Robert Henry

The plaque gives Robert Henry the victories; family papers credit his wife. Elizabeth Downing married him in Londonderry in November 1820, and they sailed the next day. A family history prepared for the Daughters of the Republic of Texas calls her a Texas heroine. It says she faced down Indians while he was away and, fleeing the Mexicans, crossed the swollen Navasota River with six children. Later she cared for the sick and the poor. Their daughters Elizabeth and Mary married the Seale brothers, Columbus and Bradford.

What the plaque says

Robert Henry (March 7, 1801 - October 29, 1865) One of victors in Battle of San Jacinto. Born in Ireland; came to America, 1820, and here to Robertson's Colony, 1832. A staunch Presbyterian, kept true to faith at risk of life. In 1836 War for Texas Independence, he served in 2nd Regt., Infantry, Texas Volunteers. Prominent in public life, he held justice of peace court beneath shade trees. He married Elizabeth Downing, Londonderry, Ire.; had 13 children. Their heirs include noted Texans. Recorded - 1970

Where it stands

Worth the stop nearby

• George H.W. Bush Presidential Library and Museum — 7.2 mi
  The library of the forty-first president on the Texas A&M campus, opened in 1997, where George and Barbara Bush and their daughter Robin are buried in a family plot on the grounds.
• Calvert — 25 mi
  A railroad cotton town of 1868 on State Highway 6 that claimed the largest cotton gin in the world and elected Black men to county and state office during Reconstruction.
• Navasota — 28 mi
  A railroad and cotton town where the La Bahia Road crossed the Navasota River, scarred by an 1865 explosion and yellow fever, and the home ground of the songster Mance Lipscomb.
• Washington-on-the-Brazos State Historic Site — 29 mi
  The townsite on the Brazos where delegates met in a cold, unfinished hall in March 1836 to declare Texas independent, with Independence Hall rebuilt and Anson Jones's Barrington farm worked as in 1850.

More markers nearby

• Ibarra Elementary School — 1.9 mi
• Primera Iglesia Bautista Mexicana de Bryan — 2.6 mi
• Saint Andrew's Episcopal Church — 2.7 mi
• The CW&BV and I&GN Railroads in Bryan — 2.8 mi