William Morton was one of Stephen F. Austin's "Old Three
Hundred," [which you can find more about in my companion blog,
"Texas Family Stories" here]. The Morton Cemetery is located in
Richmond, Fort Bend County, Texas., on part of the land grant
that William first received when he and his family came from
Alabama. He drowned in 1833 in the Brazos River Flood. However,
before that in 1825, a fellow Masonic brother by the name of
Robert Gillespie [from Scotland] died suddenly at William's
home, and William, being a skilled brick and stone mason, built
this monument for him. When Santa Ana's army stopped off here
right before the Battle of San Jacinto [where Sam Houston
defeated Santa Ana, leading to Texas' independence from Mexico],
they began to destroy the memorial until they were stopped by a
Masonic officer. The Morton Lodge No. 72 A.F. & A.M. restored
the monument in 1936, and in 2001 a marker was dedicated on the
150th anniversary of the Morton Lodge in memory of William
Morton. There are inscriptions on