Matthew Gaines

Gaines quoted in Houston Telegraph (conservative) on June 29, 1871, saying he will not support any but a Black man for Congress: “Let us not turn the mill for other men to eat the meal. We have been putting white Republicans in office enough. Now the time has come to put a colored man in.”1

A letter from Louis W. Stevenson to O. O. Howard, May 10, 1870, concerning a school in Brenham, mentions Stevenson’s having consulted Gaines.2 Other letters about the matter follow on the reel.


  1. “Senator Gaines on the War Path,” Houston Telegraph, June 29, 1871, link.

  2. NARA, M822, Roll 10, Unregistered Letters Received.