USA > Texas > Border wars of Texas; being an authentic and popular account, in chronological order, of the long and bitter conflict waged between savage Indian tribes and the pioneer settlers of Texas > Part 31
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TEXAS 1834 - 1836 SHOWING COLONIES M.M. KENNEY
-Frank R. Sweeney. 290
2.5 . Longitude West From Washington
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San antonio de Basura
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-OLiberty
Gonzales
Antonio
Guadalupe
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Atascorita Road
Rio Grande
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Colorado
Brazos
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BORDER WARS OF TEXAS.
tudes incident to frontier life, and participated in numerous Indian fights, but this was his most desperate encounter, and when narrating the incident the old veteran always grew serious. It was a life and death struggle, and his call was so close he never jested over the matter.
FATE OF THE GILLELAND FAMILY-CAPTURE AND RESCUE OF MRS. FISHER.
The narrative which follows is one of the most instruct- ive, yet pathetic, in all our Texas history, not only because it is the story of two helpless children, made or- phans by Comanches, the most cruel and bloodthirsty of all the Indian tribes, and who were dragging them to a captivi- ty worse than the fate their parents had just suffered at their hands, but, because the story in its simple, unvar- nished recital throws upon the great white, peaceful canvas of today, a faithful picture of the hardships and dangers of our early pioneers in their efforts to establish homes and civilization in Western Texas. Be it remembered, too, that this tragedy was enacted six years after peace had been won at San Jacinto.
We quote from a letter written by A. B. Hannum, First Lieutenant Matagorda Riflemen:
"In 1841-42 the Mexican Government sent several ma- rauding expeditions into Texas, and in the latter year San Antonio was twice captured and plundered. In the spring of 1842 we were in force on the San Antonio River to repel a Mexican invasion, when news came to us that the Indians had killed a Mr. Gilleland and his wife at or near the Mex- ican village, Don Carlos Ranch. After the massacre they ev- idently moved up the river, holding two little white chil- dren prisoners.
"Gen. Albert Sidney Johnston, then in command of the military, and in camp near the scene of the tragedy, called for ten men, well mounted, to reconnoiter. With Gen- eral Johnston we proceeded about one mile below the town, where I found and pointed out to him
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BORDER WARS OF TEXAS,
an Indian trail leading into the river bottom. Here, after dis- mounting and making coffee, Gen. Johnston returned to the command, leaving me in charge of half a dozen men and fif- teen scouts under Captain Price, who had joined us. We soon discovered the trail of the Indians and were in hot pursuit. There were Dr. A. T. Axsom, distinguished after- wards as president of the Board of Health of New Orleans; Colonel Kerr, purser of the Texas navy; Dallam, author of the Digest of Texas Statutes, still an authority, also author of the novel, 'The Lone Star.'
"Two miles away in camp were our noble ex-President, M. B. Lamar, and the hero of Shiloh, Albert Sidney John- ston, and not far from the site of Fannin's massacre.
"The Comanches scattered and our yelling men followed, making it impossible for them to escape. After clearing the timber, they formed in line to receive us, while a tall old chief ran up and down the line playing the flute. They had evidently counted us and intended to give battle.
"Firing commenced when a gay Indian on a finely ca- parisoned horse presented too fair a picture to be resisted, and I fired at him; he dropped from the horse, one he had captured the day before, and and all took to the woods. We fastened our horses to the trees and pursued, thinking to give them fight in regular Indian fashion, but they never rallied, and left guns, feathers, shields and horses behind. We rescued the prisoners, a little boy, lanced in the side, and a pretty little girl with long, golden curls and eyes so soft, so mystic; she was one of the politest little things on earth. The little boy, bleeding at every gasp, was given water. Dr. Axsom lay pale on the ground. 'What is the matter, Ax- som ?' 'Oh, that child's wound makes me sick.' The case of the healing of the wound of that little boy, William M. Gilleland, was published in the New Orleans Medical Journal by Dr. Axsom.
