José María de Jesús Carvajal

José María de Jesús Carvajal
Author: Joseph E. Chance
Publisher: Trinity University Press
Total Pages: 296
Release: 2012-08-31
Genre: History
ISBN: 1595341234

José María de Jesús Carvajalis both a biography of a Mexican postrevolutionary and a study of the development of a new border between Mexico and the United States during the crucial decades of the early to mid–nineteenth century. The work examines the challenges faced by Carvajal, a bilingual, bicultural character in confusing times, against the historical backdrop of the history of colonial Texas and northern Mexico. Chance has chosen to focus on a political-military figure whose career stretches from the Texas Revolution to the French Intervention. Carvajal played a key role in the violent struggle between the liberal and conservative political factions that vied for control of the Republic of Mexico from 1830 to 1874. He was the leader of a mercenary army that invaded Mexico from the United States in 1851 in an unsuccessful attempt for the creation of the so-called independent Republic of the Sierra Madre. In addition, he played significant roles in the struggle for Texas Independence and formation of the ill-fated Republic of the Rio Grande; and he opposed the American occupation of northern Mexico during the Mexican-American War, the War of Reform that solidified liberal control of Mexico under the leadership of Benito Juarez, and the French Intervention into Mexico. Carvajal’s life and exploits have been largely overlooked by contemporary historians. This work sheds new light on several important chapters in the history of Texas and northern Mexico.

JosŽ Mar’a de Jesœs Carvajal

JosŽ Mar’a de Jesœs Carvajal
Author: Joseph Chance
Publisher: Trinity University Press
Total Pages: 297
Release: 2006-03-01
Genre: History
ISBN: 1595340203

Both a biography of the titular Mexican reformer and a study of the events that shaped the Mexican-U.S. border, this book examines the challenges faced by Carvajal during the turbulent decades of the early to mid-19th century. A key figure in the violent struggle against the conservative factions that controlled Mexico, Carvajal also played significant roles in the fight for Texas's independence and the ill-fated Republic of the Rio Grande. Carvajal’s life and exploits have been largely overlooked — here, he is restored to his rightful place among the visionaries who shaped modern Texas.

José Antonio Navarro

José Antonio Navarro
Author: David R. McDonald
Publisher: Texas A&M University Press
Total Pages: 484
Release: 2013-03-01
Genre: Biography & Autobiography
ISBN: 0876112920

The first biography to appear in more than a generation on the most influential Tejano leader of the nineteenth century, José Antonio Navarro: In Search of the American Dream in Nineteenth-Century Texas fills one of the most glaring gaps in the current historical literature on Texas. The product of a lifetime of research by author David McDonald, this volume is sure to stand as the definitive treatment of Navarro’s life for decades to come. McDonald corrects many long-standing misconceptions concerning Navarro and fleshes out the details of his life in a way no author has done before. Born in San Antonio in 1795, José Antonio Navarro lived through a tumultuous era in Texas history that saw the transitions of Texas from a Spanish colony to a Mexican state, an independent republic, an American state, a Confederate state, and an American state once again. More than just bearing witness to these events, however, José Antonio Navarro helped shape them. He served in the legislatures of Coahuila y Texas, the Republic of Texas, and the state of Texas. He was a signer of the Texas Declaration of Independence and a steadfast defender of the rights of all Tejanos and people of Mexican descent in Texas, ensuring at both the 1836 Consultation that created the Texas Republic and the 1845 drafting of the state constitution after annexation that political rights would not be restricted solely to those with white skin and pure European ancestry. José Antonio Navarro has won a 2013 citation from the San Antonio Conservation Society's Publications Awards Committee. José Antonio Navarro: In Search of the American Dream in Nineteenth-Century Texas is more than just a political biography; it is a story of the American Dream. Navarro and his family worked hard to improve their lives on the Texas frontier, starting with his father, an immigrant from the Mediterranean island of Corsica. Navarro was not only an influential politician, but a successful businessman and rancher. This pattern of improvement continued into the next generation of the family when Navarro’s son Ángel entered Harvard College to study law. José Antonio Navarro was also an early friend of Stephen F. Austin, sharing a vision of Texas with the famed empresario in which both Tejanos and Anglos could thrive. Navarro believed that Texas was a place where peoples of all colors and backgrounds should be able to realize the American Dream. Published with the generous assistance of the Friends of Casa NavarroNumber Two in the Watson Caufield and Mary Maxwell Arnold Republic of Texas Series

Tejano Leadership in Mexican and Revolutionary Texas

Tejano Leadership in Mexican and Revolutionary Texas
Author: Jesús F. De la Teja
Publisher: Texas A&M University Press
Total Pages: 278
Release: 2010-01-18
Genre: Biography & Autobiography
ISBN: 1603443037

