JOHN WALKER BAYLOR was probably the only man to serve in every major campaign of the Texas Revolution, yet his body does not lay in The State Cemetery, at Austin.
He was born it is believed in December, of 1813, to John Walker and Sophia Marie (Weidner) Baylor. His city of birth was Woodlawn, Bourbon County, Kentucky, and it is well known that he came from good stock. His father was an army physician, and his father before him, was the Commander of George Washington's Life Guard in the Third Continental Division at the battle of Germantown. His brother Henry Weidner Baylor, was the namesake of Baylor County, Texas, and another brother, John Robert Baylor was a Confederate General. Then there was his Uncle, Robert Emmett Bledsoe Baylor, known as R.E.B. Baylor who first went to Texas as an ordained Baptist Preacher, who later became a Judge, then helped with the organization of the Union Baptist Association, the Texas Baptist Education Society, and helped prepare the petition that led to the establishment of Baylor University in 1845.
As a young man, John or Walker as he liked to be called was admitted to West Point, but he was dismissed due to his rowdy conduct. Walker's father being friends with both Sam Houston, and then President Andrew Jackson, pulled some strings, and got his papers restored. Walker however went back and showed his restoration order to the Commandant, and immediately returned to his family home in Natchez, Mississippi. His actions of course displeased his father, to whom he soon found himself studying medicine.
When Walker's father passed away, in 1835, he traveled to Fort Gibson, Arkansas, where he joined George M. Collinsworth's volunteers of Matagorda, Texas, to protect the citizens of what is now Victoria, Texas. He fought at Goliad in the capture of La Bahía on the 9th of October. He was a member of Philip Dimmitt's Goliad garrison and fought under James Bowie and James Fannin in the Battle of Concepción on October 28. Then on November 21, 1835, Walker was part of a committee at Goliad assigned to prepare a document expressing the volunteers' defiance of an order from Stephen F. Austin directing Dimmitt to turn over control of the post to Collinsworth. Baylor was in the five-day Siege of Bexar on December 5–9, 1835, and also signed the Goliad Declaration of Independence on December 20. Dimmitt's command was disbanded in 1836, and Baylor went to San Antonio with either Bowie or Dimmitt.
During the Battle of the Alamo, Baylor was one of four or five couriers sent by William B. Travis to La Bahía to urge Fannin to come to his aid. On March 14 as a member of Capt. Albert C. Horton's cavalry he participated in several skirmishes against Gen. José de Urrea's Mexican cavalry. Horton's troopers were scouting ahead of Fannin's retreating army and so were not captured with the other Texans in the battle of Coleto. Baylor then made his way to Sam Houston's army on the Brazos,where he joined William H. Patton's company in Col. Sidney Johnson's Second Texas Volunteer Regiment. While in this command, J.W. Baylor fought at the Battle of San Jacinto, and received a thigh wound that he considered so slight he did not report it. The month following this decisive battle, he joined a company of mounted rangers to patrol the coast and watch for a possible Mexican attack from the sea. At Copano these "Horse Marines" captured three ships bearing supplies for the Mexican army.
On July 25 now Veteran soldier, Baylor went on furlough to the home of his uncle, Robert Emmett Bledsoe Baylor, in Alabama. His wound had become inflamed. He developed a fever and died on September 3, 1836, in Cahawba, Alabama, an unreported casualty of the battle of San Jacinto.
The actual site of his grave is unknown. I believe that the Doctor was buried in the Old Cahawba Cemetery. This man deserves a monument and if he is ever located, one will be erected.
He was born it is believed in December, of 1813, to John Walker and Sophia Marie (Weidner) Baylor. His city of birth was Woodlawn, Bourbon County, Kentucky, and it is well known that he came from good stock. His father was an army physician, and his father before him, was the Commander of George Washington's Life Guard in the Third Continental Division at the battle of Germantown. His brother Henry Weidner Baylor, was the namesake of Baylor County, Texas, and another brother, John Robert Baylor was a Confederate General. Then there was his Uncle, Robert Emmett Bledsoe Baylor, known as R.E.B. Baylor who first went to Texas as an ordained Baptist Preacher, who later became a Judge, then helped with the organization of the Union Baptist Association, the Texas Baptist Education Society, and helped prepare the petition that led to the establishment of Baylor University in 1845.
As a young man, John or Walker as he liked to be called was admitted to West Point, but he was dismissed due to his rowdy conduct. Walker's father being friends with both Sam Houston, and then President Andrew Jackson, pulled some strings, and got his papers restored. Walker however went back and showed his restoration order to the Commandant, and immediately returned to his family home in Natchez, Mississippi. His actions of course displeased his father, to whom he soon found himself studying medicine.
