Biographies Archives - The Siege of Béxar Descendants

Castoñon, Luis Zertuche

May 21, 2023 by tcloud Leave a Comment

Luis Zertuche Castañon was born on March 18, 1820, to Jesus Castañon, a soldier stationed in Bexar, and Guadalupe Zertuche Castañon. According to 1830 census records, Luis spent his early years at San Jose Mission in San Antonio playing alongside his brother Pedro and sister Maria. Other siblings would come later. By age thirteen he had moved to Laredo, TX, but two years later he was back in Bexar and in the middle of the Texas Revolution! He was recruited by and served under the well known Captain Juan Seguin. Along with the rest of Seguin’s Company, Luis participated in the Siege of Bexar in the fall of 1835.

By February, Luis was behind the Alamo walls awaiting the arrival of General Santa Anna. Now under the command of Lt. Salvador Flores, Luis, along with the rest of Flores’s company received orders to leave the Alamo and provide the rear guard to the retreating families escaping Bexar, an event that would come to be known as the Runaway Scrape. The company would provide protection to those families and secure the ranches south of San Antonio. They were to escort the families and provide protection all the way to the Lavaca River and camp at Williamson Daniels where they remained anxiously awaiting orders to attack Sesma’s troops who had reached the nearby Colorado River. The order from Houston was instead to wait.

He continued to fight for the citizens of Texas serving as a spy under Deaf Smith. In 1841 he became a Texas Ranger serving under Captain Antonio Perez. He would ride with such notable Rangers as Captain Jack Hayes and Captain Henry Karnes.

Luis married Rumalda Garcia in 1852, and the two moved to Rossville, Texas. He once again served, this time in the Civil War in an Atascosa County Cavalry unit led by 1st Lt. Joseph A. Durand.

He died in Rossville on October 26,1899 and is buried at the Rossville Cemetery beside his wife and several of his children.

Austin, William Tennant

May 12, 2020 by tcloud Leave a Comment

William Tennant Austin, soldier and civil servant of the Republic of Texas, was born on January 30, 1809, in Bridgeport, Connecticut, the son of Susan (Rogers) and John Punderson Austin.

On December 12, 1830 Stephen F. Austin had located land on Buffalo Bayou for William, who had established a mercantile trade before the end of the month. In 1832 William was wounded in the battle of Velasco, and in 1833 his wife, child, and brother all died in a cholera epidemic. Later that year the Brazos River flooded and washed away his store.

At Harrisburg on June 4, 1835, William Austin, along with William B. Travis, signed a document protesting the Mexican enforcement of customs duties and other restrictions at Anahuac and pledged himself to overthrow Mexican authority there. As an early member of the so called war party, he joined William H. Wharton and several other citizens of the Columbia District on July 25, 1835, in calling for a general convention of all Texans. On August 15 he was appointed secretary of a meeting at Columbia, at the mouth of the Brazos, which established a committee of safety for the district and on August 20 called for a General Consultation. When Mexican general Martín Perfecto de Cos and 400 soldiers landed at Copano to suppress resistance to Antonio López de Santa Anna’s Centralist government, Austin and Branch T. Archer called for volunteers to resist him with force. On October 2, 1835, Austin and nine other volunteers, including James W. Fannin, Jr., George Sutherland, and Archer, left Columbia to reinforce the Texan insurrectionists at Gonzales, thus becoming part of the nucleus of the army with which Gen. Stephen F. Austin and Col. Edward Burleson besieged Bexar that fall and winter. On October 12 General Austin commissioned William Austin a colonel and appointed him as one of his two aides-de-camp, the other being Peter W. Grayson. When Stephen Austin left the army to become the spokesman for the Texan cause in Washington, D.C., William Austin continued his duties as aide to the new commander, Edward Burleson. In their official reports on the storming of Bexar, both Burleson and adjutant general Francis W. Johnson commended Austin; Burleson observed to Governor Henry Smith that Austin’s “conduct on this and every other occasion, merits my warmest praise.” On March 14, 1836, Sam Houston appointed Austin his aide-de-camp with the rank of major and ordered him to Columbia to requisition artillery and horses for the army.

