Soy de Duval

In 1821, Mexico won its independence from Spain and ramifications of that historic change was felt in the trans Nueces region, including what would become Duval County. The Spanish state of Nuevo Santander seized to exist and the area between the Rio Grande and Nueces Rivers was now part of the Mexican state of Tamaulipas. On December 15, 1826 Mexico adopted Decree #42 that laid out new colonization laws. The laws allowed foreigners to colonize vacant lands in the state, provided they submitted to the decrees of the Republic and those of the state. No foreigners took up the Mexican government in the area around Duval County. The nearest such settlement was the McMullen and McGloin grant granted to the Irish in nearby San Patricio. The decree defined a sitio as a square league or 25 million square varas , a vara being three geometrical feet or about 32 inches. A labor was designated as one million square varas or 1,000 varas on each side of a square. The congress of Tamaulipas...

Los Angeles  About the time Rancho San Diego started, another rancho was being developed by ancestors of Trinidad Vela who took possession of Santa María de Los Ángeles de Abajo (or El Mesquite) grant, located on Arroyo de los Ángeles or Palo Blanco, 36 miles from San Diego and 51 miles northeast of Carrizo. Old land documents show lands at Los Ángeles de Abajo were denounced in 1810 or 1811. Vela’s ancestors had houses and pens at Los Ángeles de Abajo, but as was the case for all landowners in the frontier, Indians forced them to abandon their property from time to time. Indeed, Indians killed Vela’s father as well as several neighbors while attending stock at the ranch. The Vela family returned to Los Ángeles de Abajo with stock and rebuilt houses and pens. They roped and herded cattle that had gone wild after the Indian attacks. Concepción José Faustino Contreras also surveyed the Santa Cruz de la Concepción grant for Francisco Cordente on August 7, 1809. The description of the ...

San Leandro grant on south bank of San Diego Creek. The Spanish were not the only ones looking at this part of Texas to see if it was suitable for their needs. The Comanche were pushing their archenemies the Lipan Apache into South Texas from their natural habitat in eastern Colorado. The Lipan Apache were a nomadic group that relied on buffalo for subsistence. By 1775, the Apache had gained control over South Texas from the more docile Coahuiltecan Indians, who found themselves in a vise grip between the Spanish and Lipan Apache. It was not uncommon for colonists to seek protection in other settlements during Indian raids. In 1823, José María García reported Indian attacks on his property at San Diego. In December 1826, Cristóbal Treviño, “with the San Diego detachment,” returned to the presidio from patrol for Indian activities. Spanish soldiers from the presidio at Laredo often made forays in the area and to repel Indian attacks. Records suggest that the soldiers had a detachment...

Map of San Diego land grant made to Julian and Ventura Flores. “Tengo…desde el antiguo gobierno cuatro sitios en el paisaje de San Diego en la costa…que poblé y cultive…” – Juan Rosales In the middle of the eighteenth century, the Spanish crown began an effort to settle the area between the Rio Bravo and the Nueces Rivers. Settlement of the area that would become Duval County began circa 1794. The Rio Grande River communities of Guerrero, Camargo and Mier were the wellspring for ranches and later communities that would emerge in the area. The earliest settlements were ranchos at San Diego, Los Ángeles, and Concepción. Spain began to make grants to influential citizens of Camargo and Reynosa, but unlike earlier porciones along the north side of the Rio Grande, these grants were larger and were further inland, along the Gulf of Mexico. The new Spanish land grant policy, however, resulted in vast grants to a few individuals, prompting the crown to revise its guidelines and limit grants to...

Another explorer sent into the area by Escandon was Tomas Sanchez, who asked the empresario for permission to found a settlement north of the Rio Grande. Escandon sent Sanchez to pursue Escandon’s dream of a settlement on the south banks of the Nueces. Sanchez, like Borrego, informed Escandon that the area was uninhabitable. Escandon gave Sanchez leave to settle on the north bank of the Rio Grande where he founded Laredo.    Escandon remained undeterred. In a 1764 report to his superiors, Escandon wrote that settlers in his towns:  “have been extending themselves with ranches and haciendas, not only in the immediacy of said settlements but also in almost all the other shore of the Rio Grande del Norte and even further, nearly up to the Nueces River, about 20 leagues before the Presidio de la Bahia del Espirito Santo whose land is good for pastures and planting; notwithstanding that I understand the inspectors set it down as useless and sterile, an error that I attribute t...