USA > Texas > The history and geography of Texas as told in county names > Part 14
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In 1839 he was appointed to act with a commissioner from the United States to adjust the eastern boundary line between that country and Texas, and concluded a treaty in the same
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year. During President Houston's second term as President he was appointed Inspector General of the Army. In 1842 he was Adjutant General in the Somervell Expedition. In 1846 he enlisted in the Mexican War; was tendered a position on the staff of General Henderson, but failing health compelled him to return to Texas in 1846. After annexation he retired from public life and devoted his energies to recuperating his fortune which he had sacrificed for Texas. He had expended $28,000 in cash and personally obligated himself for $5,000 more, and in the interim had sacrificed his planting interests in Miss- issippi. The Legislature of Texas, without a dissenting vote, allowed his claim and paid it in lands, and he thus became a large land-owner, but unsettled as it was, it was of little value. In 1850 he was married to Annie Taliaferro Howard of Gal- veston. He obtained the first charter for a railroad from Red River through Central Texas, to the coast and devoted the re- mainder of his life to this enterprise. He served one term in the Legislature (1852), and in 1853 was appointed commis- sioner to represent the United States in adjusting the south- western boundary. He continued actively promoting his rail- way enterprise, enlisting capitalists in New Orleans, New York, and Boston, and in 1856, while in New Orleans, he became sud- denly ill and returned to Galveston. Upon the advice of phy- sicians that he seek a higher altitude, he left Galveston for Tennessee, and, gradually growing worse, died at the home of his brother, in Tipton County, in that State, June 5, 1856.
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THE HISTORY AND GEOGRAPHY OF TEXAS
IRION.
Robert Anderson Irion was born in Paris, Tennessee, July 7, 1806, where he was reared and educated until ready for the university. He graduated from Transylvania University, Ken- tucky, in 1826, studied law, and entered upon his profession in his native state. He came to Texas in 1833 and located at Nacogdoches. He was elected a member of the first Senate of the Republic of Texas. In 1837 he was appointed Secre- tary of State in General Houston's Cabinet. After serving out his term, he returned to the practice of law at Nacogdoches. When General Houston was inaugurated the second time, he was tendered the office of Secretary of State, but declined and lived the remainder of his life at Nacogdoches, where he died in 1860.
JACK.
This county was named for William H. and Patrick C. Jack.
Wheeler's History of North Carolina, in giving an account of the adoption of the Mecklenburg Declaration of Independ- ence says :
"It was forwarded to the Continental Congress, at Phila- delphia, by Captain James Jack, and a copy, also, to Samuel Johnson, moderator of the Provincial Congress, at Hillsboro, on August 25, 1775."
After the close of the War of the Revolution, Patrick Jack, son of Captain James Jack, removed to Wilkes County, Geor- gia, and became a prominent citizen of that state, serving as a member of the Legislature, and in 1812 commanding a com- pany in the war with Great Britian.
He reared a family in Wilkes County, Georgia, of whom William H. Jack, Patrick C. Jack, and Spencer H. Jack be- came prominent in the early history of Texas.
William H. Jack was born April 12, 1806, and was reared and educated in Georgia, graduating at the University of that State in 1827. He studied law and removed to Tuscaloosa, Ala., and began the practice of law in 1828. In the following
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AS TOLD IN COUNTY NAMES
year he was elected a member of the Legislature of Alabama. In 1830 he removed to Texas and located at San Felipe and be- gan the practice of law. In 1832 his brother, Patrick C. Jack, and others, having been imprisoned at Anahuac by the Mexi- can authorities, he organized a party for their release, which was accomplished later. He was the author of the famous "Turtle Bayou Resolutions." In 1835 he joined the Army of the Republic, taking part in the principal campaigns and per- formed his last military service as a private soldier at the battle of San Jacinto. Shortly afterward he was appointed Secretary of State in Burnets' Cabinet and served as such un- til October, 1836. During that time he was elected a mem- ber of the lower house of the First Congress. He was after- ward a member of the Senate of the Seventh and Eighth Con- gresses, and was Chairman of the Judiciary Committee. He died of yellow fever at Galveston, August 24, 1844.
Patrick C. Jack, brother of William H., came to Texas in 1832 after having located and practiced law for three years in Jefferson County, Alabama. Upon his arrival in Texas he lo- cated first at Anahuac and later at San Felipe and began the practice of law. For protesting against the arbitrary conduct of Bradburn, Mexican commander at Aanhuac, he was imprisoned, but was soon released, as above mentioned. At the beginning of the revolution, in 1835, he promptly volunteered and command- ed a company at the storming of Bexar. In December, he was elected a member of the lower house of the Second Congress of the Republic (1838-1839) and in 1841 was appointed Dis- trict Judge of the Sixth District, in which position he served until he was stricken with yellow fever in Houston, where he died August 4, 1844.
