In the late 1870s, many Confederate veterans left northeast Texas for the frontier in Comanche, Brown, Lampasas and San Saba counties after the Indian problem was over.The families moved to the less populated frontier in order to avoid the strife caused by Union sympthsizers and Federal authorities in east Texas. Many abandoned their property because of excessive war repraration taxes. In 1879, the settlers purchased cheap public land under Gov. Oran Roberts' "pay as you go" tax reform policy. Confederate and some Union veterans and their families established homesteads on the Texas frontier.

In 1862, Brooks Williams Lee, who settled in Brown County in 1854, enlisted in Col.George Henry Sweet's 15th Texas Cavalry and was later furloughed at Clarksville and returned to Brown County as a Cofederate constription officer and scout for Maj. George B. Erath's Frontier Regiment. He was trained as a scout at a young age in Indian Territory by Jim Ned, a U.S. Army scout. From 1863-until the end of the war, Brooks W. Lee was a scout for Capt. Henry Fossett's Company of the Frontier Regiment. In January 1865, Lee was the first to encounter the Kickapoo Indians 25 miles west of the present city of San Angelo Texas at the disasterous battle of Dove Creek on the Tankersley Ranch.

Brooks and Lee Streets in Brownwood,Texas are named for him. Leonard "Len" Williams, an Indian Agent appointed by Sam Houston, was Brooks W. Lee's uncle. Brooks Lee is buried in the Lee Cemetery on private property which is located at the site of Camp Collier where a detachment of Capt. Henry Fossett's Company of the Frontier Regiment was stationed. The Gen.H.E. McCulloch Camp,SCV has placed a placed marker there.