TEXAS AND TEXANS FIFTY YEARS AGO. 41
stood high as a lawyer, and had an extensive practice in nearly
every county in the Thirteenth Judicial District. He was an Italian
by birth. He died during the Civil War, or shortly after its
close. He had a brother, Decimus Barziza, a noted lawyer of Houston,
who represented Harris county in the Fourteenth Legislature.
* * *
GENERAL THOMAS HARRISON, a member of the bar of Falls
county, settled first at Marlin, and from there removed to Waco.
Harrison was a learned lawyer and a fine advocate. He practiced
in most of the counties of the Thirteenth Judicial District. At
the breaking out of the Civil War he raised and was elected captain
of a cavalry company, which became a part of the celebrated
regiment of Terry Rangers. He finally became colonel of this regiment,
and before the close of the war was promoted to a brigadier
generalship. He was an intrepid soldier, and greatly distinguished
himself during the Civil War. He was without fear and of the
highest sense of honor. In person he was straight as an arrow, and
of that bearing and manner indicating that nature not only made
him a gentleman, but intended him for a soldier. He is dead,
but his influence and example still lives for the accomplishment of
good. Harrison, in 1854 or 1855, while leisurely riding along a
prairie road in Hill county, content, anticipating no danger, and
enjoying the beauties of the surrounding landscape, met a man in
the road on foot, who stopped him and made some inquiry as to
the road. While Harrison was answering his inquiry, the man suddenly
whipped out a pistol, shoved it in his face with a positive
order for him to dismount. Under the circumstances the general
made discretion the better part of valor, and obeyed the order with
alacrity. The man mounted, rode off at a gallop and was soon
out of sight, leaving Harrison afoot in the broad prairie. A few
days after the occurrence the writer saw Harrison in Centreville
in search of the robber and his horse. He was a much angered and
outraged man, and in that frame of mind, had he met the robber,
one or the other would have been killed. It was afterwards ascertained
that the man was a fugitive from justice from Grimes
county. The robber rode the horse down and then turned him