George Tyler Wood was elected as the second Governor of Texas in 1847. He ran for re-election in 1849 and again in 1853 and was defeated both times. 

Wood accepted defeat gracefully and retired to his plantation home on the Trinity. He undertook to build a large home two miles from the river on what he considered more healthy ground, but died at his home on September 3, 1858, before it was completed. His wife, mother, and three children were buried near him on the grounds of their first plantation in what became known as Robinson graveyard, near Point Blank.