The Homestead
Jefferson, Marion County, Texas
Marker Inscription
Built in 1851 by slave labor, square nails, broadax-hewn boards. Center society life of city.
Erected by Texas Historical Commission
The Story
Built in 1851 with slave labor, square nails, and broadax-hewn boards, The Homestead stood at the center of social life in the booming river-port town of Jefferson. Its handcrafted construction reflects the wealth flowing through antebellum East Texas.
Why it matters
It is a plain reminder that enslaved hands built much of the finest architecture of antebellum Texas.
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Themes & tags
Nearby & related markers
George Webster Smith
Jefferson, TX
George Webster Smith, a New York–born Union veteran, settled in Jefferson after the Civil War and became an ardent Republican, sitting on the board that disenfranchised former Confederates and serving as a delegate to the 1868 Constitutional Convention. After a shooting dispute in 1868, he was jailed in the city calaboose under a promise of protection—only to be dragged out and assassinated with two freedmen by some seventy disguised men, many tied to the Knights of the Rising Sun. The outrage brought martial law, and of twenty-three men tried, three were convicted of murder.
Stilley-Young House
Jefferson, TX
Completed for Louisiana cotton broker Frank Stilley and his wife Minerva around their 1860 marriage, this Greek Revival house passed by 1885 to Charlie Young, a formerly enslaved man who became a well-known Jefferson barber. Young wore a Prince Albert suit as his working uniform and gave regular customers personalized shaving mugs lettered in gold. His family kept the home until 1983, a rare thread of continuity through Reconstruction and beyond.
Hudgins-Blake House
Jefferson, TX
Built between 1855 and 1867 by William P. Hudgins in the thriving riverport of Jefferson, this house with its 13-foot ceilings and wide-board floors passed through several owners before W. L. and Mattie A. Blake, respected teachers at the Jefferson Central (Negro) School, purchased it in 1897 and kept it in their family for six decades. Its later preservation ensured the survival of a rare antebellum-era home tied to Black educators of the post-emancipation South.
Union Missionary Baptist Church
Jefferson, TX
In 1842 Captain William Perry deeded land to local enslaved people to establish a place of worship, and a sanctuary raised here in 1847 stands among the earliest Black churches in Texas. After the Civil War the congregation became a center of Loyal League, Radical Republican, and Freedmen's Bureau activity, and during the violent Reconstruction occupation of Jefferson the church was burned and members, including Albert Browning, were killed. Rebuilt in 1883 and rescued from demolition by restorers in 2003, it remains a cherished emblem of the community.