Hall's Bluff

Hall's Bluff lived off the river. According to Wikipedia and Houston County GenWeb, the community took shape in the early 1850s, when Joshua James Hall opened a warehouse and shipping business on the Trinity, twelve miles west of Crockett. It was a main stopping point for steamboats carrying cotton downriver and goods up from Galveston. The post office opened in 1852 and ran with several interruptions until the mid-1860s. After the Houston and Great Northern Railroad reached Crockett in 1872 the settlement declined, and by the mid-1930s it had a church, a school and a number of houses.

What the plaque says

Hall's Bluff Maryland native Joshua James Hall migrated to Texas and purchased a land grant in 1839 on the east side of the Trinity River. Hall and his son, James Madison Hall, established a port and ferry on the Trinity River as a shipping point for Houston County settlers. The Community of Hall's Bluff developed around the ferry in the mid-19th century, and included a general store, post office, churches and a school. Unreliable shipping due to weather-related problems and the arrival of the railroad in the 1870s, caused the port to decline and eventually most residents moved away. (1996)

Where it stands

Worth the stop nearby

• Caddo Mounds State Historic Site — 28 mi
  Three earthen mounds of an ancestral Caddo village and ceremonial center on the old El Camino Real, settled about A.D. 800 and still sacred to Caddo people, with a grass house and visitor center.

More markers nearby

• Strode-Pritchett Log Cabin — 1.3 mi
• Andrew Jackson McGown — 1.3 mi
• William Monroe Patton — 1.3 mi
• George G. Alford — 1.3 mi