CRAWFORD COUNTY, GA - BIOS - Joanna Troutman Copyright. All rights reserved. http://www.usgwarchives.net/copyright.htm This file was contributed for use in the USGenWeb Archives by: Kim Gordon kimeye1@hotmail.com Table of Contents page: http://www.usgwarchives.net/ga/crawford.htm Georgia Table of Contents: http://www.usgwarchives.net/ga/gafiles.htm Joanna Troutman, called the "Lady of Goliad", 17 year old daughter of Colonel and Mrs. Hiram Baldwin Troutman, fashioned the Texas Lone Star Flag from her silk skirts. In 1835, 150 middle Georgia soldiers marched to Texas to assist in the fight against Mexico. When they passed through Knoxville, Joanna presented the flag to Colonel William Ward on the steps of the Troutman Inn, later known as the Harris Hotel. The flag flew during the battle of Goliad and later was recognized as Texas' official flag. One hundred and one years later,[1936] Texas Governor O. B. Colquitt was guest speaker in Knoxville for the unveiling of a memorial marker sponsored by Stiles A. Martin. Joanna is buried in Austin, Texas, next to a bronze figure of herself, sculpted by Pompeo Coppini. In 1835, in response to an appeal for aid to the Texas cause, the Georgia Battalion, commanded by Col. William Ward, traveled to Texas. Joanna Troutman designed and made a flag of white silk, bearing a blue, five-pointed star and two inscriptions: "Texas and Liberty" on the obverse and, in Latin, "Where Liberty dwells there is my country" on the reverse. She presented the flag to the battalion, She born on February 19, 1818 (daughter of Hiram Baldwin Troutman) and married S. L. Pope in 1839, and the couple moved to Elmwood, their prosperous plantation near Knoxville, Georgia, in 1840. They had four sons. Her husband died in 1872, and Joanna married W. G. Vinson,[William Green Vinson] a Georgia state legislator, in 1875. She died on July 23, 1879, at Elmwood Plantation and was buried next to her first husband. In 1913 Texas governor Oscar B. Colquitt secured permission to have her remains taken to Texas for interment. =================== Contributed by: Mary Buehler Mrs Vinson, at Fort Valley Designed "Lone Star" Flag BODY NOW AT FT. VALLEY At Expense of State of Texas, it Will Be Buried in State at Cemetery at Austin--Monument Is Ordered--Mrs. Brown at Fort Valley, Gets Credit for the Plan. Fort Valley, Feb. 19--The body of Mrs. Joanna Troutman Pope Vinson, who when a girl of 18, then Miss Troutman, designned the first "Lone Srar" flag for the state of Texas, has been disinterred from a lonely cemetery in Crawford County, and now lies at the home of J.F. Troutman, here, awaiting an order from the Texas govenor as to when it shall be shipped to that state, where it will be reinterred in state at the Texas cemetery at Austin, at the expense of the state of Texas. The disinterment came as a result of a telegram from Govenor Colquitt, authorizing the work to be done at the expense of Texas. Mrs L. L. Brown, of Fort Valley, is the instigator of the plan, and the message came to her. Mrs. Brown has been in communication for a long tim, bring attention to the fact that Mrs. Vinson's grave is in a lonely and unkept grave yard in Crawford County, near Knoxville, Ga. Only recently has Texas taken an interest in the scheme. The body will be met at Austin by the govenor and a corps of prominent people, after which it will be interred in state in the cemetery there. Monument for Grave Gov. Colquitt has issued a proclamation to have a handsom monument cut, which will be erected over her grave in Texas. Mrs. Brown, the instigator of the plan to have the body removed, has worked hard on it for some time. She has had pictures of the home of Mrs Vinso, where she made the flag, made, and has circulated pictures of the woman, which have been published in Texas papers. Mrs. Brown is a member of the Georgia Federation of Women's Clubs. Mrs. Brown has been urged to accompany the body on its way to Texas but it is probable that she will not do so and therefore, the body will go unaccompanied. The fort Valley Historu Club will hold appropriate memorial service over the body before it is started on it's long journey across the country. Mrs. Vinson was about 18 years of age when she designed the flag. After that she first married Solomon Pope and then Greene Vinson. She had two sons by her first husband, who are both now dead. She was a sister of the late J. L. Troutman, Sr., father of the man at whose home the body now lies. She was about 70 years old when she died. When she made the flag, she lived at Knoxville, Ga in Crawford county, and she also lived there when she died. She lived most of her entire life at the place. The matter of the removal of the body has attracted wide- spread interest, not only in the two states involved, but in the entire south. =============================================================--- See these other resources for additional information http://alamo-de-parras.welkin.org/history/bios/troutman/joannatroutman.html painting of Joanna and the flag http://alamo-de-parras.welkin.org/history/republic/flags/troutmanflag.html =========== http://home.earthlink.net/~davescomp/history.html Descendants of Joanna =================== http://www.tsha.utexas.edu/handbook/online/articles/view/TT/ftr13.html