I am a descendant of a veteran of the army of the Republic of Texas, one of the soldiers who fought at the  Battle of San Jacinto, which decisively concluded the Texas Revolution and gained for Texas its independence.

Recently* my Yahoo! 360 page has undergone an extensive renovation, thanks largely to the expertise and kindness of one of my dear 360 friends. Particularly noticeable is the change in the background of the page. The new theme consists of Swiss artist Karl Bodmer's depiction of the American Fur Company steamboat Yellow Stone, which in 1833 carried the 23-year-old landscape artist, his employer German (Prussian) Prince Alexander Phillip Maximilian zu Wied-Neuwied, and the prince's servant and skilled hunter-taxidermist David Dreidopple over much of a nearly 3,000-mile journey from St. Louis, Missouri, to Fort McKenzie, near present-day Great Falls, Montana, and back.

My selection of this picture as a theme, however, has more to do with events three years later than the expedition of the German naturalist prince and his retinue up the Missouri River---my ancestor, William C. Gill, a private in Captain William S. Fisher's "The Velasco Blues," Company I, Texas Volunteers, almost certainly set foot, however briefly, aboard this historic vessel, which author Donald Jackson has called an "Engine of Manifest Destiny," when it ferried the Texas Army across the Brazos River as the army maneuvered to position itself opportunely to meet in combat the invading army lead by Mexican President and General Antonio López de Santa Anna y Pérez de Lebrón.

Contracted by Pierre Chateau, Jr., by permission of American Fur Company owner John Jacob Astor, the Yellow Stone, which was projected for use in the fur trade on the upper Missouri and Yellowstone rivers, was built in Louisville, Kentucky, in 1831, at a cost of $7,000. Though designed for navigating the Missouri's shallow waters and snags, the vessel of 144 tons burden nonetheless had a deep draft with a six-foot depth of hull.

One-hundred-twenty-two feet in length, the side-wheeler with a 20.5 foot beam had one engine, a single rudder, and twin stacks. Following delivery to the fur company on April 1, 1831, an additional $1,000 was spent in fitting out a blacksmith shop on board. Under command of Captain B. Young, the Yellow Stone left St. Louis on April 16, 1831, and reached Fort Tecumseh on June 19.  On July 5, it delivered its first cargo back to St. Louis.

The voyage created excitement not only among the native tribes along the route, but with business people and investors throughout the United States and in Europe. In 1832, the Yellow Stone made the first successful run as high up the Missouri River as Fort Union at the mouth of the Yellowstone River. A passenger on board for the voyage was artist and ethnographer George Catlin who chronicled the voyage in writing, paintings, sketches, and collections.  His rendering of the Yellow Stone is seen here at the end of this article.Throughout 1832 and '33, the side-wheeler made several trips up and down the Missouri River, including that during which Maximilian and his entourage were passengers.

Difficulties and expenses of navigation during the winter months caused the fur company to utilize the vessel on the lower Mississippi between New Orleans and the Yazoo River.  During one excursion of the side-wheeler near St. Louis, the Yellow Stone collided with a steamboat carrying American author Washington Irving as a passenger.

In May 1835 the Yellow Stone was registered as owned by a group of Vicksburg, Mississippi, businessmen, but later in the same year, owned by New Orleans commission merchant Thomas Toby, the steamboat was placed in dry dock and extensively repaired and outfitted for the Texas trade. Ownership of the Yellow Stone was by Thomas Toby and Brother Company as late as December of that year, however, as agents of Texas commission merchants Thomas F. McKinney and Samuel May Williams. Such listed ownership may have served to skirt U. S. neutrality laws.

The Yellow Stone first arrived in Texas, reaching Brazoria from New Orleans, in November 1835, during which time it was used to move cotton between San Felipe de Austin and Washington-on-the Brazos.  Flying the U. S. flag and manned by a U. S. crew, the Yellow Stone, Thomas Wigg Grayson, master, cleared the port of New Orleans carrying amunition as a cargo, and passengers, including forty-seven men of the Mobile Grays, who were Texas bound to volunteer for the Texas army.  The steamboat arrived at the port of Quintana at the mouth of the Brazos River in early January.

