BEXAR COUNTY HISTORICAL COMMISSION ORAL HISTORY PROGRAM INTERVIEW WITH: J ames S. Maverick INTERVIEWER: Clyde Ellis DATE: June 28, 1977 PLACE: Sunshine Ranch Road, Residence of Mr. Maverick E: Mr. Maverick, I want to ask you a question about your early family. When did they first come to Texas? Do you remember? M: My grandfather, Samuel Augustus Maverick, came to San Antonio in September, 1835. E: He reall y was an early arrival. Just a little bit after the Canary Islanders. They were here in the 18th Century, weren't they? M: When he arrived in San Antonio, the Texans had just about decided to revolt against Santa Ana, who was taking over all their civil rights. E: I wanted to ask you a little about him. What was his ancestry? Where did he come from? M: He came from Pendleton, South Carolina, up i n the mountains of western South Carolina. E: How was he related to the relative from Charl ottsville? M: Now you are on the other side of the fence. He was not related to them. That was my mother's family . E: O.K. Well, we'll have to keep that separate . But I do MAVERICK 2 want to go into that. So, what's the history then of Samuel Augustus Maverick? M: His father was Samuel Maverick ( and there have been a number of Samuel Mavericks) in Charleston . He was raised in Charleston and left there because of the yellow fever epidemics that they had there. E: Now what did the family do in Charleston? M: They were ship builders, and my great grandfather owned 17 ships . 17 seagoing ships . They were all taken by the English in the Revolutionary War. E: Well, now, the family were English to begin with, weren't they? .. the Maverick family? M: The Maverick family came from England . And at quite an early date, just a few years after the arrival of the Mayflower. E: Yes. And then this particular branch was in Charleston. M: One of the Mavericks sold his holdings in Massachusetts and moved to Barbados where he was quite a large land owner and plantation owner. And then his son moved to Charleston and his name was Samuel Maverick and there was another, his uncle, named Samuel Maverick, too . And he moved there. One of them became the first Governor of the Colony of Charles Town (later Charleston), of the State of South Carolina. E: That's interesting. And that's a recurring name in the family, isn't it? M: Yes, there were so many Samuel Mavericks when they moved to Charleston, that's where we lost track. We don't know whether it was the young Samuel or his uncle Samuel whom we MAVERICK 3 are descended from. E: That does make that research difficult when there are that many of them. And this particular forebearer left Charleston because of the yellow fever . M: Yes, several children in the family died. E: And so did he come then to Texas? M: No. He was my great grandfather. He moved to northwest South Carolina, up in the mountains near Pendleton. And his son, my grandfather (Samuel Augustus Maverick) was tired of the politics in South Carolina, because they were talking about seceding from the Union, and he didn't believe in that and he wanted to be where he would be out free,like in Texas. E: So then when he went to the mountains, did he have sort of a ranch? M: The Samuel Maverick who moved to Pendleton was my great grandfather. He never came to Texas . He had a big plantation there which is still there .. the home is still there. We visited it and it's one of the show places of the town. E: Is it still owned in the family or ... M: No. A rather poor farm family bought the place, but they were so much interested in it that they spent all the money they could get hold of in repairing and putting it in first class order . And it's one of the tourist places to be visited in Pendleton. E: Well, that's interesting . So then the ancestor who came MAVERICK 4 to Texas ... M: ... was Samuel Augustus Maverick. E: He was a son of the ship builder in Pendleton. Okay. I wonder what motivated him to come to Texas? How do you suppose Texas came to his notice? M: He had read and heard about Texas, as everybody had in the United States at that time. It was the "land of opportunity" and ... E: Was it being promoted as a real estate thing? M: No, except that it was known that you could buy land very cheaply at that time, at a very low price. He bought some land from the government which was then Mexico . The head of the State was in Coahuila . The capital of the State of Coahuila, Texas, was Monclova, nearly 300 mi l es from San Antonio .. .. "Coahuilan Texans". He bought some land from the State and then he bought, after Texas became independent, why he bought scrip, so many acres of scrip , and he was, besides being a lawyer (he graduated from Princeton) he had studied law and also was a surveyor. He would buy the scrip at 6¢ an acre and then go out and locate land that he had bought, and survey and claim it. E: That's interesting. So he came here when it was still property of Mexico, that State of Coahuila, and then Texas shortl y thereafter, it became an independent Republic . M: Yes, just three months after he was in San Antonio . E: Did he come directly to San Antonio or did he settle first in another area? MAVERICK 5 M: No, he didn't settle anywhere else. But he came in with a good deal of money, and he bought land as he came along . He bought a good deal of land in Texas before he arrived in San Antonio. And when he arrived here he went and stayed at the home of John W. Smith, who later was the first Mayor of San Antonio. E: Had they had an association prior to his coming here? M: No . E: Now, this is your great, great grandfather? M: No, that's my grandfather . Samuel Augustus Maverick 1S my grandfather. E: All right. Did he have any active part in the legal part of organizing the Republic of Texas? M: He did. Now three months after he arrived here , the town was encircled by the Texian army, and there was a good deal of dissension among them. They were all volunteers and they encircled the town for about three months or longer. And there was no one willing to take command and come into town against the fortified army of maybe a thousand or so trained soldiers . So Maverick and Smith were finally put under house arrest, but they got out and joined the Texian army . By that time, Ben Milam was there and they entreated the Texians to attack the city at once, because the soldiers in town were in a demoralized condition and they were afraid. And so Ben Milam then shouted: "Who'll follow Ben Milam into San Antonio?" And Sam Maverick acted as his guide into San Antonio . Milam was killed on the second day, but Col. MAVERICK 6 Francis W. Johnson took over command immediately, and the battle went fiercely forward. Four days later, Gen. Cos ran up the white flag of surrender. Mr. Maverick was present when the Articles of Capitulation were signed in the "Cos House" on Villita Street. E: To have been such a new arrival he found himself deeply involved in the affairs of this area. M: He certainly did. And then John W. Smith, after this surrender, sent his family East ... all the females in the family .. and there was no place for them to stay so they moved into the Alamo. And they were considered a part of the garrison of the Alamo, but there was an election held there when Texas decided to have a "Convention of the People of Texas" at Washington-on-the - Brazos. And Sam Maverick was elected, almost unanimously, they said, by the men Ln the Alamo to represent them ... he and Jesse B. Badgett. And the two of them left there a few days later and, while they were in Washington-on-the-Brazos, signing the Texas Declaration of Independence, they heard that Santa Ana had attacked San Antonio and that the Alamo had fallen. E: Goodness. Well, were the women ... what had happened to the women in the family who had been sent to the Alamo? Had they, you know, John W. Smith and ... M: No, he sent his family East. E: Oh, I see. Okay. Then what course did he take after that? M: John W. Smith? E: No, your grandfather. MAVERICK 7 M: He stayed there for awhile ... he was a lawyer ... one of the very few lawyers present and he helped write the Constitution of the Republic of Texas. Then when Santa Ana's army came , it's obscure exactly what he did-­ whether he took part in the Battle of San Jacinto or not. But the diaries say that right after the Battle of San Jacinto he went East, and met a young lady. E: Was this in Alabama? M: Tuscaloosa, Alabama. Waited there and then married her there. E: How did it happen? Do you remember her name? M: Mary Ann Adams .