The Southwestern Historical Quarterly, Volume 63, July 1959 - April, 1960 Page: 151
684 p. : ill., maps, ports. ; 23 cm.View a full description of this periodical.
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Texas Collection
financial support to the winning of independence. Williams' manifold
services to the Republic of Texas may only be suggested; they cannot
even be outlined within the limited time of this occasion. Williams
brought in hundreds of recruits, he furnished arms and provisions,
and he served as a commissioner to try to arrange a five-million-dollar
loan. After those negotiations failed, he was still successful in con-
tracting for the vessels that made up the second Texas Navy in 1839.
The city of Galveston came into being while Williams was away
in the East between 1836 and 1839, but he was, nevertheless, one of
the founders of the Galveston City Company and some of the earliest
permanent construction in Galveston was the McKinney and Williams
warehouse at Strand and Twenty-fourth. The firm's mercantile in-
terests were many and varied.
Williams has been heralded as the father of Texas banking. This
came from his being the initiator of the first Texas bank, the Com-
mercial and Agricultural Bank, in 1847. He was president of the
only bank of issue in Texas up to the close of the Civil War. He
established branches and he had business and financial worries enough
to vex a saint. The care of money does bring responsibilities, cares
that the improvident never think on. In many other ways Williams
was a leading citizen: he represented Galveston in the Congress of
the Republic at Austin in 1839-1840; in 1843 he was one of two
commissioners appointed to arrange an armistice with Mexico; in
1840-1841 he was Grand Master of the Masonic order in Texas.
Materially he built the structure that unites us today. Perhaps
in a spiritual way he dedicated it and we have come for rededication
ceremonies. He built sturdily; the hard core of his work endureth.
One thing I have not yet said and will only mention in passing-
Williams, like thousands of others, was not always appreciated. This
is but a way of saying that governments-even good governments-
are frequently callous to individuals who have been their most de-
voted servants.
But today Samuel May Williams looks down upon this little group
of grateful and appreciative followers and with banker-like exactness
he says to Mrs. Anne Brindley and her splendid associates: "The
account is paid-late, but in full and with interest. My fellow towns-
people-my people remembered."
New occasions teach new duties to houses. The Williams house
became the Tucker house, the domicile of Philip C. Tucker, Jr.
Tucker was also from New England, being born in Vergennes,
Vermont, in 1826. He was a lawyer, and like Williams, a careful and
meticulous man, both as a counselor and as a pleader. Like Williams
also, he was a great and conscientious public servant. The house felt
at home with the new master. Tucker served with Prince John
Magruder in the Confederate recapture of Galveston and even in
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Texas State Historical Association. The Southwestern Historical Quarterly, Volume 63, July 1959 - April, 1960, periodical, 1960; Austin, Texas. (https://texashistory.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metapth101186/m1/189/: accessed May 1, 2024), University of North Texas Libraries, The Portal to Texas History, https://texashistory.unt.edu; crediting Texas State Historical Association.