George Bernard Erath family papers

George Bernard Erath (1813-1891), surveyor, soldier, and legislator, was born and educated in Vienna, Austria. He moved to America upon his graduation from Vienna Polytechnic Institute, landing first in New Orleans, Louisiana, and then settling in Cincinnati, Ohio, in 1832. The following year, he moved again to the Republic of Texas to be a surveyor in Robertson’s colony. In 1835, he signed up for John H. Moore’s ranger company, campaigning against the indigenous Americans, and in 1836, he volunteered for service in the Texas Revolution in Company C of Colonel Edward Burleson’s First Regiment, Texan Volunteers. Following the Revolution, Erath continued his career as a soldier while also surveying until 1843, when he became a member of the House of Representatives of the Eighth and Ninth Congresses of the Republic (1843-1845).

A supporter of Texas annexation to the United States, Erath was elected to the state’s First Legislature. In 1846, he resumed his career as a surveyor, planning the towns of both Waco and Stephenville. He then was elected to the Senate of the Seventh, Eighth, and Ninth Legislatures (1857-1861). He resigned in 1861 to serve on a two-person committee dedicated to the resolution of issues between Texas and the indigenous Americans on its reservations.

In 1864, Governor Pendleton Murrah appointed Erath major of a regiment in the Second Frontier District, which held responsibility for the defense of the Texas frontier. Ten years later, Erath made one final descent into political life, representing the Nineteenth District in the Fourteenth Legislature of the Senate.

Erath married Lucinda Chambers in 1845, and they had five children. In 1886, Erath dictated his memoirs to his daughter, author and poet Lucy Alice Erath (1857-1948), who was once described as the “First Lady of Waco.” George B. Erath died in 1891, and the Texas State Historical Association published his memoirs in 1923. Erath County, Texas, is named for him.

Sources:

Caroll, H. Bailey. “Texas Collection.” The Southwestern Historical Quarterly 52, no. 4 (1949): 448-463.

Handbook of Texas Online, s.v. "Erath, George Bernard," http://www.tshaonline.org/handbook/online/articles/EE/fer1.html (accessed July 8, 2010).

Wikipedia, s.v., “George Bernard Erath,” https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/George_Bernard_Erath (accessed April 15, 2021