Richmond

Richmond, Texas

Richmond, Texas

View of the Forth Bend County Courthouse in Richmond, Texas the seat of the county. Photograph by Larry D. Moore.
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Map of Fort Bend County

Richmond, the county seat of Fort Bend County, is on the Brazos River fifteen miles southwest of Houston. The city's transportation links include U.S. highways 90A and 59, the Southern Pacific Railroad, and the Atchison, Topeka, and Santa Fe Railway. In early 1822 a group of twelve to fifteen men led by William W. Little camped in the vicinity of the present city and were soon followed by other members of Stephen F. Austin's Old Three Hundred. A log fort built at the bend in the Brazos River became the nucleus of a settlement, which came to be known as Fort Bend, or the "Fort Settlement." The community was evacuated in 1836 during the Runaway Scrape. In early 1837 the town of Richmond was established by Robert Eden Handy and his business partner, William Lusk, and as early as April the partners were advertising to sell lots in the town. Named after Richmond, England, the town was first incorporated by the Republic of Texas in May 1837; in December, when Fort Bend County was formed, Richmond became its seat of government. In January 1839 a Methodist Episcopal church was organized, and in April the town's first newspaper, the weekly Richmond Telescope and Texas Literary Register, began publishing. The town's early residents included some of the best known Texans of the period, including Erastus (Deaf) Smith and Jane Long ; Mirabeau B. Lamar lived on a plantation within the present limits of the city. By 1851 Richmond included a brick courthouse, two stores, a Masonic Hall, the Methodist church, and the Richmond Male and Female Academy. A yellow fever epidemic swept through Richmond in 1853, but its future seemed assured in 1855, when the Buffalo Bayou, Brazos and Colorado Railway extended its tracks into the town. By 1859 the town was a prosperous shipping and market center for the area's cotton plantations and had grown to include a cotton warehouse and two hotels; a brick building for other stores was also being built.

Though a number of men from Richmond and the surrounding area joined Confederate companies during the Civil War and the local economy declined, in other ways the town itself remained largely isolated from the conflict. After the end of the war, many emancipated slaves from surrounding plantations began to move into Richmond's environs; in 1866 an agency of the federal Freedmen's Bureau was established at Richmond, and in 1867 a company of federal troops were stationed there. Allied with White Republicans, the area's Blacks controlled local politics until 1889, when Whites in the area seized control after the Jaybird-Woodpecker War.

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John Leffler | © TSHA

Handbook of Texas Logo

Adapted from the official Handbook of Texas, a state encyclopedia developed by Texas State Historical Association (TSHA). It is an authoritative source of trusted historical records.

Belongs to

Richmond is part of or belongs to the following places:

Currently Exists

Yes

Place type

Richmond is classified as a Town

Location

Latitude: 29.58222970
Longitude: -95.76319200

Has Post Office

Yes

Is Incorporated

Yes

Population Count, 2021 View more »

12,233