As these sketches are restricted to men for whom counties have been named, we can do no more than to merely mention Spencer H. Jack, a no less distinguished member of the family, and Thomas M. Jack, son of William H. Jack, the princely gen- tleman and scholar, the erudite lawyer and finished orator, the gallant soldier and genial gentleman beloved of all who came within the sphere of his magnetism.
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THE HISTORY AND GEOGRAPHY OF TEXAS
JONES.
Dr. Anson Jones, last President of the Republic of Texas, was born at Great Barrington, Mass., on the 20th day of Feb- ruary, 1789. He was licensed to practice medicine in 1820, and after several years in the practice went to Venezuela. In 1833 he came to Tex- as and settled in Brazoria; he joined Captain R. J. Calder's company as a private. Later he was made surgeon of the Second Regiment, and in that ca- pacity served at the battle of San Ja- cinto, leaving his medical post long enough to take part in the battle as a private. In 1836 he represented Bra- zoria in the Texas Congress. In 1838 he was appointed Minister to the United States, and while absent was elected to the Senate; in 1842 was made Secretary of State by President Houston, and at the close of his term was elected President of the Republic. His last remarks in the ceremonies attendant upon the change of Texas from a Republic to a State of the Union are justly regarded as one of the finest specimens of Texas oratory. After an- nexation he retired to his country home, and for eleven years remained in private life. In 1857 his friends brought him for- ward for the United States Senate, but he was defeated, and on the 7th of January, 1858, he commited suicide by shooting himself at the old Capitol Hotel in Houston.
KAUFMAN.
David Spangler Kaufman, in whose honor this county was named, was born at Boiling Springs, Pennsylvania, December, 1812. He attended the common school there, entered Prince- ton College and graduated in 1833. He then moved to Natchez, Mississippi and there studied law and was admitted to the bar. He then located at Nachitoches, Louisiana, and began the practice of his profession. In 1837 he moved to Nacogdoches, Texas, and in 1838 was elected to the lower house of the Texas
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Congress and served in 1839-40-1-2 and 1843, and in the Sen- ate of the Texas Congress from 1843, up to annexation. He was chosen Speaker of the lower house in 1839 and again chosen in 1840. In 1845 he was appointed Charge D' Affairs at Wash- ington. He moved to Lowe's Ferry on the Sabine in that year. At the first election for members of the United States Con- gress he was chosen to represent the eastern district of Texas, re-elected in 1847 and 1849, and on the 31st of January, 1851, died and was buried in Washington. He was a lawyer of ex- ceptional ability, especially gifted as an orator. During the debate on the Cherokee Land Bill, a measure championed by Sam Houston, then a member of the Texas Congress, Kaufman represented the opposition with conspicuous ability and later in the lower house of the United States Congress he won his laurels in the debates on the Compromise Measures of 1850.
LAMAR.
Mirabeau B. Lamar, second President of the Republic of Texas, was born in Louisville, Georgia, August 16, 1798. In early life he was the private secretary of Governor Troupe; in 1835 he visited Texas and de- clared his intention of becoming a citizen. He returned to Georgia to make his arrangements. Hear- ing that the revolution had begun, he hurried back to Texas. He reached the army encamped on the Brazos; enlisted as a private; was in the battle of San Jacinto, and was especially commended for gallantry by General Houston. Soon after the battle he was in- vited to President Burnet's Cab- inet and made Secretary of War. At the first election he was chosen Vice President of the Republic, and at the second election was chosen President to succeed General Houston and served two years. In 1847 he was made Post Commander at Laredo. In
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THE HISTORY AND GEOGRAPHY OF TEXAS
1851 he was married to Miss Maffitt, sister of the celebrated Con- federate Naval Commander, and settled in Fort Bend County on his plantation. In 1859 he was appointed as Minister to Argentine Republic, but his health failing, he returned home and died, December 19, 1859, and was buried at Richmond, Texas.
RAINS.
