GENERAL ALEXANDER M. HOUSTON
(1794-1870)

By Dr. Wayne C. Temple

In the Old State Capitol on the Public Square in Springfield, Illinois, hangs an oil portrait of Alexander M. Houston. However, any information on this man has long since disappeared from the acquisition records. Yet this distinguished gentleman deserves a biographical sketch. After diligent research the following facts have been discovered.

Among the first pioneer settlers in Crawford County, Illinois, were William, John, and Alexander M. Houston (their relationship unknown). Crawford became a county on December 31, 1816. William Houston was already in the county when the 1820 census was taken. But the exact date that Alexander arrived cannot be determined. He most certainly came to Illinois about 1822 (or a year later) after he resigned his commission in the Regular Army.

According to Army and census records, Alexander was born in either Tennessee or Virginia in 1794 and received his commission as 2nd Lt. in the 7th Infantry on March 24, 1818, while a resident of Tennessee. During this time, the Seminole War was going on with Major General Andrew Jackson in charge of the Southern Division of the United States' defensive forces, which faced the Spanish-controlled Florida Territory. Gen. Jackson commanded about three regiments totaling 3,000 men with an additional several thousand of Indian allies. He had been sent into West Florida by orders dated December 26, 1817.

This portrait of General Alexander M. Houston, painter unknown, hangs in the Old State Capitol. Photo by William Furry

It was to this important and active command that 2nd Lt. Houston reported. His tombstone in Woodland Cemetery in Xenia, Ohio, proudly boasts that Houston served as "an officer in the regular army under Gen. Jackson." From October 1 to December 31, 1818, he was the Regimental Quartermaster and promoted to 1st Lt. on August 31, 1819, but resigned his commission on March 1, 1822. With the Seminoles and Spanish defeated, Jackson retired from the Army on June 1, 1821, yet remained on paper until December 1 that year as the Territorial Governor of Florida. Perhaps Houston felt that his personal allegiance lay with Maj. Gen. Jackson from Tennessee, and he saw no reason to continue serving in the Regular Army.

At some date after his retirement from the Army, Alexander M. Houston moved to Illinois to join his Houston relatives in Crawford County. On January 10, 1824, Alexander received a commission as Brigadier General in the 2nd Brigade, 2nd Division of the Illinois State Militia. From that time forward, he was known as General Houston. A prominent citizen of that region, Houston in the following year became a director and incorporator of the Wabash Navigation Company. Then in 1826 he ran for sheriff of Crawford County, was elected and commissioned September 1 that year.

Growing prosperous, he next purchased Federal land in Crawford County, Illinois on November 8, 1827. For $100, he got 80 acres, this tract being the East Half of the Southwest Quarter of Section 1 in Township Six North, Range Eleven West of the Second Principal Meridian. A practicing Democrat, he became a candidate for Presidential Elector on Andrew Jackson's ticket, was elected and commissioned on November 20, 1828. Since Jackson carried Illinois, Gen. Houston was privileged to cast a ballot for his old military commander when he, Richard M. Young, and John Taylor, met—presumably in Vandalia —to send the three Illinois electoral votes to Washington for "Old Hickory."

When the U.S. Census was taken for Crawford County in 1830, the enumerator discovered that A.M. Houston (age 36) had another male, between the ages of 20 and 30, living in his family. His wife, Eliza, was between 20 and 30 (actually, we know she was 27 years of age), plus two free "colored," one male between 10 and 20, and one female, between 10 and 20. Evidently, Houston had these three to help with his farming project. It is entirely possible that Houston brought the two persons of color

18 Illinois

from Tennessee, and they previously may have been his slaves.

Having served in the Regular Army, Houston without hesitation volunteered for duty in the Black Hawk War at the then-relatively advanced age of 38. With his valuable military knowledge, he first became an Aide-de-Camp to Brig. Gen. Milton K. Alexander of the Second Brigade, Third Army. Without doubt, he assisted Gen. Alexander with his paperwork. However, he later was mustered in as the Captain of his own company in the Second Regiment, Second Brigade of Illinois Mounted Volunteers and served from May 15 until mustered out at Dixon's Ferry on August 2, 1832.

In 1840, Alexander and Eliza were still residing in Crawford County. But this time, no others were in their household. (Nevertheless, John Houston, a male between 40 and 50 years, was living beside them.) Yet by 1850, Alexander and Eliza, whom we now know was born in Kentucky, were farming Parke County of Indiana. They owned $11,400 in real estate, a very tidy sum in those days. Parke County lies on the Wabash River, roughly 60 miles due west of Indianapolis and across from Edgar County, Illinois. And when on November 7, 1851, Houston received his bounty for his service in the Black Hawk War, although then living in Indiana, he took his acreage in Richland County, Illinois. It is possible that a relative or tenant was going to farm it for him.

Approximately three years later, A.M. Houston removed to Zenia, Greene County, Ohio. His wife, Eliza, having died, Alexander married Mrs. Emily Jane Platter in Xenia on September 19, 1854, the Reverend H.W Taylor officiating. She was born on December 29, 1815, and had a son, the Reverend James E. Platter. Alexander and Emily Jane continued to reside in Xenia where they were respected citizens. They were duly noted in that city in the 1860 and 1870 census returns. Alexander was an ordained elder in the Presbyterian church, and active in the community, evidently laboring in some business enterprise or living off invested funds.

In June of 1870, Alexander and his wife visited all of his relatives in Indiana and then proceeded to New York State, where they saw all of her living relatives. While staying with his stepson, the Rev. James E. Platter, in Sandy Hill, General Houston suffered a heart attack and died on July 20, 1870, at the age of 76. His devoted wife returned the body to Xenia, Ohio, where it was interred in Woodland Cemetery. When the widow succumbed on June 14, 1900, at the age of 84, she too, was buried beside her husband.

Dr. Wayne C. Temple is a deputy director of the Illinois State Archives and an internationally recognized Lincoln scholar and author. He is a frequent contributor to the publications of the Illinois State Historical Society.

Illinois Heritage 19