Mirabeau LamarIn 1838, Dr. Willis Roberts and most of his family moved to Texas at the invitation of longtime friend Mirabeau Lamar, second President of the Republic of Texas, who had lived with the family twenty years earlier. Lamar appointed several members of the Roberts family to positions in the new country’s government. Dr. Roberts transported a large house frame by ship to Galveston, Texas, where he was the Collector of Customs. He relocated the frame several times before deciding where to finally build. After a couple of years, Dr. Roberts gave up on the Texas adventure in the wilderness and returned to the more civilized world of Mobile, where he died in 1853. Several of Willis’ children, Olivea, Sophia and Samuel, however, remained in Texas, where in 1841 Samuel was appointed Secretary of State of the Republic. While there, Samuel married and built a showplace house in Bonham, Texas circa 1853. Educated at West Point, Samuel had been a classmate of Jefferson Davis, President of Confederate States. [i]
[i] Isbell records, 910 Government Street, Mobile, Alabama.
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