Ottr Catholic Heritage in Texas
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Gradual settlement of Rfo Grande City area. It was not only Fray Juan Bautista who thought it wise to occupy the territory opposite Camargo. That same year [1753] a group of settlers of the new villa petitioned Escandon to grant them lands north of the Rio Grande in the region of the present city of that name. "We beg and request your Lordship," they said, "that for our greater safety and security you assign us, if possible, two hundred sitios of land and the corresponding caballerias [a Spanish measure of land], these to be located on the opposite bank of the Rio Grande ... at the place commonly known as Carnestolendas, upstream; that we may use them [to pasture] our cattle, sheep, and goats." The petition was signed by Juan de los Angeles Garcia, Miguel Lopez de Jaen, Francisco Lopez de Jaen, Joseph de Hinojosa, and Francisco Ignacio Farias. On March IO, 1753, Escandon granted the request. "In view of the great need experienced by the petitioners as a result of the large herds and flocks they now have," he declared, "I grant and assign to them one hundred sitios [ten leagues square] of Ganado illayor in the said area north of the Rio Grande, running from its bank northward and extending from the crossing known as La Laja to that of Monteritos on the said Rio Grande, hence northward toward the Nueces River. Fifteen new families, not included in the present settlement, are to be established in this area to prevent the depopulation of the villa already founded and to enable the present settlement better to withstand attacks by barbarous Indians. . .. This land is granted to them in the name of the king on condition that the families stipulated must settle on it within six months at their own cost." 31 Thus in March, 1753, the area now occupied by Rio Grande City and its vicinity was officially granted by Escandon for settlement. By that time, as a matter of fact, a few daring pioneers of Camargo had already begun to pasture their herds on Texas soil. Two years later, in 1755, there were a number of large and prosperous ranches north of the Rio Grande, chief of these being those of Nicolas de los Santos Coy and Blas Maria Farias. The description of the country in which these ranches were established leaves no doubt of the location. Opposite Monteritos crossing, the report declares, the chain of hills that come down to the river recedes for a league or two. It was on the hill nearest the river, at a place called Carnestolendas, that Captain Blas Maria de la Garza Falcon had his ranch, where twenty-two servants, most of
JI Auto de visita de Camargo. March Io, I 7 53 . .A. G. M., Provincias /nternas, vol. 172, pp. 190-193.
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