The "Old Three Hundred" were 297 grantees who purchased 307 parcels of land from Stephen Fuller Austin in Mexican Texas. Each grantee was head of a household, or, in some cases, a partnership of unmarried men. Austin was an American approved in 1822 by Mexico as an empresario for this effort, after the nation had gained independence from Spain. By 1825 the colony had a population of 1,790, including 443 enslaved African Americans.[1] Because the Americans believed they needed enslaved workers, Austin negotiated with the Mexican government to gain approval, as the new nation was opposed to slavery. Mexico abolished it in 1829.
1833 map of Coahuila and Texas; Austin's Colony is the large pink area in the southeast.
American Moses Austin was authorized as an empresario by Joaquín de Arredondo of Spain to create a colony of Americans in Texas, which was lightly populated, as a bulwark against the native Comanche people. Before this plan could be implemented, Moses Austin died in Missouri in 1821. That same year Mexico gained independence from Spain.[2]:17–18
Stephen F. Austin agreed to carry out his father's plan for a colony. At the end of the summer of 1821, he and a small group of Anglo-American settlers crossed into Texas. Before he reached San Antonio to meet with the governor, the group learned that Mexico had gained its independence from Spain. Texas was now a Mexican province rather than a Spanish one. Governor Martinez assured Austin that the new Mexican government would honor the colonization contract.[3]
Austin returned to Louisiana to recruit settlers. He offered land at 12 cents per acre, which was 10% of what comparable acreage sold for in the United States. The Settlers were required to satisfy four regulations:
They had to improve the land (usually by adding structures), and
They had to cultivate the land within two years, or forfeit it.
Settlers would pay no customs duties for seven years and would not be subject to taxation for ten years. In return, they were expected to become Mexican citizens.[4]
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In March 1822, Austin learned that the new Mexican government had not ratified his father's land grant from Spain. He had to travel to Mexico City, 1,200 miles (1,931km) away, to get permission for his colony.[5] There, he discovered that the Mexican government was dedicated to equal rights for all races and opposed to slavery. (It abolished slavery in 1829.) Austin considered legal slavery critical to the success of his colony, so he spent a year in Mexico City lobbying against anti-slavery legislation. In 1823 he reached a compromise with the government of Agustín de Iturbide to allow slavery in Texas, with restrictions.[2]:20–23
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The 1823 Imperial Colonization Law of Mexico allowed an empresario to receive a land grant within the Mexican province of Texas. The empresario and a commissioner appointed by the governor were authorized to distribute land to settlers and issue titles in the name of the Mexican government. Only one contract was ultimately approved under this legislation: the first contract granted to Stephen F. Austin.[6]
Establishment
Summarize
Perspective
Between 1823 and 1825, Austin granted 297 titles under this contract. Each head of household received a minimum of 177 acres[7] or 4,428 acres[8] depending on whether they intended to farm or raise livestock. The grant could be increased for large families or those wishing to establish a new industry, but the lands would be forfeited if they were not cultivated within two years.[6]
The settlers who received their titles under Stephen's first contract, known today as the Old Three Hundred, made up the first organized, approved group of Anglo-American immigrants from the United States to Texas. The new land titles were located in an area where no Spanish or Mexican settlements had existed. It covered land between the Brazos and the Colorado rivers, from the Gulf Coast to the San Antonio Road.[9] This area had long been occupied by indigenous peoples, however, and they objected to Anglo-American encroachment, resisting with armed conflict. Both Comanche and Apache warriors raided the new colony.
Austin wrote the colony's legal code, including elements to control enslaved African Americans. Any slave who left a plantation without permission was to be tied up and whipped. Considerable fines were to be assessed for any person helping or harboring a runaway slave.[2]:23–24
The capital of this new colony was San Felipe de Austin. This is now known as San Felipe in Austin County.
Growth
When Austin began advertising his colony, he received a great deal of interest. He was selective in his choice of colonists, which set it apart from others of the time. Austin chose settlers who he believed would be appropriately industrious. Overall, Austin chose people who belonged to a higher economic class than most immigrants, and all brought some property with them. All but four of the men could read and write. This relatively high level of literacy had a great influence on the future of the colony. According to historian William C. Davis, because the colonists were literate, they "absorbed and spread the knowledge and news always essential to uniting people to a common purpose".[10]
Although Mexican law required immigrants to be Catholic, most of Austin's settlers were Protestant. Many chafed at being ruled by Catholics. Virtually all were of British ancestry.[1]
One-quarter of the families brought enslaved African Americans with them. Jared Groce brought 90 slaves, having had large plantations in the Southeast.
