James Charles Wilson

A Yorkshireman, Wilson attended Oxford University before coming to Texas in 1837. He served in Charles K. Reese's company on the Somervell expedition and as a private in Company E on the Mier expedition under William S. Fisher. Captured with the expedition, he refused help offered by the British government on the ground that he was an English citizen, and stayed in prison until he escaped on July 30, 1843. He was elected commissioner of the court of claims in 1856, and he was first buried in the Askey Cemetery.

What the plaque says

James Charles Wilson When this county was created in 1860 by the Eighth Texas Legislature, it was named for Texas patriot James Charles Wilson. A native of England, Wilson (1818-1861) left his homeland in 1836 and by 1839 had settled in Brazoria County, Texas. He studied law there under Judge John W. Harris and future Governor Elisha M. Pease, and boarded with former Provisional Governor Henry Smith. Wilson had a multifaceted career while a resident of the state. As part of the ill-fated Mier Expedition in 1842, he was held in a Mexican prison until escaping in 1843. He returned to Brazoria County, where he served as editor of the "Brazos Planter" and a district clerk. After obtaining his law license in 1844, Wilson had a successful law practice, was elected to the Texas Senate, and became Commissioner of Claims to settle problems arising from land grants given under the colonization laws of Spain and Mexico. During the last years of his life, James C. Wilson moved his family to a homestead near Gonzales, where he continued to practice law and was licensed to preach in the Methodist Episcopal Church. Upon his death in 1861, Wilson was buried in the family cemetery near Gonzales but was later reinterred in the State Cemetery in Austin. (1985)

Where it stands

Worth the stop nearby

• Mission Espada and the Espada Aqueduct — 22 mi
  The southernmost San Antonio mission and the oldest Spanish aqueduct in the United States, still carrying river water over Sixmile Creek to the fields after nearly three centuries.
• Mission San Juan — 23 mi
  The mission near the river bend where the San Antonio got its name in 1691, with an unfinished church foundation and farm fields still watered by an eighteenth-century acequia.
• San Antonio Missions National Historical Park — 25 mi
  Four working parish churches on the Mission Trail south of downtown, with the visitor center at Mission San Jose, the Queen of the Missions, and the descendants who still worship there.
• Mission Concepción — 27 mi
  A stone church dedicated in 1755 that has never fallen into ruin, its convento ceilings still painted, and the ground where the Texas Revolution's fight for San Antonio began.

More markers nearby

• Wilson County — steps away
• The Flores de Abrego Family and Floresville — steps away
• Captain Will Wright — steps away
• Texas Ranger and Sheriff Capt. Will L. Wright — 0.9 mi