Sam Houston's First Home in Texas

Sam Houston made his first permanent Texas home in Nacogdoches after leaving Washington, D.C. in December 1832. A former Tennessee governor and U.S. congressman, he found the town agreeable because of the presence of Tennesseeans and fellow masons Adolphus Sterne and Henry Raguet. Houston boarded with the Sternes, established a law practice, and with their sponsorship was baptized into the Catholic Church, which enabled him to own property under Mexican law. He arrived soon after settlers in Anahuac, Velasco, and Nacogdoches had driven out their Mexican garrisons in the first actions of the Texas Revolution, and he represented Nacogdoches at the Convention of 1833 in San Felipe and at the Consultation of 1835. Though often away during the Texas Revolution and the early republic, he kept close ties to the town, including a lasting friendship with Thomas J. Rusk; the two later served as Texas' first U.S. Senators. In an 1849 affidavit witnessed by Rusk, Houston said he first domiciled in Nacogdoches in February 1833 and continued to declare his residence there, and nowhere else, until 1839.

Nacogdoches, Texas · United States