Sidney Sherman Chapter # 1 · the founding chapter of the Daughters of the Republic of Texas · Galveston, since 1891
Some legacies you inherit.
This one you join.
Membership in the Daughters of the Republic of Texas isn't open to just anyone — it's reserved for the women whose families helped build the Republic. If your ancestor was a Texan before Texas was a state, a place in the very first chapter of the DRT may be yours to claim.
Established 1891 | We built the monuments | We marked the graves | We saved the Cradle of the DRT
The oldest chapter of the oldest patriotic women's organization in Texas.
In 1891, ten women met in a little Galveston law library with $8.35 and a refusal to let Texas forget its heroes. They named their chapter for General Sidney Sherman — the man credited with the cry "Remember the Alamo!" Chapter # 1 has not missed a single year since.
founded in Galveston
1891
No. 1
the first chapter
years, unbroken
135+
5,500+
annual volunteer hours
Sidney Sherman Chapter member decorating the Texas Heroes Monument for Texas Independence Day, March 2.
be a part of it
Four ways to belong.
Become a Daughter: If you descend from a builder of the Republic, your seat is waiting. → See if you qualify
Invite Us: Museums, schools, and civic groups partner with us to speak, mark graves, and mount commemorations. Let’s work together. → Contact the chapter.
Shop the Collection: Jewelry, notecards, and keepsakes—heirloom-worthy items that support our mission and let you carry a piece of the chapter’s legacy home. → Browse the collection
Present a Program: Historians, authors, and descendants present Texas history at our meetings. Have a story to tell? → Propose a program
more than a century of showing up — and we’re not done
From the moment Sidney Sherman Chapter was founded in 1891, its members have been leaving their mark on the Island — literally. They moved the graves and then erected a monument to General Sidney Sherman and President David G. Burnet in Lakeview Cemetery, then re-erected it after storms brought it down — twice. They catalogued and placed marble headstones on the graves of all the veterans of the Republic, fought to save the San Jacinto battlefield from commercial development, and mounted an antique Navy cannon before the Sherman monument on Broadway (the cannon now resides at the Cradle).
It was the women of this Chapter who gave Henry Rosenberg the idea for the Texas Heroes Monument — then helped to oversee its construction, organized its dedication on San Jacinto Day 1900, and welcomed 10,000 people to witness it. When the City of Galveston moved to relocate the monument in the 1950s, Sidney Sherman Chapter blocked it. Today, we are at the table with the City ensuring its restoration and long-term care.
The Chapter is the caretaker of The Cradle — the small Galveston room where the idea of the Daughters of the Republic of Texas was first spoken aloud. We are the owner of Lafitte's Grove, the pirate’s campground and one of the Island's most storied historic sites. At Rosenberg Library, two oak trees stand as living monuments planted by the Chapter: one grown from an acorn of the 500-year-old Treaty Oak in Austin, the other a descendant of the “Heritage Tree” behind the North Barracks of the Alamo in San Antonio.
But the work of Sidney Sherman Chapter has never been only about bronze and stone. These women presented framed portraits of Sam Houston and Stephen F. Austin along with Texas flags to every public and parochial school on the Island. They made the history of the Republic of Texas era come alive in 2000s with 170+ presentations of the “Texas Trunk” to area schools and civic organizations. During two World Wars, members traded their white gloves for Red Cross bandages — logging hundreds of volunteer hours sewing, knitting, and staffing the soldiers’ Day Room.
We rallied. We showed up. Year after year. Decade after decade.
Because history doesn’t save itself.
For 135 years, the Sidney Sherman Chapter has been a quiet, constant, indispensable thread in the fabric of Galveston County — honoring the women and men who made Texas possible, and proving, meeting by meeting, that the work is never finished.
meet a few of our ancestors
The next one could be in your family.
These are real ancestors of a few of our members — pirates, preachers, fighters, and defenders of the Alamo.
Four Sidney Sherman Chapter members whose ancestors are depicted below.
Charles Cronea: Cabin boy to the pirate Jean Lafitte, the most famous pirate in American history. When Cronea died the Galveston news ran one headline “Last Pirate Dead!”
Henry Stephenson: The first Protestant minister to preach in Texas at a time when Mexican Texas was Catholic and Protestant worship was illegal. A quiet act of spiritual courage that helped lay the foundation for religious freedom in the Republic.
Jesse Burditt: Fought at San Jacinto under Sidney Sherman, with four sons and two nephews who fought alongside him. Later a Texas Ranger and Travis County Commissioner, he vowed to live until San Jacinto Day, and died on it, April 21, 1855 — 19 years after the battle.
Juana Navarro Alsbury: A Tejana who walked out of the Alamo alive — proof the cause of Texas belonged to anyone who claimed it.
Could one be yours? See if you qualify →
the only question that matters
Membership is by bloodline. To become a Daughter, you must be a woman aged 16 or older who descends — directly, by blood—from an ancestor who lived in or served the Republic of Texas before it joined the United States on February 19, 1846.
That ancestor might have been a soldier or officer of the Republic, a colonist of Austin’s Old Three Hundred, a landowner or resident living in Texas as far back as 1820, or the recipient of a Republic of Texas land grant.
Not sure? That’s what we’re here for. Tracing your line is part of the journey—and we’ll help preserve it for generations to come.
Do you qualify?
your turn
This is your turn.
We are descended from people who did not quit. They fought, they built, they preserved — then handed it to the next generation and said: your turn. The Sidney Sherman Chapter has been answering the call since 1891. Claim your place.
Members and their guests gather the third Saturday, October through May (except January), at the Artillery Club in Galveston.