Under control of the firm of McKinney and Williams, the side-wheeler ran cotton and other produce from up the Brazos to the firm's headquarters at Quintana. On one such trip in February 1836 the vessel went as far up as the vicinity of San Felipe de Austin with Captain John E. Ross as captain.  Above San Felipe at Groce's landing, the vessel was taking on a cargo of cotton when General Sam Houston and his Texas army arrived in a heavy rain across the river on March 31, 1836.

Establishing camp on the west side of the Brazos, General Houston impressed the vessel to ferry his men across the flooded river. On April 12, the same day that Mexican General Santa Anna with 750 picked men and one six-pounder cannon were crossing down river at Thompson's Ferry, the Yellow Stone began the first of seven crossings to ferry the Texan army across the swollen Brazos. Released from impressment and Groce's cotton placed to protect passengers. crew, and engine, the steamboat ran at full steam past the burned ruins of San Felipe at 10 p.m. on the night of April 15 and through musket fire and shots from a six-pounder fired by soldiers of the division commanded by General Joaquín Ramirez y Sesma. Some of the mounted soldiers even made attempts to lasso the smokestacks of the vessel.  Although only slightly damaged the steamboat briefly spun around careening into the bank; nevertheless, the steamboat reached Quintana, passengers and cargo intact.

Following the victory of the tiny Texas Army over the contingent led by Santa Anna at the Battle of San Jacinto on April 21, President ad interim David G. Burnet (on April 26) commandeered the Yellow Stone to house the cabinet and transport the government officials to the scene of the battle. On May 9, the returning vessel transported additional passengers beside the government officials, including Santa Anna and his staff and eighty Mexican prisoners, as well as the Texans' wounded General Sam Houston and his staff. From Galveston Island, the vessel continued on to Velasco (across the Brazos from Quintana) where the cabinet was to begin treaty negotiations with Santa Anna.

Among the final services to the young republic by the steamboat was the transport of the body of former empressario Stephen Fuller Austin, who had died while serving as Secretary of State of the new republic at the first official capital Columbia in December 1836. His body and mourners were transported from Columbia Landing (also called Marion) to the home of Austin's sister at Peach Point Plantation, where funeral services were held. In the spring of 1837, the vessel removed the government of the republic from Columbia to the new capital at Houston, as well as the press and staff of the Telegraph and Texas Register.

The final fate of the Yellow Stone is a mystery. A ship's bell, alleged to be that of the Yellow Stone is in the Alamo museum. Sam Houston summed up the importance to Texas of the steamboat that once transported pelts, buffalo skins, Indians, and fur trappers in the far north of the Missouri and Yellowstone rivers. Wrote Houston: "Had it not been for its service, the enemy could never have been overtaken until they reached the Sabine [River]," and also the "use of the boat enabled me to cross the Brazos and save Texas."

[*This article first appeared as an entry in my Yahoo! 360 blog for April 01, 2007. The blog entry itself was titled "The Little Steamer that Could!"]

Pictures: (Top) Aquatint by Karl Bodmer.  (Bottom) George Catlin's depiction of the Yellow Stone at St. Louis just prior to its maiden voyage to the mouth of the Yellowstone River in 1832.

Benjamin Franklin Holt, farmer, teacher, soldier, and merchant, fourth son (fourth of nine children) of Benjamin and Charity Ann (Wrinkle) Holt, was born in Texas in the Sabine District (Department of Nacogdoches) on May 30, 1830.  His parents and his oldest brother, Abram, moved there from Louisiana in 1825.  His father, Ben Holt, represented the Sabine District as a delegate to the Convention of 1832, held in San Felipe de Austin.  The Holts returned to Louisiana in 1836 and resided there until 1852 when they moved to Ranch Prairie in Brazoria County, Texas.

On September 21, 1854, Benjamin Franklin Holt married Ann P. Hoskins, whose parents, Isaac C. and Nancy (Spraggins) Hoskins, had come to Texas from Christian County, Kentucky, in 1832.  (Nancy's father was Virginia-born pioneer Texas Baptist preacher Thomas Spraggins who at Independence, Texas, in 1839, led efforts to establish a Baptist Church there, and out of its organization grew the founding at Independence of Baylor University.  Thomas in 1830 was likewise a resident of Christian County and on the census for that year was listed just above the entry for the household of Isaac Hoskins.) In 1860 the household of Benjamin and Ann were enumerated after the respective households of his parents and of his brother Abram. The census gave the occupation of Benjamin F. Holt as "Teacher."

