Pennsylvania-born Nathan Mitchell (1817-1897), soldier and merchant, was an early settler of Texas, arriving in 1822 as a young boy with his father, Asa Mitchell (1795-1865) and mother, Charlotte Woodmancy Mitchell. The family comprised part of the original 300 settlers of Austin Colony. Both Nathan and Asa Mitchell fought in the battle of San Jacinto in April 1836, Asa as a sergeant in Company B of the First Regiment of Volunteers and Nathan in Captain Robert Stevenson’s Infantry Company H, 1st Regiment.
Mitchell studied law under Judge John Hemphill in Washington, Texas, and served as a 2nd Lieutenant of a mounted gun company in December 1836. In 1839 he worked as a clerk in the general land office in Austin as well as in the quartermaster corps in the Mexican War. He died in 1897.
Sources: Handbook of Texas Online, s.v. Mitchell, Asa, http://www.tshaonline.org/handbook/online/articles/MM/fmi51.html (accessed August 17, 2010).
McKeehan, Wallace L. DeWitt Colony Biographies. Sons of Dewitt Colony Texas. http://www.tamu.edu/ccbn/dewitt/dewittbios2.htm (accessed August 17, 2010).
From the guide to the Mitchell, Nathan Papers 1930s; 96-024., 1822-1897, (Dolph Briscoe Center for American History, The University of Texas at Austin)
