Sam Houston was the first president of the Independent Republic of
Texas, and he later served as governor of the state of Texas.
Houston was born on March 2, 1793, and had little, if any, formal
schooling. His family moved from Virginia to Tennessee in 1806, and
there Houston grew to adulthood. He served in the War of 1812
(1812–15) as a lieutenant in the U.S. Army, commanded by General
Andrew Jackson (1767–1845). After the war, Houston returned to
Tennessee, studied law, and became an attorney.
Joins the Cherokees
Houston was elected to the U.S. Congress in 1823. Four years later, he
became governor of Tennessee. In 1829, he married Eliza H. Allen, but
the marriage soon came to a sudden end. Divorce was highly uncommon
at the time, and the public was scandalized. Houston never told anyone
what had gone wrong, but considering himself a ruined man, he resigned
the governorship. He moved to Indian Territory west of the Mississippi
River to start a new life among a band of Cherokees that he had known
since childhood.
In Indian Territory, Houston took a Native American name, wore
Indian dress, became a tribal citizen, and married a Cherokee woman.
He lived among the Cherokees until 1832, when he left his Indian wife
and migrated to Texas. At that time, Texas was a Mexican province in political turmoil because of the increasing number of Anglo-Americans moving into the area.
Texas revolutionary
Houston took an active role with those in Texas who wanted more selfrule and less interference from Mexico City. He signed the Texas
Declaration of Independence and was selected commanding general of
the Texan army on March 4, 1836.
Soon, bands of Texans, disobeying Houston’s orders, captured
Mexican forts at the Alamo and Goliad. By the end of March 1836, both
forts had been recaptured by Mexican troops and their Texan defenders
wiped out. Nearly two hundred Americans were killed at the Alamo.
After the defeat at the Alamo, Houston turned his small army eastward and rapidly fled toward the Louisiana border in a retreat popularly
known as the “Runaway Scrape.” The Mexican army, led by General
Antonio López de Santa Anna (1794–1876), pursued Houston’s army.
On April 21, 1836, Houston surprised the Mexican general by suddenly
turning his troops and attacking the Mexican army. In the ensuing battle, known as the Battle of San Jacinto, nearly half the Mexicans died and
the rest, including General Santa Anna, were taken prisoner. The Texans
lost only six men.
President of Texas
Houston’s spectacular victory in the Battle of San Jacinto ended the war
and assured Texan independence. It also led to Houston’s election as
president of the Independent Republic of Texas in the summer of 1836.
As president, Houston’s main goal was to arrange for the United States
to annex, or add, Texas to the Union as quickly as possible. American
politics in the years leading to the American Civil War (1861–65) were
divided, and delayed Texas’s entry into the Union.
Texas finally became a state in 1845, and Houston was elected to
represent the state in the U.S. Senate. Although Texas was firmly a part
of the South, Houston rejected many of the Southern political causes of
the 1850s. He believed in preserving the Union over Southern sectionalism (favoring one’s region over one’s country). In 1859, he became governor of Texas, and in early 1861 he refused to cooperate with the state’s
secession convention, the formal meeting at which Texas decided to
withdraw from the Union. He also declined to take an oath of allegiance
to the newly formed Confederate States of America. Soon Houston was forced to retire from the governorship because of
his Unionist views. His ejection from the governor’s office embittered
him and soured his few remaining years.