This county was named for Emory Rains, a native of War- ren County, Tennessee, where he was born May 4, 1800. He came to Texas in 1826 and settled in Red River (Lamar) Coun- ty. Later having located in Shelby County, he represented Shelby and Sabine Counties in the Senate of the Republic dur- ing the Second Congress in 1837 and in the Constitutional Con- vention of 1845. After annexation he represented Shelby Coun- ty in the Legislature and held several minor offices. He died March 4, 1878, in the county that bears his name.
VAN ZANDT.
Isaac Van Zandt, in whose honor this county was named, was born July 10, 1813, in Franklin County, Tennessee. He was the son of Jacob and Mary (Isaac) Van Zandt. His father was the youngest son of Jacob Van Zandt, who, about the year 1800, moved from North Carolina to Tennessee and settled in Franklin County. His ma- ternal grandfather, Samuel Isaac, moved from South Carolina, to Lincoln, an ad- joining county, about the same time. Both grand- fathers were soldiers in the Revolutionary War, Isaac having been one of Marion's men. Isaac Van Zandt's early education was only such as was af- forded by the country schools, ill health interferring with this much of the time, but his fondness for reading good books
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largely compensated his lack of school work. He early became a member of the Primitive Baptist Church and so continued through life.
At the age of twenty he married Francis Cook Lipscomb, a cousin of Judge Lipscomb, of the Supreme Court of Texas. About this time he began merchandising with his father at Salem, a nearby village. His father soon afterwards died and the business was closed.
He then converted all his holdings into money, went North and purchased goods, and began merchandizing at Coffeeville, Mississippi. It was during the "flush times" in Mississippi, and he went down in the general financial crash.
In 1838 he started for Texas, but did not arrive until late in 1839, having spent most of the time at Camp Sabine, an abandoned military post, where he was ill most of the time. He made a brief trip into Texas and returned with the news that he had been offered two hundred dollars by a Mr. Shoe- maker to settle up some business for him. He then (December 1839) moved his family into Texas, and after going into an unfinished log-house he later purchased a place near Elysian Fields in Harrison County. He lived here until his appoint- ment as Minister to Washington. After his return to Texas he took up his abode at Marshall, which town he helped to lay out in 1842. He was licensed to practice law in 1840. In this year, while yet not entitled to vote, he became candidate for Congress and was elected by two-thirds majority over his op- ponent, and while a member of that body opposed Houston's "Cherokee Land Bill." He was re-elected to Congress the next year. In 1842, although only twenty-nine years old, he was appointed by President Houston Minister Plenipotentiary to the United States and made the trip to Washington, by private con- veyance. He spent the greater part of 1842 and 1843 in Wash- ington. It was during this stay in Washington, that he, in company with J. Pinckney Henderson, had frequent conferences with John C. Calhoun, the result of which was a treaty of an- nexation which was rejected by the United States Senate; in 1844 he was on the Princeton with President Tyler and party when the bursting of a gun killed Mr. Upshur and Mr. Gil-
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THE HISTORY AND GEOGRAPHY OF TEXAS
mer, members of Tyler's Cabinet. He returned to Texas in 1844 and was elected to the Constitutional Convention of 1845 and led the forces in favor of inserting the "Homestead Clause" in the Constitution. After this he resumed the practice of law, and in 1847 was a candidate for Governor, but it was not his to complete the race, as death ended his career before the election. He died of yellow fever at Houston, October 11, 1847, at the age of thirty-four years three months and one day. At his death his family consisted of his wife and five children. This family circle continued unbroken for sixty-one years, un- til the death of his widow, April 8, 1909, at the advanced age of nine-three years.
WILSON.
James C. Wilson was born in England in 1816. He was a man of superior education and intelligence. He came to Texas in 1837 and located in Brazoria County. When General Woll made his raid into Texas, capturing San Antonio and a number of prominent citizens, a proclamation was issued, calling for troops, and Wilson joined the company of Captain Reese from Brazoria. Following the fortunes of his company, which was in the Mier Expedition, he was made a prisoner and marched to Mexico City. He made his escape from prison, returned to Texas, and in 1844 was elected District Clerk of Brazoria Coun- ty. He held this office until after annexation, when he remov- ed to Matagorda County, which he represented in the Senate of Texas. In 1856 he was appointed Commissioner of Claims. At the end of his term he joined the itinerant ministry of the Methodist Episcopal Church and died at Gonzales in 1861.
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AS TOLD IN COUNTY NAMES
WOOD.
