John Austin (soldier), Date of Birth, Place of Birth, Date of Death
TweetJohn Austin (soldier)
soldier
Date of Birth: 17-Mar-1801
Place of Birth: New Haven, Connecticut, United States
Date of Death: 11-Aug-1833
Nationality: United States
Zodiac Sign: Pisces 
About John Austin (soldier)
- John Austin (March 17, 1801 — August 11, 1833) was a Texian settler, one of Stephen Austin's Old Three Hundred, and the Texian commander at the Battle of Velasco during the Anahuac Disturbances before Texas Revolution. No relation (or a distant relation) to the empresario Stephen Austin, John was born to John Punderson Austin and Susan Rogers Austin in New Haven, Connecticut.
- He initially also bore the middle name Punderson but apparently ceased using it, as it appears on none of his Texan records.
- John found work as a sailor and joined the Long expedition in New Orleans in 1819.
- Captured and imprisoned in Mexico, John later returned to Texas and joined Stephen Austin's colony, befriending him and becoming constable of his settlement at San Felipe de Austin.
- He was joined in Texas by his brother William. Stephen provided the capital for John's cotton gin on Buffalo Bayou, and his brother James opened a store with John in Brazoria, Texas.
- Involved through his business with the coasting trade, John became the port officer in 1831 and alcalde for Brazoria the next year.
- He was also the delegate for Victoria at the Convention of 1832, signed the Turtle Bayou Resolutions, and following his command at Velasco was elected brigadier general of the Texian militia.
- John Austin died with his two children in a cholera epidemic at Gulf Prairie.
- His wife Elizabeth married Thomas Parrott in 1834, returning the upper half of John's Buffalo Bayou grant to his father.
- His father, arriving in Texas, also succumbed to cholera and died in 1834.
- Half of the lower John Austin league was latter sold to John and Augustus Allen for the settlement which became Houston, Texas.
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