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Early RepublicReconstruction & Gilded Age

Fisher County

Roby, Fisher County, Texas

Marker Inscription

Sites of old Indian trail from Mexico to settlements on Texas frontier. In this region in 1856, Colonel Robert E. Lee, then commanding the famed U.S. Second Cavalry (and later General-in-Chief of the Confederate Army), campaigned against the Indians. County formed from Young and Bexar territories. Created 1876. Settled in 1877. Organized 1886. Named for Samuel Rhoads Fisher (1794-1839), a signer of the Texas Declaration of Independence, Secretary of the Navy in the Republic of Texas, 1836. Roby, county seat, named for landowners. (1965)

Erected by Texas Historical Commission

The Story

This region was crossed by an old Indian trail running from Mexico to the Texas frontier settlements, and in 1856 Colonel Robert E. Lee — then commanding the U.S. Second Cavalry, years before he led the Confederate army — campaigned against Native peoples here. Fisher County was carved from Young and Bexar territories, created in 1876 and organized in 1886, and named for Samuel Rhoads Fisher, a signer of the Texas Declaration of Independence and Secretary of the Navy of the Republic. Its seat, Roby, took its name from local landowners.

Why it matters

The county's origins bind together the Indian frontier, the antebellum U.S. Army in Texas, and the founding generation of the Texas Republic on the West Texas plains.

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Related people

  • · Robert E. Lee
  • · Samuel Rhoads Fisher

Themes & tags

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