Ashton Villa

Built in 1859 using slave labor and European craftsmen, Ashton Villa was one of the first brick structures in Texas — a three-story Victorian Italianate mansion with walls thirteen inches thick. Those walls mattered: the house survived the 1900 hurricane while sheltering Brown's widow and children. During the Civil War it served as headquarters for both armies in turn. The Galveston Historical Foundation rescued it from demolition in 1970, and every Juneteenth the grounds host a reading of General Order No. 3 — the order that made Texas slavery history.