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Show Town of Velasco Has 3 Claims to "Cradle of Texas Liberty" Title - First of Stephen Austin's Colonists Arrived at This "Plymouth Rock" in 1821; It Was the "Concord" Where the First Gun of the Texas Revolution Was Fired in 1832; and the Treaty of Peace Signed Here in 1836 Ended the Struggle for Independence. Western Newspaper Union. Ey ELMO SCOTT WATSON SPEAK of "the cradle of Texas liberty" and the average person immediately thinks of the Alamo, where Davy Crockett and his comrades-in-arms died, or the battlefield of San Jacinto, where Sam Houston triumphed tri-umphed over the Mexican dictator, Santa Anna. Then there's Washington-on-the-Brazos, where the Texan Declaration of Independence was signed on a March day 101 years ago. All of these places, of course, are important landmarks land-marks in the history of the Lone Star state and of the United States as well. But before the "cradle of liberty" title is finally awarded to any one of them, consider the claims of another spot in Texas to some share in, if not a complete right to, that distinction. dis-tinction. Brazoria county, or more specifically, the old town of Velasco at the mouth of the Brazos river is that place. It was at Velasco that the Lively, Live-ly, the first vessel with emigrants for Stephen F. Austin's colony of Americans, arrived on December 21, 1821 exactly 201 years after the arrival of another band of colonists on the "stern and rock-bound rock-bound coast" of New England. Thus Velasco became the "Plymouth "Plym-outh Rock of Texas." It was here on June 26, 1832, that the opening open-ing gun of the Texas revolution was fired, thus baptizing in blood the "Concord of Texas." And it was here on May 14, 1836, that public and secret treaties of peace between the Republic of Texas and Santa Anna were signed, thus bringing to a successful close the Texas struggle for liberty. So it would seem that Brazoria county, and especially Velasco, has an uncommonly good claim to that title of "the cradle of Texas liberty." The arrival of the Lively, the "Maj'flower of Texas," at Velasco in 1821 marked the beginning of Stephen Austin's effort to carry out the plan of his father, Moses Austin, for the colonization col-onization of Texas. During the next 14 years between 25,000 and 30,000 settlers were landed there. In the meantime there had begun the chain of events which would culminate in the revolution against Mexican rule and the establishment of the Republic of Texas. In 1832 Velasco was a Mexican port, garrisoned by about 250 men in a circular fort with a mound of earth, on which artillery artil-lery was mounted, in the center. It was also an important port with several vessels plying between be-tween it and New Orleans. Among these vessels was the Sabine. Up to this year no duties or customs had been demanded by government govern-ment officials. But when they found the trade was becoming profitable the commander of the fort notified the Sabine's captain, Jerry Brown, that he must pay certain duties and procure a clearance of his vessel from Col. John Davis Bradburn, then commanding com-manding at Anahuac on what is now Galveston bay. Travis Imprisoned. Bradburn, an American who had entered Mexico in 1816 or 1817, had allied himself with Bust-amente Bust-amente when the latter, as vice president of Mexico in 1829, had headed a successful revolution. Bradburn had been put in charge at Anahuac, one of several military mili-tary forts that were part of Bust-amente's Bust-amente's scheme of dictatorship and oppression, and had perpetrated perpe-trated a series of annoyances and indignities on the colonists, including in-cluding the arrest and imprisonment imprison-ment of William Barrett Travis, who later was to die a hero's death at the Alamo. This occurrence was really the spark that fired the powder trail of revolution. Shortly afterwards, a meeting was held at Brazoria, where the unjust confinement of American citizens at Anahuac and the unfriendly attitude of the Mexican authorities were discussed. dis-cussed. After passing the "Turtle Bayou resolutions" reciting the tyrannical acts of Bustamente and his minions and their subversion subver-sion of the Mexican constitution of 1824 and pledging their support to Santa Anna, who was then supporting sup-porting the 1824 constitution, the colonists made their plans to overthrow Fort Velasco. Three companies were organized, organ-ized, and the schooner Brazoria, then at Brazoria after bringing a cargo from New Orleans, was ii s "', a.mi,..is .- i . a. .X,,,,,K ...u.i.t i.i.ui iiiii.iuuii.u.u'i.'."U. . iwl'ii. i "J Ml' uim'M'.wnu. rmi.iu... w ; 1 - vvm;- i I i? - w.VA Jy, ?:;;;::: as;;:;. :;:: :5 -i ,. :., ::-.. s-- : . :, v.:; , : i J x . ' V . " ": ' ':"''-"': :;:'yX'- ::.v S Pi.