Texas Historical Marker #09535
The Brazos Canal. Chartered in 1841, the Brazos Canal Company was the result of local landowners' efforts to build canals to connect inland plantations to Gulf shipping ports. Construction began in 1847 on a canal, referred to locally as the "slave ditch" because it was dug by the slaves of company owners. A one-mile section, twenty-four feet wide and three feet deep, took two years to complete. The project was soon abandoned. A rival company, the Galveston and Brazos Navigation Company, completed a canal between the Brazos River and Galveston Bay in 1856. Texas Sesquicentennial 1836 - 1986 #9535
?, Lake Jackson, TX, United States
Texas Historical Marker #12847
Joseph H. Hawkins. Joseph H. Hawkins Native Virginian Joseph H. Hawkins practiced law in Kentucky, where he served as state legislator and U.S. congressman before moving to New Orleans. There he befriended Stephen F. Austin, who was broke and reluctant to complete his father's colonization plans on his own. Hawkins encouraged him to continue, offering him a job and, later, capital for the project. In 1821, the two men formalized an agreement in which Austin acknowledged receipt of $4,000 and agreed to divide equally the lands he would receive as colonizer, or empresario. Hawkins sent boats of supplies and colonists to meet Austin in Texas but died in 1823, leaving his wife, George Ann (Nicholas), and five children deeply in debt. She returned with the children to her native Kentucky to be near her family and Hawkins' brother, Littleberry. She appointed Nathaniel Cox to help settle her husband's estate. In 1824, the Mexican government gave Austin, as empresario, almost 100,000 acres, but law required a person to reach majority age and live in Texas to own land, so the Hawkins children could not immediately claim their share. Austin worked with Cox to find a suitable agreement and, in 1833, conveyed to the Hawkins heirs some 42,000 acres of land in and around Brazoria county. Each of Hawkins' children lived briefly in Texas. Edmund St. John (d. 1836) was the first, followed by Norbourne, who died at Goliad in 1836, George (d. 1837), and then Joseph Thomas (d. 1850). Mary Jane came in 1839 but, after her husband died, returned to Kentucky, where she stayed. Although none of his heirs persevered in Texas, Hawkins' legacy in Texas is apparent in the success of Austin's first colony and all that sprang from the early Texas settlement. (2002) #12847
?, Lake Jackson, TX, United States