This county was named for George T. Wood, who was born in Georgia in 1815, and came to Texas in 1838, locating in Liberty County. He engaged in planting and performed some service as a ranger. He represented Liberty in 1841 and 1842 in the Con- gress of the Republic, and was later commissioned Brigadier General of the militia. At the beginning of the Mexi- can War he enlisted and was made Col- onel of a regiment that participated in General Taylor's campaign. After the war was over, he returned to Texas and represented his district in the State Senate. In 1847 he was elected Gov- ernor of the State, but held the office only one term, having been defeated by P. Hansborough Bell in 1849. He then retired to private life and died in the part of Liberty County now embraced in San Jacinto County in 1856.
13
CHAPTER X.
THE EARLY JURISTS OF TEXAS.
The lawyer of this generation who is familiar with the sys- tem of jurisprudence that has been developed from its incep- tion in 1836 cannot fail to be impressed with the preeminent ability of the lawyers and judges whose constructive genius laid the foundation so deep and broad and withal so much in harmony with those principles of justice and good practical judgment that must forever remain their most enduring mon- ument. Of those who have been commemorated in County names are :
Brewster
Gray
Hutchinson
Oldham
Collingsworth
Hansford
Lipscomb
Roberts
Dallam
Hartley
Mills
Webb
Donley
Hemphill
Ochiltree Wheeler
Franklin
BREWSTER.
Henry Percy Brewster was born in Laurens District, South Carolina, November 22, 1816. At the age of nineteen, while on a visit to Alabama, he heard of the fall of the Alamo and the massacre at Goliad. He hurriedly made his way to New Orleans and embarked in a vessel for Texas. He arrived at Velasco in the early spring of 1836 and proceeded to the head- quarters of the Texas army and enlisted as a private in Cap -- tain Briscoe's Company and was made private secretary to General Houston, participating in the battle of San Jacinto, April 21. He accompanied the General to New Orleans in May and, returning to Texas in August, was made Secretary of War in Burnet's Cabinet. After retiring from that position, and just as he arrived at the age of twenty, he began the prac- tice of law at Brazoria and from the outset was recognized as a most brilliant and thorough young lawyer. In 1840 he was appointed District Attorney. After holding that office un- til 1843, he resigned and resumed his practice and immediate- ly went to the forefront of his profession, and eschewed po- litical preferment. He was engaged in much of the most im-
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portant litigation in the State of the succeeding ten years. In 1846 he was Attorney General of Texas, succeeding J. W. Harris. In 1855 he moved to Washington and continued the practice of law there until the breaking out of the Civil War, when he returned to Texas and was appointed Adjutant General and chief of staff to Albert Sidney Johnston and was near him when he was killed at Shiloh. Later he was on special duty in the Confederate Army, mainly with General Hood. When peace came, he returned to Texas and resumed the practice of law at San Antonio and continued until 1883, when he ac- cepted the appointment to the office of Commissioner of In- surance, Statistics, and History tendered by Governor Ireland, and was in the active discharge of his duties, when on the 17th day of November, 1884, he was stricken with paralysis and died. By special request before death, his body was carried to Galveston, taken out to sea and buried in the waters of the Gulf.
COLLINSWORTH.
This county was named for James T. Collinsworth, first Chief Justice of the Republic of Texas, who was born in Tenn- essee in 1804. He was educated in the common schools, studied law and began the practice 1826. From 1830 to 1834 he was United States District Attorney in Tennes- see and at the expiration of his term came to Texas and located in Mata- gorda. He was a member of the con- stitutional convention of 1836 and a signer of the Texas Declaration of Independence. President Burnet ap- pointed him one of the Commission- ers to the United States, and upon the organization of the judiciary sys- tem of the Republic of Texas, in 1837, Collingsworth was ap- pointed Chief Justice. He became a candidate for the Pres- idency of Texas in 1838 and during the canvass was drowned in Galveston Bay. The historians differ as to the manner of his death, some alleging that he committed suicide by jump-
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THE HISTORY AND GEOGRAPHY OF TEXAS
ing from a steamer, but others alleging that it was accidental drowning.
DALLAM.
This county was named for James W. Dallam, who was born in the city of Baltimore on the 24th day of September, 1818. He was educated at Brown University, Rhode Island and later studied law under Reverdy Johnson in Baltimore. In 1839 he removed to Matagorda, Texas, went to Washington, D. C., in 1844, and there complied Dallam's Digest of the decisions of the Supreme Court of the Republic of Texas, which were pub- lished in 1845. In the fall of that year he returned to Mata- gorda and married the daughter of S. Rhoads Fisher. In 1847 he was induced to undertake the establishment of a newspaper in Indianola; he went to New Orleans to make arrangements for its publication and was there stricken with yellow fever, of which he died, August 20, 1847.
