David Hill, according to Dr. Woldert, who was raised in Tyler from the age of four in 1849, came to Smith County from Harrison County about 1844, prior to the establishment of Tyler. Hill was a land speculator and a miller. His residence was on the Aaron T. Castlebury survey. He built a grist mill and a cotton gin, using a V-style wooden-screw press, sometime about 1850. In 1856, he built his sawmill about a mile south of the grist and gin operations. The mills were about eighteen miles to the northeast of Tyler and located just east of Glade Branch on the Sabine River.
This saw mill was worth a capital investment of $3,000 as recorded in the 1860 Census. Hill's mill was situated in the Starrville Beat, and he kept ten employees busy at an average monthly wage of $30 each. With raw materials including $1,800 in pine and oak and $400 in other stock, the saw mill produced 500,000 of pine lumber worth $5,000 and 200,000 feet of oak lumber worth $2,500.
Most of his lumber was used in housing construction in Tyler. Woldert believes the mill closed about 1863.