San Antonio de Valero and Missionary Activity, 1716-1719 77
the Rio Grande and two from the Presidio of Coahuila. These soldiers would not be missed, he thought, because most of the Indians who troubled the presidios on the Rio Grande would soon be congregated at San Antonio by Father Olivares. 6 The detailed recommendations of the Fiscal de Hacienda are important and interesting because they may rightly be called the genesis of the founding of San Antonio de Valero, the first mission on the present site of San Antonio, and the beginning of the civil settlement of San Fernando de Bejar, to be reenforced in 1731 by families brought specially for the purpose from the Canary Islands. It is significant that in this report, while keeping ever present the urgent need for putting a stop to the commercial activity of the French and extending the dominions of the King of Spain, the real motive for the occupation of the San Antonio River was a deep and sincere desire to convert the natives to Christianity. Father Olivares does not refer to the French either in his first or his second report, but he stresses the opportunities for missionary work among the thousands of Indians that lived in the neighborhood of the San Antonio River. The reports of Ramon and the missionaries do not stress the danger from the French either, but they point out that, if the efforts to win the friendship of the Tejas and their neighbors are not supported by the government, if more soldiers are not assigned to afford adequate protection and inspire respect to the Indians, the French may use them \ for their selfish interest in promoting illicit trade and turn them into enemies of Spain. They showed the need of supplies and the difficulty of securing them from the frontier outposts of Coahuila, thus hinting indirectly at the necessity of a halfway station and preparing the ground unintentionally for a favorable reception of Father Olivares' suggested establishment. Olivares responsible for mission on the San Antonio. St. Denis and his new attempt to introduce merchandise into the northern provinces of New Spain had no influence whatsoever upon the decision to occupy the San Antonio River, for when he arrived for the second time in Mexico City, in June, 1717, and even before the viceroy had heard through Diego Ramon at San Juan Bautista of the seizure of his goods, the Real A cuerdo had approved the recommendations of the Fiscal,· Martin de Alarcon had 6 Resumen general de los autos sobre noticias, informes y escritos desde 1688 a 1718 •.. Velasco. November 30, I 7 I 6. San Francisco el Grande Arcllive, VIII, 1 :a6- .163; copy also in Provincias lnternas, Vol. 181, pp. 139-180.
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