James Collinsworth

The tablet lists Collinsworth's offices; the Handbook shows how close he stood to Sam Houston. At the Convention of 1836 he introduced and steered the resolution naming his fellow Tennessean commander in chief, chaired the military affairs committee and sat on the constitution committee. Houston made him an aide-de-camp with a major's rank on April 8, and Rusk praised his bravery after the battle. In May he was sent to Washington to seek help and possible annexation, on the strength of his ties to Andrew Jackson; the mission failed. He turned down Houston's offer of the attorney generalship.

What the plaque says

James Collinsworth Born in Tennessee, 1806. Drowned in Galveston, July 11, 1838, and his remains brought by boat up Buffalo Bayou to Houston. His remains interred in this cemetery under the auspices of Temple Lodge No. 4. First Masonic funeral ever held in Texas. Delegate to the Consultation held at San Felipe, 1835. Signer, from Brazoria municipality, of the Texas Declaration of Independence. "Bore himself as a chief" at San Jacinto. Secretary of State, 1836. Senator in the Congress of Texas, 1836. First Chief Justice of the supreme Court of Texas. A county in Texas was named in his honor.

Where it stands

Worth the stop nearby

• Sam Houston Park and the Heritage Society — 0.5 mi
  Ten historic buildings gathered in a downtown park below the skyscrapers, among them the 1870 house of the Reverend Jack Yates, built five years after emancipation.
• Buffalo Soldiers National Museum — 1.5 mi
  A museum in Houston's 1925 Light Guard Armory that tells the service of Black soldiers from the Revolutionary War onward, built from one veteran's thirty years of collecting.
• Rothko Chapel — 1.7 mi
  An octagonal chapel open to all faiths, built by the de Menils around fourteen dark canvases by Mark Rothko, with Barnett Newman's Broken Obelisk standing in the pool outside.
• Emancipation Park — 1.7 mi
  The Third Ward park that freedpeople bought for Juneteenth in 1872, rebuilt in 2017 on Emancipation Avenue and still the center of the city's June 19 celebration.

More markers nearby

• John W. Moore — steps away
• John Kirby Allen — steps away
• George Allen — steps away
• David Porter Richardson — steps away