After the war Austin, who had married Elizabeth Bertrand on January 25, 1836, returned to his Brazoria County plantation. There in 1837 he was elected clerk of the Brazoria county court and, on January 21, 1838, was appointed collector of revenue for the port of Velasco. In 1840 he was a resident of Brazoria County, but by 1848 he had moved to Washington-on-the-Brazos, where he was once again a merchant. In 1854 he was in Galveston as a commission merchant and cotton factor. During the Civil War Austin served as Confederate marshal for East Texas and was appointed a brigadier general of state troops. He was a Democrat, a Mason, and an Episcopalian. He died at Galveston on February 25, 1874.

Handbook of Texas Online, “AUSTIN, WILLIAM TENNANT“

Obituary

Death of Col. Wm. T. Austin.
The Galveston Daily News (Galveston, Texas), Thursday, Feb. 26, 1874, Page 1

ONE OF THE VETERANS OF THE TEXAS REVOLUTION.

Colonel William Tennant Austin, another of the veterans of the Texas Revolution, died at his residence in this city yesterday morning.

Colonel Austin was born in the city of Bridgeport, Connecticut, on the thirtieth of January, 1809. His father, John P. Austin, was a man of prominence in his day, having graduated at Yale College with high honors.

After the war of 1812, the family located at Norwich, Connecticut, from which place William F. Austin (sic) emigrated to Texas in 1828 with a family consisting of a wife and one child, and became a member of Stephen F. Austin’s colony. He was successfully engaged in mercantile business until about the year 1833, when the overflow of the Brazos destroyed his goods and improvements.

In 1834 he joined the volunteer army of Texas and was attached to the military family of General Stephen F. Austin, Commander-in-Chief, as aid-de-camp. At the battle of San Antonio de Bexar, December, 1835, he served as aid-de-camp on the staff of General Edward Burleson, and on the fourteenth of March, 1836, was complimented by General Saml Houston by being assigned to duty as aid-de-camp, a position which was resigned during the following May. Nothing of special importance in the shape of military operations occurring in Texas after that time, Col. Austin located with his family in Brazoria County, on a plantation, and made continual practice of joining Indian expeditions and scouting parties on our frontiers, so long as that sort of service was necessary.

As a staff officer, Col. Austin ranked high, as may be inferred by his assignment to duty with the most distinguished of the Texan leaders. At San Antonio Bexar, at San Jacinto, and on other important battle-fields, he conducted himself with such gallantry as to challenge the admiration of his comrades, and elicit honorable mention from his superior officers. Although Col. Austin has never figured prominently upon the political stage, he has always taken a lively interest in public affairs, and his name has frequently been mentioned in connection with official positions. At the time of his death he was President of one of the Democratic ward clubs, and, notwithstanding his age, was a prompt attendant at the meetings of the same.

Upon the organization of the Agricultural and Industrial Association, of this city, he was elected Secretary, the duties of which office he continued to discharge up to the commencement of his fatal illness. The funeral of the deceased will take place from Masonic Hall this afternoon at three o’clock. All members of the fraternity, and friends, are invited to attend.

Lewis, Martin Baty

March 21, 2018 by tcloud 1 Comment

Martin Baty Lewis (1806–1884), soldier and county official, was born in Clark County, Indiana, on January 13, 1806, the eldest son of Sally (Lemasters) and Samuel S. Lewis, who also served at the Siege of Bexar. He married Nancy Moore 1825 in Indiana and they had eleven children.

He emigrated to Texas in January 1830, with his family following in March 1832. He settled first on Ayish Bayou in what is now San Augustine County. They then moved to Indian Creek near Bevil’s Settlement in what is now Jasper County. His league of land is located on the east bank of the Angelina River, adjoining William Jourdan on the north and his father, Col. Samuel S. Lewis on the west.

