Part 4, Note 18
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Telegraph and Texas Register, November 5, 1845, April 15, 1846,
December 7, 1846, December 21, 1846, May 10, 1847, June 14, 1847, July 5, 1847;
Galveston Evening News, March 3, 1846; Texas Democrat, March 11,
1846; Victor Bracht, Texas in 1848, Charles Frank Schmidt, trans. (San
Antonio: Naylor Printing Company, 1931), p. 10. The Kate Ward was built
and owned by two men, identified as Ward and Robertson. They may have been
Trowbridge Ward and Joseph W. Robertson, each of whom was named as a
commissioner in the law which created the second Colorado Navigation Company
(see Gammel, comp., The Laws of Texas 1822-1897, vol. 2, p. 937). Ward
may also have been Thomas William Ward, who was involved in later navigation
efforts, or Samuel Ward, who at the time owned a substantial amount of land in
Colorado County, or George W. Ward, a cotton merchant in Matagorda who sold the
land to Samuel Ward (see Colorado County Deed Records, Book D, p. 217, Book E,
p. 321). Probably, though, he was William J. Ward, the captain of the boat.
The above-cited issue of the Texas Democrat provides
this physical description of the Kate Ward: "115 feet keel; deck the
same; 24 feet beam; hull divided into 8 compartments, all water tight; 2 engines
or 70 horse power. With wood, water &c., she draws 18 inches, and is capable of
carrying 800 bales of cotton."