"The little girl was, when I saw her in 1886, one of the handsomest of the very handsome women for which Texas is justly distinguished, and she, Mrs. Rebecca J. Fisher, a veritable queen of society.
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BORDER WARS OF TEXAS.
"The Gilleland children were taken just as the sun was setting, and were rescued the next morning, the Indians trav- eling all the time until overtaken by the riflemen.
"General Johnston was in command, and carried Rebecca the little girl, from the Carlos Ranch to the home of a Pres- byterian minister, Dr. Blain, in Victoria. The boy was left behind under Dr. Axsom's nursing and my directions."
STORY OF THE HEROINE.
Mrs. Fisher, who here tells her terrible experience, is at present (1912) living in Austin. Her story further illus- trates the dangers of frontier life in early Texas:
"My parents, Johnstone and Mary Barbour Gilleland, were living in Pennsylvaina, surrounded with everything to make life pleasant, when they became so enthusiastic over the encouraging reports from Texas that they concluded to join the excited throng and wend their way to this, the sup- posed 'Eldorado of the West.' They hastily and at great sacrifice, sold their home near Philadelphia, and set sail for Galveston with their three children. Not being used to the hardships and privations of frontier life, they were ill prepared for the trials which awaited them. I know not the date of their arrival. They moved to Refugio county, near Don Carlos Ranch, which proved to be their last earthly habitation.
"My father belonged to Captain Tomlinson's company for some months, and when not in active warfare was engaged in protecting his own and other familes, removing them from place to place for safety. They frequently had to flee through blinding storms, cold and hungry, to escape In- dians and Mexicans. The whole country was in a state of excitement. Families were in constant danger and had to be ready at any moment to flee for their lives.
"The day my parents were murdered was one of those days which youth and old age so much enjoy. It was in strange constrast to the tragedy at its close. We were only a few rods from the house. Suddenly the warwhoop of the
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Comanche burst upon our cars, sending terror to all hearts. My father, in trying to reach the house for weapons, was shot down, and near him my mother, clinging to her child- ren and praying for God to spare them, was also murdered. As she pressed us to her heart we were baptized in her pre- cious blood. We were torn from her dying embrace and hurried off into captivity, the chief's wife dragging me to her horse and clinging to me with a tenacious grip. She was at first savage and vicious looking, but for some cause her wicked nature soon relaxed, and folding me in her arms, she gently smoothed back my hair, indicating that she was very proud of her suffering victim. A white man, with all the cruel instinets of the savage, was with them. Several times they threatened to cut off our hands and feet if we did not stop crying. Then the woman, in savage tones and gestures would scold, and they would cease their cruel threats. We were captured just as the sun was setting and were rescued the next morning.
"During the few hours we were prisoners the Indians never stopped. Slowly and stealthily they pushed their way through the settlement to avoid detection, and just as they halted for the first time the soldiers suddenly came upon them and firing commenced. As the battle raged the Indi- ans were forced to take flight. Thereupon, they pierced my little brother through the body, and striking me with some sharp instrument on the side of the head, they left us for dead, but we soon recovered sufficiently to find ourselves alone in the dark, dense forest, wounded and covered with blood.
"Having been taught to ask God for all things, we prayed to our Heavenly Father to take care of us and direct us out of that lonely place. I lifted my wounded brother, so faint and so weak, and we soon came to the edge of a lange prairie, when as far away as our swimming eyes could see, we discovered a company of horsemen. Supposing them to be Indians, frightened beyond expression, and trembling under my heavy burden, I rushed back with him into the woods, and hid behind some thick bushes. But those brave men, on
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the alert, dashing from place to place, at last discovered us. Soon we heard the elatter of horses' hoofs and the voices of our rescuers calling us by name, assuring us that they were our friends who had come to take care of us. Lifting the almost unconscious little sufferer, I carried him out to them as best I could. With all the tenderness of women, their eyes suffused with tears, those good men naised us to their saddles and hurried off to camp, where we received every attention and kindness that man could bestow.
