Our Catltolic Heritage in Texas
the parish funds since 1809. These included a note made by the deceased subdeacon Juan Manuel Zambrano in the amount of $1,250.00, which was to be collected from his heirs; the amount due from Mariano Lopez, in two notes for $211.75 and $995.87, to be paid by his bondsmen; and a note for $304.50 made by the paymaster of the local militia com- pany to Victor Blanco. Fathers Juan Diaz de Leon and Miguel Muro, missionaries from Zacatecas, presented their appointments and faculties, which were approved and reissued by the Vicar on April 12. Similar faculties were granted to Father Jose Dario Zambrano, nephew of the subdeacon who had died in 1824. The Vicar instructed the young priest, through the pastor of San Fernando, to say Mass at the Alamo chapel on July 24 for the families of the soldiers and civilians living across the San Antonio. Zambrano ignored the request, whereupon the Vicar revoked his faculties. Several sacred vessels and other mission property belonging to San Jose, Concepcion, San Francisco and San Juan were found in the parish church of San Fernando during the visitation. Father Garza was instructed to make a separate inventory of the property of each of the missions then in San Fernando. With characteristic negligence he failed to carry out the order and had to be reminded twice before July 25, when he was peremptorily ordered to do it without delay. By that time, however, the Vicar was contemplating his departure from Texas. It seems Garza never made the inventory. 1' An examination of the wills and bequests revealed that Felix Ruiz left to the Church $296.50. The money was to be collected from Jose Manuel de la Garza, executor of the estate. Antonia Ruiz, his wife, left a bequest of $258.62. Subdeacon Juan Manuel Zambrano, who died in Mier on November 5, 1824, requested in his last will that the executor of his estate have twenty-five Masses said for the repose of the souls of his father, his mother, and himself. Concepcion de Estrada bequeathed her right to one day's irrigation to defray her burial expenses. The Vicar ordered Jose Maria Zambrano, the executor of the estate, to sell this irrigation right and turn the proceeds over to the Church. 15 One of the last acts of the first Rural Dean was to inform Father Jose Antonio Valdez at La Bahia that he could not free Maria Jose HA careful search of the San Fernando Cathedral Ar~hives has failed to disclose the inventories. JSThe Spanish reads "un dia de agua," meaning the right to irrigate from the public ditch one day a week.
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