Former Homesite of Joseph L. Bennett

Bennett fought in Texas before 1836. In October 1835 he was a captain under Stephen F. Austin and was at Concepción, outside San Antonio, before taking his discharge that November. After San Jacinto he wrote Sam Houston that he, not Colonel Sidney Sherman, had really led the Second Regiment, and he accused Sherman of sitting out the fight in a clump of timber. That is Bennett's version. In October 1839, when Montgomery's founder sold the town, the deed carved out Bennett's lot. He died in 1848. The marker stands beside the highway, and there is nothing else to visit.

What the plaque says

Former Homesite of Joseph L. Bennett Joseph L. Bennett, who came to Texas in 1834 and settled in this area, joined the Texas army in early 1836. As captain of a company of local volunteers, he left this area about March 1, 1836, to lead his troops to aid Texan forces at the Alamo. Upon reaching the Colorado River he learned of the fall of the Alamo, and so discontinued the mission. He soon joined with Sam Houston's main army and in April was elected Lt. Colonel of the 2nd Regiment of Volunteers, the company he commanded at the Battle of San Jacinto. Bennett received land grants in payment for his military service, and in 1837 President Sam Houston appointed him to command a frontier defense unit. Elected by Montgomery County voters to the Republic of Texas Congress, he served for two terms, 1838-1840. He briefly resumed military service in 1842 as a member of the Somervell Expedition against Mexico. Bennett also was active in local civic affairs, serving as mail carrier from Houston to Montgomery, county commissioner and supporter of area schools. He moved his family to his headright land grant in present Navarro and Freestone counties in 1848. He died later that year and was buried in a family graveyard near Streetman.

Where it stands

Worth the stop nearby

• Fanthorp Inn State Historic Site — 21 mi
  A cedar-log dogtrot cabin of 1834 on the road through Anderson that grew into a seventeen-room inn and post office for travelers of the Republic, kept by one family until 1976.
• Navasota — 26 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

• Lake Creek Settlement — 2.7 mi
• Town of Montgomery — 2.8 mi
• Charles Bellinger Stewart — 2.8 mi
• John M. Wade — 2.8 mi