Silvia Hector Webber was one of the conductors on the Underground Railroad route from Texas to Mexico. She was widely known for taking in people of need, and she worked with her husband John to smuggle enslaved people to freedom over the Rio Grande river to Mexico.
Silvia's story started in Louisiana, where she was born into slavery in 1807. When she was twelve years old, she was sold to Morgan Cryer, Sr. of Clark County, AK for $550 ($11K in today's dollars). In 1826, Silvia came to Texas with the Cryer family when they got a land grant as part of the new Austin Colony.
John Webber was among the original settlers of the Austin Colony, and was neighbor and business partner of John Cryer. Together, the two men were in the business of smuggling tobacco in Northern Mexico, Webber Silvia at some point between 1826 and 1829 and became infatuated with her. John Webber eventually was married Silvia Hector by Father Michael Muldoon (interracial marriage was legal in the Mexican state of Coahuila y Tejas). While still enslaved, Silvia gave birth to three children with John Webber. John and Silvia were finally able to negotiate with John Cryer the freedom of their three children, as well as the freedom of Silvia herself by June 11, 1834. Webber and Cryer documented their negotiation in a legal document, which was latter dubbed the "Freedom Papers." The document required John and Sylvia to “pay” Cryer “a negro girl three years of age . . . and a negro boy to be two years old,” with the Webber land east of Austin as collateral. The Webbers never intended to pay the bond, and eventually agreed to forfeit a large portion of their Webberville property.
Silvia was one of the first free black persons to live in Travis County. Initially, she and John were accepted as an interracial couple, although Silvia was never seen as an equal. Their neighbors at Webberville treated Sylvia with respect because they appreciated her kindness and early settlers considered her kind, welcoming and intelligent. She is remembered for taking in and comforting an orphaned child, as well as opening her home to a man disabled with rheumatoid arthritis for years. When white women visited her house, she served them while they ate, but she and her children did not eat with them. When women offered to return the favor, she ate alone in their kitchen. Because the Webber children were not allowed to attend the local school due to racial prejudice, they hired Robert G. McAdoo, a North Carolinian school teacher, to be a live-in tutor for their children.
In 1836, the Republic of Texas was established following the Texas Revolution. Its constitution took away the rights and freedoms that Black people had enjoyed under Mexican law and outlawed interracial marriage. As more people from the Deep South moved into the area, Silvia and their children experienced cruel prejudice and discriminatory treatment. The new Webberville settlers wanted to rid the settlement of its founder and his "family of mulato offspring." The Webbers were also under the constant threat of slave stealers and slave catchers, who would kidnap freed slaves and sell them back into slavery. By the early 1850's the Webbers' lives at Webberville had come under such threat, they chose to uproot and move to Hildalgo County. Upon their arrival they were accepted among Mexican American families. They established and ran a ferry from their land near the Rio Grande across the river to transport goods for their trading business. To further protect his family, John changed his name to Juan Fernando Webber.
Silvia and John were anti-slavery advocates and Unionists, offering a safe haven to freedom seekers bound for Mexico. Silvia was known to be charitable to anyone that needed assistance. She and her family fed and provided shelter and asylum to runaway slaves on the Underground Railroad that led to Mexico. They used their ferry to deliver freedom seekers across the Rio Grande. When the Confederate army occupied the Rio Grande Valley, Sylvia and John were persecuted for their position against the Confederacy and driven off their land. After confederate troops kidnapped two of their sons, the family fled to Mexico and did not return until after the end of the war.
In 1872, John received a pension from the United States, and died ten years later. He was buried in the Webber Cemetery in Hidalgo County, near Donna, Texas. Silvia died ten years later in 1892. Silvia's "Freedom Papers" have someone survived, and are now on exhibit at the Briscoe Center at the University of Texas-Austin.
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