This Day In Texas History - March 19

[joe817]

1697 - Future Texas chronicler Isidro Félix de Espinosa was professed as a novice at the College of Santa Cruz de Querétaro, a Franciscan missionary institution in Mexico. He probably arrived in Texas in 1703. Espinosa's missionary activities in Texas included his participation in several expeditions. Dubbed the "Julius Caesar of the Faith in New Spain" because he worked by day and wrote all night, Espinosa left behind several works on early Texas, including a biography of his friend Antonio Margil de Jesús. Espinosa's Crónica de los colegios de propaganda fide de la Nueva España has been called the "most important contemporary account of the Franciscans in Texas."

1823 - Don Agustin Iturbide who had overthrown the Spanish Government and established himself as Emperor of Mexico, was himself overthrown by Mexican Federalists under Santa Anna. A governing commission is then established with a new Constitution is promised. By January 1824, pieces of the new Constitution are enacted into law, and by October 1824, the completed new Constitution becomes law.

1826 - Cherokee leader John Dunn Hunter arrived in Mexico City to renew negotiations with the Mexican government for land for a Cherokee settlement in Texas. Hunter was promised land to be granted to individual Indian settlers but was unsuccessful in getting a tribal grant with the right of self-government. He returned to East Texas and, with Cherokee diplomatic chief Richard Fields, began negotiations with Martin Parmer and his associates for the so-called Fredonian Republic, which would have divided Texas between the Indians and the Anglo-Americans. The Mexican government moved quickly to quash the uprising, however, and the Cherokee council refused to take part in the Fredonian Rebellion.

1836 - Texans, commanded by Colonel James Fannin, having left the protection of the mission at Goliad, were defeated in an open field battle by Mexican Federal troops under General José Urrea. This is known as the Battle of Coleto.

1836 - Robert Hamilton and George C. Childress were appointed by the Convention of 1836, to go to Washington, D.C., to seek recognition of the independence of Texas and establishment of commercial relations with the United States.

1840 - Republic of Texas soldiers killed some thirty Penateka Comanche leaders and warriors and five women and children in the Council House Fight in San Antonio. The Comanches had come to San Antonio seeking to make peace. Texas officials had demanded that the Comanches return all captives, but the Penatekas brought only a few prisoners, including the severely abused Matilda Lockhart. After a dispute about the other captives, Texas soldiers entered the Council House, where the peace talks were being held, and informed the assembled chiefs that they were to be held as hostages until the remaining captives were released. The Comanche chiefs attempted to escape and called to their fellow tribesmen outside the house for help. In the ensuing melee, the soldiers killed most of the Comanches who remained in the Council House courtyard. Six whites were killed and twenty wounded as well. The Council House Fight outraged Comanche sensibilities, for they considered ambassadors immune from acts of war. Led by Buffalo Hump, the Penatekas retaliated by raiding deep into Texas. Comanche hatred of Texans deepened and contributed much to the violence of the frontier.

1863 - Mark Francis, first dean of the School of Veterinary Medicine at the Agricultural and Mechanical College of Texas (now Texas A&M University), the son of Abner and Martha Ann (Vaughan) Francis, was born on March 19, 1863, in Shandon, Ohio. He received a degree in veterinary medicine from Ohio State University in 1877. Francis became professor of veterinary science at Texas A&M in 1888. He became dean of the School of Veterinary Medicine in 1916 and was chief of the division of veterinary science in the Agricultural Experiment Station System. His fight against the fever tick and his work in developing the subcutaneous injection method of immunizing cattle against Texas fever gave him an international reputation and the cognomen "Father of the Texas Cattle Industry."

1864 - Cristóbal Benavides, son of José Jesús Benavides and Tomasa Cameros, was born on April 3, 1839, in Laredo. He was also the great–great–grandson of Tomás Sánchez de la Barrera y Garza, who had established the village of Laredo in 1755. Benavides received his education in Laredo and Corpus Christi, and before the Civil War was a stockman who built up a sizable ranch. With the coming of the Civil War he enlisted as a sergeant in a company of local Tejanos being raised by his half-brother, Santos Benavides. Within a year he had achieved the rank of lieutenant. The company commanded by Santos was then reorganized into a unit called Benavides' Regiment. Cristóbal Benavides was promoted to captain and given command of a company in his brother's regiment. On March 19, 1864, he fought to defend Laredo against Union forces that had advanced upriver from Brownsville intent on seizing or destroying some 5,000 bales of cotton stacked in St. Augustine Plaza in Laredo. After the war Cristóbal Benavides concentrated on his sheep and cattle ranch and on his mercantile business. By 1890 he had become one of the wealthiest men in Webb County. He died on September 2, 1904.

