William Goyens is an incredibly interesting man (as I'm sure you know better than I), very successful at many things but, at least as far as I can tell, the issue of him being a runaway slave is still open to question with one story of Goyens buying his freedom, when his "owner" showed up in Nacogdoches, by paying him (the owner) $5,000.
The most credible story to me is that he was born free but during a trip to La. an attempt was made to sell him into slavery and instead he signed a note. He returned to Nacogdoches and when the holder of the note attempted to collect he (Goyens) contested it in court and won.
Perhaps part of the problem is that he was involved in a lot of things, even acting as a Cherokee interpreter for Houston and there are so many stories about him, I'm sure some of which, hum, skirt on the edge of dubious facts.
Kudos to you for keeping the flame burning! I feel sorry for kids these days that don't have the benefit of a very rich story.