Jose Bernardo Gutierrez De Lara, Mexican Frontiersman
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JOSE BERNARDO GUTIERREZ DE LARA, MEXICAN FRONTIERSMAN 1811-1841 by James Clark Miiligan, B.A. in Ed., M.S. in Ed A DISSERTATION IN HISTORY Submitted to the Graduate Faculty of Texas Tech University in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree of DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY Approved Accepted December, 1975 ^ I ACKNOWLEDGMENTS The kind help and encouragement of several persons facilitated the writing of this dissertation. Ernest Wallace, William Johnson, Lowell Blaisdell, Lawrence Graves, and William Tucker served on the doctoral committee and offered valuable suggestions. David Vigness, chairman of the committee, was most helpful in selecting the topic, directing the research, and guiding the writing of this study. il CONTENTS ACKNOWLEDGMENTS ii LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS iv Chapter I. A CRIOLLO PROPAGANDIST FOR INDEPENDENCE 1 II. AMBASSADOR WITHOUT A COUNTRY 23 III. COMMANDER-IN-CHIEF OF THE REPUBLICAN ARMY OF THE NORTH ... 52 IV. PRESIDENT-PROTECTOR OF THE PROVISIONAL GOVERNMENT OF THE STATE OF TEXAS 76 V. A DEFIANT EXILE 106 VI. GOVERNOR OF TAMAULIPAS 135 VII. COMMANDANT GENERAL OF THE EASTERN INTERIOR STATES 159 VIII. DEFENDER OF THE CONSTITUTION 188 BIBLIOGRAPHY 210 Hi LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS Map of Nuevo Santander 22 Jose Gutierrez de Lara 51 iv CHAPTER I A CRIOLLO PROPAGANDIST FOR INDEPENDENCE Northern Mexico, a land of contrasts, contains four major geogra phic and climatic regions. The geographic regions include the Sierra Madre Occidental on the west, the Mesa del Norte in the center, the Sierra Madre Oriental to the east, and the coastal plains along the Gulf Coast. The climatic regions are equally varied. Along the Rio Grande is a semi-arid zone where rain falls primarily in the summer; to the south is a dry temperate zone with a small amount of rain throughout the year; further south is a wet temperate zone; and finally, the most south- em area is a wet, tropical zone with a hot climate all year round. Included within this region is an area known to the Spaniards in the colonial period as the Seno Mexicano, which stretched from the Panuco River in Nuevo Santander to the Medina River in Texas. Due to the topo graphy of the province, it was a refuge for over eighty-three different Indian tribes. A virtual state o2 war existed between these tribes and Spain throughout the colonial period, because for more than two centuries the Indians continued to raid and plunder Spanish settlements. The necessity of subduing these tribes, together with that of stopping ^Richard S, MacNeish, "Preliminary Archaeological Investigations in the Sierra de Tamaulipas, Mexico," Transactions of the American Philosophical Society, Vol. 48 (December, 1958), p. 10. 2z. T. Fulmore, "History of Texas Geography," Southwestern Historical Quarterly, Vol. I (July, 1897), p. 14. possible intrusions by foreign powers, forced the Spanish government to take action. A veteran Indian fighter named Jose de Escandon was authorized in 1746 to conquer the entire area.-^ After preliminary investigations, Escandon received approval from Viceroy Juan Guemes de Horcacitas, Conde de Revilla Gigedo, for a plan of conquest and colonization of the province. His efforts were highly successful. In a report given October 13, 1755, at Queretaro, Escandon listed the number of settlements and people that had been founded in the province since he had started his colonization program in 1748. Twenty-four settlements with a total population of over six thousand, with supporting troops, had been established. Among the villas founded was Revilla, a farming and ranching site located on October 10, 1750, at the junction of the Rio Grande and Salado River. Revilla was originally settled by Vincente Guerra, a wealthy landowner from Coahuila, with twenty-six families who numbered 115 people. The town grew slowly—by 1753 it had only increased to forty-three families—but it grew steadily. In 1757, an official inspection conducted by Captain Jose Tienda de Cuervo, assisted by Augustm Lopez de la Camara Alta, for the viceroy, the Marques de las ^Alejandro Prieto, Historia geografia y estadistica del estado de Tamaulipas (Mexico: Tip. Escallerillos, 1873), p. 16. ^Lawrence Francis Hill, Jose de Escandon and the Founding of Nuevo Santander (Columbus, Ohio: The Ohio State University Press, 1926), p. 105. ^Ibid., p. 98. "Hubert Howe Bancroft, History of Mexico (6 vols.; San Francisco: The History Company, Publishers, 1887), III, p. 344. Amarlllas,7 revealed that Revilla had fifty-eight families which numbered 357 people composed of Spaniards, mestizos, and mulattos. These families, primarily emigrants from Nuevo Leon, were scattered Q over a wide area because of their ranching activities. The number of cattle, horses, mules, and sheep exceeded fifty thousand head, and the entire colony had a population of over eight thousand people.