DUANE
Duane's take
Here's how the official marker tells it — Washington County, C.S.A. Now, when people talk about the Civil War in Texas, they tend to reach for the battlefields first. But sometimes the real weight of a war gets carried by the folks back home — the ones keeping the whole operation from falling apart.
And if you want to understand how Texas held itself together during those four years, you'd do well to pull over and think about Washington County. Because Washington County was, by every measure, the most populous county in the state during the Civil War. The most.
Out of every county in Texas, this one had more people than any other. That's not a small thing. People mean labor, and labor means production, and in wartime, production is everything.
So here's what they were buildin' out here. Local factories turned out spinning jennies, lumber, pots, kettles, wagons — and army ambulances. Think about that last one for a moment.
Somewhere in Washington County, somebody was sawing wood and fitting wheels, knowing full well those ambulances were headed toward places where men would need them badly. The county served as a center for production, warehousing, transportation, and communications. It had a large quartermaster depot.
And Brenham — the county's main town — was one of only four state depots in all of Texas where government cotton was held. From Brenham, wagons and carts hauled that cotton all the way to Mexico, trading it for vital military and civilian supplies. All the way to Mexico.
Wagon after wagon, rolling south through the dust. Brenham was also the terminus of the rail connections to Houston, and the town was alive — that's the word the marker uses, alive — with troops, stagecoaches, and freighters. And every early morning, when the train came in from Houston, it was met by a pony express operation that took the Houston Telegraph and carried it up to Austin so the Gazette there could publish the latest war news in the state capitol.
Think about that chain. Train to rider to press. Every morning.
The news had to move, and Washington County was part of how it moved. Not everything kept moving, though. The Confederate paper shortage eventually forced the Brenham Banner to suspend publication altogether.
The paper simply ran out of paper. That's the kind of quiet, grinding hardship that doesn't make it into too many stories. But in nearby Washington-on-the-Brazos, one press never stopped.
Eva Lancaster kept printing The Texas Ranger — never missed an issue — while her husband and two sons spent four years fighting for the South. Four years. Three members of her family gone to the war, and she kept that paper running the whole time.
You want to talk about somebody holdin' the line, well. Washington County sent cavalry, infantry, and artillery units to fight on all fronts. Waul's Legion organized and trained right here in the county.
Brenham served as the headquarters for the reserve corps of Texas. And out of Independence, General Jerome Robertson led Hood's Texas Brigade — celebrated, the marker calls it — for seventeen months. Most populous county in the state.
Factories, depots, cotton wagons to Mexico, a pony express before dawn, a woman running a press alone while her family fought a war. Washington County, C.S.A. wasn't just supporting the Confederate effort. In a lot of ways, it was the effort.
And Eva Lancaster never missed an issue.
What the marker says
Washington County was the most populous in the state during the Civil War. It served as a center for production, warehousing, transportation and communications, and had a large quartermaster depot. Local wartime factories made spinning jennies, lumber, pots, kettles, wagons and army ambulances. Government cotton was held in Brenham, one of four state depots. From here, wagons and carts hauled it to Mexico in exchange for vital military and civilian supplies. Brenham, terminus of rail connections to Houston, was alive with troops, stagecoaches and freighters. Here, the early morning train was met by a pony express operation that carried the Houston Telegraph to Austin so that town's Gazette might publish the latest war news in the state capitol. A Confederate paper shortage forced the Brenham Banner to suspend publication. In nearby Washington-on-the-Brazos, however, Eva Lancaster never missed an issue, printing The Texas Ranger while her husband and two sons spent four years fighting for the South. Cavalry, infantry and artillery units from Washington County fought on all fronts during the war. Waul's Legion organized and trained in the county, and Brenham served as the headquarters for the reserve corps of Texas. Additionally, Gen. Jerome Roberston of Independence led the celebrated Hood's Texas Brigade for seventeen months. (1965)