Name/Title
Lewis L. White [Press Photo]Description
Press photo of Lewis L. White gravesite in Castroville, Texas.Context
L. L. White, a resident of the old town of Castroville--"the little Alsace of Texas"--in Medina County, made such a request shortly before his death in 1889, and his favorite horse was killed and buried with him legend says.
Miss Ruth Curry Lawler, owner of the historic old Landmark Inn in Castroville, insists that some of the town's oldest settlers have verified the strange story. And one aged resident told her that White's dog was also killed and buried with him. References to White's burial with his favorite horse is also in the book, "Texas a Guide to the Lone Star State," published in 1940, compiled by writers under the works Project Administration and sponsored by the Texas State Highway Commission.
According to the tale, White, who had covered untold miles on horseback after he became a Texas colonist in the 1840s, had become so attached to his favorite steed that he did not like the idea of leaving it behind when he started on his final "journey." Hence the bizarre request that the horse be interred with him.
According to H.E. Haass, former county judge of Medina County, who has been collecting history about that county since 1907, White was a member of the noted Castro Colony, established in Texas in 1844 by Count Henri de Castro. And, states Judge Haass, who has a large collection of copies of wills drawn up in Medina County, White's will is among the strangest he has ever read.
In 1850 White obtained 640 acres of land near Hondo. He later established a colony for former negro slaves, giving each a 20-acre tract of land and a lot for a house. As he was a stonemason, he built for himself the first dwelling of stone and mortar construction in the territory, about six miles north of Hondo. The house was a large two-story one, with a big cellar.
Herbert Decker, who now owns the property on which the house stood, remembers seeing in the ruins of the old house a stone with the following inscription: "L. L. White, 1852," presumably the year the house was built. In the large cellar, White, also a cheesemaker, stored cheese, hauling away large quantities of it for sale. And the roof of his two-story house was used to good advantage, also, affording an excellent lookout for nearby settlers to scan the countryside for strayed stock.
Soon after the outbreak of the Civil War, White, a Union sympathizer, and also unpopular because he was a "free thinker," fled to Mexico and remained until the close of the conflict. Returning to his home near Hondo and discovering his livestock and other possessions gone, he went to Castroville where he built another dwelling of French provincial design, on land sloping to the Medina River. He operated a lime kiln and made chairs for sale.
One crumbling wall and the remains of a deep stone cistern are the last mute reminders of White's sojourn on the land near Hondo. The grave of White's wife, Matilda, is somewhere near the house but is now lost.
The inscription on the monument above White's grave in Castroville contains no reference to the horse. The grave is about 50 feet east of the house where White lived, enclosed by a cement wall about five feet high.