Also known as “Charlie.” See also Weeks Family.

The 1870 Census has a Charles C. Weeks listed as married to Marguerite Weeks, who is the “Maggie” in the Weeks Family correspondence; the same census record lists “Dora” as their daughter, and Dora is referred to in some of Maggie’s correspondence as a daughter who was badly burned by an accident with fire in 1863. The census also lists an eldest son “John,” who is also mentioned in Maggie’s correspondence. Other evidence suggests her name may be spelled “Margaret Ann Glassell.” Their son may be William Glassell Weeks. The 1870 census indicates they were back in Iberia Parish by then.

During the Civil War

In May 1863, Charlie was still near Mansfield uncertain what to do, but his sister Harriet Weeks predicted then that he would soon follow her to the “wheat country” in Texas.¹

During the war, he appears to have received—or believed he had received—a contract from the Confederate government to haul supplies. In February 1864, he wrote to his step-father John C. Moore from Walker County, Texas, that he had “done well I think in coming to Texas,” having hired his slaves to “Skaggs men” at $50 per month for men, $25 per month for women, and $25 per month for boys. He was confident, too, that “labor will be higher, when cotton picking commences.” Weeks had also had his carts converted into wagons, because the government had offered him $10 a day for a wagon team and driver, “with all expenses paid.”² Maggie (who had remained in Louisiana at a Mr. Glassell’s place near Mansfield) was less pleased with the arrangement, describing his “experience of Texas life” as “rather hard,” and adding that “his turning a regular wagoner is very bad.”³

Weeks partially agreed that the arrangement was neither completely voluntary or ideal, as his wagon would have been “pressed” if he had declined. But now he had the opportunity to haul “salt, sugar, or whatever I choose” on his own account, while his mules would be fed by the government. His job was to haul clothing manufactured in the state penitentiary in Huntsville.⁴

By April, the entire deal, which was now described as a “verbal contract” with a Col. Spring, appears to have fallen through, and C. C. Weeks made separate arrangements to haul bacon to Moscow for the Commissary Department. While on his way, though, three of his enslaved wagon drivers ran away, taking three mules. Weeks hired white drivers and proceeded to Moscow and then to see his family near Mansfield, learning there that one of the men had been captured and put in jail.⁵

Not long thereafter, Weeks’s fortunes worsened when he was stopped in Shreveport and put in the army.⁶ As late as August, John Moore was still trying to get an exemption for Weeks, using his influence with the governor.⁷ Meanwhile, family correspondence suggests that Weeks’s financial affairs deteriorated in late 1864, and he wrote his sister-in-law from Wood Park on July 4 that “coming to this poverty-stricken country last year, & supporting my negroes in idleness, has used me up.” Although his slaves were “now hired at good prices,” he feared that “Dr. Smith,” who was attending them, would keep the hire money and leave Charlie in debt. Meanwhile, Charlie groused, “the vile animals runaway,” including two who had run away from Charlie to William F. Weeks’s camp at Gentry Station, where Charlie later “had them pickled.”⁸ A letter from Maggie to Judge Moore confessed that she wasn’t sure that she would be able to “pay the tax upon all of the negroes” with the “little jewelry and silver I have” and asked for financial assistance.⁹ A later letter informed Moore that Charlie had been “acting as overseer for Bud,” who was still planning to leave for a trip to Mexico around November 1.¹⁰

Shortly after this letter, however, William reported to John C. Moore that he was worried about “the negroes of C. C. W.” not having enough provisions and had advised Weeks to hire them out, which he thought could be done at about $100 per annum. “From what I can learn,” Weeks wrote, “his family presently want for the necessaries of life,” Charlie had “expended a large sum to get provisions. They are so high that he gets very little for a large amt of money.” Weeks had advised Charlie to go back to Louisiana and bring his family “to my place in Walker County where there is a good house within 12 miles of where Ally will live next year,” and where William could promise to supply them with provisions.¹¹