Early History of the City of Bastrop

Stephen F. Austin chose this crossing for the capital of his Little Colony, a grant of 1827 for 100 families, having noted the spot favorably on his first journey into Texas. By 1830 Josiah Wilbarger, Reuben Hornsby and the Burlesons had settled nearby, though a traveler that year counted only a bachelor and two families in town. On June 8, 1832, land commissioner Jose Miguel de Arciniega platted the town on Mexican lines around a central square that was never built. Juan N. Almonte counted 1,100 people in the area in January 1835.

What the plaque says

Early History of the City of Bastrop Long before white men arrived, this region was inhabited by Tonkawa and Comanche Indians. In 1691 the first Spanish explorers crossed this territory en route to east Texas. From their route, parts of "El Camino Real" (the King's Highway) were blazed, thus placing Bastrop on a major early travel artery. Because El Camino Real crossed the Colorado River here, this was a strategic spot. In 1805 the Fort "Puesta del Colorado" and accompanying community were founded here to protect commerce on the road. In 1825 this area became "Mina," one of the first settlements in the colony of Stephen F. Austin. It was named for revolutionary leader Xavier Mina. In the years that followed, many members of its first 100 families served in the Texas Revolution (1836), the Mexican War (1846-1848), and were active in political life in the Republic and State of Texas. In 1837 when the town incorporated, the name was changed to "Bastrop" to honor the Baron de Bastrop, influential early land agent and statesman. The city was also designated county seat in 1837. (1968) From 1851-1870, this was seat of Bastrop Military Academy, an important Texas school. First courthouse was built in 1853; present one in 1883 on the same spot. (1968)

Where it stands

Worth the stop nearby

• Bastrop State Park — 0.4 mi
  The westernmost loblolly pines in the United States, cut off from the East Texas forest by a hundred miles of post oak, burned almost entirely in 2011 and growing back.
• Texas Wendish Heritage Museum — 18 mi
  A museum at Serbin of the Wends, a Slavic people from Lusatia whose congregation of nearly 600 crossed on the Ben Nevis in 1854, losing seventy-three to cholera on the way.
• McKinney Falls State Park — 26 mi
  Limestone falls on Onion Creek inside Austin, where people camped under a rock overhang for thousands of years and a financier of the Texas Revolution built his stone ranch house.
• Lockhart Courthouse Square — 28 mi
  A cotton-era courthouse town named the Barbecue Capital of Texas, built near the 1840 Plum Creek fight that followed the killing of Comanche leaders at peace talks.

More markers nearby

• Lost Pines of Texas — steps away
• The Gotier Trace — steps away
• Bastrop County — steps away
• Felipe Enrique Neri Baron de Bastrop — 0.6 mi