Dr. Albert Moses Levy

Dr. Albert Moses Levy was born in Amsterdam, Holland, in 1800, the son of Abraham Levy and Cornelia Bernard. The family came to the United States from England in 1818 and settled near Richmond, Virginia. His brothers and sisters were: Isaac, Jacob, Lewis, Esther, Mary, Julia and Rebecca.

Dr. Levy, was graduated from the University of Pennsylvania in 1832, and first practiced medicine at Richmond, Virginia, where he met and married Maria Bishop Pine. They had a child, Rachel Cornelia, and when Rachel was six months old, his wife died. His brother, Jacob A. Levy, and wife, Martha Ezekiel, took Rachel to raise along with their own five children. When Rachel was grown, she married Abraham Levy, her first cousin, the son of Jacob A. Levy, with whom she was raised. She and Abraham had six children, three of which died in infancy. The surviving children were Ada, Martha and Ernest.

Brokenhearted from the loss of his beloved wife, Albert Moses Levy went to New Orleans to visit relatives; there he heard about Texas and its struggle for independence.  He joined the New Orleans Greys and left for Texas. Within two months he was appointed surgeon in chief of the volunteer army of Texas. His military service was from October 22, 1835 to February 10, 1836 and included service in the siege of Bexar, where he was wounded.

After leaving the army, Levy joined the Texas Navy aboard the schooner Brutus. David G. Burnet, president of the Republic of Texas, signed Levy’s appointment papers as a surgeon in the navy in March 1836.

Levy was aboard the Independence on April 17, 1837, when it was captured by two Mexican brigs-of-war and the crew was thrown into a Mexican prison. Levy escaped  after three months of imprisonment and walked back to Texas.

He was given several grants of land for his services. In Llano County he received warrant #664 for 1,280 acres of land for his services, when he and his other men fought with Fannin. Certificates #151 for 640 acres of land for his participation in the Siege of Bexar, and #44 for one league and one labor of land in Matagorda County on which he decided to make his home and practice medicine.

Dr. Levy married Claudinia Olivia Gervais, April 4, 1838, the daughter of Judge Sinclair David Gervais. She was born in Yazoo, Mississippi. They had five children: Katherine Levy, born in 1839; Albert Gervais, born November 2, 1840; Laura Virginia, born April 4, 1843; Charles Gillette, born May 29, 1845; and Lewis Fisher, born December 29, 1847.

On October 17, 1830, Albert Moses Levy deeded 428 acres of land situated on Jones Creek in Brazoria County to his daughter, Rachel Cornelia Levy, who was living in Richmond, Henrico County, Virginia, but she never acknowledged the gift. Dr. Levy was Jewish and when he married a Gentile, his people disowned him. He and his wife, Claudinia joined the Episcopal Church. Dr. Levy died May 22, 1848 and was buried in Matagorda Cemetery.

Dr. Levy had a good practice and was well-loved in Matagorda. After his death, Claudinia sold her home to Dr. Edward A. Peareson and returned to Mississippi to live near her brother, sisters and other relatives.

Historic Matagorda County, Volume I, page 158
 

Colorado Gazette & Advertiser, May 28, 1842
 

Hebrew Cemetery
Richmond, Virginia
 

Courtesy of George Seitz

Rachel, daughter of Albert Moses Levy
at left

Jacob & Martha Levy, brother and
sister-in-law of Albert, who
raised Rachel at bottom

Returns to Native Town
Son Of One Of Matagorda's Pioneers Who Fought For Texas Independence

A few days ago Matagorda was visited by one of her native sons now residing in New Orleans--Lewis Fisher Levy and a broker in the Sugar Exchange of the Crescent City.

Mr. Levy was born in Matagorda, Texas, in 1847, a self-exiled wanderer now returning after an absence of 55 years to the home of his birth. He is a son of Dr. A. M. Levy, prominent physician in Matagorda during the 40's of the last century. Dr. Levy served as an officer in the Navy during the war between Texas and Mexico in 1836, and his son holds the commission issued by the Republic of Texas to his father, dated Harrisburg, March 20, 1836, and signed by David G. Burnet, first president of the Republic and Robt. Potter, Sec'y of the Navy.

The sword worn by Dr. Levy during that campaign, was again worn by the first Lieut. of a company of cavalry from Mississippi, in which the son served as a private during the Civil War, and is in a high state of preservation at the present time, although nearly 80 years old and a veteran of two wars.

Mr. Lewis F. Levy was a private in Company F., Yerger's Mississippi Cavalry, was captured June 4, 1863, in a cavalry fight near Mechanicsburg, Miss., and remained in prison at Alton, Ill., and Fort Delaware near Philadelphia about two years until the close of the war and has his parole issued by the federal authorities and also his furlough from the confederate authorities at Richmond in 1865.

He visits Matagorda on a mission of love, to behold the spot where he was born and to locate, if possible, the grave of his father, Dr. Albert M. Levy, who died here, about 1848, but was unsuccessful after a careful search through the old cemetery. He did find the graves of several persons he knew here in his boyhood, notably Sam W. Fisher, after whom he was named, and the Rev. W. M. Wright and his wife, the rector of the Episcopal church here in those days, whom he knew well in his boyhood. After his father's death, Mr. Levy, as a child, was an inmate for several years, of the home of Mrs. Nancy Thompson who was his God mother and as dear to him as his own beloved mother and stood with reverence in the shadow of the old home, one of the oldest in Matagorda, and recalled with profound love the memory of that sainted soul now passed to the realms of eternal bliss.

Matagorda News and Midcoast Farmer, August 8, 1913