In the April, 1971, issue of "Southwestern Historical Quarterly," historian Llerena Friend wrote that there was a need for a new editing of Houston correspondence to complement the eight-volume collection compiled in the 1930s by Eugene C. Barker and Amelia Williams.
When author Madge Roberts began research for her previous book, "Star of Destiny: ""The"" Private Life of Sam and Margaret Houston," she began to collect just such a file of previously unpublished Houston correspondence, which soon consisted of nearly a thousand letters. Because most of these letters were until recently in...

Volume II of Sam Houston s personal correpondence continues the four-volume series of previously unpublished personal letters to and from Sam Houston. This volume begins March 6, 1846, as Houston leaves Texas to take his place in the U. S. Senate. Included in his letters are comments on national politics and life in Washington, D. C., descriptions of politicians and their wives, and his observations on generals of the Mexican War. New information sheds light on his feelings towards being a candidate for the presidency. Family letters give a picture of life on Texas plantations during the...

Volume III of Sam Houston's personal correspondence continues the projected four-volume series of previously unpublished personal letters to and from Sam Houston. This volume begins in the fall of 1848 as Houston returns to Washington for the Second Session of the Thirtieth Congress after the close of the Mexican War. His first focus was on settling the Texas boundary and other problems relating to the welfare of his state. Once these were solved he seriously considered resigning his senate seat. However, he sensed the coming Civil War and seemed to feel that he should do all in his power to...

Volume IV of this series brings to a close nearly ten years of research and publication of Sam Houston's correspondence by Madge Thornall Roberts and the University of North Texas Press. As befitting a final volume in this series, it includes a comprehensive index of all four volumes.
Volume IV continues with letters from 1852 showing Houston's concern over the approaching Civil War and his hopeless struggle to prevent it. His letters during the Civil War prior to his death reveal his feelings on military strategy and his pride and mixed emotions as his eldest son joins the Confederate...