-W. - ;.7;::;;l ' I $M:V0M Vi' ::::aV ': 'i ::::::w :::. ! : jg:3 Bronze tablet on the monument located near the coast guard station at Velasco, Texas, which tells of the fame of that town as the "Cradle of Texas Liberty." pressed into service by order of John Austin, "master of the military mili-tary forces at this place," apparently appar-ently a thoroughly unofficial title. One company of marines, under William J. Russell, sailed down the river on the schooner and the other two companies led by Austin Aus-tin and Henry S. Brown marched to Velasco. They converged on the fort, intending to attack at daybreak. But an accidental shot by one of the men about midnight disclosed their presence and the battle was on. All through the night the fighting fight-ing went on, and the next morning morn-ing June 26, 1832 the fort surrendered, sur-rendered, with more than two-thirds two-thirds of its defenders lying dead t , ' v5-;:: " .'K?vir';fS ": STEPHEN F. AUSTIN or wounded. One of the terms of surrender was release of Brad-burn's Brad-burn's prisoners at Anahuac. Not long after this historic battle, bat-tle, Santa Anna succeeded Bustamente Busta-mente as the ruler of Mexico. The coming into prominence of Santa Anna, a "liberal," led the Texans to ask for reforms, such as the right to use the English language in public places, privilege of organizing or-ganizing their own militia, separation sepa-ration of Texas from the state of Coahuila, and other changes. Eventually Stephen F. Austin went to Mexico City to lay a new constitution for the proposed Mexican Mex-ican state of Texas headed by Sam Houston, before the Mexican government. Apparently successful, success-ful, he started back. But a letter he had written back home advising advis-ing his Texas friends to go ahead with their separate statehood organization or-ganization plans without waiting for authorization, fell into the hands of Mexican officials. He was arrested and kept in prison for 15 months. By the time of his release and return to Texas in 1835, Austin came back convinced thatwarwns Texas' only course. Several local lo-cal assemblies were held and declared de-clared Texas a free and sovereign state, notably one at Goliad on December De-cember 20, 1835. Then followed the battles of the Alamo, Goliad, and others, leading up to the final i triumph at San Jacinto on April 21, 1836. The revolution which was started start-ed at Velasco four years before was destined to return to that same setting for the final dramatic dra-matic act. David G. Burnet, who had been named Texas' provisional provi-sional governor at a constitutional constitution-al convention at --Washington-on-the-Brazos on March 1 at the very time of the tragic siege of the Alamo made Velasco the temporary capital of the new republic re-public and there the treaty of peace which ended the revolution was signed on May 14, 1836. Changes of a Century. During the century that has elapsed since that historic event the geography of the region has undergone several changes. The present town of Velasco is four miles inland. The original Velasco, Velas-co, which was situated at the very mouth of the Brazos, virtually disappeared dis-appeared before the turn of the century with the failure of the many efforts to create a satisfactory satisfac-tory deep-water harbor, due to lack of funds and the constant silting of the Brazos. Although most people think of Texas in terms of cattle, grain, fruit, and oil, the fact is that it is rich in other products. One of these is sulphur and it was sulphur sul-phur that turned the trick of providing pro-viding this region with a satisfactory satisfac-tory harbor. Though some of the richest farmlands of the nation lie along the lower Brazos, the bulk of the farm commerce had to turn to the port of Galveston, and later Houston. Then the famous fa-mous Spindletop oil strike of 1901 turned attention on the "salt domes" of the coastal plain, sulphur sul-phur was found at Bryanmound, near what is now Freeport, and operations on it were begun in 1912. The shoal conditions still were troublesome, however, and it was eventually determined that the only way to create a practical harbor would be to divert the Brazos river, letting it empty its water and alluvial deposits into the gulf at another point, and retain re-tain the original mouth, as an estuary, es-tuary, for a port. This unique engineering en-gineering project was accomplished accom-plished by October, 1929, and Freeport harbor has been easily maintained at 32-foot depth since. The state of Texas now supplies nearly one-fifth of the world's production pro-duction of oil and sulphur. The importance of oil in the machine age is familiar to everyone but sulphur plays almost