Part 8, Note 34

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Colorado Citizen, January 6, 1876; Index to Abstracts of Lands, Colorado County, Texas, Colorado County Abstracts Collection (Ms. 43), Archives of the Nesbitt Memorial Library. In the newspaper cited above, Stafford was said to have built a $6000 investment into a $200,000 fortune. In 1870, when signing the controversial bond for Sheriff William M. Smith, he had listed his property. Then he owned two tracts of land in Colorado County, one of 420 acres worth $1500 and another of 170 acres worth $1480, plus 800 acres in Gillespie County valued at $800. He also owned a half interest in 10,000 cattle, with his interest valued at $15,000; forty horses worth a total of $1200; and he had "no Debts and . . . several thousand Dollars in cash." His net worth at the time then was at least $20,000, and, depending on how much "several thousand" dollars was, perhaps as much as $40,000. Nonetheless, the 1870 census declares that he owned only $3000 in real estate and $1500 in other assets (see Colorado County Bond and Mortgage Records, Book G, p. 286; Ninth Census of the United States (1870) Colorado County, Texas, Schedule 1).