HistoricSiteMarkers
Early RepublicCivil War

Dr. Samuel Floyd Vaughan Home

Jonesville, Harrison County, Texas

Marker Inscription

This home evolved from a two-room central hall plan house built in 1841-42. The second story was completed in 1865, and the Italianate style front rooms and Eastlake style porches were added after Dr. Samuel Floyd Vaughan purchased the home in 1870. A native of Missouri and a Civil War veteran, Vaughan (1844-1916) served Harrison County as a physician and surgeon. The homestead has remained in the Vaughan family for more than 100 years. Recorded Texas Historic Landmark - 1985

Erected by Texas Historical Commission

The Story

This East Texas home began in 1841–42 as a modest two-room central-hall house, then grew through the decades — a second story added in 1865, and Italianate rooms and Eastlake porches after Dr. Samuel Floyd Vaughan bought it in 1870. A Missouri native and Civil War veteran, Vaughan served Harrison County as physician and surgeon for the rest of his life. More than a century later the homestead still belonged to his family.

Why it matters

The house's layered architecture mirrors the settling and rebuilding of East Texas across the republic, Civil War, and recovery that followed.

Own a business near here? Add it to the map.

Related people

  • · Samuel Floyd Vaughan

Themes & tags

Nearby & related markers

Swanson's Landing

Jonesville, TX

Founded by civil engineer and planter Peter Swanson, Swanson's Landing was a bustling Caddo Lake port from the 1830s to the 1860s, shipping cotton and pelts toward New Orleans and receiving settlers' goods in return. In the 1850s it anchored the first railroad in East Texas, a line built to Marshall and rerouted during the Civil War to move Confederate troops toward Louisiana. The port's story darkened in 1869 when the steamer Mittie Stephens burned nearby with the loss of 69 lives.

Marshall

Marshall, TX

Founded in 1839 and named for U.S. Chief Justice John Marshall, this East Texas town became a strategic hub during the Civil War, housing supply, ordnance, medical, telegraph, and military headquarters. When Federal forces overran Missouri, that state's Confederate government relocated here, making Marshall the wartime capital-in-exile of Missouri. Rail lines and trade cemented its role as a regional center long after the war.

Robert W. Loughery, Civil War Editor

Marshall, TX

Robert W. Loughery, born in 1820, became one of East Texas' most influential newspapermen through his Harrison County papers, above all Marshall's Texas Republican. A fierce partisan, he used his columns to champion slavery, secession, and the Confederacy while lambasting his critics. After the war he wrote across the state, served briefly as U.S. Consul in Acapulco, and died in Marshall in 1894.

John Barry Henderson Home

Marshall, TX

This sturdy home of hand-cut local iron-ore stone—said to be the county's only 19th-century native-stone residence—began as a way station on the stage route from Shreveport to Daingerfield. Its builder, John Barry Henderson, supplied beef to the Confederate Army during the Civil War, and the house has remained in his family ever since.