-*-^ The colony continued to attract new settlers, who prospered from farming and ranching industries. An investigation in 1769 entrusted to General Juan Fernando del Palacio and Jose Osorio, a lawyer, revealed a total of 2,245 Spanish families that numbered 10,813 people living in Nuevo Santander. They also reported 479,710 head of livestock. •*- A year later Don Lino Nepomuceno Gomez, on a tour of the missions in the area, reported that the town of Revilla had grown to the sizable popula tion of sixty families.12 ^Herbert Eugene Bolton (trans.), "Tienda De Cuervo's Ynspeccion of Laredo, 1757," Southwestern Historical Quarterly, Vol. VI (January, 1903), p. 187. °Lopez de Camara Alta to Viceroy, February, 1758, Archivo general de la nacion, Historia, Vol. 53. Hereafter cited as AGN, Historia. E. J. Foscue, "Agricultural History of the Lower Rio Grande Valley Regions, Agricultural History, VIII (July, 1934), p. 128. l^Tienda de Cuervo to Viceroy, October 13, 1757, AGN, Historia, Vol. 54. Don Lino Nepomuceno Gomez, Visita a la Colonia del Nuevo Santander, Report by Secretaria de Agricultura y Fomento al V Congreso Mexicano de Historia, Mexico, 1942, p. 20. 12ibid., p. 60. In 1767, the king ordered the population to establish land grants in long strips so that each settler was assured of water rights. The Gutierrez de Lara family of Revilla was included in this distribu tion. Don Jose Santiago Gutierrez de Lara, the son of Don Bemabe Gutierrez de Lara, who with Guerra was one of the original settlers of the town, received Porcion Number Twenty along the east bank of the Rio Grande. It was a long, wide strip of land, containing about seven thousand acres. In 1786, he bought Porcion Sixty-seven from Jose Feliz Recio.l-^ As the family's wealth increased over the years, so did its social and political standing. In 1786, too, Santiago Gutierrez was a leading official in the town council. His elder son, Jose Antonio Apolinario, received canonical and civil law degrees from Monterrey and became a priest in Revilla; and his younger sons, Jose Bernardo and Enrique, were trained to run the family estate. Jose Bernardo inherited the land upon the death of his father, married his cousin. Dona Maria Josefa de Uribe, in 1798, and settled into the life of a criollo land owner, blacksmith, and storekeeper. By this time northern Mexico was known as the Interior Provinces, as it had been reorganized for administrative and defensive purposes by Jose de Galvez, visitor-general in 1771 for Charles III, and consisted of the Califomias, Sonora, Sinaloa, Nueva Vizcaya, and Texas. Galvez, had also recommended the establishment of a commandancy-general for l^Land Records, Starr County, Texas. Copy in Gutierrez de Lara Papers, 1812-1886, State Archives, Austin, Texas. Hereafter cited as Gutierrez Papers. •*-^Rie Jarratt, Gutierrez de Lara, Mexican-Texan (Austin: Creole Texana, 1949), p- 4. northern Mexico, and this was done by a royal order on August 22, 1776. At the same time Galvez made further provisions for the defense of the commandancy. For this, he authorized two companies of dragoons and three of fusileers, each company to consist of one hundred men. These troops were further divided into so-called "flying companies" (companias volantes) which were small, mobile forces that could protect the entire area at a reduced expense to the Crown.-^^ Then, for more efficient administration, in 1785, the Interior Provinces underwent another reorganization. They were divided into three regions with a commandant for each. The eastern region, commanded by Juan de Ugalde, was composed of Texas, Coahuila, Nuevo Leon, and Nuevo Santander.•*•' The area continued to undergo administrative changes through the years of Spanish control. It was reduced to two divisions in 1787; but reunified again in 1792. At the same time the Californias, Nuevo Leon, and Nuevo Santander were placed under the direct control of the viceroy. In 1804, the area was divided into two systems, with Nuevo Santander 1 Q included in the one known as the Eastern Interior Provinces.-^^ The major reason behind so many administrative changes was the continuous Indian problems. Missions similar to San Francisco Solano •l^Herbert Ingram Priestley, Jose de Galvez, Visitor-General of New Spain, 1765-1777 (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1916), p. 293. l^Ibid., p. 294. l^David Martell Vigness, "The Republic of the Rio Grande: An Example of Separatism in Northern Mexico" (Ph. D. dissertation. Univer sity of Texas, 1951), p. 24. l^ibid., p. 25. de Ampuero, at Revilla, had been established throughout the provinces to deal with the Indians, but they had achieved only limited success. They were successful in the conversion of the more settled tribes, but were failures in their efforts with the more warlike tribes. Many tribes continued to raid and plunder without fear of retaliation from the Spanish, but the most troublesome were the Apaches, Lipans, and Comanches.-^^ Due to their excursions in Nuevo Santander, the Spanish government continued to change its administrative system and appoint officials that were believed to be most capable of handling the situation.