William Jarvis Cannan

Cannan came to Texas in 1835 from Edgefield, South Carolina, and his army service is exact in the records: March 1 to November 1, 1836, as a private in the First Regiment of Texas Volunteers, which fought at San Jacinto. The Republic paid him with a bounty warrant for 640 acres in Brazoria County. He married Matilda Jane Lonis in 1837, and after she died in Brazoria in 1850 he married Parmelia Wilcox. By the Handbook's count the two marriages produced nine children, where the plaque says eleven. He died in September 1881.

What the plaque says

William Jarvis Cannan (December 23, 1808 - September 24, 1881) A Republic of Texas soldier during War for Independence. Born in Edgefield, S. C.; came to Texas in 1835. Entering army, he fought in famed victory of San Jacinto, April 21, 1836. He received headright and bounty lands in Brazoria, San Patricio, Coleman, and Limestone counties. He had 11 children by his two marriages: first, to Martha Jane Lonis (who died in 1851), then to Mrs. Permelia Rowena Wilcox. Recorded - 1970

Where it stands

Worth the stop nearby

• Brazoria National Wildlife Refuge — 3.5 mi
  Coastal prairie, salt marsh and bays between Freeport and Christmas Bay, where an auto tour along Big Slough passes wintering geese, ducks and wading birds in the tens of thousands.
• Levi Jordan Plantation State Historic Site — 20 mi
  A sugar and cotton plantation on the San Bernard River whose enslaved builders and their descendants left one of the best-preserved African American archeological sites in Texas.
• Varner-Hogg Plantation State Historic Site — 22 mi
  A Brazos sugar plantation built by enslaved people for the Patton family, later leased convict labor and Hogg family oil, now told through Rachel Patton and Sarah Ford.
• Galveston Island State Park — 25 mi
  A cattle ranch willed to the state that now runs the full width of Galveston Island, from two miles of Gulf beach across dunes and prairie to the marshes of West Galveston Bay.

More markers nearby

• Velasco Lodge No. 757, A. F. & A. M. — 3.7 mi
• R. O'Hara Lanier School — 3.8 mi
• Site of Town of Old Velasco — 4.2 mi
• Velasco Methodist Church — 4.4 mi