1869 - Fort Inge (Camp Leona) is on the east bank of the Leona River a mile south of Uvalde in southern Uvalde County. On March 13, 1849, frontier artist Capt. Seth Eastman and fifty-six soldiers of companies D and I, First United States Infantry, established camp on the Leona, four miles above Woll's Crossing. In December 1849 the post was renamed Fort Inge in honor of Lt. Zebulon M. P. Inge, United States Second Dragoons, a West Point officer killed at the Mexican War battle of Resaca de la Palma. Fort Inge was established as a part of the first federal line of frontier forts in Texas.

It was to serve as a base of operations for army troops and Texas militia. The missions of the soldiers included security patrols for the construction of the San Antonio-El Paso military road, escorts for supply trains and mail, protection for frontier settlements from bandits and Indian raiders, and guarding the international boundary with Mexico. The fort was a typical one-company, fifty-man post for most of its history. One staff inspector reported that Fort Inge "is justly regarded as one of the most important and desirable positions in Texas. No station of the line possesses so many advantages as this . . . in point of wood, water, and soil . . . It is pre-eminent as a military site. [It is in] a state of constant warfare and constant service." The establishment of the post in 1849 immediately attracted a number of farmers to the area. In 1853 Reading Wood Black bought land a mile upstream and began the settlement of Encina in 1855. The community was renamed Uvalde in 1856. Fort Inge was closed for federal service on March 19, 1869, and the garrison transferred to Fort McKavett.

1898 - The Pecos and Northern Texas Railway Company was chartered on March 19, 1898, by James J. Hagerman and associates to build from Amarillo through Canyon, Umbarger, Hereford, Friona, and Bovina to the Texas-New Mexico line at Farwell and Texico, a distance of ninety-five miles. The P&NT opened on March 1, 1899, to the Texas-New Mexico border, where connection was made with the Pecos Valley and Northeastern Railway which, together with other affiliated companies, formed a line from Amarillo to Pecos through eastern New Mexico. In 1901 the P&NT and affiliated lines were acquired by the Atchison, Topeka and Santa Fe Railway Company.

[joe817]

Letters From The Past: David G. Burnet to M. B. Menard, March 19, 1836.

Interim president of Texas instructs Menard to negotiate neutrality with Indian tribes of eastern Texas without promising land. A fascinating read:


https://www.tsl.texas.gov/exhibits/indi ... 836-1.html

[ELB]

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1869 - Fort Inge (Camp Leona) is on the east bank of the Leona River a mile south of Uvalde in southern Uvalde County. On March 13, 1849, frontier artist Capt. Seth Eastman and fifty-six soldiers of companies D and I, First United States Infantry, established camp on the Leona, four miles above Woll's Crossing. In December 1849 the post was renamed Fort Inge in honor of Lt. Zebulon M. P. Inge, United States Second Dragoons, a West Point officer killed at the Mexican War battle of Resaca de la Palma. Fort Inge was established as a part of the first federal line of frontier forts in Texas.

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Fort Inge is marked on Google Maps but there doesn't appear to be anything there, because the satellite view shows the location is in the middle of a large agricultural field.

The battle in which Lt Inge was killed, Resaca de la Palma, was one of the battles that Lt U.S. Grant participated in when General Zachary Taylor was returning from San Antonio to relieve Fort Texas, which was besieged by the Mexicans. The fort's commander, Major Brown, was the only two men at the fort who were killed by the siege, and General Taylor renamed the fort to be Fort Brown in his honor. This provided the name for the city of Brownsville. Unfortunately for Lt Inge's place in history, the fort named after him did not inspire anyone to rename the town of Encina that was made possible by the presence of the fort. Instead, the town was renamed after a prior Spanish governor, Juan de Ugalde, although for some reason the "g" was changed to a "v", thus giving Uvalde.

In a final bit of trivia, actor Matthew McConaughey was born in Uvalde.