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Circa 1858 original 10.5 x 6.75 unissued Texas Association stock certificate for a share of 8,000 square miles on the Trinity River. As the Republic of Texas was short on cash and inhabitants and faced the threat of Mexican invasion, companies were granted large tracts of land. In fine condition. A handsome document, highlighted by a small vignette at the bottom depicting a spear-wielding Indian hunting a bison.
An unrecorded document about the Texas Association, better known in Texas history as the Mercer Colony. The Texas Association was formed in early 1844 by Charles Fenton Mercer, a former agent for the Peters' Colony, which had obtained a large empresario grant to settle North Texas. Following a controversy between English and American stockholders in which the latter seized control of the project, Mercer sold his interest in the enterprise and obtained a separate contract from the Republic of Texas. This agreement, made by President Sam Houston on January 29, 1844, granted Mercer and the Association 8,000 square miles on the Trinity River. In a prospectus entitled Texas Colonization, Mercer offered up to a half section of land for every family settling on the grant before March 20, 1845.
Although he had spent over $15,000 on his project by September of 1847, Mercer's plans did not progress smoothly: ‘The work of colonization was impeded by the fact that various Texas politicians, land speculators, and squatters…questioned the legality of the renewal of the empresario system. Squatters moved into the Mercer survey and denied the claims of settlers who held…certificates’ [Handbook of Texas]. Faced with mounting losses, Mercer in 1852 assigned his interests in the colony to a group of Louisville investors in exchange for an annuity of $2,000. Under the leadership of George Hancock, the Chief Agent, the Association was reorganized. In September 1858, Secretary Claudius Duval called in Mercer's original hundred certificates and issued new shares for one hundred dollars each. This certificate is from that issue of 1858.
The Western Americana auction of Jochen Zeitz.
