Colonel Richard E. Waterhouse

Richard E. Waterhouse, army officer and merchant, son of Richard Green Waterhouse, was born on August 11, 1805, at Knoxville, Tennessee. He was married to Mary Thomas Lane at Athens, Tennessee, on March 20, 1831; they had eleven children.

Waterhouse was captain of a company that took part in the Seminole War in 1837, and during the Mexican War he commanded an infantry regiment. He resigned and returned to the United States to raise a cavalry regiment and served as a major of the Tennessee Mounted Volunteers from June 1846 to May 1847. He served as colonel of the Fourth Regiment of Tennessee Volunteers from November 1847 to August 1848. He was a member of the Tennessee legislature in 1841–42.

In 1849 Waterhouse moved with his family to San Augustine, Texas, where he engaged in the mercantile business and acquired large landholdings. In 1857 and again in 1859 he was elected representative to the Texas legislature from San Augustine County. His store was robbed and he was murdered in San Augustine on December 31, 1863. The murder attracted wide attention but was never satisfactorily solved.