"I was seven years of age when my parents were mur- dered. Sixty odd years have passed since then, and yet my heart grows faint as the awful time passes in review. It is indelibly stamped upon memory's page and photographed so deeply upon my heart that time with all its changes can never erase it."
LAST RAID INTO ANDERSON COUNTY.
In the year 1843, a party of Indians, about ten in num- ber, made their last hostile raid in the territory embracing what is now Anderson county. "We called it Burnet county at that time," says pioneer Capt. Wm. R. Russell of Har- per, Texas, who supplies these facts:
"In the neighborhood where my father and family lived. near Mound Prairie, they stole some horses and killed and butchered a very fat ox, belonging to David Roberts. Tak- ing the greater part of the flesh of the ox, they left in a westward direction. My father, Col. Lewis M. Russell, head- ed a party of citizens and followed them. They crossed the Trinity River, and on the bank of the river on the west side, the Indians stopped and pulled off the shoes from the horses and cut notches in the front of the horses' feet, so that they would make a track resembling the track of a buf- falo. The Indians moved on westward about two miles, and stopped to barbecue their beef. The scouts sighted the In- dians at the head of a ravine that led into the river, the ravine being completely enveloped with a thick jungle of brush, briers and vines. The scouts charged on them, but the
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Indians made good their escape down the ravine. The scouts captured all their horses and returned home without firing - again."
CAPTURE OF THE SIMPSON CHILDREN.
A widow named Simpson lived at Austin. Among other children she had a girl, Emma, aged about' fourteen years, and a boy, Thomas, about twelve years of age. During the summer of 1844, about 4 o'clock one afternoon, these child- ren went to drive up the cows, They were on the dry branch, near where Maj. C. L. West's residence now stands, when their mother heard them scream. She required no ex- planation of the cause; she knew at once that the Indians had captured her darlings. Sorrowing, and almost heart-bro- ken, she rushed to the more thickly settled part of the town to implore citizens to turn out and endeavor to recover her children. A party of men were goon in the saddle and on the trail.
They discovered that the savages were on foot-four in number-and were moving in the timber, parallel to the riv- er and up it. They found on the trail shreds of the girl's dress, yet it was difficult to follow the footsteps of the fleeing red men. From a hill they descried the Indians just before they entered the ravine below Mount Bonnell. The whites moved at a run, but they failed to overtake the barbarians. A piece of an undergarment was certain evi- dence that the captors had passed over Mount Barker. The rocky surface of the ground precluded the possibility of fast trailing, and almost the possibility of trailing at all. Every conceivable effort was made to track the Indians, and all proved unavailing. They were loath to return to Austin to inform the grief-stricken mother her loved ones were indeed the prisoners of savages, and would be subject to all the brutal cruelties and outrages of a captivity a thousand times more terrible than the pangs of death. The scene which en- sued when the dread news reached Mrs. Simpson's ears can not be pictured with pen or pencil No science, nor art,
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nor device known to man could compass such an underfak- ing. The wail of agony and despair rent the air, and tears of sympathy were wrung from the frontiersmen who never quailed when danger came in its most fearful form.
In about one year Thomas Simpson was restored to his mother. He had been purchased from the Indians by a trader at Taos, New Mexico. From him many particulars of the capture were obtained. He said his sister fought the In- dians all the time. They carried her by force, dragging her frequently, tore her clothing and handled her roughly. Thomas was led by two Indians. He offered no resistance, knowing he would be killed if the did.
When the Indians discovered they were being followed, they doubled, coming back rather in the direction of Austin. They made a short halt not far from Hon. John Hancock's place. Thomas begged his sister not to resist, and told her such a course would eause her to be put' to death. She was eventually separated from him. When the Indians who had her in charge rejoined their companions, young Simpson saw his sister's scalp dangling from a warrior's belt. No one will ever know the details of the bloody deed. But a knowledge of Indian customs justifies the belief that the sacrifice of an innocent life involved incidents of a more revolting character than mere murder. In the course of time the bones of the unfortunate girl were found near the place where Mr. George Davis erected his residence, and to that extent corroborat- ed the account of Thomas Simpson.
