 After becoming the first white settlers in Walton County, they were soon joined by other relatives and friends, drawn by the fertility of the soil and the unspoiled wilderness.However, by 1832, other white people had moved into the area and were wantonly destroying the wildlife as well as starting forest fires.Both the McLennans and old Chief Story decided to depart for better places; the Chief sent his sons to scout for lands to the east, while many of the McLennans and their kin decided to head west by boat, and became prominent early settlers of what later was named McLennan County, Texas.