as vital a role. In one form or another anoth-er it enters into the making of almost every article of modern life, notably rubber goods, newspapers, news-papers, steel, plastics, paints, dyes, inks and synthetic textiles, and it is of particular importance to the farmer as it is the primary processing factor in making fertilizers fer-tilizers and is invaluable in fungicides fung-icides and insecticides. So, historic ground that Brazoria Bra-zoria county is with its claims to being the "cradle of Texas liberty," liber-ty," it is also an important factor fac-tor in the economic picture of the modern commonwealth of Texas and of the United States because of its harbor and the large oil and sulphur tonnage that moves through it. It is doubtful if one American in a thousand ever heard of the battle bat-tle which was fought at Velasco on June 26, 1832, or realizes the importance of this "Concord of the Texas Revolution." For that matter, it is a none-too-familiar tale to many citizens of the Lone Star state. For, as John Henry Brown, in giving an account of the battle in his "History of Tex said in explanation of his care li verifying the facts: "This special care was taken because of the great historical importance of the first actual measurement of arms in the succession suc-cession of bloody dramas which led to the independence of Texas and which had been so imperfectly imperfect-ly described, not to say partially ignored, by writers on Texan history. his-tory. A deep sense of patriotic duty impelled the effort also to secure and place in enduring form the names of those dauntless pioneer-farmer heroes who first punctured the arrogance of Mexican Mexi-can despotism and gave a foretaste fore-taste of the grand achievements yet in store for the knightly chivalry chiv-alry destined to win Texas from barbaric misrule to peaceful civilization." civ-ilization." Couched in less poetic terms, but in its frankness perhaps more indicative of the temper of the": Texas colonists, is the report of' Henry Smith, one of the Velasco colonists who participated in and was wounded in the battle, and who afterward became provisional provision-al governor of Texas. In his version ver-sion of the affair at Anahuac and the Battle of Velasco, he said: "We had declared in favor of Santa Anna (as opposed to Bustamente), Busta-mente), not that we had any choice in names, for, we had no more confidence in one Mexifij than in another, but we had been sworn to support the constitution and were willing to redeem our pledge. The fact is we were determined de-termined to protect ourselves from insult and injury. We could not be called rebels, because we were battling for our constitution and, too, under the Mexican flag which we had nailed fast to the masthead, with 'Constitution' in large letters on it so that it could not be mistaken . . . "Our remonstrances, though courteous and respectful, were bold, manly and calculated from our bold and dignified manner to show the Mexican nation that our constitutional and vested rights could not be infringed with impunity im-punity and that if we were not respected re-spected by them, that at least we respected ourselves as freemen." But the significance of Velasco or rather the whole region around the mouth of the Brazos river in Texas' economic and a v - I ' : ,r .:r ' : A- ' ! , (If - l ' ' ' f " " ' J t h U I i ' " i i t ) f-v H i i 3 i I -f I New Monument Erected on the Battlefield of San Jacinto. military history by no means begins be-gins and ends with its role as setting set-ting for the overture and the finale of the revolutionary drama. It was at Brazoria that Austin, upon his return from imprisonment imprison-ment in Mexico, made one of the greatest political speeches of history, his-tory, putting into the record his strong conviction that war against the Mexican oppressors was the only recourse left to the American Ameri-can colonists. Then, too, Austin's home was at Peach Point plantation, planta-tion, only a few miles north of the modern town of Freeport, and when he died in December, 1836, he was buried in Peach Point cemetery. The original gravestone grave-stone may still be seen there but . fastened to it is a bronze tablet which reads: "The state of Texas October 18, 1910, removed the remains re-mains of General Stephen Fuller Austin to the capital city of Austin Aus-tin where they were reinterred in the state cemetery and a statue erected over the grave." Near the town of West Columbia in Brazoria county also stands a marker designating the site of the first capitol of the Republic of Texas. Here on October 3, 1836, the Texas congress met and elected elect-ed Sam Houston, the victor of . San Jacinto, as its first president' and Stephen F. Austin, its first secretary of state. |
