Joshua Houston, a servant of Sam Houston and an officeholder after the Civil War, was raised as a slave on Temple Lea's plantation in Marion, Perry County, Alabama. At his death in 1834 Lea left Joshua and his family to his daughter, Margaret Lea, who took them to Texas in 1840, when she married Sam Houston. In Texas Joshua became a skilled blacksmith, wheelwright, and stage driver. In the fall of 1862 Houston freed his slaves, even though it was illegal to do so, whereupon Joshua took the last name of Houston. In 1866, he purchased land in Huntsville, where he opened a blacksmith shop and built a two-story house.