JONES, JAMES WALES (1797-1847). James W. Jones was born in Columbia County, Georgia, on January 13, 1797, the son of Thomas and Sarah Jones. He and his brother, Randal Jones, were among the first of Stephen F. Austin's Old Three Hundred colonists. By January 1822 they were in what is now Washington County. In July 1822 the brothers found Jane Long on the San Jacinto River and took her to San Antonio. On August 10, 1824, James Jones received title to a league and a labor of land in what are now Fort Bend and Wharton counties; he settled in Fort Bend County near Henry Jones. James Jones's wife, Hetty (Styles), was a sister of Mrs. Henry Jones. In 1826 James Jones was aged between twenty-five and forty. Ammon Underwood visited the James Jones plantation in January 1835. Jones served in the Texas Army under Capt. Wyly Martin from March 7 to June 7, 1836. In 1840 Jones was on a committee to check fraudulent land claims in Fort Bend County. He was living at Richmond in December 1845; he died at Prairie Lea on September 29, 1847. He and his wife were reburied in the State Cemetery in 1953.

BIBLIOGRAPHY: Eugene C. Barker, ed., The Austin Papers (3 vols., Washington: GPO, 1924-28). Lester G. Bugbee, "The Old Three Hundred: A List of Settlers in Austin's First Colony," Quarterly of the Texas State Historical Association 1 (October 1897). James K. Greer, "The Journal of Ammon Underwood, 1834-1838," Southwestern Historical Quarterly 32 (October 1928). Telegraph and Texas Register, January 14, 1846. Texas Gazette, February 6, 1830. Texas Sentinel, February 5, 1840.

Recommended citation: "JONES, JAMES W." The Handbook of Texas Online. [Accessed Mon Feb 17 13:48:49 US/Central 2003].