In August 1832 Lewis was a sergeant major in the battalion commanded by James Whitis Bullock, and he participated in the battle of Nacogdoches. In November and December 1835 he was captain of a company of East Texas volunteers that took part in the Siege of Bexar. In July 1836, when a Mexican incursion into Texas by Gen. José Urrea was feared, Lewis raised a company of Jasper volunteers and marched to join the Army of the Republic of Texas on the Coleto. He resigned this command in August 1836.

Lewis served as county surveyor of Jasper County from its organization in 1836 until 1845. In 1844 he was also chief justice of Jasper County. In 1845 he patented title to 2,958 acres of land in Jasper County. Lewis Ferry on the Neches River is believed to have been named for him. He also presided over the organization of Newton County when it and Jasper were divided. He ordered Newton County’s first elections.

In 1847 he was a sergeant in the Texas Cavalry under Capt Veatch & Lt. Col. Bell in the Mexican-American War. He left Texas for California for the gold rush of 1849, and in 1863 he settled at Millertown, Fresno County, California where he served as surveyor and a judge. In 1851 he served as an Adjutant with the Mariposa Battalion under the command of Maj. James Savage, and took part in the discovery of Yosemite National Park.

He died March 1884 in Madera County, California.

Lewis, Martin B. – Handbook of Texas Online
Lewis’ Ferry – Handbook of Texas Online
Martin B Lewis (Sergeant)
LTC Martin Baty Lewis, Sr – findagrave.com

Bull, Pleasant Marshall

March 8, 2018 by tcloud 1 Comment

Pleasant Marshall Bull was born Feb. 18, 1808 in Grainger County Tennessee to John Valentine Bull and Fetna Bean. He came to Texas to acquire land, arriving in 1831 and settling in Brazoria, Austin Colony.

He was a veteran of the Battle of Concepcion and the Battle of Bexar and is on the muster roll of the Siege of Bexar in Capt. John York’s company.

He was en route to San Jacinto when he fell ill. He was taken by wagon to his fiance, Marion Alsbury, the daughter of Thomas Alsbury, one of Austin’s Old Three Hundred settlers. They boarded a ship at Galveston bound for New Orleans, perhaps to seek medical help, but he died April 24, 1836, shortly after the Battle of San Jacinto and was buried at sea in Galveston Bay.

He never married and had no children. Pleasant’s family moved to Texas in 1853 to claim his bounty.

Moore, Col. John Henry

July 27, 2017 by tcloud 5 Comments

Colonel Moore was elected Colonel Commandant of the Army of Texas on October 11, 1835 in Gonzales, the same day Stephen F. Austin was elected Commander in Chief and Edward Burleson, Lieutenant Colonel. Moore resigned his office on November 6th in Bexar and Ed Burleson was elected to replace him on November 7th.

MOORE, JOHN HENRY (1800–1880).
See: Handbook of Texas Online

John Henry Moore, one of the Old Three Hundred and a participant in the Texas Revolution, was born in Rome, Tennessee, on August 13, 1800. According to tradition he ran away from college in Tennessee to avoid studying Latin and went to Texas in 1818. His father took him back to Tennessee, after which Moore returned to Texas in 1821 as one of the first settlers on the upper Colorado River. He fought the Indians along the Colorado in 1823 and 1824 and went into partnership with Thomas Gray as one of Stephen F. Austin’s original settlers. Moore and Gray received title to a league and a labor of land now in Brazoria and Colorado counties on August 16, 1824. The census of March 1826 listed Moore as a farmer and stock raiser, aged between twenty-five and forty. He was then a single man with two servants. He married Eliza Cummins, daughter of James Cummins, probably before 1828, when he built a twin blockhouse called Moore’s Fort at the site where La Grange was established on May 17, 1831. Moore lived at La Grange until 1838, when he built a home on his plantation nine miles north of the town. In 1834 he led an expedition against the Waco and Tawakoni Indians on the upper Brazos River, and in July 1835 he organized four companies of volunteers to attack the Tawakonis in Limestone County. In September 1835 he warned of the expected Mexican attack and was so outspoken in favor of Texas independence that he was ordered arrested by Martín Perfecto de Cos. On September 25, 1835, the Committee of Safety at Gonzales asked Moore for reinforcements, and he marched to Gonzales to take command of the Texans in the battle of Gonzales on October 2. He is said to have designed the “Come and Take It” banner (see GONZALES “COME AND TAKE IT” CANNON). He was elected colonel of the volunteer army, and after serving as a member of the council of war called to discuss the best means of protection against the enemy, he was ordered by Austin to organize a cavalry company of the men who had pistols and double-barreled shotguns.