It is no difficult matter to conceive what were the im- pressions produced upon parents then living in Austin by this event. It is easy to imagine how vivid the conviction must have been that their sons and daughters might become the victims of similar misfortunes, sufferings and outrages. Let the reader extend the idea, and include the whole fron- tier of Texas in a scope extending, as it then did, from Red River to the Rio Grande, a sinuous line upon the outer tiers of settlements, and including a large extent of the Gulf coast. Let him remember that the country was then so sparcely populated it was quite all frontier, and open to in-
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cursions of the merciless tribes who made war upon women and children, and flourished the tomahawk and the scalp- ing knife in the bedrooms and the boudoirs, as well as in the forests, and upon the bosom of the prairie. When he shall have done this, he can form an approximate conception of the privations and perils endured by the pioneers who re- claimed Texas from the dominion of the Indian, and made it the abode of civilized men.
BRUTAL MURDER OF CAPT. KEMPER AND PERILOUS ESCAPE OF HIS FAMILY.
The reader has already learned in the opening chapters of this work, much of the troubles of the early settlers with the ferocious tribe of Caranchua Indians, and of their final expulsion and fate. The last notable hostile act of this tribe was the murder of Capt. John Frederick Kemper, at his ranch home, "Kemper's Bluff," on the Guadalupe River, in Victoria county. This hardy pioneer was a native of Kentucky, but came from Tennessee to Texas in 1836, having been previously united in marriage to Miss Eliza Miller, daughter of Col. Miller, who brought volunteers to the Texas army three separate times-the first as early as the year 1835. Capt. Kemper was in command of an artil- lery company in Colonel Miller's regiment. The command was made prisoners of war at Copano, immediately after Fan- nin's disastrous battle of the Calito; were separated and spared from the inhuman massacre perpetrated a few days afterwards.
Captain Kemper settled at Kemper's Bluff in 1845. At the time of his death the family consisted of himself, wife and two children, Amanda Jane, aged three years, and James, aged five months. Mrs. Miller was also present, on & visit with her daughter.
The killing of Capt. Kemper by the Caranchuas oc- curred in November, 1845. About 3 o'clock in the afternoon the milch eows were seen running to the pen, pursued by a party of Indians. Captain Kemper, gun in hand, stepped
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outside the house and motioned them to desisti; their only reply was a volley of arrows, one of which took effect, striking the captain in the shoulder, back of the collar bone and passing out beneath the shoulder blade. He re-entered the house, Mrs. Miller pulling the arrow out of the wound, and expired in a few minutes. The Indians came about the house, not venturing, however, in front of the only door. Mrs. Kemper fired a gun at them once through a crack be- tween the logs, but was ignorant as to the effect of the dis- charge. About dark the red devils procured a quantity of dry moss, which they placed under the floor and fired. Mrs. Kemper raised a plank and Mrs. Miller extinguished the flames by pouring on them a pail of water. They then left the house, and with the timber for a guide, proceeded to the residence of Mr. Alonzo Bass, on the Calito, about twelve miles distant, arriving at 3 o'clock in the morning. Their mournful flight was through a dark, rainy night-and later accompanied by a fierce norther. The party that went down the next day to inter the remains of Capt. Kemper, found the house robbed of all articles esteemed of value by the sav- ages. Feather beds were emptied of their contents and the crockery was all broken. Upon their departure, the fiends laid a brand of fire upon the breast of their victim, the sig- nificance of which is left to the elucidation of those more conversant with the lore of the aborigines.
The venerable Colonel Miller died at Victoria, Feb. 16, 1862. Mrs. Kemper resided but a short time at Kemper's Bluff after her husband's death. Amanda J. was married to Mr. David F. Williams in Victoria, Nov. 4, 1868.
