Sam Houston - no ordinary Ulsterman, no ordinary American
by Fred Brown, News/Feature Writer - Knoxville News/Sentinel, Tennessee

 A great commotion filled the town. Bright-eyed soldiers marched through Maryville, a small village south of Knoxville, Tennessee. Music blared. Banners and flags flew. It was some sight, enough to quicken the blood and light the fires of young men eagerly looking for adventure.

Sam Houston watched as the army entered the outskirts of the settlement. Men with muskets were on the move and his heart pounded with the excitement.
War had once again come to the United States, newly independent and  now facing the arrogance of the expansionist dreams of the British empire, which had been taking advantage of American vessels on the high seas.

The United States, just 32 years after gaining its independence from England, was again going up against that great power.

As he arrived to volunteer for duty, many of his friends questioned young Sam’s sanity. He patted a letter he held from his mother giving him permission to join the U.S.  Army’s  7th Infantry.

There was no room for cowering in the Houston household, which dated its courage to Sir Hugh Padivan, a Norman knight of formidable bravery, and Sir John Houston, who built the family’s estate near Johnstone, Scotland in the waning years of the 1600s. His mother, Elizabeth Paxton, had already expressed that clearly when she told all of her sons that the door to her home was always open to the courageous and closed to the coward.

Sam’s father, Samuel Houston, had been a major in the  American Revolutionary War, a hero fighting with Morgan’s Rifle Brigade, considered to be elite and one of the most celebrated corps in the Continental Army. Sam Houston was very much a product of Ulster pioneers Samuel Houston and Elizabeth Paxton. He was born March 2, 1793, near Lexington, Virginia, in Rockbridge County in a crease in the road known as Timber Ridge Church, the family plantation.

The best-known and understood version of Sam Houston’s family origins begin in Scotland. His great-grandfather, John Houston, son of Sir John Houston who built up the family’s fortunes in Johnstone, Scotland, eventually moved his family to Ireland.

These Ulster-Scots were from the Ballybracken area of East County Antrim in the north of Ireland. It is believed the first Houstons emigrated to America between 1729 and 1735. Arriving on the shores of the United States, the name changed from Huston to Houston.

John Huston, Sam Houston’s grandfather, left Co. Antrim for the fertile valley lands of the Shenandoah Valley, Virginia about 1740, and within four years had established the Providence Presbyterian Church.

Sam’s father died in 1807, and in the spring Elizabeth Paxton Houston decided to move her six sons and three daughters across the Allegheny Mountains to the frontier, which was then barely west of those intimidating mountains. With one new wagon and an older one, she packed her family over the rugged terrain and reached Baker’s Creek Valley in Blount County, Tennessee, settling on 419 acres her husband had secured before his death.

Here, young Sam grew up and became a great reader from his father’s extensive library. He studied Alexander Pope’s translation of the “Iliad” until he just about wore out the pages. He read Virgil, ancient history and geography. Even at an early age, Sam Houston began to stand out and to be recognized as a leader. Well, sort of. He could not be content in school, despite his love of reading and of learning.

At 5 feet, 11 inches tall, Sam was handsome and cut a fine figure. He apparently understood his powers of manhood well and was at times difficult to reign in.

“There was something about this man,” wrote one of Sam Houston’s contemporaries, “that made light of yardsticks.” Another described him as “6 feet, 6 inches ...  of fine contour.”

Sam had a large, long head, wavy chestnut hair and friendly blue eyes. He once described himself as being “as straight as an Indian.” At 16, he left home to spend a couple of years with the Cherokee. By the time he returned war clouds had risen over America. U.S. naval vessels were being assaulted by the British, who shook them down trying to find British seamen who had jumped ship to get away from the slave-like conditions under English Navy captains.

The United States, only three decades into its youth and Thomas Jefferson in his second term as American President, bristled at having its ships boarded and even Americans taken off and forced into His Majesty’s Navy.

On the day he signed to join the army, young Sam had a few words for his friends who had criticised  him for volunteering. It was the first of many speeches he would make over his lifetime.

Standing in front of  “some well-dressed sergeants,” Sam turned to a gathering crowd. “And what have your craven souls to say about the ranks? Go to with your stuff. I would much sooner honor the ranks than disgrace an appointment. You don’t know me now, but you shall hear of me”, said Sam.

Oh, to be sure!

His mother gave her son his father’s musket before he packed off to be with Andrew Jackson at Horseshoe Bend, Alabama.

“Never disgrace it,” she told Sam. There was not much to worry about on that front. “Remember,” his mother told him, “I had rather all my sons should fill one honorable grave than that one of them should turn his back to save his life.”

She also gave him a gold ring. Inscribed on the inside was the word “honor.” Sam Houston wore that ring to his grave.

He marched off with the Seventh Infantry from Knoxville and was shortly promoted to sergeant. Later, he reached the rank of ensign in the 39th Infantry. In fighting the Creek Indians, who had sided with the British, he was severely wounded when an arrow slammed into this thigh.  The wound was so bad, Jackson ordered Sam not to return to battle.

Paying little attention to that directive, Sam convinced a line commander to dislodge the arrow, and he was last seen heading over enemy breastworks. He received two other near-fatal wounds in the battle. That was just the start of an epic life. By age 30, Sam Houston was a member of the House of Representatives. By age 34, he had been elected Governor of Tennessee by a wide majority.

But while serving as Governor, his brief marriage to his first  wife, Eliza Allen, fell apart. She left him, and the heart-sick Houston moved to Oklahoma to be with his adopted Indian father.

It was in Oklahoma that he dropped off into near-total disrepute. He took an Indian wife, and the Cherokee, who had formerly proudly called him The Raven, gave Houston a new name: The Big Drunk. In later life, he was converted as a Baptist church member But by 1832, Houston had changed. He had moved to Texas and in 1835 had been appointed general of a military district.

In 1836, Texas had declared its independence from Mexico and Houston was elected commander-in-chief of the armies of Texas. He took control of Texas forces after the fall of The Alamo. In retreat and on the run, Sam Houston began to train and equip a ragged band of volunteers.

On April 21, 1836, at the Battle of San Jacinto, Sam Houston and his army inflicted such a devastating defeat on Gen. Santa Anna, who headed a larger and better-equipped army, that it has been called one of the eight most decisive battles in history.

The victory essentially gave the United States not only Texas, but the future states of New Mexico, Arizona, Utah, Colorado, California and parts of Wyoming.

Houston went on to fame as the first president of the Republic of Texas, later as a U.S. Senator from Texas.

In the Senate, he proved himself a man of complexity and principle. He supported Indian rights, westward expansion and the preservation of the union against the rising voices of secession and Civil War.

The latter stance cost him his one true shot at the American presidency as well as his Senate seat. He later was elected governor of Texas, but resigned the governorship rather than sign an oath to the Confederacy.

Sam Houston, of Scots-Irish stock, was no ordinary man, no ordinary American.