Barrington Plantation

Anson Jones's presidency ended with him unpopular. Elected in September 1844, he took no position on annexation in the campaign, and after Congress voted to join the Union he delayed ninety days, partly over objections from England and France; he was burned in effigy. On February 19, 1846, he declared, "The Republic of Texas is no more," then retired to Barrington. In 1857 he expected the legislature to send him to the U.S. Senate and received no votes. He died by suicide in Houston on January 9, 1858.

What the plaque says

Barrington Plantation Anson Jones, the last president of the Republic of Texas, bought 1,107 acres here from M. Austin Bryan in 1844. This site, named "Barrington" for Jones' birthplace in Massachusetts, was the "White House of Texas" from 1844-46. By 1845 Jones had built two dwellings, a kitchen, office, smokehouse, and stables. After Jones' leadership in the annexation of Texas to the U.S. in 1846, he retired here to become a gentleman farmer. Other buildings were added in 1847. Jones sold the plantation in 1857. The house was moved to Washington-on-the-Brazos State Park in 1936. (1996)

Where it stands

Worth the stop nearby

• Washington-on-the-Brazos State Historic Site — 4.6 mi
  The townsite on the Brazos where delegates met in a cold, unfinished hall in March 1836 to declare Texas independent, with Independence Hall rebuilt and Anson Jones's Barrington farm worked as in 1850.
• Star of the Republic Museum — 4.6 mi
  A star-shaped museum of the Republic of Texas years, 1836 to 1846, built at Washington-on-the-Brazos after a Brenham campaign and opened on March 1, 1970.
• Independence and Old Baylor Park — 9.2 mi
  A crossroads north of Brenham that was the richest town in Texas when it won Baylor University in 1845, refused the railroad, and lost the college to Waco and Belton in 1886.
• Navasota — 11 mi
  A railroad and cotton town where the La Bahia Road crossed the Navasota River, scarred by an 1865 explosion and yellow fever, and the home ground of the songster Mance Lipscomb.

More markers nearby

• Friedens Church of Washington, UCC — 2.6 mi
• African American Catholic Community — 3.5 mi
• Asa Brigham — 4.1 mi
• John William Smith — 4.1 mi