THE LATER COLONIES AND FRONTIER EXPANSION.
Elsewhere we have briefly noticed the early colony grants to Austin, Edwards, De Witt, Robertson, and others, which were in force and building during the period of Mex- ican domination over American Texas-1822 to 1836. The promotion and carrying out of these contracts by the en- terprising empresarios, of course, resulted in the more rapid
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settlement of the country and the expansion of its fron- tiers.
After the revolution and the establishment of independ- ence, quite a ude of emigration flowed into the new and famed Lone Star Republic, and many daring and adventurous spirits drifted in, and fearlessly abode at! San Antonio, Cor- pus Christi, and at other points along the exposed frontier- along and up the Colorado and the Brazos, and even to Red River on the fearfully exposed northern boundary. But during the first half of the Republic's ten years existence no regular colony contracts of any consequence were made. On Feb. 4, 1841, however, an act was passed authorizing the President to enter into contracts for the colonization of wild lands in Northwest and Southwest Texas-the act be- ing amended, with more liberal and encouraging conditions, on Jan. 1, 1843.
'Under this law, as originally enacted, President Lamar, on Aug. 30, 1841, entered into the contract for what became known as the famous Peter's Colony, in North Texas. The east line of this grant ran from the mouth of Big Mineral Creek, in Grayson county, due south, passing about ten miles east of Dallas, to a point in the eastern part of Ellis coun- ty, and thence west and north to Red River, embracing a large district of the best lands in North Texas. "Begin- ning in 1842," says John Henry Brown, "it was rapidly set- tled, chiefly by farmers from Missouri, Illinois, Indiana, Kentucky, Tennessee, and other states. It has developed in the fifty years, (Brown wrote twenty years ago. The in- crease in population and strides of progress during this pe- riod has been even greater than the preceding half centu- ry), despite bloody Indian wars, the Civil War and the ca- lamities following, into the wealthiest and most populous portion of the State, in which are comprehended the whole or large parts of the counties of Grayson, Collin, Dallas, Cooke, Montague, Wise, Parker and several others on the west. "'
The inducement offered to settlers in this colony was
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a headright of 640 acres to the heads of families, and 320 acres to each single man-the company receiving its pay in liberal premium lands lying further west. In the sequel to this volume-"Texas Frontier History"-the trials endured and the dangers encountered and combatted by these brave settlers in defense of their homes, as well as the similar troubles of colonists in other of the later settlements, along the expanding frontier, will be fully noted.
The Mercer Colony, attempted about this time - the grant covering the territory now embraced in Kaufman and some adjoining counties-was not at first successful. But the enterprise at least served to augment the Peters set- tlements, where most of Mereer's colonists re-settled.
About the time that the Peters Colony was gotten un- der headway, another important, and finally prosperous, settlement, known as the Castro Colony, was commenced in the southwestern part of the Republic. Henri de Castro was a wealthy, highly enlightened and noble Frenchman. On January 15, 1842, he contracted with President Houston for settling a colony of his countrymen and others in the fertile prairies west of the Medina River. At great expense -more than $150,000-for ship transportation (at different times and in all, 37 ships were chartered) and conveyance overland, Castro brought over and settled during the period of his eight years contract, over 5,000 immigrants, "farm- ers, orchardists, and vine-growers, chiefly from the Rhenish provinces." These people he sustained and fed at his own expense till they could prepare homes and lands and raise food crops, and get a foothold in the new country, whither they had so confidently followed their benefactor and noble leader; and whose prototype is found only in his predeces- sor, the great empresario, Austin. Space prevents a narra- tion of the troubles of these colonists during the first years -harassed, as they were, by both Indians and Mexicans -and but for the constant vigilance of Capt. Jack Hays and his brave rangers, who so faithfully patrolled that ex- posed section, they must have failed and perished.
