Author: Karen Sikes Collins
The first title to the land on which the Moore-Hancock Farmstead was built was issued before the Texas Revolution by the Mexican government, and from this very first deed, there was trouble. The land of the farmstead was part of Stephen F. Austin’s “Little Colony”. The Mexican government signed a contract with Austin in 1927 to introduce one hundred families into the area. The boundary between Austin’s Little Colony and the grant to the north, later known as Robertson’s Colony, was what is now the boundary between Travis and Williamson counties. The Colorado River bounded the colony on the south. Austin selected an eleven-league tract approximately 48,000 acres), which included the area of the farmstead, for his personal use. It had rich land, fine pasture for sheep and horses, and was well watered with springs. He planned to build his home here. His Secretary Samuel M. Williams was instructed several times to make sure the title to that land was in Austin’s name for his personal use and not to sell (information from The Austin Papers, edited by Eugene C. Barker).
But something shady happened. Records said that on June 30, 1835, the Mexican government deeded this land selected by Austin to Thomas Jefferson Chambers, a surveyor and naturalized citizen of Mexico. His uncle, Talbot Chambers, Commissioner of Coahuila and Texas, may have been responsible for registering a deed with a fraudulent earlier date on it. Thomas Chambers, born in Virginia in 1802, the youngest of 20 children, was also a lawyer and land speculator who acquired several large tracts of land in Texas illegally or under suspicious circumstances. During his entire adult life, Chambers sought political prominence through elected office or military appointment but his better qualities were overshadowed by debt, dishonesty, and violence. After learning that one tract he had bought was sold for back taxes during his absence , Chambers shot and killed the new owner. The deed for the Farmstead and all its neighbors was dated June 30, 1835, and issued to this scoundrel, Thomas Jefferson Chambers.
Of course, early citizens and officials of Austin’s colony knew of Chambers reputation and shady dealings. In 1836, when Texas gained its independence from Mexico, the new Republic provided for a Land Office to be in charge of deeds. Almost all Mexican deeds were accepted by the new Republic but not Chamber’s claim to this tract of land on which much of Austin now stands. Beginning in 1838, the Texas Land Office began granting this land to others. The Farmstead area was part of a league of land (4,428 acres) granted to George Washington Spier who quickly sold the land in smaller parcels. Those who purchased the land from Spier soon found themselves in a lawsuit brought by Chambers. Chambers was a very unpopular person in Austin because this suit clouded titles and hampered the settlement of parts of Travis County for many years. Chambers was disliked throughout the state as well as in Austin, and it did not surprise many when Chambers was mysteriously assassinated with a shotgun blast through his parlor window on March 15, 1865, at his home in Chambers County. Most landowners here settled with Chambers’ estate in the 1860s paying a second time for their land but clearing their titles; however, it was not until 1925 that the Texas legislature paid Chambers’ heirs $20,000 to clear the title to the State Capitol site (information from a thesis written by Llerena B. Friend, University of Texas, 1928, and the Handbook of Texas, 1996, Vol. 2).
George Washington Spier was deeded this land on February 24, 1838, by the Republic of Texas, before Austin had been selected as the new capital. Spier had come to Texas when it was still part of Mexico and had served with the Army of Texas fighting for Texas independence. As a married settler in Texas, he was entitled to a Headright league of land (4,428 acres). He selected a long narrow tract fronting on the Colorado River and running north to about Anderson Lane which included much of Shoal Creek and its springs (the same land claimed by Chambers). Spier filed his survey with the Land Office on February 24, 1838, and that same day sold large tracts to Gideon White, Norman Wood, Thomas and David Adams. Spier was a hog farmer in Fayette County who operated a post office out of his home and served as a Justice of the peace, road commissioner, and land commissioner. He used his headright league to raise some cash and had no interest in living on it. Unfortunately, Spier died later that year before the Land Office issued title and for three years, those who purchased this land from Spier had only a title bond to the land.
Alabama native Gideon White purchased one fourth of a league (1,237 acres) for $1,237 from Spier. Within two years of purchasing the land, the White family (Gideon, wife Elizabeth, five daughters, and eight slaves) was living in a double pen dogrun log house on the West Bank of Shoal Creek at Seiders’ Spring (then called White’s Spring and near present day 34th Street). In 1842, Mexican troops under Rafael Vasquez invaded Texas again and captured San Antonio. Residents of Austin (population over 800) and the government hurriedly left. With less than 100 people left in town, the Indians began more frequent raids to reclaim their hunting land. The White family moved from their house on Shoal Creek into town for safety. There were numerous deaths among the settlers of Austin in 1842 and one of them was Gideon White who had ridden from town three miles to his house on Shoal Creek to look after some cattle. A newspaper account of his death said he was “killed within half a Mille of his own house on Shoal Creek, by a party of about a dozen Indians. He probably fired his rifle as they bore down upon him, and then ran into a thicket where he was found in a few minutes after shot in several places… A party of citizens came out in time to see some of the Indians as they returned, but it was nearly dark and no pursuit could be made. The Indians were supposed to be Wacos, and left with such precipitation, that they did not scalp him… Mr. White killed one of the Indians.”
Upon his death, his wife divided the land into five parcels, one for each daughter. Perhaps because Austin was nearly deserted at that time, the girls did not receive title to their land until 1846 when Texas became a state and the government moved back to Austin. White’s slaves were also bequeathed to his daughters and wife.
After owners Chambers, Spier, and White, these five girls were the inheritors of Gideon White’s quarter league. The two oldest daughters who were already married, Cornelia Johnson and Elizabeth Moore, inherited two long narrow unimproved tracts of 521 acres each with minimal water. The youngest three (Rebecca Thompson, Louisa, and Narcissa) inherited smaller tracts with improvements and the house at Seiders Springs.
Daughter Elizabeth became the owner of the land holding the Moore-Hancock Farmstead. Elizabeth Ann, born in 1824 in Dallas County, Alabama, married Martin Moore, Austin’s first merchant. Moore came from Ireland to the new Republic of Texas in 1838. In 1839, he was in Austin selling food to the hungry gangs of Irish and German workers who were cutting trees and building structures to house the government of the Republic. Elizabeth and Martin married in 1844 while Austin was nearly abandoned. Martin built their first home on 20 acres in front of the French Legation. After several successful years as a store owner, Martin began raising cattle and horses on his wife’s country land. In 1849, on Elizabeth’s inherited separate property, they built a new large log home known today as the Moore-Hancock Farmstead.
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