When Walker's father passed away, in 1835, he traveled to Fort Gibson, Arkansas, where he joined George M. Collinsworth's volunteers of Matagorda, Texas, to protect the citizens of what is now Victoria, Texas. He fought at Goliad in the capture of La Bahía on the 9th of October. He was a member of Philip Dimmitt's Goliad garrison and fought under James Bowie and James Fannin in the Battle of Concepción on October 28. Then on November 21, 1835, Walker was part of a committee at Goliad assigned to prepare a document expressing the volunteers' defiance of an order from Stephen F. Austin directing Dimmitt to turn over control of the post to Collinsworth. Baylor was in the five-day Siege of Bexar on December 5–9, 1835, and also signed the Goliad Declaration of Independence on December 20. Dimmitt's command was disbanded in 1836, and Baylor went to San Antonio with either Bowie or Dimmitt.
During the Battle of the Alamo, Baylor was one of four or five couriers sent by William B. Travis to La Bahía to urge Fannin to come to his aid. On March 14 as a member of Capt. Albert C. Horton's cavalry he participated in several skirmishes against Gen. José de Urrea's Mexican cavalry. Horton's troopers were scouting ahead of Fannin's retreating army and so were not captured with the other Texans in the battle of Coleto. Baylor then made his way to Sam Houston's army on the Brazos,where he joined William H. Patton's company in Col. Sidney Johnson's Second Texas Volunteer Regiment. While in this command, J.W. Baylor fought at the Battle of San Jacinto, and received a thigh wound that he considered so slight he did not report it. The month following this decisive battle, he joined a company of mounted rangers to patrol the coast and watch for a possible Mexican attack from the sea. At Copano these "Horse Marines" captured three ships bearing supplies for the Mexican army.
On July 25 now Veteran soldier, Baylor went on furlough to the home of his uncle, Robert Emmett Bledsoe Baylor, in Alabama. His wound had become inflamed. He developed a fever and died on September 3, 1836, in Cahawba, Alabama, an unreported casualty of the battle of San Jacinto.
The actual site of his grave is unknown. I believe that the Doctor was buried in the Old Cahawba Cemetery. This man deserves a monument and if he is ever located, one will be erected.
JOHN WALKER BAYLOR was probably the only man to serve in every major campaign of the Texas Revolution, yet his body does not lay in The State Cemetery, at Austin.
He was born it is believed in December, of 1813, to John Walker and Sophia Marie (Weidner) Baylor. His city of birth was Woodlawn, Bourbon County, Kentucky, and it is well known that he came from good stock. His father was an army physician, and his father before him, was the Commander of George Washington's Life Guard in the Third Continental Division at the battle of Germantown. His brother Henry Weidner Baylor, was the namesake of Baylor County, Texas, and another brother, John Robert Baylor was a Confederate General. Then there was his Uncle, Robert Emmett Bledsoe Baylor, known as R.E.B. Baylor who first went to Texas as an ordained Baptist Preacher, who later became a Judge, then helped with the organization of the Union Baptist Association, the Texas Baptist Education Society, and helped prepare the petition that led to the establishment of Baylor University in 1845.
As a young man, John or Walker as he liked to be called was admitted to West Point, but he was dismissed due to his rowdy conduct. Walker's father being friends with both Sam Houston, and then President Andrew Jackson, pulled some strings, and got his papers restored. Walker however went back and showed his restoration order to the Commandant, and immediately returned to his family home in Natchez, Mississippi. His actions of course displeased his father, to whom he soon found himself studying medicine.
When Walker's father passed away, in 1835, he traveled to Fort Gibson, Arkansas, where he joined George M. Collinsworth's volunteers of Matagorda, Texas, to protect the citizens of what is now Victoria, Texas. He fought at Goliad in the capture of La Bahía on the 9th of October. He was a member of Philip Dimmitt's Goliad garrison and fought under James Bowie and James Fannin in the Battle of Concepción on October 28. Then on November 21, 1835, Walker was part of a committee at Goliad assigned to prepare a document expressing the volunteers' defiance of an order from Stephen F. Austin directing Dimmitt to turn over control of the post to Collinsworth. Baylor was in the five-day Siege of Bexar on December 5–9, 1835, and also signed the Goliad Declaration of Independence on December 20. Dimmitt's command was disbanded in 1836, and Baylor went to San Antonio with either Bowie or Dimmitt.