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Speaking of Hays and his rangers during this period, the noble old Franco-Texan empresario, Henry Castro, says:
"T take this occasion to do justice to Captain Jack Hays and his noble company. They were equal to any emer- gency, but such a company can, in my opinion, only be com- pared to the old Musketeers of Louis XIV, who represented the chivalrous gentleman soldiers of France. Hays and his men represented the true and chivalrous, disinterested Amer- ican gentleman soldier, who at all times was ready to shed the last drop of his blood for his country and the protection of the feeble."
At every opportunity the Indians harassed these ex- posed colonists, and from the time they set foot on land and began their journey overland, and mostly afoot, to their wild prairie homes, they were beset with dangers. "In the rear of one of their first emigrating parties, the Indians forty miles below San Antonio, attacked and burned a wag- on. The driver, an American, rifle in hand, reached a thick- et, and killed several of the Indians; but they killed a boy of nineteen-a Frenchman-and cutting off his head, nailed it to a tree. In the burnt wagon was a trunk containing a considerable amount of gold and silver. In the ashes the sil- ver was found melted, the gold only blackened."*
The founding and sustainng of the Castro Colony in that remote and exposed section was indeed a bold step. John Henry Brown says: "He confronted dangers unknown to the first American colonists in 1822, for besides hostile savages, now accustomed to the use of firearms, it challenged inroads from the whole Rio Grande Mexican frontier, which in 1822, furnished friends and not enemies to foreign settle- ments in Texas.
An interesting volume could be written descriptive of the efforts of Henry Castro to settle his colony, then ex- posed to the attacks of bandit and guerilla Mexicans, but a little tto its west, and to all the hostile Indians north and west of his proposed settlement. It was an achievement
* Brown's History of Texas.
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entitling the name of Castro to be enrolled among the most prominent pioneers of civilization in modern times. ... Yet the youth of today, joyously and peacefully galloping over the beautiful hills and valleys he rescued from savagery, are largely ignorant of his great services.
The contract entered into by President Houston with Fisher and Miller, for what became known as the German Colony, and which grant covered the beautiful mountain sections drained by the Perdenales, Llano, San Saba and the lower Conchos, after passing to the management of "The German Immigration Company," also proved success- ful-though perhaps fraught with more dangers and tribula- tions than that of any other of the later colony enterprises.
A large number of industrious settlers were introduced between 1844 and 1848, who followed the pursuits of stock raising and farming, and eventually triumphed over the hos- tile savages who domiciled, as it were, in their very midst, infesting every valley and mountain. But the fierce con- fliets of these brave German pioneers hardly come within the period of time alloted, to this volume.
Thus was the spirit of emigration again set in motion, and continued, wth increasing volume and energy.
THE REPUBLIC OF TEXAS IS NO MORE.
And now we have arrived at that period in Texas histo- ry which marks the close of the Lone Star Republic, and with it we shall conclude the present compendium of bor- der annals, having closely followed the doings of the brave pioneers from the day of their first advent under Austin; during the uncertain colonial period and on down through the dark years of the Republic, constantly struggling for an existence, and fighting the common foes, both Indians and Mexicans, till they finally triumphed, and won a great state to American civilization, commerce and education. Of the further affairs of Texas as a State and of' her contin- ued struggle with the red men for mastery and frontier ex-
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pansion, the reader will be told in a second volume, ander the title-"Texas Frontier History."
Of the fortunes of the Lone Star Republic, it may be said that for nearly ten years it proudly claimed an exist- ence, and struggled forward in financial straits and under all sorts of most adverse circumstances, as one of the inde- pendent nations of the world. Nothing but the wise and careful councilings of her statesmen, chief among whom was the great Sam Houston, and the determined valor of pa- triotic and fearless defenders in the mighty contest all along her extended and exposed borders, saved and upheld the young nation-a feat that astonished mankind, and is well reckoned as one of the anomalies of the world's histo- ry. A vast empire reclaimed from a wilderness of savagery, and wrested from a grasping and populous nation; and then held against both Mexican and Indian claimants. All this, too, by a mere handful of fearless pioneers-that bold little body of buckskin-clad and poorly fed border troopers and dashing rangers, in their constant strife and bold, wonderful exploits-the like of which the world has never before or since witnessed.
