Henry Eustace McCulloch - Texas Career

Texas Career

Henry McCulloch shared in his brother Ben's economic attempts in the 1830s, including transporting goods by raft on the Mississippi, once all the way to New Orleans. When Davy Crockett went to Texas in 1835, Henry McCulloch and his brother made plans to meet Crockett's Tennessee Boys at Nacogdoches on Christmas Day. However, Ben contracted measles and was bedridden for several weeks and while ill convinced his brother Henry to return to Tennessee in November of 1835. Luckily, the illness kept them from arriving with Crockett at the Alamo.

In 1838, both Henry and Ben McCulloch were making a living as surveyors. They also made a reputations as Indian fighters. Both took part in the Battle Creek Fight against the Comanche Indians in Navarro County, also known as "The Surveyors' Fight". In 1839, Henry McCulloch was on the muster roll of Capt. Mathew Caldwell's "Gonzales Rangers". Also in 1839, Ben was elected to the Republic of Texas House of Representatives after a contentious campaign that included assorted slanders between the candidates. As a result, Ben fought a rifle duel with his opponent, Reuben Ross and received a permanently crippling wound in the arm. The matter was considered closed but it flared up again the following year, this time involving Henry, who killed Ross with a pistol.

On August 20, 1840, McCulloch married Jane Isabella Ashby, daughter of John Miller Ashby and Mary Harris Garnett of Kentucky, who had been early settlers in the DeWitt Colony, which was centered on Gonzales. They had twelve children, most of whom remained in Texas.

Later in 1840, McCulloch took part in the Battle of Plum Creek, acting as a scout against the Comanches and being wounded. When a Mexican raiding force under Gen. Adrian Woll invested San Antonio in September 1842, he served as First Lieutenant of a company of volunteers from Seguin. He again operated as a scout, including infiltrating enemy lines, and commanded a spy company at the Battle of Salado Creek. With his brother, Ben, he subsequently took part in the failed Somervell expedition and both men were ordered to leave shortly before most of the Texans were captured at Mier, Mexico in Tamaulipas, December 25, 1842.

He was elected sheriff of Gonzales in 1843 and also opened a mercantile business there. The following year, he moved his family permanently to Seguin.

There are several letters written in the 1890s (now in the possession of the Texas State Library) in which McCulloch describes his (and his brother's) activities during the Texas Revolution and under the Republic.

In December 1847, McCulloch was in command of a Ranger company in Burnet County and established what became Fort Croghan. When the War with Mexico began, he took command of a volunteer company patrolling the same area of the western frontier against Indian raids. He continued this service after the war as captain of a company of Texas Mounted Volunteers out of Fort Murrill, and also operating a Ranger post in Kimble County.

He served in both houses of the Texas Legislature from Guadalupe County, being elected to the House of Representatives in 1853 and the Senate in 1855. Among other subjects, he introduced bills to regulate the use by slaveowners of "manager slaves" and to acquire the Alamo as a state monument. He then received an appointment as U.S. marshal from President Buchanan for the eastern district of Texas, and was a delegate from Guadalupe County to the Texas secession convention in January 1861. {His brother Ben had been 1852 US Marshal for the eastern District of Texas}