During the Battle of the Alamo, Baylor was one of four or five couriers sent by William B. Travis to La Bahía to urge Fannin to come to his aid. On March 14 as a member of Capt. Albert C. Horton's cavalry he participated in several skirmishes against Gen. José de Urrea's Mexican cavalry. Horton's troopers were scouting ahead of Fannin's retreating army and so were not captured with the other Texans in the battle of Coleto. Baylor then made his way to Sam Houston's army on the Brazos,where he joined William H. Patton's company in Col. Sidney Johnson's Second Texas Volunteer Regiment. While in this command, J.W. Baylor fought at the Battle of San Jacinto, and received a thigh wound that he considered so slight he did not report it. The month following this decisive battle, he joined a company of mounted rangers to patrol the coast and watch for a possible Mexican attack from the sea. At Copano these "Horse Marines" captured three ships bearing supplies for the Mexican army.
On July 25 now Veteran soldier, Baylor went on furlough to the home of his uncle, Robert Emmett Bledsoe Baylor, in Alabama. His wound had become inflamed. He developed a fever and died on September 3, 1836, in Cahawba, Alabama, an unreported casualty of the battle of San Jacinto.
The actual site of his grave is unknown. I believe that the Doctor was buried in the Old Cahawba Cemetery. This man deserves a monument and if he is ever located, one will be erected.
He was born it is believed in December, of 1813, to John Walker and Sophia Marie (Weidner) Baylor. His city of birth was Woodlawn, Bourbon County, Kentucky, and it is well known that he came from good stock. His father was an army physician, and his father before him, was the Commander of George Washington's Life Guard in the Third Continental Division at the battle of Germantown. His brother Henry Weidner Baylor, was the namesake of Baylor County, Texas, and another brother, John Robert Baylor was a Confederate General. Then there was his Uncle, Robert Emmett Bledsoe Baylor, known as R.E.B. Baylor who first went to Texas as an ordained Baptist Preacher, who later became a Judge, then helped with the organization of the Union Baptist Association, the Texas Baptist Education Society, and helped prepare the petition that led to the establishment of Baylor University in 1845.
As a young man, John or Walker as he liked to be called was admitted to West Point, but he was dismissed due to his rowdy conduct. Walker's father being friends with both Sam Houston, and then President Andrew Jackson, pulled some strings, and got his papers restored. Walker however went back and showed his restoration order to the Commandant, and immediately returned to his family home in Natchez, Mississippi. His actions of course displeased his father, to whom he soon found himself studying medicine.
When Walker's father passed away, in 1835, he traveled to Fort Gibson, Arkansas, where he joined George M. Collinsworth's volunteers of Matagorda, Texas, to protect the citizens of what is now Victoria, Texas. He fought at Goliad in the capture of La Bahía on the 9th of October. He was a member of Philip Dimmitt's Goliad garrison and fought under James Bowie and James Fannin in the Battle of Concepción on October 28. Then on November 21, 1835, Walker was part of a committee at Goliad assigned to prepare a document expressing the volunteers' defiance of an order from Stephen F. Austin directing Dimmitt to turn over control of the post to Collinsworth. Baylor was in the five-day Siege of Bexar on December 5–9, 1835, and also signed the Goliad Declaration of Independence on December 20. Dimmitt's command was disbanded in 1836, and Baylor went to San Antonio with either Bowie or Dimmitt.
During the Battle of the Alamo, Baylor was one of four or five couriers sent by William B. Travis to La Bahía to urge Fannin to come to his aid. On March 14 as a member of Capt. Albert C. Horton's cavalry he participated in several skirmishes against Gen. José de Urrea's Mexican cavalry. Horton's troopers were scouting ahead of Fannin's retreating army and so were not captured with the other Texans in the battle of Coleto. Baylor then made his way to Sam Houston's army on the Brazos,where he joined William H. Patton's company in Col. Sidney Johnson's Second Texas Volunteer Regiment. While in this command, J.W. Baylor fought at the Battle of San Jacinto, and received a thigh wound that he considered so slight he did not report it. The month following this decisive battle, he joined a company of mounted rangers to patrol the coast and watch for a possible Mexican attack from the sea. At Copano these "Horse Marines" captured three ships bearing supplies for the Mexican army.
On July 25 now Veteran soldier, Baylor went on furlough to the home of his uncle, Robert Emmett Bledsoe Baylor, in Alabama. His wound had become inflamed. He developed a fever and died on September 3, 1836, in Cahawba, Alabama, an unreported casualty of the battle of San Jacinto.
The actual site of his grave is unknown. I believe that the Doctor was buried in the Old Cahawba Cemetery. This man deserves a monument and if he is ever located, one will be erected.
Family Members
Advertisement
Explore more
Sponsored by Ancestry
Advertisement
