1838 Old Town Plat of Montgomery Found; Being Restored

A 187 year old Plat of Montgomery, or ‘New’ Town of Montgomery ‘On the Hill’ drawn by an early Lake Creek Settlement pioneer was recently rediscovered by a former MISD Texas History teacher, Brenda Beaven, and member of the Montgomery Historical Society. The 1838 document, originally signed by William Watters ‘W.W.’ Shepperd, who founded the new town site when he purchased land from John Corner in February 1839 after being four years in the area. The earliest settlers to the region received land grants from the Mexican government in the early 1830’s, and those who put down roots between the West Fork of the San Jacinto River and Lake Creek became known as settlers to the Lake Creek Settlement.

The original Mexican Land Grant recipient, John Corner, sold William C. Clark 600 acres of land in the most northwestern corner of the Corner League in 1831. In 1835, W. W. Shepperd purchased the western 200 acres of Clark’s 600, a square that would become the first site of the town of the Lake Creek Settlement, later known as Montgomery ‘Under the Hill,’ near where Town Creek is located today. Shepperd built a home for his family on the land, opened a trading post, and advertised for lots to be sold in July 1837’s ‘Telegraph and Texas Register,’ with the headline ‘Montgomery,’ along with his business partner, John Wyatt ‘J.W.’ Moody, who was previously County Clerk for Montgomery County, Alabama. Moody would become the Republic of Texas’ first Auditor. Later that year Montgomery County, Texas had been created in December 1837. Historian Robin Montgomery has noted that in ‘Papers of The Texas Revolution,’ Vol. 9, Page 156, by John H. Jenkins, that Montgomery ‘Under the Hill’ was a known entity by February 13, 1836, in a letter from Acting Governor James W. Robinson, to J.G.W Pierson, the date coincides with Lake Creek Settlement pioneer Charles B. Stewart’s attendance at the ‘Convention of 1836,’ which resulted in the Texas Declaration of Independence from Mexico, and his marriage to W.W. Sheppard’s daughter, Julia.

“The plat came from the Addison-Gandy House, one of the historical homes in Historic Montgomery,” said Ms. Beaven. “I found it in the Nathaniel Hart Davis Museum marked as ‘fragile.’”

One of the problems with the creek were the flies and mosquitos, and by 1837 Shepperd was eyeing the hill, and settled a deal in February 1838, when he purchased 212 acres of land from John Corner, due south of the 200 acres he purchased from Clark three years earlier. In the minutes of the first meeting of Commissioners Court, Shepperd donated a half interest in the new town land and 60 acres of pine in return for the town of Montgomery being named the county seat of Montgomery County. By April 1838, Shepperd made a deal to lease or sell a house to the County for the first Courthouse in Montgomery.

“This is a very important document,” said Billy Ray Duncan, President of the Montgomery Historical Society. “It shows the original layout of the town as noted by W.W. Sheppard, and even has a Courthouse clearly shown in the center.”

The Plat of Montgomery was a planning document on the part of Shepperd, since the purchase of the land for the upper new town had not yet taken place, but the newly formed County had a meeting of its Commissioners Courts soon after, and surely Shepperd presented the plat in that meeting telling of his plans. The document is in terrible shape, but an old copy made before the original document deteriorated fills in the missing pieces. The document does contain part of a sentence “which the town of Montgomery consist.” Much of the writing is illegible. To the right of the document is written, “Plan of the town of Montgomery, January 1, 1838.” Another line of text reads “Line of Reserve of W.W. Shepperd,” with an original signature with its associated swirls. The current state of the plat is undisplayable, showing its misshapen edges, lots and natural cut-throughs due to the thin nature of the paper, the acidic ink, and the biting nature of the thin metal nib of the dip pen used at the time.

A Map by Historian Kameron Searle, locating both Montgomery townsites in the 1830s