HISTORICAL SIGNIFICANCE TO HOUSTON AND TEXAS:
Robert Wilson, born in 1793, lived in Natchez Mississippi in the 1820s and was a business partner of William Plunkett
Harris operating steamboats on the Mississippi and Red rivers. According to family history, in the 1820s, he brought
supplies for the first colonists on his schooner Rights of Man. By 1828, he had joined William’s Texas brother, John
Richardson Harris in developing Harrisburg where he owned and operated a gristmill, sawmill, and various other
businesses. He also invented and acquired a patent for a brick machine. He became associated with the Allen
brothers in establishing Houston. In 1830 he married his second wife, New Orleans widow Sarah Reed.
In 1832 Wilson joined the siege at Anahuac and became politically active. He provided ships to take Mexican troops
back to Mexico. In 1836 he was elected and served a 3 year term in the First Texas Senate. He earned the nickname
Honest Bob because of his conflict with the fiscal policies of Lamar. He died in 1856 and is buried at the Glenwood
Cemetery. (Handbook of Texas)
Robert’s son by his first wife, James T.D. Wilson, born in 1820, arrived in Columbia, Texas in 1835. He served as a
private in the Texas army and assisted in the capture of the Mexican sloop-of-war Correo Mexicano. In 1837 he
moved to Houston and worked for his father in the real estate business. As an employee of the military board of
Texas during the Civil War, he bought supplies in Mexico for the Confederate Army. Afterwards, when banking was
legalized in Texas, he became director and president of the National Exchange Bank.
In 1874, Governor Richard Coke appointed him to replace Thomas H. Scanlan as Mayor of Houston. He was then
elected and served until 1875.
During the 1820s, the Cone family arrived in Texas from Georgia. H.H. Cone was a surgeon serving in the Texas
Army and afterwards settled his family in Houston. In 1855, James Wilson married Mary Adaline Cornelia Cone.
(Handbook of Texas) Family history dictates that the bed could have been used by Robert or was a wedding gift to
James and Mary, and the dates confirm that time frame. Since Robert passed in 1856, perhaps it was part of his
estate and passed on to James at that time. (anecdotal narrative – Jeff Carroll)
The bed was used in the master bedroom in the home that James built Mary (1857) in downtown Houston on an entire
block across from Tranquility Park. (Houston’s Forgotten Heritage)
When Mary died in 1899 and James in 1902, the bed passed to their oldest son Harvey T.D. Wilson, who resided his
entire lifetime in the family home. After he died, his younger brother Hubert continued to live in the house until around
1914. After staying vacant for a couple of years, it was torn down in 1916. (Houston’s Forgotten Heritage)
The bed passed to their sister Cornelia Beranice Wilson Dargan who owned half of the 2900 block of Crawford. In
1927 her daughter Mildred married Festus R. Carroll and the bed was used in their cottage at 2902 Crawford.
Following the deaths of Mildred’s parents in 1944, the Houston property was sold, and the family moved to 300 S.
Summit in Weimar, Texas. The bed remained there until the house and contents were sold by her son, Jeff Carroll, in
1990.
Sources:
American Cabinetmakers, Marked American Furniture, 1640-1940 ;
Wm. C. Ketchum, Jr., with The Museum of American Folk Art
Furniture Built to Last for a Lifetime, Chapter 18:
http://www.selfcraft.net/Hannaford/CHBook/CH_Ch18-23.pdf
The Handbook of Texas :
Robert Wilson: http://www.tshaonline.org/handbook/online/articles/fwi56
James T.D. Wilson - http://www.tshaonline.org/handbook/online/articles/fwi54
Robert and JTD Wilson - earlier version
Family Anecdotal Report (letter) – Jeff Carroll
website: http://www.jeffcarroll-legendarytexas.com/
Article and photo of J.T.D.’s home taken from Houston’s Forgotten Heritage
Inventions Patented by Texans 1846-1861, Southwestern Historical Quarterly, Andrew Forest Muir