Cariesman, Horatio

The following data is extracted from History of Fort Bend County, Texas.

Whose land grant fronts the Brazos River on the west side, where the station of Thompson is now on the Santa Fe road, was born in Virginia in 1792, but moved in early life first to Kentucky and then to Missouri, where he engaged in surveying. In 1818 he married Miss Mary Kinchaloe, and in the fall of 1821 prepared to immigrate to Texas with the Kinchaloe family. They embarked on boats to descend the river, but winter coming on, they held up until the next spring, when Mr. Kinchaloe preceded the party to New Orleans, where he chartered a schooner, "Only Son," Captain Ellison, and sent five or six young men to the Colorado to plant a crop of corn. Mr. Chriesman, with the families of Kinchaloe, Rawls and Pruitt, left St. Louis in a flat-boat February 25th, 1822. At New Madrid the party was detained by sickness, and Mrs. Chriesman and her sister died. Being detained again at the mouth of Red River by continued sickness, some of the men who were well book a boat load of bacon up Red River to Alexandria. All the river trade was then carried on in flat-boats. Arriving at New Orleans, Mr. Kinchaloe again chartered the "Only Son" to convey them to Texas. They landed at the mouth of the Colorado June the 19th, 1822. A few days after another vessel with immigrants landed at the same place. The supplies brought by both boats were left in charge of four young men, while the families went up to Wharton (present location), where Mr. Kinchaloe s young men had raised a supply of corn. The young men left in camp with the supplies were killed by the Craunkaway Indians, and the goods destroyed or carried away. In 1823 Mr. Chriesman assisted in making a crop at the Clay place, near the present town of Independence.

When General Austin returned from Mexico Mr. Chriesman was appointed surveyor, and he held this office until the Mexican invasion of 1836. His assistants were Ross Alley, Bartlett Sims, Seth Ingram, William Selkirk, Thomas S. Borden, Moses Cummings, and John S. Moody, all of Austin's Colony. In 1825 Mr. Chriesman married the second time, Miss Augusta Hope being, his choice. He filled the office of alcalde at San Felipe, and was in the army in 1835, but was on detached service when San Antonio was taken in the commencement of the Texas Revolution. He helped to remove families during the flight from the Mexicans, and missed the battle of San Jacinto. He died in Burleson County in 1848.

Source: History of Fort Bend County, Texas

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