Cordier-Tschirhart-Seal House
Castroville, Medina County, Texas
Marker Inscription
Jean Baptiste Cordier (1804-1881) built this Alsatian pioneer dwelling after migrating to Texas in 1844. The native limestone structure had three downstairs rooms and an attic. Cordier sold the cottage in 1847 to blacksmith Stephan Ahr (1821-1903) and shoemaker Jacob Biry (1810-1867), whose families occupied it together. In 1906 the house was purchased by Eugenia Beck (Mrs. Sebastian) Tschirhart (1861-1938). It was restored by her descendants, Mr. and Mrs. Adrian L. Seal. Recorded Texas Historic Landmark, 1976.
Erected by Texas Historical Commission
The Story
In 1844 the empresario Henri Castro planted a colony of Alsatian immigrants on the Medina River west of San Antonio, and Castroville still wears that Old-World heritage in its steep-roofed stone cottages. Jean Baptiste Cordier, one of those first settlers, raised this dwelling from local limestone with three rooms below and an attic above — a modest but sturdy piece of the frontier. Over the decades it passed through the hands of a blacksmith, a shoemaker, and the Tschirhart family, its shared occupancy a snapshot of how tight-knit these pioneer households were. Restored by later descendants, it earned recognition as a Recorded Texas Historic Landmark in 1976.
Why it matters
The house is a tangible survivor of Castroville's Alsatian colony, one of the most distinctive immigrant settlements of the Texas frontier and a reminder that the American West was built by newcomers from many corners of Europe.
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Related people
- · Jean Baptiste Cordier
- · Stephan Ahr
- · Jacob Biry
- · Eugenia Beck Tschirhart
- · Mr. and Mrs. Adrian L. Seal
Related events
- · Alsatian settlement of Castroville, Texas (1844)
Themes & tags
Nearby & related markers
Louis Haller House
Castroville, TX
Louis Haller was a teenager when he emigrated from France to the Alsatian colony at Castroville in 1845, part of Henri Castro's ambitious settlement scheme on the Texas frontier. He scouted for the Texas Rangers and hauled freight during the Civil War before marrying Leonie Naegelin and raising a family in this limestone house, built around 1877. Its distinctive corner fireplace, whose chimney angles up through the wall to emerge at the roof peak, marks it as a fine example of the region's Alsatian-influenced pioneer craftsmanship.
Site of the Homestead of Henri Castro
Castroville, TX
Henri Castro, a French-born naturalized American, became one of the Republic of Texas's most important empresarios when he won authority in 1842 to plant a colony of Europeans in the rugged country west of San Antonio. Recruiting hundreds of families — many Alsatian — he founded Castroville on the Medina River in 1844, spending his personal fortune to shelter and provision colonists he treated "as though they were his children." He reserved this central block as his own homestead, built a stone house, and even planted an experimental garden to learn which crops the land would bear.
Henri Castro
Castroville, TX
Henri Castro, born in Bayonne, France, of Portuguese noble descent, became a naturalized U.S. citizen before helping negotiate a crucial loan for the cash-strapped Republic of Texas — service that earned him a diplomatic post from Sam Houston. As empresario between 1843 and 1847 he brought at least 2,134 European colonists to this corner of Medina County, spending his own fortune to sustain them. His dedication drew comparisons to Stephen F. Austin, and Castro County later took his name.
Alsatians of Texas
Castroville, TX
In 1842 the empresario Henri Castro brought his first colonists to the land west of the Medina River, most of them from the Rhine country and many from Alsace on the French-German border. Two years later he laid out a townsite the settlers named Castroville, which became the heart of Alsatian culture in Texas. They built white-washed, single-story limestone houses in the European manner and carried over farming, winemaking, cuisine, and customs that still flavor the region.