San Jacinto Museum of History

Albert and Ethel Herzstein Library

Manuscript Collections

Finding Aid

MOSES AUSTIN BRYAN PAPERS

1814-1930 (Bulk: 1836-1889)

Manuscript Collection: MC060

Size: .8 linear feet

Boxes: 2

OCLC No: 49802680

Acquisition: Mr. and Mrs. Paul G. Bell, 1986.

Restrictions on Access: None

Terms Governing Use: Open for research by appointment.

Processed by: Melissa Calderwood, 2002.

Publication Rights: Copyright has not been assigned to the San Jacinto Museum of History. All requests for permission to publish or quote from manuscripts must be submitted in writing to the Library Director. Permission for publication is given on behalf of the San Jacinto Museum of History as the owner of the physical items and is not intended to include or imply permission of the copyright holder, which must also be obtained by the researcher.

Citation: [Identification of Item], Moses Austin Bryan Papers, MC060, San Jacinto Museum of History, Houston, Texas.

Creator Sketch:

Moses Austin Bryan was the third son born to James and Emily Austin Bryan, the daughter of Moses Austin and sister of Stephen F. Austin, in Herculaneum, Missouri, on September 25, 1817.  After the 1822 death of James Bryan, Emily Austin Bryan married James F. Perry.  Emily Bryan and her children moved to Potosi, Missouri, where Moses Austin Bryan attended school until the age of eleven.  Employed in Perry and W.W. Hunter's store until December 1830, Bryan accompanied Hunter to Texas and worked in the San Felipe store of W.W. Hunter and Stephen F. Austin. 

In 1832, at the age of fourteen, Bryan began service as Stephen F. Austin’s secretary when he accompanied Austin to Saltillo, Mexico.  Bryan and Austin boarded with one of the legislators, Don Jesus de la Grande, and it was there that Moses Austin Bryan learned to speak Spanish.  In 1835 Bryan clerked in the Austin colony land office and in the fall again served as Austin’s secretary during Austin’s brief tenure as commander of the Texas army. 

Bryan enlisted in the Texas army as a private shortly after the fall of the Alamo and participated in Houston’s retreat.  He served at the Battle of San Jacinto as third sergeant in Captain Moseley Baker’s company, as an aide-de-camp on the staff of Thomas J. Rusk, and as an interpreter for the meeting between Sam Houston and Antonio López de Santa Anna.  In 1839, President Mirabeau B. Lamar appointed Bryan as secretary of legation under Anson Jones, minister from the Republic of Texas to the United States.  Bryan served as a member of the 1842 Somerville [Somervell] Expedition.  During the Civil War, he enlisted in Third Texas Regiment, rising to the rank of major.  In 1873, Bryan helped organize the Texas Veterans Association and served as its secretary until 1886.

In 1840, Bryan married Adaline La Mothe of Rapides Parish, Louisiana; she died May 30, 1855.  They had four sons and two daughters.  Bryan married Cora Lewis, daughter of Ira Randolph Lewis, in 1856; they had four sons and one daughter.  Moses Austin Bryan died in Brenham at the home of his son, Beauregard, on March 16, 1895, and was buried at Independence, Texas.

Bibliography:

“BRYAN, MOSES AUSTIN.” The Handbook of Texas Online.  http://www.tsha.utexas.edu/handbook/online/articles/view/BB/fbrar.html

Dixon, Sam Houston and Louis Wiltz Kemp.  The Heroes of San Jacinto.  Houston:  Anson

 Jones Press, 1932.

Scope and Content Note:

Correspondence, financial records, legal documents, printed materials, creative works, memorandum and notes, surveyor’s field notes, and photographs record the life of Moses Austin Bryan (1817-1895).  The correspondence documents Bryan's travel to Washington, D.C. as secretary of legation (1839), communications with James F. Perry at Peach Point, Brazoria County, Texas, regarding personal financial matters (1832-1852), and service in the Somerville Expedition (1842).  Communications from J. Hampton Kuykendall (13 letters) reveal Bryan’s interest in published accounts of Texas history. General correspondence within the Austin-Bryan-Perry family illuminates family business in the 19^th century.  The financial and legal documents (1814-1908) outline Bryan's expenditures and payments of debt, and include estate and probate documents of Emily M. Bryan Perry.  A bound journal illuminates Bryan's financial transactions from 1845-1881. Printed materials include several pamphlets from the Texas Veterans Association (1873-1899).  Bryan’s record of historical events in early Texas is outlined in a handwritten historical account of 1835-1836 and the typed "Reminiscences" (1889) which speaks of his service with Austin and involvement in the Texas army.  The papers also include memorandum and notes and surveyor’s field notes.  The collection contains four photographs of Texas veterans.

Archivist's Note:

The Moses Austin Bryan Papers were donated to the San Jacinto Museum of History Association by Mr. and Mrs. Paul Gervais Bell (great-grandson of Moses Austin Bryan) of Houston.  The papers were collected from a variety of sources by Bell.

MOSES AUSTIN BRYAN PAPERS, 1814-1930 (Bulk: 1836-1889)

Manuscript Collection: MC060

Size: .8 linear feet

Boxes: 2

Inventory

Series: Correspondence: Received

Series: Correspondence: Sent

Series: Correspondence: Third Party, Bryan-Perry Family

Series: Correspondence: Third Party, General

Series: Financial

Series: Legal

Series: Printed Materials