The Twentieth Century Biographical Dictionary of Notable Americans: Volume IV G Green, Traill page 396 GREEN, Thomas Jefferson, soldier, was born in Warren county, N.C., Feb. 14, 1802; son of Solomon and Fanny (Hawkins) Green. He attended Chapel Hill college and the U.S. military Academy. In 1822 he was elected to the general assembly of North Carolina and shortly after was married to Sarah A., daughter of the Hon. Jesse Wharton of Nashville, Tenn. He then removed to a plantation in Florida, where he remained till the death of his wife in 1832, having in the meantime represented his county in the Florida legislature. In 1836 he went to Texas, where he was commissioned brigadier-general and sent back to the United States to raise a brigade, which he did at the expense of his entire fortune. Returning with his brigade, he arrived at Velasco after the battle of San Jacinto and on the day that Santa Anna was released and placed on a war vessel to be carried to Vera Cruz, General Green, believing the release of Santa Anna to be a mistake, protested, and trader the authority of President Burnet, reimpressioned the Mexican. This action was sustained by the government and Santa Anna was consigned to the care of General Green, who treated him as a guest. Subsequently when their positions were reversed General Green was heavily ironed and ordered to work on the roads, which last he refused to do though threatened with death. Santa Anna, after his release, again began his incursions of Texas, and in 1843 General Sommerville, with a command of about seven hundred Texans, crossed into Mexico; then under implied executive authority, started homeward before striking a blow. General Green and others refused to return, recrossed the Rio Grande and attacked the town of Mier. After a nineteen hours' fight in which the enemy lost twice the entire force of their assailants, the battle went against the Texans and 261 men and officers were captured and imprisoned in the dungeons of Perote near the city of Mexico. After six months' labor in digging through an eight-foot wall of volcanic rock, General Green with fifteen others escaped on July 2, 1843, and he with seven others returned to Texas. Subsequently he was a representative in the Texas congress, where he used every effort to secure the release of the men whom he had left in the Mexican dungeons. He also introduced the bill which made the Rio Grande the boundary line between Texas and Mexico, the Nueces having been previously recognized as the line. President Polk based his claims and right to send troops to the mouth of the river in dispute upon this bill, and the Mexican war and the acquisition of Texas, New Mexico and California was the consequence. General Green also demonstrated the feasibility and absolute necessity of a railroad across this territory to the Pacific as a war measure in a memorial to Congress in 1850, and he afterward took an original part in the projection and building of the Southern Pacific railroad. During the pending of negotiations for the annexation of Texas to the United States he was tendered by President Polk the post of confidential agent of the United States, but declined on the ground that he was then a citizen of the other contracting power, In 1845 he returned to the United [p.396] States and was married to the widow of John S. Ellery of Boston, Mass. Later he went to Texas and in 1849 journeyed through Mexico to California. After working there in the mines he was elected a member of the first state senate, served one term, and was a candidate for the U.S. senate the ensuing year. As major-general of the California militia he subdued and effected a treaty with hostile Indian tribes. During his citizenship in Texas he assisted in purchasing the land and laying out the town of Velasco. While in California he projected and laid out the towns of Ore and Vallejo and introduced into the legislature the bill for the establishment of the state university. In his declining years he returned to Warren county N.C., and settled on "Esmeralda" plantation on Shocco Creek, cultivating corn and tobacco. He is the author of The Texan Expedition Against Mier (1845). He died at "Esmeralda" plantation, Warren county, N.C., Dec. 12, 1863. Deloris Williams