Benjamin Franklin Holt served as a private in the Confederate cavalry in the War Between the States.  He was enlisted at Columbia (Brazoria County, Texas) on March 26, 1862, by John W. Brooks for the duration of the war.  He was assigned to Company A, 12th Texas (Brown's) Cavalry Battalion, which later became the 35th (Brown's) Regiment, Texas Cavalry.  At Camp Chocolate in early November 1862, Holt and his younger brother Henry Madden Holt requested a transfer from Captain Stephen W. Perkin's "Columbia Blues" (Company A, 12th Battalion) to Captain William Sander's Cavalry Company (Company A, Joseph Bates's Battalion).  The transfer was effected on January 1, 1863.  On November 11, 1863, four cavalry companies from the 13th (Bates's) Regiment, Texas Infantry, were transferred to the 12th (Brown's) Battalion, making it the 35th (Brown's) Regiment, Texas Mounted Volunteers.  Thus, at the end of the war, Holt was a private in Company H of Brown's Regiment.

In 1867, Benjamin's parents died within seven months of each other, and their estates were thus combined as a single probate case.  From their estate, Benjamin and Ann purchased the house of his parents, which was near their own residence and other real estate holdings at the time.

Benjamin and Ann had no children of their own; however, the oldest son of Abram Wrinkle Holt (Benjamin's brother) and Margaret Elizabeth "Betsy" (Bludworth) Holt, was named for his uncle, and the nephew's name appears in various documents as Benjamin Franklin Holt, Jr., though he was more often known as Frank or Franklin.  Following the accidental death of Betsy on September 20, 1856, Abram Holt remarried in Bexar County, Texas, to Martha M. Young, a widow, and in 1862 the couple bought land in Burleson County to which they moved their combined family.  Franklin, however, chose to remain in Brazoria County and to reside with Benjamin and Ann Holt.

Censuses of 1870 and 1880 indicate that Benjamin and Ann also took in a young orphaned boy named Robert Scoby, who was probably the son of Mathew Scoby and thus grandson of early Austin Colony pioneers Robert and Mary (Fulcher) Scoby.  The 1900 census shows the younger Robert and wife Emma residing in Lake Charles, Calcasieu Parish, Louisiana.  Benjamin Franklin Holt (Sr.) is shown on the 1870 census as a farmer living with his wife, Ann, his nephew Frank, and Robert Scoby (age 6).  The real estate holdings of Benjamin were estimated at $1500; and his personal assets, at $1000.

By 1876, as indicated by his listing in the Bradstreet business directory for that year, Benjamin was the operator of a general store.  The community was then known as Ranch(e) Prairie. (Also listed in the business directory that year as a businessman in Ranche Prairie was cattleman William D. Hoskins, brother of Ann P. Holt.)  The 1880 census gives Benjamin's occupation as "Storekeeper."  Residing in his household besides himself at that time were Robert Scoby and Samuel H. Williams, a minister.

Ann P. (Hoskins) Holt died on March 21, 1878.  Benjamin died on February 28, 1882.  They are buried in the cemetery, now called Phair Cemetery, consequent to the change in name of the community in honor of Rev. George Phair, minister of the Methodist Church that once stood by the cemetery.

Following the death of Benjamin Franklin Holt, his nephew Benjamin Franklin Holt (Jr.) and his wife, Julia Ann (Follett) Holt, purchased the home, once owned by Franklin's grandparents, Ben and Charity Ann Holt, at the administrator's sale.  Benjamin Franklin Holt (Jr.) died in Velasco on August 11, 1897; his wife had died October 18, 1890.  He and his wife were both buried at Phair Cemetery.

The land on which all three Benjamin Holts ( Benjamin "Ben" Holt, Benjamin Franklin Holt, and Benjamin Franklin "Frank" Holt, Jr.) lived and farmed, and successively owned, is on Big Slough.