“Memorial and Biographical History of Dallas County,” published:  
Chicago;  The Lewis Publishing Company, 1892.

R.A. ROBERTS, M.D.,  Dallas county, was born in Cleveland county, North 
Carolina, February 25, 1837, a son of Thomas J. Roberts, a native of the 
same county.  His grandfather, Colonel John M. Roberts, was a 
Revolutionary soldier, and a native of Virginia.  R.A. Roberts received a 
liberal academic education at Shelby, North Carolina, and afterward entered 
the collegiate department of the Furman University at Greenville, South 
Carolina, and graduated in the class of 1857, receiving the degree of A.B.  
He then began the study of medicine under the preceptorship of Dr. Thomas 
Williams, of Shelby, North Carolina, and then took his first course of 
lectures in the Medical College at Charleston, South Carolina, in the session 
of 1857-'58.’ He continued the study of medicine under Dr. Williams in 
connection with his practice until the fall of 1858, when he entered the 
Jefferson Medical College of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, and after a full 
course and thorough examination he graduated in the class of March, 1859.  
Dr. Roberts then located in Marion district, South Carolina, where he had a 
successful practice until the fall of 1859, after which he became dissatisfied, 
having become afflicted with the Western fever, or, more properly termed, 
the Texas fever.  He came by way of Memphis, Tennessee, up the Red River 
to Shreveport, Louisiana, and then by private conveyance to Dallas, Texas, 
arriving November 1, 1859.  Dallas was then a small and uninviting place, 
and Dr. Roberts concluded to locate in Cedar Hill, but there being no 
unoccupied houses he was obliged to buy one in which to winter.  When the 
spring opened it found two very much dissatisfied persons, and he and his 
wife then started out in a buggy to look over middle Texas, going through 
Ellis, Navarro and Limestone counties, down to the terminus of the Houston 
& Texas Central railroad, and over into Washington county.  But not liking 
any of the country, they concluded to remain at Cedar Hill for a year or two, 
and then return to South Carolina.  Having brought some slaves with him, 
Dr. Roberts decided to buy a farm two miles south of Cedar Hill, and a 
number of stock horses and cattle.

About the time he was getting ready to return to South Carolina the Civil 
war commenced, and he countermanded all arrangements in that direction, 
and in the spring of  1862 he volunteered as a private in Company B, 
Nineteenth Texas Cavalry, but was soon selected as Company Surgeon for 
Company B.  After going into Arkansas with the Nineteenth Texas Cavalry, 
which became one of Parsons’ Brigade, he met with Surgeon J.Hunter 
Berrien, Chief Surgeon on the staff of General E.Kirby Smith, who was 
commanding the Trans-Mississippi department, with headquarters at Little 
Rock.  Dr. Berrien was graduated at the same medical college as Dr. 
Roberts, and he told the latter he would send up an application for him for 
Assistant Surgeon of the Confederacy.  The application in due time returned 
from Richmond approved, and he was ordered to be examined by the 
medical examining board of the Trans-Mississippi department located at 
Shreveport, Louisiana.  His examination was entirely satisfactory and Dr. 
Roberts was then put on duty in the Blockley hospital at Little Rock, where 
he remained until 1863, and by request was then ordered to report to General 
Henry E. McCulloch, commander of the Northern sub-district of Texas, at 
Bonham, where he was placed on duty as Examining Surgeon.  Dr. Roberts 
also acted as Post Surgeon, and in the spring or early summer he was 
ordered to report for duty to General Magruder at Houston, and directly to 
Major General John Ireland, now ex-Governor, in the southern district of 
Texas; was next put on duty as Post Surgeon at Fort De Bray on Matagorda 
Island in command of Major John A. Vernon; and in the spring or summer 
of 1864 was ordered to report to General N.H. Darnell, in command of the 
port of Dallas.  Dr. Roberts was then put on duty as Post Surgeon of Dallas 
and also in charge of the hospital of this city, where he remained until the 
surrender in April, 1865.

Taking the oath of allegiance and returning home, he again went into the 
private practice of medicine.  He and his wife were still dissatisfied with 
Texas, and having a desire to return to the old State east of the Mississippi 
river, he traded his farm for horses and mules, took all the stock he had left 
from the ravages of the war, and started for Louisiana and Arkansas, in order 
to sell them to get means to accomplish his journey.  But he found the 
farmers with no means to buy the stock and returned with them to Texas, 
turned them out on the prairie, and went into the active practice of medicine.  
He bought out Dr. R.L.Sullivan, located again at Cedar Hill, Dallas county, 
Texas, and bid adieu to all desires to return to the Carolinas.  He has since 
built up a large and successful practice in this county and surrounding 
country, and in due course of time the country improved, and his landed 
possessions also increased.  The Grand Central & Santa Fe railroad had 
decided to go somewhere through this section, and Dr. Roberts gave said 
railroad as an inducement to pass through where it now is located a free right 
of way for about one mile, plenty of switch room, land for depot purposes, 
and every other block of land in the railroad addition, and the road accepted 
the proposition and built the depot where it now stands.  Dr. Roberts has 
ever been a true and tried Democrat, and was a delegate from Dallas county 
to the first Democratic State Convention after the Edmond J. Davis 
administration, convening at Galveston, to nominate the State ticket.

He was married in 1859, to Miss R.E. Croft, of South Carolina, and they 
have five sons and two daughters living and one son deceased:  William A., 
Charles D., Duncan B., Robert Lee, Joshua L., deceased, Mollie A., now 
Mrs. Newland, Thomas D., and Jessie May.  Dr. Roberts is still living in 
Cedar Hill, following his profession, but is gradually retiring from active 
practice, in connection with his son, Dr. C.D. Roberts.  He has practiced 
medicine in this community about thirty-two years.  He has never had 
political aspirations, but has been a quiet citizen, and he and his wife have 
been consistent members of the Missionary Baptist Church at Cedar Hill for 
many years.

Submitted by: L. Pingel