Governor Elisha Marshall Pease

Before his governorship Pease helped build the Republic's laws. He was secretary of the committee of safety at Mina in 1835 and of the General Council, wrote part of the Constitution of the Republic, served as chief clerk of the navy and treasury departments, and took a major part in writing the criminal code. In 1837 he became the Republic's first comptroller of public accounts, and in 1846 he wrote the state's Probate Code. Late in life he presided over the Tax-payers' Convention of 1871 and was collector of customs at Galveston from 1879.

What the plaque says

Governor Elisha Marshall Pease (January 3, 1812 - August 26, 1883) In 1835 E. M. Pease migrated to Texas from his native Connecticut. He joined the Texian forces at the Battle of Gonzales, Oct. 2, 1835, which initiated the Texas War for Independence. In the early days of the Republic, he worked as a government clerk and later served in the Legislature and Senate. He was a prominent lawyer in Brazoria when elected Governor in 1853. During Gov. Pease's first two terms in office, 1853-57, a permanent school fund was established and Texas' first free public schools built. Other achievements included increased railroad construction and reduction of taxes and the state debt. Gov. Pease ordered Texas Rangers to the frontier to combat recurring Indian raids. The Pease family became the first to occupy the newly constructed Governor's Mansion in 1856. A staunch Unionist, Pease restricted his political activities during the Civil War (1861-65). In 1866 he again ran for Governor but lost to J. W. Throckmorton. Gen. Philip H. Sheridan, federal military commander of Texas, removed Throckmorton in 1867 and appointed Pease provisional governor to enforce Reconstruction policies. Pease resigned in protest in 1869. At the time of his death he was an Austin banker. Married to Lucadia Niles (1813-1905), he had three daughters. (1977)

Where it stands

Worth the stop nearby

• Texas State Capitol — steps away
  Austin's fourth statehouse, a Renaissance Revival capitol of 1888 that stands 311 feet to its Goddess of Liberty and was restored after the 1983 fire.
• Bullock Texas State History Museum — 0.6 mi
  The state's history museum at the head of Congress Avenue, built around the hull of La Salle's ship La Belle, raised from Matagorda Bay with 1.8 million artifacts.
• French Legation State Historic Site — 0.7 mi
  A raised pine house built in 1840 and 1841 for France's envoy to the Republic of Texas, who left Austin in a rage over a neighbor's pigs before it was finished.
• Harry Ransom Center — 0.8 mi
  The University of Texas archive where a Gutenberg Bible and the earliest surviving camera photograph are always on view, free, beside the papers of Watergate and the movies.

More markers nearby

• Henry Smith — steps away
• Governor James Edward Ferguson, Governor Miriam A. Ferguson — steps away
• Governor Edmund Jackson Davis — steps away
• First Classes of the University of Texas Law School — steps away