Holt Collier
Born in 1846 to the Mississippi slave
family of Harrison and Daphne
Collier, Holt was one of probably 11
children. The Colliers were house
servants to the prominent and
influential Howell Hinds family at the
Home Hill Plantation in Jefferson
County. Holt spent his young years
at Home Hill caring for the large
pack of hounds that Hinds would take
on hunts and Holt would sometimes
go along.
When Holt was 10, Howell Hinds took
him to another family property, Plum
Ridge Plantation, to help attend
Hinds’ young son, Thomas. Plum
Ridge, located in Washington County,
was in a rugged wilderness area with
huge stands of giant trees and thick
cane, stinging insects, venomous
snakes, alligators, wolves, panthers
and bears. One of Holt’s primary
duties was to provide meat for the
Plum Ridge plantation workers. He
hunted with a 12-gauge shotgun,
became an excellent marksman and
could shoot equally well from either
shoulder. While still just 10, Holt shot
his first bear.
When the Civil War started Holt
joined the Confederacy to be with his
masters Howell and Thomas Hinds.
He was only 14. He then joined
Company I of the Ninth Texas
Cavalry, was involved in frequent
action and served successfully as a
military spy.
Af
ter the war, Holt became a Texas
cowboy for about one year, but
returned to Mississippi and lived
most of the rest of his life around
W
ashington County and part of the
original Hinds County, named for his
master’s family.
As the years passed, Holt became
well known for his bear-hunting
ability and is credited with killing
over 3,000 bears – more than the
number taken by Daniel Boone and
Davy Crocket put together.
It was the pursuit of black bear that
brought President Theodore
Roosevelt to Mississippi in 1902 and
teamed him together with the then
56-year-old Holt Collier. Holt’s
unsurpassed expertise made the hunt
a success even though the president
would not shoot the large male bear
that Holt single-handedly captured
and tied to a tree. Instead, the
incident was nationally publicized in
editorial cartoons on the front page of
the
W
ashington Post
. An enterprising
New York store owner, Morris
Michtom, saw the cartoon and
created a stuffed toy he called
“T
eddy’s bear.” The popularity of the
stuffed bear lead to the formation of
the Ideal Toy Company. And, when
the Teddy bear turned 100 years old
in 2002, Mississippi named it the
official state toy.
Holt Collier died on August 1, 1936,
at 90 years of age. Holt was buried at
Live Oak Cemetery in Greenville,
Mississippi near the area where he
killed his first bear.
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