Sam Houston descendant dies at 102

Services for Margaret Decker Everitt, who was Sam Houston's oldest living descendant, will be held at 2 p.m. Sunday (December 5t, 1999) at Trinity Episcopal Church, 1015 Holman (Houston, Harris County, Texas).

She died in St. Luke's Episcopal Hospital (Houston, Harris County, Texas) on Tuesday (November 30, 1999) at 102.

Her grandmother, Nancy Elizabeth Morrow, was one of Houston's eight children and his oldest daughter.

Everitt, who drove until she was 99, was born February 7, 1897, in Georgetown (Williamson County, Texas). Her father, Davis E. Decker, was a state senator and a judge.

Everitt spent much of her young life at Quanah in Hardeman County in North Texas.

In 1997, at the time of her 100th birthday, she confided that being a descendant of Houston, Texas' greatest hero, was a source of embarrassment to her when she was a child.

"I hated it because I thought it made me different from others," she explained.

Everitt's first husband, Henry S. Aurand, rose to Lieutenant General in the Army during World War II and was the father of her two sons, now deceased. She divorced him, remarried him, then divorced him again.

She and New York banker Archibald Lawson Jr. were then married for six years when he died.

She said her fourth marriage, to Edward A. Everitt, who rose to an Army colonel, proved to be her best. They had been   married 35 years when he died in 1970.

Burial will be December 10 in Arlington National Cemetery.

Everitt survived all three of her husbands and her two sons, and drove a car until she was 99.

Her father, Davis E. Decker, was a state senator and judge. Her grandmother, Nancy Elizabeth Morrow, was the oldest daughter among the general's eight children.

Houston, commander of the Texas army in its war against Mexico, led his troops to victory over the Mexican general Santa Anna in the historic battle of San Jacinto on April 21, 1836. He was president of Teas twice during its nine years as a sovereign state, then served 14 years in the U.S. Senate after Texas became a state in 1854.

Everitt worked closely with the Sam Houston Memorial Museum.

She was born Feb. 7, 1897, in Georgetown, and first married World War II Lieutenant General Henry S. Aurand. Later, she wed New York banker Archibald Lawson Jr., and finally Army Co. Edward A. Everitt.