In April 1825, Green DeWitt acquired a land grant from the Republic of Mexico to settle 400 families in and around the present location of Gonzales. He recruited ex-Missouri state senator James Kerr as his surveyor general to establish a capital for his colony. Kerr laid out four leagues allocated to the capital township and named it Gonzales in honor of Don Rafael Gonzales, the provisional governor of the state of Coahuila y Texas. Kerr and a few other men built their cabins in this area along what is now called Kerr’s Creek. Indians were a constant threat, and after a destructive raid in July 1826, the settlers, few in number and unable to defend the settlement, abandoned this site for a temporary settlement called Old Station, six miles from the coast on the Lavaca River.
Late in 1827, after their crops were harvested and a fort had been completed at Gonzales, 40 of the DeWitt colonists at Old Station relocated to Gonzales. The official census of the DeWitt Colony of 1828 listed a total population of 75 comprised of 9 families and 25 single men. The relocation of the 40 residents from Old Station was a new start for the DeWitt Colony, and with the promise of land titles and opportunities for a new life, more settlers came to the Gonzales area. Pavilion erected by the Spade & Trowel Garden Club, 2010 – 2011
