The Bates-Sheppard House
Cuero, DeWitt County, Texas
Marker Inscription
This structure was built principally of lumber salvaged from ruins of the Indianola home of Morgan steamship Captain Henry Shepard (1826-1879). After a hurricane destroyed Indianola in August 1886, the late captain's son-in-law, Francis Walter Bates (1854-1930), shipped the salvaged materials here by rail and reconstructed the house on this site. Completed in the fall of 1886, it was occupied by Bates, his wife Elizabeth Sheppard Bates (1857-1904), her sister Mrs. Jennie Sheppard Luther (1860-1938), and a brother Henry D. Sheppard (1870-1951). Bates was a hardware merchant in Cuero, 1884 to 1930. He was a Mason, a Knight-Templar, and (1887 to 1914) a city Alderman greatly interested in the volunteer fire department. H. D. Sheppard, for years the Cuero agent for the Southern Pacific Railroad, was a local business leader. After 1904 Mrs. Luther was mistress of the house. Another Sheppard brother, Joseph, with his wife, children, and grandchildren also frequented the house as part of the extended family. Altered and enlarged in 1925, this Victorian house remained in the Bates-Sheppard family until 1968. Recorded Texas Historic Landmark - 1978
Erected by Texas Historical Commission
The Story
When a hurricane leveled the Gulf port of Indianola in 1886, the seafaring Sheppard family did not simply mourn a lost home — they salvaged its lumber, loaded it onto railcars, and rebuilt inland at Cuero. Reassembled that same fall, the Victorian house sheltered three generations of the Bates and Sheppard families, including a hardware merchant and city alderman and a Southern Pacific railroad agent. It stayed in the family until 1968 and was recorded as a Texas Historic Landmark in 1978.
Why it matters
The house is a tangible relic of Indianola, a once-thriving Texas port erased by storms, and of the way Gulf Coast families literally carried their lives inland as the coast gave way to the railroad towns.
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Related people
- · Henry Shepard
- · Francis Walter Bates
- · Elizabeth Sheppard Bates
- · Jennie Sheppard Luther
- · Henry D. Sheppard
Themes & tags
Nearby & related markers
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