Edwin R. Rainwater

Edwin R. Rainwater (1813 – before 1850) was a soldier in the Texas Army during the Texas Revolution, noted for a daring action during the Battle of San Jacinto that helped seal the decisive Texian victory.

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Biography

Edwin R. Rainwater came to Texas prior to 1837. The Deed Records of Gonzales County, Book D, page 120, show that at the town of Velasco, Brazoria County, Edwin R. Rainwater on March 4, 1837 purchased one-fourth of a league of land situated on the Lavaca River in Gonzales County for $1,400 and sold it on the same day to Chester Newell for $1,400. The deed was witnessed by J. S. D. Byrom and J. B. Hoskins.[1]

He enlisted in the Texas army and was a member of Captain Henry Wax Karnes' Company of Cavalry and was one of the men who assisted in destroying Vince's Bridge. The others who were with him on that mission were Deaf Smith, John Coker, Dimer W. Reaves, Young Perry Alsbury, John T. Garner and Moses Lapham.[2] He evidently left Texas soon after the Mexican–American War. He did not apply for the Bounty and Donation land due him for his services in the army and he assigned his land rights in Matagorta County to Samuel Fuller on January 25, 1848.[3][4] He served in Company A, Captain Benjamin Hill's Company, Texas Mounted Volunteers during the Mexican–American War and he served from April 14, 1847 to June 16, 1847. The 1847 muster rolls list him as age 34 in 1847.[5]

He became an early citizen of Rio Grande City, TX in Starr county, where he was involved in organizing the county government in the fall of 1848 to address the increasing influence of outlaws in this border town at the termination of the Mexican-American war. His disappearance from Texas records at this point suggest he died prior to 1850.

Sources
  • Muster Rolls of the Texas Revolution (1st ed.). Austin: Daughters of the Republic of Texas. 1986. ISBN 0911317368. LCCN 84072397.
  • Nance, Joseph Milton (1964). Attack and Counterattack: The Texas-Mexican Frontier, 1842. Austin: University of Texas Press. LCCN 65000988. OCLC 478759.
  • Houston, Sam (1938–1943). Williams, Amelia W.; Barker, Eugene C. (eds.). The Writings of Sam Houston, 1813-1863. Austin: University of Texas Press. LCCN 39009948.
  • The Corpus Christi Star, November 14, 1848. (University of Texas, Center for American History)

See also

References
  1. Abstract of All Original Texas Land Titles Comprising Grants and Locations to August 3, 1841 (microfiche), General Land Office, Austin, Texas, Bascom Giles, Commissioner
  2. Biographical Sketches of the Men Who Won Independence for Texas, Louis Wiltz Kemp, online edition, http://www.sanjacinto-museum.org/>
  3. The Heros of San Jacinto, page 316, Sam Houston Dixon & Louis Wiltz Kemp, 1932, The Anson Jones Press, Houston, TX
  4. 1840 Citizens of Texas, Vol. 3, Land Grants, page 232, Gifford White, publ. 1983, Ericson Books, Nacogdoches, TX,
  5. Texas Veterans in the Mexican War, Muster Rolls of Texas Military Units, pages 78-79, Charles D. Spurlin, publ. 1984, Victoria College, Victoria, TX
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