Josiah Taylor

The plaque leaves out a man who had no say. Taylor's enslaved manservant, Thomas, went with him in the Gutiérrez-Magee expedition, and on January 24, 1813, in a fight over a cow during the siege of La Bahía, Thomas was the only republican killed. Taylor later commanded the right wing at Medina on August 18, 1813, was wounded seven times and escaped on horseback. He brought his family back to Texas in 1824 and died in the DeWitt colony in 1830. His grave in present-day Cuero has a state marker.

What the plaque says

Josiah Taylor Born in Virginia. First came to Texas in 1812, as captain in the Gutierrez - Magee Expedition, an attempt to free Mexico from Spain; fought at La Bahia, Alazan, Rosales; wounded 7 times in the Battle of Medina. Returned to Texas with family, 1824; listed in Atascosita Census, 1826; settled here in Green De Witt Colony, 1829. Five sons fought in Battle of Salado Creek with Capt. Jack Hays' company of Texas Rangers, during Mexican invasion of 1842. Recorded - 1973

Where it stands

Worth the stop nearby

• Chisholm Trail Heritage Museum — 3.4 mi
  A cattle-country museum in Cuero's 1903 Knights of Pythias Hall, telling the Guadalupe Valley's 1866 drive north and the Sutton-Taylor feud that bloodied DeWitt County.
• De León Plaza — 23 mi
  The central plaza of Guadalupe Victoria, the only predominantly Mexican colony in Texas, founded by Martín De León in 1824 and taken from his family after 1836.
• Museum of the Coastal Bend — 23 mi
  Victoria College's museum of thirteen thousand years on the middle Texas coast, from Clovis hunters and Karankawa potters to La Salle's lost Fort St. Louis and the first ranches.

More markers nearby

• Hephzibeth Looker Taylor — steps away
• Leonard Roy Harmon — 2.4 mi
• De Witt County Monument — 2.6 mi
• Cuero — 2.6 mi