DONLEY.
Stockton P. Donley was born in Howard County, Missouri, May 27, 1821. He was educated at Transylvania University, Kentucky, and came from there to Texas in 1846, locating at Clarksville, in Red River County. In 1853 he was elected District Attorney. In 1860 he removed to Tyler and in 1861 enlisted as a private in Gregg's Regi- ment; was promoted to a Lieutenancy for gallantry at Fort Donaldson; was captured there, was exchanged and, finding that his health would no longer permit him to serve in the field, return- ed to Tyler, and resumed the practice of law. In 1866 he was elected to the supreme bench, but was superseded in 1867 by the military. He resumed the practice of law in partnership with Judge Roberts, and died in Kaufman,
Texas, February 17, 1871.
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FRANKLIN.
Franklin County was named for Hon. Benjamin C. Franklin, who was born in Georgia, April 25, 1805, and was educated at Franklin College, Athens, Georgia. He was admitted to the bar in 1827 and began the practice of law at Macon, Georgia. He removed to Texas in April, 1835, and immediately joined a com- pany in pursuit of Indians. Later he enlisted as a priv- ate in Captain Calder's Company and was in the campaign from Gonzales to San Jacinto, in which lat- ter engagement he partici- pated. After the war he was appointed District
Judge of the Republic, served three years, and in
1840 retired from the bench and located in Galveston and entered the active practice of his profession. He represented Galveston in the Legisla- ture for four years. At the beginning of the Civil War, be- ing physically unfitted and too old for military service, he retired to his farm in Montgomery County, where he remain- ed until 1870, when he returned to Galveston. He died De- cember 25, 1873, just after being elected to the State Senate.
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THE HISTORY AND GEOGRAPHY OF TEXAS
GRAY.
Peter W. Gray was born at Fredericksburg, Virginia, April 10, 1819, and removed with his father's family in 1837 to Hous- ton, Texas, where he was reared and educated. In 1846 he was a member of the First Legisla- ture of the State and later serv- ed many years as District Judge of the South Texas District. He was elected a member of the Confederate Congress and serv- ed throughout the Civil War. After the close of the war he re- turned to Houston and began the practice of law, and in a few years built up one of the largest practices in the South. In 1874 he was appointed to the supreme bench, but he resigned on account of feeble health. He died in Houston, October 3, 1874. He was a scholar and highly cultured gentleman and a patron of letters; it was largely due to his financial and other aid that Mr. Yoakum was enabled to complete his excellent history of Texas.
HANSFORD.
Judge John M. Hansford came to Texas in 1837 and settled near Jonesville (Scottsville), in what is now Harrison County, and took a leading part in the politics of that section. In 1838 he was elected to the lower house of the Congress of Texas from Shelby County and was chosen Speaker of that body. On Jan. 31, 1840, he was appointed Judge of the Seventh Judicial Dis- trict of Texas and served in that capacity until Jan. 19, 1842, when he resigned. The "Regulator-Moderator War" was at its height during this period in that section, and Judge Hans- ford was not entirely able to steer his way clear through the warring factions. At one time he abandoned his court be- cause of the strength of the assembled mob. Articles of im-
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peachment were at one time preferred against him, but to solve all difficulties he resigned his office and the articles were with- drawn.
After leaving the bench, he retired to his farm near Jones- ville. In 1844, while he and his wife were absent, attending church one Sunday morning, a mob took possession of his place and demanded possession of some slaves he was holding un- der a writ of sequestration. Upon his refusal to comply with their demand he was shot and killed in the presence of his wife.
HARTLEY.
Oliver Cromwell Hartley was born in Bedford County, Penn- sylvania, March 31, 1823, and was educated in that state at Franklin and Marshall College, from which he graduated in 1841, with the added honor of being the valedictorian of his class. He studied law and was admitted to the bar in 1844. In 1846 he came to Texas, landing at Galveston. He volun- teered as a private in the Mexican War and was later made a Lieutenant, but he was disabled in the summer of 1846 and returned to Galveston and began the practice of law. He then prepared a brief digest of the statutes of Texas, beginning the work in 1848, and in 1850 the Legislature subscribed for one thousand and five hundred copies. He was elected to the Leg- islature in 1851, and in that year was appointed reporter to the Supreme Court and held the office until his death in Gal- veston on the 13th day of January, 1859. In addition to his work as reporter he was, in 1854, appointed one of a commis- sion of three to codify the laws of Texas.
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