Tejanos (Texans of Mexican heritage) were instrumental leaders in the life and development of Texas during the Mexican period, the war of independence, and the Texas Republic. Jesús F. de la Teja and ten other scholars examine the lives, careers, and influence of many long-neglected but historically significant Tejano leaders who were active and influential in the formation, political and military leadership, and economic development of Texas. In Tejano Leadership in Mexican and Revolutionary Texas, lesser-known figures such as Father Refugio de la Garza, Juan Martín Veramendi, José Antonio Saucedo, Raphael Manchola, and Carlos de la Garza join their better-known counterparts—José Antonio Navarro, Juan Seguín, and Plácido Benavides, for example—on the stage of Texas and regional historical consideration. This book also features a foreword by David J. Weber, in which he discusses how Anglocentric views allowed important Tejano figures to fade from public knowledge. Students and scholars of Texas and regional history, those interested in Texana, and readers in Latino/a studies will glean important insights from Tejano Leadership in Mexican and Revolutionary Texas.

War and Peace on the Rio Grande Frontier, 1830–1880

War and Peace on the Rio Grande Frontier, 1830–1880
Author: Miguel Ángel González-Quiroga
Publisher: University of Oklahoma Press
Total Pages: 420
Release: 2020-03-05
Genre: History
ISBN: 0806166800

The historical record of the Rio Grande valley through much of the nineteenth century reveals well-documented violence fueled by racial hatred, national rivalries, lack of governmental authority, competition for resources, and an international border that offered refuge to lawless men. Less noted is the region’s other everyday reality, one based on coexistence and cooperation among Mexicans, Anglo-Americans, and the Native Americans, African Americans, and Europeans who also inhabited the borderlands. War and Peace on the Rio Grande Frontier, 1830–1880 is a history of these parallel worlds focusing on a border that gave rise not only to violent conflict but also cooperation and economic and social advancement. Meeting here are the Anglo-Americans who came to the border region to trade, spread Christianity, and settle; Mexicans seeking opportunity in el norte; Native Americans who raided American and Mexican settlements alike for plunder and captives; and Europeans who crisscrossed the borderlands seeking new futures in a fluid frontier space. Historian Miguel Ángel González-Quiroga draws on national archives, letters, consular records, periodicals, and a host of other sources to give voice to borderlanders’ perspectives as he weaves their many, varied stories into one sweeping narrative. The tale he tells is one of economic connections and territorial disputes, of refugees and bounty hunters, speculation and stakeholding, smuggling and theft and other activities in which economic considerations often carried more weight than racial prejudice. Spanning the Anglo settlement of Texas in the 1830s, the Texas Revolution, the Republic of Texas , the US-Mexican War, various Indian wars, the US Civil War, the French intervention into Mexico, and the final subjugation of borderlands Indians by the combined forces of the US and Mexican armies, this is a magisterial work that forever alters, complicates, and enriches borderlands history. Published in association with the William P. Clements Center for Southwest Studies at Southern Methodist University in Dallas, Texas

The Ranger Ideal Volume 1

The Ranger Ideal Volume 1
Author: Darren L. Ivey
Publisher: University of North Texas Press
Total Pages: 665
Release: 2017-10-15
Genre: History
ISBN: 1574417010

Established in Waco in 1968, the Texas Ranger Hall of Fame and Museum honors the iconic Texas Rangers, a service which has existed, in one form or another, since 1823. They have become legendary symbols of Texas and the American West. Thirty-one Rangers, with lives spanning more than two centuries, have been enshrined in the Hall of Fame. In The Ranger Ideal Volume 1: Texas Rangers in the Hall of Fame, 1823-1861, Darren L. Ivey presents capsule biographies of the seven inductees who served Texas before the Civil War. He begins with Stephen F. Austin, “the Father of Texas,” who laid the foundations of the Ranger service, and then covers John C. Hays, Ben McCulloch, Samuel H. Walker, William A. A. “Bigfoot” Wallace, John S. Ford, and Lawrence Sul Ross. Using primary records and reliable secondary sources, and rejecting apocryphal tales, The Ranger Ideal presents the true stories of these intrepid men who fought to tame a land with gallantry, grit, and guns. This Volume 1 is the first of a planned three-volume series covering all of the Texas Rangers inducted in the Hall of Fame and Museum in Waco, Texas.

