Mary Smith McCrory Jones was the wife of Anson Jones, who served as the last president of the Republic of Texas from 1844 to 1846 before it joined the Union as a state. This digital collection contains mostly letters written by Mary Jones during the decades following the death of her husband.

After Anson Jones died in 1858, Mary moved the family to Galveston, then to a farm in Harris County. Spanning the latter half of the 19th century, the bulk of the letters are from Mary Jones to her son, Cromwell Anson Jones, who became a lawyer and served as a judge in Harris County. The correspondence provide a glimpse into post-Civil War life in Texas, especially legal and financial issues related to land ownership; Mary Jones had inherited land throughout East Texas from her husband, and frequently consulted her children in such matters.

In addition to family letters, the collection also contains legal documents, including official deeds of land from the State of Texas, a Confederate tax receipt from 1864, City of Houston and Harris County tax statements, and a court summons from the City of Houston (as plaintiff) against Mary Jones for taxes due in 1898.

Transcriptions of the letters are provided under the descriptions of most items.

The original materials are available in UH Libraries' Special Collections in the Mary (Mrs. Anson) Jones Letters.