The Southwestern Historical Quarterly, Volume 88, July 1984 - April, 1985 Page: 385
476 p. : ill. (some col.), maps, ports. ; 23 cm.View a full description of this periodical.
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Albert Clinton Horton
Horton planned to donate $50,000 to higher education. At the dawn of
the War between the States, few Texans viewed life from such an eco-
nomically imposing vantage point."6
Only a few isolated events from this period have left behind evidence
to shed light on Horton's last years. One son was given (Robert John,
born March 21, 1844) and another was taken away (Thomas, died Sep-
tember, 1848). Six other men joined with Horton to establish Wharton
Masonic Lodge No. 99 in 1852. Daughter Patience was married to
Isaac N. Dennis in 1853. Dennis served in the sixth, seventh, and eighth
legislatures, and he and Patience had one daughter, Lida Dennis. A will
prepared in 1858 split the estate equally between Horton's children; the
names of the slaves specifically bequeathed to his son Robert suggest
that care was taken in at least some cases not to disrupt slave families.
A proposal by Wharton County to build a railroad in 186o was opposed
in court by Horton and his son-in-law Isaac Dennis, who believed the
rail project, a public concern, would place an unfair burden on the
wealthiest planters, as well as unnecessarily duplicate the services of-
fered by the Buffalo Bayou, Brazos and Colorado Railroad. It can be
inferred from the testimony that Horton was among the investors in
the latter. Horton had a pew in the Episcopal Church in Matagorda,
which had been rebuilt in 186o; this fact suggests that he still main-
tained, and perhaps had never cut, his ties to that coastal town. Not
mentioned in his will of 1858 were intentions, manifested later, to en-
dow Baylor University with a "professorship of not less than $50,000."
Horton did not remove himself completely from public affairs, serving
as a delegate to the Democratic party national convention in Charleston
in 1860. A little later, as the secession crisis crystallized, Horton at-
tended the meetings, held in Austin in February, 1861, that selected the
Texas delegates to the Secession Convention in Montgomery.6
The war soon came, followed by defeat, and most of his estate, his
slaves, was no longer his property. The war years must have been diffi-
cult for Horton: he lost his son to the war as soon as hostilities began,
55Webb, Carroll, and Branda (eds.), Handbook of Texas, I, 321, Ralph A Wooster, "Notes on
Texas' Largest Slaveholders, 186o," SHQ, LXV (July, 1961), Appendix 1, 78-79; Ralph A.
Wooster, "Wealthy Texans, 186o," ibid., LXXI (Oct , 1967), 171-179; Carroll, A History of Texas
Baptists, 503. In the 186o census return Horton owned 167 slaves, while David G. Mills, Hamhn
Bass, and Abner Jackson of Brazoria County and J. D. Waters of Fort Bend County owned more
than that number. Ibid.
b Williams, History of Wharton County, 194, 312, Davenport Papers, Vol. IX; Members of the
Legislature of the State of Texas from I846 to 1939 ([Austin, 19391), 23, 28, 34, Albert C. Horton
Will; Ballinger and Jack, Supreme Court Galveston, January Term, i86o-No 1387 ([Galveston?
186o?]), 12, 14; Jeter, Matagorda, 61-62; Burleson quoted in Carroll, A History of Texas Baptists,
503. Horton was nominated as a delegate to the Secession Convention but was not elected Er-
nest Willham Winkler (ed ), Journal of the Secession Convention of Texas, 186i ([Austin], 1912),
79-80385
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Texas State Historical Association. The Southwestern Historical Quarterly, Volume 88, July 1984 - April, 1985, periodical, 1984/1985; Austin, Texas. (https://texashistory.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metapth101210/m1/451/: accessed April 19, 2024), University of North Texas Libraries, The Portal to Texas History, https://texashistory.unt.edu; crediting Texas State Historical Association.