Rector in Fort Smith, Arkansas on July 22, 1856, and the couple had seven children. His son Ben Cabell later become a mayor of Dallas. After his release from prison, William Cabell returned to Arkansas, where he studied law and was admitted to the bar in 1868. Gen. Cabell and his family moved to Dallas in 1872. He was elected mayor of Dallas in 1874, 1875, and again in 1877. In 1883 he was elected to another two-year term of office. From 1885 to 1889 he served as United States Marshall for the Northern District of Texas. In 1876, 1884, and 1892 he was a delegate to the Democratic National Convention and in 1890 was elected commander of the Trans-Mississippi Department of United Confederate Veterans. He died in the home of his daughter, Mrs. Katie Muse, on Feb. 22, 1911.

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