List
Summarize
Perspective
Lester G. Bugbee in his article "The Old Three Hundred", published in The Quarterly of the Texas State Historical Association (October 1897), identifies the head of each of the Old Three Hundred families who received a land grant in Austin's colony.[11] They were:
wife Elizabeth "Betsy" & children Lydia, Collins, Nepsey, Abel, Edward (Leander), Benjamin; one hired hand, seven servants; horses, mules, cattle, and farming utensils
In 1822, Beason (originally Beeson) began operating a ferry across the Colorado River. Beason also established a gristmill, gin, and a sawmill; his wife operated a boarding house. The settlement became known as Beason's Ferry or Beason's Crossing, later the site of the Texas Army camp under General Sam Houston. Following the Battle of the Alamo, Santa Anna's army headed for San Jacinto, and Sam Houston ordered that Beason's Crossing be burned during the Runaway Scrape. Beason's Crossing was officially renamed Columbus after the population returned In 1837. See Columbus, Texas.
Donated the land on which Bellville was founded in 1846
M. Berry
Isaac Best
1774
1837
Wife Mary Margaret (Wilkins), and some of their nine children.
After spending his early years in Pennsylvania and Kentucky, Best and his wife left Garrard County, Kentucky, and moved to Montgomery County in southern Missouri in 1808. There he built a mill and an outpost known as Best's Fort, which served as a refuge from Indian attacks during the War of 1812. The family and several slaves moved to Texas in 1824. On August 19 of that year, Best received title to a sitio ["site", in Spanish] east of the Brazos River in what is now Waller County. He increased his landholdings and built a home near the site of present Pattison. The 1826 census described Best as a farmer and stock raiser between forty and fifty years of age. His household consisted of his wife, three sons, two daughters, and four slaves. Best may have lived at San Felipe in 1833, when William B. Travis issued a subpoena for him as a witness in a case against Isaac Clower. Best died near Pattison in 1837. On August 21, 1974, the Texas Historical Commission dedicated a marker to him on Farm Road 1458 1½ miles west of Pattison."
Married 3 times. 3rd wife, Jane Mason Wilkins McCormick Duke. 6 children; Mary Francis, Charlotte Jane, Thomoas Marshall, Jr., John Marshall, Stephen Austin, Alice Imogin
Died, Hynes Bay, Refugio County, Texas during the yellow fever epidemic of 1867-Certified by Witnesses: Wm. Andrews, G. Seelingson, F. Hunt. Source: Daily Ranchero, September 1, 1867.
The plot of land now sits in modern Fort Bend County. Fitzgerald died in 1832 and willed the land to his daughter Sarah. She would later sell the entire property to Johnathan Dawson Waters.
Freeman George received 1 sitios land between San Bernard and Bay Prairie (Matagorda County) and 1 labor of land located Brazos East side opposite San Felipe (Waller County). According to the Handbook of Texas Online, he was given a league and a labor of land (see above) which is known as Matagorda and Waller counties on July 7, 1824. Also one of the original patentees in the vicinity of Old Ocean, Texas, in southwestern Brazoria Co.
Historical marker erected at Hodge's Bend Cemetery in Fort Bend County (1975), where Alexander Hodge's grave is located.
Francis Holland
William Holland
Kinchen Holliman
James Hope
C.S. Hudson
George Huff
John Huff
Isaac Hughes
Eli Hunter
Johnson Calhoun Hunter
May 22, 1787
May 29, 1855
Wife: Mary Martha Harbert; Children as of March 1826: Robert Hancock Hunter, John Calhoun Hunter, Harriet Harbert Hunter, Thomas Jefferson Hunter, Thaddeus Warsaw Hunter, Messina Hunter, Martha Hunter
Education: Dr. Johnson Hunter, earned a Medical Diploma around 1805. Dr. Johnson & Martha raised 10 children, four girls and six boys. He received a title to a sitio (roughly 4600 acres where La Porte and Morgan's Point, TX are now located) of land from the Mexican government in 1824. In 1826, he sold Hunter's Point (peninsula between Galveston & San Jacinto Bays, now known as Morgans Point and La Porte and relocated to Fort Bend County, where he built a home that served as a Richmond area landmark for fifty years, currently Pecan Grove.[37] In 1855, a five-acre tract of land was donated by Dr. Johnson Hunter on the R.H. Hunter survey and was called the Frost Institute. The institute was organized by Dr. Johnson Hunters' son-in-law. Frost Institute was located approximately six miles north of Richmond.[38] Dr. Hunter was buried in the family cemetery, known as the Brick Church Graveyard.
His death was recorded as 9 Sept 1833 in the diary of William B. Travis. Pryor's will states he was from Botetourt County, Virginia He disowned his only son Trammell J Pryor.
Elizabeth Thompson, 1 Child- Harriet E. Tong (1817–1884)
Father- William H. Tong (1756–1848) Revolutionary Way Minuteman in Maryland, fought at Bradywine and Germantown with George Washington. William Tong, 2 wives and 26 children
