Samuel Houston was an American politician and soldier who served as the first and third president of the Republic of Texas. He also was the Governor of Texas from 1859 to 1861.
Background
Ethnicity:
Houston's parents were descended from Scottish and Irish immigrants.
Samuel Houston was born on March 2, 1793, in Rockbridge County, Virginia, United States. He was the son of Samuel Houston and Elizabeth Paxton. His father was a member of Morgan's Rifle Brigade and was commissioned as a Major during the American Revolutionary War. Houston had eight siblings.
Education
After Houston's father died in 1807, he and his family went to eastern Tennessee. Houston was made to work as a shop clerk at his older brothers' store. He received less than a year and a half of formal education. In 1809, when farming and clerking proved distasteful to him, he ran away to live with the Cherokee Indians for 3 years. The Cherokee called him "The Raven."
Career
Samuel Houston started his career in 1812 when he founded a one-room schoolhouse in Tennessee and served there as a teacher. However, the same year he enlisted in the 7th Regiment of Infantry to fight the British in the War of 1812. By December of that year, he had risen from private to third lieutenant. While fighting at the Battle of Horseshoe Bend in 1814 he was badly wounded but had his injuries bandaged and rejoined the war. He served under Andrew Jackson who was greatly impressed by Houston's bravery and valor. Following his recovery Houston was assigned as an Indian agent to the Cherokees. However, some differences with John C. Calhoun, the Secretary of War, led to his resignation in 1818. In 1818, Houston began studying law at the office of Judge James Trimble and passed the bar exam; he was appointed as the local prosecutor in Nashville in 1818. Soon he entered politics and in 1822 was elected into the United States House of Representatives for Tennessee. Houston served as a Congressman from 1823 to 1827. In 1829, he opened a trading post in Fort Gibson (nowadays Oklahoma). He represented the Cherokee in dealings with the Federal government twice.
In late 1832 the seventh president President of the United States, Andrew Jackson, sent Houston to deliver peace medals to tribes of western Indians and to negotiate with them. After that he was granted land in Texas. Houston was elected to represent Nacogdoches, Texas, at the Convention of 1833. Later when the revolution began, he was commissioned as the Major General in the Texas Army in 1835. However, the volunteers refused to follow his lead during the winter of 1835, and he spent his time with the Cherokee. Again, in 1836, he was named commander in chief of the Texan forces. On March 6, 1836, Houston signed the Texas Declaration of Independence and on October 22 he became the first president of the Republic of Texas. He held this post until December 10, 1838 and again from December 12, 1841 to December 9, 1844. The United States annexed Texas in 1845 and the next year Samuel Houston became Senator for Texas. He held this post until 1859. In 1859, he was appointed as Governor of Texas, however, in March 1861, Houston was deposed from office for failure to take the oath of allegiance to the Confederacy. In 1862, Houston retired to his farm in Huntsville, Texas. He died on July 26, 1863.
In 1854, Houston, having earlier made a profession of Christian faith, was baptized by the Baptist minister, Rufus C. Burleson.
Politics
Samuel Houston entered politics as a Democratic-Republican Party politician in 1819 and supported Andrew Jackson's candidacy in the 1824 presidential election. When Houston became Governor of Tennessee he advocated the construction of internal improvements, such as canals, and sought to lower the price of land for homesteaders living on public domain. Besides he helped Andrew Jackson with the campaign in the 1828 presidential election. In 1833 Houston was elected to represent Nacogdoches, Texas, and strongly supported the petition of Texas for statehood. He also chaired a committee that drew a proposed state constitution. Later when the Texas Revolution broke out Houston helped organize the Consultation into a provisional government for Texas. He voted for a measure that demanded Texas statehood and the restoration of the 1824 Constitution of Mexico. In 1836, Houston helped to organize the Convention where the Republic of Texas declared independence from Mexico.
When Samuel Houston became President of the Republic of Texas, he entered the Democratic Party, formed a new government and selected Thomas Jefferson Rusk as secretary of war. Besides Houston tried to normalize relations with Mexico and, despite some resistance from the legislature, arranged the release of Santa Anna. He also urged the end of the importation of slaves into Texas and defended Indian rights. As a United States Senator from Texas Houston supported the Oregon Bill in 1848, but opposed the Kansas-Nebraska Act in 1854. He said that a nation divided against itself cannot stand and predicted that Kansas-Nebraska Act would cause a sectional rift in the country that would lead to war. From 1855 to 1856 he was a member of the Know Nothing movement, but after 1856 became a nonpartisan politician. As Governor of Texas he followed conservative policy, seeking annexation to the United States, peace with the Indians and with Mexico, and minimum government spending.
Views
Quotations:
"Texas will again lift its head and stand among the nations. It ought to do so, for no country upon the globe can compare with it in natural advantages."
"Texas has yet to learn submission to any oppression, come from what source it may."
"No tyrant or usurper can ever invade our rights so long as we are united. Let Mr. Lincoln attempt it, and his party will scatter like chaff before the storm of popular indignation which will burst forth from one end of the country to the other. Secession or revolution will not be justified until legal and constitutional means of redress have been tried, and I can not believe that the time will ever come when these will prove inadequate."
"Our people are going to war to perpetuate slavery, but the war will be its death knell."
Personality
Those who knew Sam Houston said that he was tall, friendly man who was both flashy and courageous. He also used to drink a lot, but his wife Margaret Moffette Lea managed to convince him to stop drinking.
In 1839, he purchased a horse which became one of the foundation sires of the American Quarter Horse breed named Copperbottom. He owned the horse until its death in 1860.
Physical Characteristics:
Houston died of pneumonia.
Connections
Sam Houston married Eliza Allen in 1829. Eliza was unhappy with this marriage and left him soon after. In response, Houston resigned his governorship and went to live with the Cherokee in the western part of the Arkansas Territory. He later married Tiana Rogers, a Cherokee woman, in the Arkansas Territory. Their marriage ended when his wife refused to accompany him to Texas.
Sam Houston married Margaret Moffette Lea on May 9, 1840. Their marriage produced eight children. Houston, who had a problem of excessive drinking, finally gave up this habit thanks to his wife.
Sam Houston
In Sam Houston, James L. Haley explores Houston's momentous career and the complex man behind it. Haley's fifteen years of research and writing have produced possibly the most complete, most personal, and most readable Sam Houston biography ever written.
2002
Sam Houston: A Study In Leadership
From Houston's Virginia birthplace to his homes and grave in Huntsville, Texas, from Horseshoe Bend to San Jacinto, Bill O'Neal repeatedly has visited the sites of Sam Houston's life. O'Neal lectured about Houston for more than three decades in Texas history classes at Panola College, and the response to his public lecture on Houston as a leader at the Bob Bullock Museum inspired this book.
2016
Exiled: The Last Days of Sam Houston
Ron Rozelle's masterful biographical portrait here lingers on Houston's final years, especially as lived out in Huntsville, when so much of his life's work seemed on the verge of coming undone. Artfully written for the general reader, Exiled: The Last Days of Sam Houston is a compelling look at Sam Houston's legacy and twilight years.