This county was named for Captain Henry Stevenson Brown. Henry was born in Madison County, Kentucky on March 8, 1793 to Caleb S. Brown and Jemima Stevenson Brown. Both of Henry’s grandfathers had served in the American Revolution. Early in his adult life, he moved to Missouri. He is said to have served in a local militia as they defended their settlements against native tribal attacks. He later served as sheriff and enlisted in the Army for the War of 1812. Around 1814, he married the former Margaret “Peggy” Kerr Jones, a widow and the sister of James R. Kerr, the namesake of Kerr County and Kerrville. The couple settled in Pike County, Missouri located north of St. Louis. There Henry engaged in trading on the Mississippi.
Peggy had a son (Maryland) and two (Sarah and Mary) daughters from her previous marriage. She and Henry had three sons: Rufus Easton, Thomas Jefferson and John Henry and one daughter, Margaret.
Their son John Henry Brown is perhaps the better known of the three sons of Henry and Peggy since he was a soldier, a newspaperman, an author, a member of the Texas legislature, a former mayor of Galveston and Dallas, a delegate to the Texas Secession Convention, a member of the Confederate Army and a member of the Texas state Constitutional Convention. John Henry wrote that the area that the family came from in Missouri furnished a good number of families who moved to Texas.
John Henry related that his father had previously been engaged in the trading business on the Mississippi River between Missouri and New Orleans and on one trip in 1824, he journeyed to Texas with his younger and physically infirmed brother John. He had met John in New Orleans as John had previously been on his way to Cuba for his health. The brothers had decided to form a venture into Texas and also down into what is now Mexico. Their intended “territory” was still inhabited by very few Europeans at that time. On this extended trip, their party was attacked by an unnamed band of Indians. Some were killed. Some escaped. John pretended to be dead and stayed at the scene as the survivors fled. John became separated from the rest of his party. The survivors, believing that John had been killed, reported his death to his family. Eventually John found his way to a group of Waco Indians. They did not kill him, though some had wanted to, but treated him harshly until he was able to escape around eighteen months later. Henry had been unsuccessful in his effort to search for John. His brother’s time with the Waco tribe later resulted in him being referred to by the nickname “Waco.” By chance, the brothers were reunited once more in Texas in 1826. They resumed their trading business before returning to Missouri for a while. John Henry Brown tells that their many tales of Texas generated a great deal of interest among the Missouri residents.
Henry continued trading for the next few years as more and more people became interested in relocating to Texas. Henry relocated to Texas with his family in early 1828. Some of their Pike County acquaintances included Arthur Burnes and Josiah Wilbarger, both early Texas settlers. Henry Brown and his brother John were both members of DeWitt’s colony. Henry is also mentioned as having fought engagements against various Indian tribes near the present site of Waco, north of San Antonio and on the Nueces River. He continued his trading business, operating from headquarters at various locations in south central Texas. Henry is noted as having been involved in the Anahuac disturbances and other conflicts with Mexico. Accounts add that he led a company in engagements against Mexican forces in the Battle of Velasco. Later that year, he was a delegate to the Convention of 1832 in support of American settlements in what was at the time still the property of Mexico.
Life was harsh and this generation of early Texas settlers faced a number of hardships. Burnes and Wilbarger were among a group of individuals who were attacked by native tribes in 1833 as they were surveying east of the present town of Austin. Burnes was killed and Wilbarger was severely scalped, although he survived. Henry’s brother John died of smallpox in 1833. Henry followed him in death after having contracted cholera in 1834. Henry was fifty-one years old when he died. He is considered to be a soldier in the service of the Texas Revolution, even though he succumbed to illness before its resolution in 1836. His wife Peggy survived him until 1861.
Brown County was named in his honor in 1856 and was formally organized two years later. The area from which it was formed included parts of Comanche and Travis counties. The county is near the center of the state.
Many times, Texas counties are named in honor of individuals who may not have ever lived there or even have been through the area. Henry S. Brown is said to have passed through the land that became Brown County at least once when he and a band of soldiers were pursing a band of Comanche in 1828.
In its issue of July 24, 1966, the Brownwood Bulletin posted an interesting study by Dr. Fred Anderson Tarpley of East Texas State University (now known as Texas A&M Commerce) concerning the origins of the names of some of the towns in the county. Their results are noted below:
- Bangs – named for early pioneer Samuel Bangs who lived there.
- Blanket – a local legend says that a local creek was named by surveyors who came across a number of Tonkawa caught in a downpour while hunting. The surveyors noted that the Tonkawa used their blankets for shelter and named the nearby water source for the incident.
- Brookesmith – named for a director of the Frisco Railroad, Brooke Smith.
- Brownwood – named for Henry S. Brown.
- Byrds (now a ghost town) – named for a resident, Mart Byrd, its first postmaster.
- Cross Cut – the local legend says that there was an argument in a meeting to name the post office. a resident suggested “Cross Out” since the location was “across and out of the way.” the Postal Service apparently made a mistake and read the word “out” as “cut” and named the post office “Cross Cut.”
- May – named for Nathan L. May, an early settler.
- Owens – named for E. Owens who gave the land for the town.
- Thrifty (now a ghost town) – named to describe the character of the people who lived there.
- Winchell – named for Frank T. Winchell, an early settler.
- Williams Ranch – named for a local ranch owned by John Williams who came to the area in 1856.
- Zephyr – name suggested after surveyors got caught in a “blue norther.” (the town was later the site of a devastating tornado.)
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