WRITINGS OF Sur HOUSTON, 1860
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correctly and return it, informing me how the amount shall be remitted and it will receive prompt attention. Sam Houston.
1 Exccut.ive Records, 185.9-1861, p. 230, Texas State Library.
To GUSTAVE SCHLEICHERt Executive Department, Austin, September 27, 1860.
Gustave Schleiker, Esq., Sir: The San Antonio and Mexican Gulf Railroad having completed an additional section of Twenty-five miles of their road and having made application for the land granted by the State on said Twenty-five miles, you are hereby requested to proceed at once, and make the necessary examination, and report under oath, upon the condition and affairs of said Road and Company, in order that I may act in regard to said application. Sam Houston. 1 Executive Records, 1859-1861, p. 230, Texas State Library. Gustave Schleicher (November 29, 1823--January 10, 1879) was born in Darmstadt, Germany; he was educated at the University of Giessen, and chose the engineering profession. He proved to be successful in his work, and was engaged in several extensive internal improvement projects in Europe before coming to America. In 1844, in company with thirty-nine other graduates of German universities he organized what is known as the "Colony of Forty," which bought a large tract of land in what is now Llano and adjacent counties. This colony engaged in stock raising accord- ing to the most scientific methods; but the location that they had chosen was beyond the well-settled part of the State, and Indian depredations and other causes rendered their enterprise impracticable. In 1850, with a num- ber of his associates, Schleicher moved to San Antonio, and there he soon mastered the Spanish and English languages. In 1853, he was elected to the State Legislature, and in order to obtain an inside view of the Ameri- can governmental institutions and customs, more than for the honor or the money of the position, he accepted the service. At the close of his term, in 1864, he was chosen surveyor of the Bexar Land District, an area of country, which at that time, was larger than all the New England States together. He held that position for five years. In 1869, he was elected to the State Senate. When the Civil War began in 1861, he entered the engineer corps and served in the Confederate Army with the rank of captain. At the close of the war he devoted his chief interest to railroad building, a work that he had begun before the war. He laid out and superintended the construc- tion of the railroad from Cuero to Indianola. He was elected to the Forty- fourth United States Congress, was reelected to the Forty-fifth, and to the
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