First Burials in Matagorda Cemetery, Benjamin Wightman and Esther Randall Wightman

Elias Wightman was Austin's recruiter for the Matagorda townsite. In 1828 Austin sent him and David Burnet to the United States, and that November Wightman started back with fifty to sixty colonists, mostly New Yorkers, including his parents. They travelled by wagon, river and, from New Orleans, the schooner Little Zoe, on a voyage planned for seven days that a county history says took thirty-one. They landed in late January 1829 and built a stockade for shelter. Esther Wightman died on June 20, 1830, and Benjamin on August 6. Their graves began the cemetery.

What the plaque says

First Burials in Matagorda Cemetery, Benjamin Wightman and Esther Randall Wightman Parents of Elias R. Wightman, grantee of the Matagorda town league, from Republic of Mexico. Benjamin and Esther Wightman, natives of Connecticut, lived in Wightman Town, Herkimer County, N. Y., before joining (1828) colony brought here by their son of "Little Zoe", the first sailing vessel ever to enter port of Matagorda. (1972)

Where it stands

Worth the stop nearby

• Levi Jordan Plantation State Historic Site — 28 mi
  A sugar and cotton plantation on the San Bernard River whose enslaved builders and their descendants left one of the best-preserved African American archeological sites in Texas.

More markers nearby

• Matagorda Cemetery — steps away
• Albert Clinton Horton — steps away
• Richard Royster Royall — steps away
• Ira Ingram — steps away