John Frelan Winters
Walker County, Walker County, Texas
Marker Inscription
A San Jacinto Veteran; born in Tennessee, July 13, 1814; died January 16, 1864.
Erected by Texas Historical Commission
The Story
Born in Tennessee in 1814, John Frelan Winters was among the volunteers who fought at the Battle of San Jacinto, the clash that secured Texas independence in 1836. He lived on in the young republic and later state, dying in January 1864.
Why it matters
Veterans of San Jacinto were the founding generation of Texas, and markers to them preserve the memory of the fight that birthed the republic.
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Related people
- · John Frelan Winters
Related events
- · Battle of San Jacinto
Themes & tags
Nearby & related markers
James and Rhoda Creel Beall Winters
New Waverly, TX
James and Rhoda Winters led their large family from Tennessee to this land between the forks of the San Jacinto River in 1834, following the good report of two elder sons who had come ahead. When war with Mexico broke out, the family gave heavily to the cause: sons and sons-in-law fought in the 1836 Texas Revolution, and one son, James W. Winters, lived to help mark the San Jacinto battlefield in 1901, 65 years after fighting there. Family members went on to help settle half a dozen more Texas counties.
Site of Former Town of Danville
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Founded before 1840 in a rich plantation district, Danville grew into a thriving trade center with fifteen businesses, churches, and good schools. When its leaders refused right-of-way to the Houston & Great Northern Railway in the 1870s, commerce fled to the new railroad town of Willis, and Danville faded until only Sheperd Hill Cemetery remained. Among its people was Jonathan Lindley, who died defending the Alamo in March 1836.
Woodland, Home of Sam Houston
Huntsville, TX
Sam Houston loomed over Texas from its birth as a republic — the general who won independence in 1836 and the new nation's first president. In 1847, while serving as a U.S. Senator, he and his wife Margaret built this whitewashed log home they called "Woodland," a "bang up place" where four of their children were born and where Houston spent what he considered his happiest years. His story darkened at the end: a Unionist governor who opposed secession, he was pushed from office when Texas joined the Confederacy in 1861.
West Fork of The San Jacinto River
Conroe, TX
The West Fork of the San Jacinto carries thousands of years of history: Patiri and other Native peoples lived along it in the Archaic and later eras, and Spanish explorers named the river in the 1700s. American pioneers settled here even before Stephen F. Austin extended his colony over the area in 1824, and just downstream, on April 21, 1836, Sam Houston's volunteers defeated Santa Anna to win Texas independence. In later years riverside farms grew into cotton plantations shipping by keelboat, and today the united forks feed the Houston Ship Channel.