Centre Hill

David Ayres, pioneer merchant and a founder of the first Methodist missionary society in Texas, son of Silas and Mary (Byram) Ayers, was born in Morristown, New Jersey, on August 10, 1793. He and his wife, Ann, were married in 1815 in the John Street Methodist Church in New York City. From 1817 to 1832 Ayres, who changed the spelling of his name from that of his parents, was a merchant in Ithaca, New York, where he played a significant role in establishing Methodism and building its first church there. In 1832 he came to Texas to buy property and build a home. He landed at the mouth of the Brazos in early 1833 and proceeded up the river to Washington County, where he bought a tract of land thirty miles west of Washington-on-the-Brazos. After clearing part of the land and building a stone house called Montville, he returned to the East.

In May 1834 he, his brother, and their families returned. Ayres brought with him what he believed to be the first box of Bibles ever shipped to Texas and a supply of books from the New York Sunday School Union. The family settled on the Nueces at San Patricio. In November Ayres moved his family and remaining possessions to Montville, Washington County. He distributed Bibles to all who would receive them. In addition to running his mercantile business, he began a school in his home, taught by his wife and Lydia Ann McHenry. William B. Travis left his son, Charles Edward Travis, with the Ayreses to attend that school. Charles stayed there for two years after the battle of the Alamo.