Tejano Tiger

Tejano Tiger
Author: Jerry Thompson
Publisher: Texas A&M University Press
Total Pages: 541
Release: 2017-10-25
Genre: History
ISBN: 087565665X

Riding the rough and sometimes bloody peaks and canyons of border politics, Santos Benavides’s rise to prominence was largely the result of the careful mentoring of his well-known uncle, Basilio Benavides, who served several terms as alcalde of Laredo, Texas, and Chief Justice of Webb County. When the Civil War erupted in 1861, Basilio was one of only two Tejanos in the state legislature. During Santos’s lifetime, five flags flew over the small community he called home—that of the Republic of Mexico, the ill-fated Republic of the Rio Grande, the Republic of Texas, an expansionist United States, and in March 1861, the rebellious Confederate States of America. It was under the Confederacy in the disputed Texas-Mexico borderlands that Santos Benavides reached the pinnacle of his military career as the highest-ranking Tejano in the entire Confederate army. In the decades that followed the Civil War, he became an esteemed political leader, highly respected on both sides of the border. This is the first scholarly study of this important historical figure. At the pinnacle of his political career in 1879, Benavides held the distinction of being the only Tejano in the Texas legislature. Through strife, sweat, blood, and heroism in defense of the border, Benavides rose to economic and political heights few could dream of. As a friend and confidant of two Mexican presidents, he was one of the single most influential individuals in the nineteenth-century history of the border. His life was one of enduring perseverance as well as binational leadership and skilled diplomacy. He was without doubt the single most important individual in the long and often violent history of Laredo. The niche he carved in the tumultuous transnational history of the Texas-Mexico borderlands seems secure.

Fighting Stock

Fighting Stock
Author: Richard B. McCaslin
Publisher: Texas A&M University Press
Total Pages: 497
Release: 2019-05-02
Genre: Biography & Autobiography
ISBN: 0875657516

In Fighting Stock, Richard B. McCaslin illuminates numerous facets of Ford’s life typically overshadowed by emphasis on his identity as Ranger and soldier in nineteenth-century Texas. In this third volume of the Texas Biography Series, published by TCU Press and The Center for Texas Studies, McCaslin reveals Ford as a man spurred on by the legacy of his nation-building grandfathers and his own strong convictions and energy to become a force in shaping Texas as a Southern state before and after the Civil War. Ford’s battles as a Ranger, and as a leader of Texas’ military forces allied with the Confederacy, were only part of his legacy in Texas history. He was also a physician, lawyer, and the editor of several newspapers, and among his many roles in politics and civil service were multiple terms as a state legislator and the mayoralty of Austin and Brownsville. Later in life, he fought to preserve Texas history and wrote his own extensive memoirs. Known for his courage and toughness as a military commander, Ford was also a talented strategist, diplomat, and community leader. McCaslin’s in-depth historical detail paints a full picture of this famous Texan, a fighter not only on the battlefield, but on the civic and political fields as well.

Civil Wars and Reconstructions in the Americas

Civil Wars and Reconstructions in the Americas
Author: Evan C. Rothera
Publisher: LSU Press
Total Pages: 342
Release: 2022-09-21
Genre: History
ISBN: 0807178438

In the latter half of the nineteenth century, three violent national conflicts rocked the Americas: the Wars of Unification in Argentina, the War of the Reform and French Intervention in Mexico, and the Civil War in the United States. The recovery efforts that followed reshaped the Western Hemisphere. In Civil Wars and Reconstructions in the Americas, Evan C. Rothera uses both transnational and comparative methodologies to highlight similarities and differences among the wars and reconstructions in the US, Mexico, and Argentina. In doing so, he uncovers a new history that stresses the degree to which cooperation and collaboration, rather than antagonism and discord, characterized the relationships among the three countries. This study serves as a unique assessment of a crucial period in the history of the Americas and speaks to the perpetual battle between visions of international partnership and isolation.

The War Went On

The War Went On
Author: Brian Matthew Jordan
Publisher: LSU Press
Total Pages: 369
Release: 2020-04-01
Genre: History
ISBN: 0807173053

In recent years, Civil War veterans have emerged from historical obscurity. Inspired by recent interest in memory studies and energized by the ongoing neorevisionist turn, a vibrant new literature has given the lie to the once-obligatory lament that the postbellum lives of Civil War soldiers were irretrievable. Despite this flood of historical scholarship, fundamental questions about the essential character of Civil War veteranhood remain unanswered. Moreover, because work on veterans has often proceeded from a preoccupation with cultural memory, the Civil War’s ex-soldiers have typically been analyzed as either symbols or producers of texts. In The War Went On: Reconsidering the Lives of Civil War Veterans, fifteen of the field’s top scholars provide a more nuanced and intimate look at the lives and experiences of these former soldiers. Essays in this collection approach Civil War veterans from oblique angles, including theater, political, and disability history, as well as borderlands and memory studies. Contributors examine the lives of Union and Confederate veterans, African American veterans, former prisoners of war, amputees, and ex-guerrilla fighters. They also consider postwar political elections, veterans’ business dealings, and even literary contests between onetime enemies and among former comrades.