David Robert Wingate
Orange, Orange County, Texas
Marker Inscription
(1819-1899) In 1852 wealthy Mississippi sawmill owner David Robert Wingate moved his family to a large cotton plantation in Newton County. During the Civil War (1861-65), he donated lumber from his Sabine Pass sawmill to build Fort Sabine and other posts. Federal troops burned his home and business. In 1874 he relocated in Orange, bought into a sawmill, and branched into rice farming. Wingate served as county judge in Newton and Orange counties. Although plagued with fires and disasters, Judge Wingate rebuilt his holdings and continued to help others.
Erected by Texas Historical Commission
The Story
David Robert Wingate moved his family from Mississippi to a large East Texas cotton plantation in 1852, having built his fortune in sawmilling. During the Civil War he supplied lumber from his Sabine Pass mill to build Fort Sabine and other Confederate posts, and Federal troops burned his home and business in retaliation. Undeterred, he rebuilt in Orange after the war, invested in a sawmill, took up rice farming, and served as county judge.
Why it matters
Wingate's story links the timber industry to the Confederate war effort and the resilient rebuilding of the East Texas economy in the Reconstruction years.
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Related people
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Themes & tags
Nearby & related markers
Putnam B. Curry
Orange, TX
A New York native, Putnam B. Curry moved to Galveston in 1860 and enlisted in the Confederate army, seeing action along the Texas Gulf Coast during the Civil War. After the war he married Eliza Ann Ochiltree and settled in Orange, where he opened a mercantile firm and later ran a hotel and published a newspaper. A leader in the local business community, he remained active until his death in 1910.
Alexander Gilmer
Orange, TX
An Irish immigrant who reached America in 1846, Alexander "Sandy" Gilmer built ships in Orange with his cousin and ran a mercantile before the Civil War, when he served the Confederacy as a blockade runner trading local cotton and lumber for scarce supplies and took part in the 1863 Battle of Sabine Pass. After the war he turned to sawmilling, and though fires destroyed four of his mills, he became one of the region's leading lumbermen, with holdings that included the town of Remlig—his name spelled backward. He died in 1906 while on business in New York.
Jerome Swinford
Orange, TX
A Missouri native, Jerome Swinford came to Sabine Pass in 1859 to enter the steamboat trade and, after Civil War service, settled in Orange, where he worked in a sawmill and became a popular merchant. An active Mason, he served as mayor, alderman, and school board member, helped plan a ship channel at Sabine Pass, and won election to the Texas Legislature in 1888.
Samuel H. Levingston
Orange, TX
Born in northern Ireland in 1832, Samuel H. Levingston left home at fourteen and learned ship carpentry in Apalachicola, Florida, before moving near present-day Orange just before the Civil War. He served the Confederacy as a ship carpenter and blockade runner, then returned to build paddle-wheel boats hauling cotton down the Sabine. His son George later grew the family trade into the Levingston Shipbuilding Company, and the land the family once farmed became a city park.