In January 1839 Moore commanded three companies of volunteers in a campaign against the Comanches. When he returned from that campaign he was personally directed by President Sam Houston to raise 200 men to protect San Antonio from both Indian and Mexican attacks. Again in October 1840 he fought the Comanches between the Concho and Colorado rivers and carved his name on the ruins of the old San Sabá Presidio. In March 1842 Moore commanded two companies of volunteers raised in the Fayette County area to assist in driving Mexican raiders under the command of Rafael Vásquez from San Antonio. In July 1842 he was authorized to raise 200 volunteers for the defense of the western frontier. While pursuing Indians who attacked on Cummins Creek in August 1842 Moore became so ill with inflammatory rheumatism that the Telegraph and Texas Register announced his death on August 17, 1842. The report, however, was premature. During the raid of Gen. Adrián Woll on San Antonio during September 1842, Moore again raised a company of volunteers and, serving under the command of Mathew Caldwell, participated in the pursuit of Woll to the Rio Grande. In September 1861 Moore enrolled in Company F, Terry’s Texas Rangers (the Eighth Texas Cavalryqv). Too old to fight, he was appointed to a committee to secure bonds to finance the war. During the Civil War he lost most of his property, much of which was slaves, but he recovered financially before his death. He died on December 2, 1880, though the marker erected at his grave by the Texas Centennial Commission in 1936 gives the date of his death as February 25, 1877. Moore was buried in the family cemetery eight miles north of La Grange.

Weekly return of Col. John H. Moore’s Regiment of Texas Volunteers for the week ending Wednesday 21^st Oct. 1835

Colonel Moore married Eliza Cummins (b: April 23, 1809, d: February 25, 1877), daughter of Judge James Cummins (alcalde at San Felipe de Austin) and Elinor Waller Cummins in Columbus, TX on June 14, 1827. Children:

William Bowen Moore | 1828–1893
Armstead Adam Moore | 1831–1831
Tabitha Bowen Moore | 1832–1895
Eliza Francis Moore | 1837–1896
John Henry Moore, Jr. | 1838–1884
Robert James Moore | 1842–1879
Mary Ereline Moore | 1844-1907

Kevin Coleman wrote:

Colonel Moore’s plantation home and cemetery are located seven miles North of present day La Grange on what used to be our family’s property. A large Spanish hacienda style home that originally served as a hunting lodge was built on the site of Colonel Moore’s own home there on the highest point in Fayette County. My wife and I were married in that house in 1984. Sadly, the place burnt down in early September 2011 in a fire that erupted simultaneously with the big Bastrop fire in 2011. On the wall of the ranch house was what I suspect was the original framed photo of Colonel Moore – the only photo of him I’ve seen used in publication.

Our family spent considerable time maintaining his old cemetery and took great pride in doing it. My mom was responsible (though she is not credited) for locating and raising awareness for Moore’s Fort – Colonel Moore’s twin blockhouse that is now reassembled in Round Top. A few years ago, she donated a downtown lot to the city of La Grange stating that it should be designated as a park acknowledging the history of Fayette County. She asked that it be named in Colonel Moore’s honor and have a statue of him there, but local politics prevailed. The original deed to that property had Colonel Moore’s signature on it.

Though I am not related to Colonel Moore, I feel very close him. I am constantly in search for new information on his exploits. I have an extensive library of books that reference him for mostly his Indian expeditions or the Battle of Gonzales. My goal is to bring his other accomplishments to light.

Kevin B Coleman
Katy, Texas