[Illustration: Sam Houston.]
He was born, of Irish descent, in 1793, in a farmhouse in Virginia. When
he was thirteen years old the family removed to a place in Tennessee, near
the home of the Cherokee Indians. The boy received but little schooling
out in that new country. In fact, he cared far less about school than he
did for the active, free life of his Indian neighbors.
So when his family decided to have him learn a trade he ran away from home
and joined the Cherokees. There he made friends, and one of the chiefs
adopted him as a son. We may think of him as enjoying the sports and
games, the hunting and fishing, which took up so much of the time of the
Indian boys.
On returning to his home, at the age of eighteen, he went to school for a
term at Marysville Academy. In the War of 1812 he became a soldier and
served under Andrew Jackson in the campaign against the Creek Indians. In
the battle of Horseshoe Bend he fought with reckless bravery. During that
fearful struggle he received a wound in the thigh. His commander, Jackson,
then ordered him to stop fighting, but Houston refused to obey and was
leading a desperate charge against the enemy when his right arm was
shattered.
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