The history of every state in the American Union is tinged with the life's blood of their early settlers' and pio- neers in their struggles for possession over and against the red men. In no land or country was this strife waged with more bitterness and cruelty, and bloodthirsty stubborn- ness than in our own Texas; beginning, as it did, in the open ing chapter of its pioneer history, and carried on with re- lentless and determined fury, as it was, for more than half a century-ending only in recent times.
Referring to internal affairs and the condition of Tex- as with regard to her Indian foes at the time of annexa- iton, and her ability to cope with this foe, Garrison ("Tex- as," p. 271-2) says: "It was possible for the United States to protect the State from invasion, but Texas had an enemy that was practically within, her gates, with whom it was much more difficult to deal. This was the Indian. The tribes inside the limits of the State on the north made fre- quent raids into the country south of Red River and were
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very troublesome. Of course, the most annoying Indians, now as of old, were the Comanches, along the western fron- tier, who liked especially to kill and scalp Mexicans, but were willing on occasion to accept a Texas victim. The in- terior was protected with tolerable effectiveness from their ravages by the advance line off settlements, yet at no little cost to the settlers themselves. They were the brave hand with which the deadly blows of savagery must be re- ceived and warded off. The State employed its ranger force to good advantage, but it was difficult to prevent or anticipate an Indian, raid, and the line of exposure was sev- eral hundred miles in length." 1
The circumstances invited the application of the system of colonizing the Indians on reservations, and in 1855, the State having set apart the necessary lands, most of the Tex- as tribes were induced to locate on reservations under the protection and.supervision of agents-one on the upper Braz- os and ome on its tributary known als Salt Fork.
In regard to affairs and conditions of the Republic dur- ing the adminstraton of President Anson Jones-Dec. 9th, 1844, to Feb. 19th, 1846- Historian Wooton says: "During that period there was but one Congress, the Ninth, which met in regular session the first Monday in December, 1844, and adjourned February 3, 1845, and again convened in spe- cial session on June 16, which continued until June 24. Aside from the usual legislation necessary to perfect the laws and run the government, there was no incident of spe- cial importance in the acts of the Ninth Congress. The country was at peace, both at home and abroad; the popu- lation was rapidly increasing, there was the prospect of ear- ly annexation, to the kindred states of the north, and the finances were so improved that the Republic's paper was at par, while there was a cash balance in the treasury suffi- cient to operate the government for two years without a dol- lar of additional receipts."
The destiny of the giant Republic of the Lone Star was foreordained, as it were, however, and its people earnestly sought union with the land of freedom-preferring the flow- er of statehood tol the pompous-sounding title of republic.
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The bill introduced for the annexation of Texas to the Unit- ed States, having received the approval of the House of Representatives, February 25, and a favorable majority vote having obtained on March 1, 1845, the measure was signed i-being one of the very last official acts of President John Tyler-and Feb. 19, 1846, Texas became a State.
The dream of the Austins had come to pass; Sam Hous- ton had realized his far-planned hopes and won immortal fame; the matchless pioneers had triumphed; a vast domain had been established in the far and wild southwest; its po- sition well defined and ably maintained, till voluntarily sur- rendered and added to the galaxy of states to continue in growth, progress and grandeur, forever most resplendent. The deed was one of great moment, and it thrills, as one reflects - stands in vivid imagination with the vast throng assembled on that memorable occasion, listening to the silvery ringing and swelling oratory of Anson Jones, the out-going and last President of the Republic of Texas, as he delivered his valedictory, concluding with the signifi- cant but solemn utterance : "The final act in the great drama is now performed. The Republic of Texas is no more."
THE END.
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