Henrietta Chamberlain, a Presbyterian preacher's daughter, married rancher Richard King in 1854. She bore him five children at two-year intervals in the late 1850s and early 1860s. The last child, Robert E. Lee King — known as "Lee" — was considered his parents' favorite. "Lee" died in St. Louis of pneumonia in 1883. He was 19. Richard King started drinking his favorite bourbon, "Old Rosebud," heavily after that and Henrietta stayed in St. Louis, perhaps to be away from King in his cups. Some years later she would give strict orders that no liquor could be sold on King Ranch or in the town of Kingsville. During Richard King's Rosebud years, daughter Alice Gertrudis stayed at the ranch to look after her father. King was in bad health in 1885 and the whiskey didn't help his growing stomach pains. Henrietta returned home to persuade him to go to San Antonio for treatment. Before he left the ranch, King's last instructions to his lawyer, James B. Wells, was to keep buying land and never sell a foot of "dear old Santa Gertrudis." King died at the Menger Hotel on April 14, 1885. He was 61. Most of the family was there, by his bedside, along with Mifflin Kenedy, who had just buried his wife Petra. The eulogy of an old trail hand who had worked for King summed up the cattleman: "He was a rough man, but he was a good man. I never knew a rougher man nor a better man."
King left the ranch to Henrietta. He started with 15,000 acres and kept buying land until he owned 614,000 acres. He also left a debt of $500,000. She took over management of the ranch, with the help of Robert J. Kleberg, who would marry Alice Gertrudis King the following year...more
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