Merry Christmas fellow Texans and friends of Texas. Today is Sunday, Dec. 21, 2014. • • • • • • =+ -+ -+-+= Jane Long, a historic figure in Texas, gave birth to child in 1821< On Dec. 21, 1821, Jane Herbert Wilkinson Long gave birth to a child on Bolivar Peninsula. Although she was called the Mother of Texas, because of the birth of Mary James Long, she was not the first English-speaking woman to bear a child in Texas. Censuses between 1807 and 1826 reveal a number of children born in Texas to Anglo-American mothers prior to 1821. Born in 1798, in Maryland, Jane Long moved as a child to Mississippi Territory. Jane lived as a teen at a plantation near Natchez, where she met James Long when he was returning from the battle of New Orleans. The couple married on May 14, 1815, and for the next four years lived in the vicinity while James practiced medicine at Port Gibson, experimented with a plantation, and became a merchant in Natchez. When Long left for Nacogdoches in June 1819, Jane and their daughter, Ann Herbert, born on Nov. 26, 1816, remained with a sister, Anne Chesley, a widow, because of advanced pregnancy. Another daughter, Rebecca, died in infancy. About March 1820 James Long took Jane to Bolivar Peninsula on Galveston Bay. She claimed to have dined with Jean Laffite on Galveston Island. Jane Long was not the only woman at Fort Las Casas on the peninsula. Several families remained in the little community surrounding the military post when Long left for La Bahía on Sept. 19, 1821. Instead of returning within a month as promised, Long was captured at San Antonio and taken to Mexico City where he was accidentally killed on April 8, 1822. Pregnant again, Jane stubbornly waited for her husband even when the guard and the other families left Bolivar. She was all alone except for Kian, a black maid, and Ann when she gave birth to her third daughter. Lonely and near starvation, Jane welcomed incoming immigrants heading for the San Jacinto River early in 1822. She abandoned her vigil and joined the Smith family at their camp on Cedar Bayou. By mid-summer she moved farther up the San Jacinto River, where she finally received word that James Long had been killed. She went to San Antonio in September to seek a pension from Gov. José Félix Trespalacios, her husbands former associate. She remained there 10 months without success in her quest, She went to Alexandria and returned to Texas after the death of her youngest child 1824. She was given land in Fort Bend and Waller counties but did not live there, preferring San Felipe until April 1830, when she took Ann to school in Mississippi. They lived with a sister, Anne W. Chesney Miller, until January 1831, when Ann James married Edward Winston, a native of Virginia. The newlyweds and Jane made a leisurely pilgrimage back to Texas, where they arrived in May. Jane bought W.T. Austins boarding house at Brazoria in 1832, which she operated for five years. In 1837, again a widow and age 39, she moved to her land in Fort Bend County and sold a parcel to Robert E. Handy who developed the town of Richmond, the county seat of Fort Bend County. Jane opened another boarding house and also developed a plantation two miles south of town. She bought and sold land, raised cattle and grew cotton with the help of slaves. Her plantation was valued at over $10,000 in 1850. By 1861, she held 19 slaves valued at $13,300 and about 2,000 acres. When the war ended, she continued to work the land with tenants and briefly experimented with sheep. In 1870 she lived by herself next door to Ann who had married James S. Sullivan. Ann died in June, leaving the care of Jane to the grandchildren. By 1877, Jane was unable to manage her diminished estate valued at only $2,000. She died on Dec. 30, 1880, at the home of her grandson, James E. Winston, and is buried in the Morton Cemetery in Richmond. In 1936, a centennial marker was erected in her honor in Fort Bend County. • • • • • • =+ -+ -+-+= George Tyler Wood became second governor of Texas in 1847< On Dec. 21, 1847, George Tyler Wood took office as the second governor of Texas. The Georgia native had fought in the Creek Indian War at the battle of Horseshoe Bend, where he met Sam Houston and Edward Burleson. He moved to Texas in February 1839 and settled on the Trinity River. Wood served in the Texas Senate in 1846 and fought in the Mexican War. He was elected governor in 1847, defeating James Miller, Nicholas Darnell, and Jesse J. Robinson. Woods administration devoted much time to the debt question, frontier defense, and the New Mexico boundary dispute. Wood was defeated by Peter Hansborough Bell in his bid for re-election in the fall of 1849 and died in 1858. He died at his home on Sept. 3, 1858, before it was completed. His wife, mother, and three children are buried near him on the grounds of their first plantation in what became known as Robinson graveyard, near Point Blank. Some disagreement exists over Woods middle name. Early accounts listed it as Tyler, but the monument erected at his grave gives the name as Thomas. Wood County and Woodville, the county seat of Tyler County, are named for him. • • • • • • =+ -+ -+-+= Also on Dec. 21 in Texas: • In 1853, the Texas legislature passed the Mississippi and Pacific Railroad Act, designed to encourage the construction of a southern transcontinental railroad through Texas. The first transcontinental railroad through Texas (and the second in the nation) was not completed until 1881, when the Texas and Pacific and the Southern Pacific met near Sierra Blanca. • In 1861, the state legislature established the Frontier Regiment to patrol west of the line of settlements from the Red River to the Rio Grande for the protection of the Indian frontier of Texas. During the last 18 months of the Civil War the regiment increasingly devoted itself to enforcing Confederate conscription laws, arresting deserters and tracking down renegades and outlaws. • In 1879, James Armstrong, politician and attorney, died of pneumonia. He was born in Kentucky about 1811 and joined the Jasper Volunteers on March 3, 1836. He was later elected to represent Jasper County in the Republic of Texas Congress. He later represented Jefferson from 1839-40. He moved to Williamson County in 1848 and was an attorney and a rancher and served in the Texas Senate. • In 1944, the new Pecos High Bridge in West Texas was opened down river from the original, which for years had been the highest railroad bridge in North America. Construction started in August 1943 at a site 440 feet downstream from the 1892 bridge. The Sunset Limited was the first train to cross when the bridge was opened to mainline traffic on Dec. 21, 1944. The 1944 Pecos High Bridge is still in use, but the rails now stand only about 265 feet above the Pecos River, which has risen because of Amistad Reservoir. • • • • • • Texas History Day-by-Day is compiled by retired newspaper journalist Bob Sonderegger (anglebob61@yahoo). A primary source of information is Handbook of Texas Online. Your comments or additions are welcome.
Posted on: Sun, 21 Dec 2014 11:49:41 +0000