John Houston

John Houston (1689 or 1690 – 1754) was an Irish-born American planter. He immigrated from the Kingdom of Ireland to Colonial America in the 1730s. During the voyage the passengers learned that the ship's captain planned on robbing the wealthy passengers of their gold sovereigns. They took control of the vessel and sailed to Philadelphia. After living a number of years in Lancaster, Pennsylvania, Houston moved his family and established a plantation in what is now Rockbridge County, Virginia. His great-grandson was Sam Houston.

Background During the Wars of the Three Kingdoms, the Houstons and other Presbyterians emigrated from Scotland and settled in Ulster. The great migration from Scotland to the north of Ireland occurred between 1640 and 1670, during the later stages of the Plantation of Ulster. Houston descends from baronets (Sir Patrick Houstoun, 1st Baronet). (Haley states, "the settlement that grew up around it became known as Hughstown, the common source of variant family spellings of Houstoun, Houston, and Huston".)

According to Marquis James, Sam Houston's biographer, the family left Belfast, Ireland, for Pennsylvania in 1730. They and other families carried gold sovereigns on their transatlantic journey, which was rare among immigrants. The ship's master, with others, planned to steal the money. The passengers were made aware of the scheme in the mid-Atlantic and they took control of the ship, apprehended the captain and put him in chains, and navigated the ship into the port of Philadelphia. The Houstons settled in Lancaster, Pennsylvania. While in Pennsylvania, Houston's two daughters and a son, John, were married. around 1742 (The John Houston mentioned in the book may have been Houston, or his son John.) or seven children. Their children were: Robert, Isabella, Esther, John III, Samuel, Matthew, and James.

Legacy Sam Houston was Houston's great grandson, who descended through his grandparents John Houston II and Sarah Todd and his parents Samuel and Elizabeth Paxton Houston.