Our Catholic Heritage in Texas
plan to cause an outbreak is evident. Cordero had written Herrera on October 19 that the determination of the pretensions of the United States rested with the king. However, it would be best in the meantime to avoid giving the Americans a pretext for an open break by opposing their advance to the Sabine by force. The orders of the commandant general in this respect were with reference to scouting parties and patrols, "not against the advance guard of a regular army, looking for an excuse to attack." He, therefore, suggested allowing the Americans to advance unopposed as far as the Sabine.m A few days later came Salcedo's confirmation of the policy adopted by Herrera. From the Hacienda de los Homos he wrote to Cordero that under no circumstances was an attack to be made upon the Americans. Better that the disputed territory be occupied by them than to jeopardize the claim of Spain to it by hasty action. 113 Not until October 22 did Wilkinson finally set out on his triumphal march to the Sabine. "It was an idle march," says McCaleb, "selfishly begun and disgracefully ended." 114 They proceeded unopposed to the east bank of the Sabine where they halted on October 29. On the previous day Wilkinson had sent his trusted aide-de-camp, Walter Burling, of whom we will hear more, to Cordero in Nacogdoches with the proposal that without yielding a pretension or ceding a right, the two powers should retire to Nacogdoches and Natchitoches respectively; and that until the boundary question was settled, the Spaniards were not to recross the Sabine, and the Americans, the Arroyo Hondo. Burling left with Herrera a copy of the proposals which were substan- tially those made in February by Salcedo, 115 and hurried on to Cordero. He appears to have delivered his dispatch to the governor in Nacogdoches at noon on November 1. Here he remained until the third, when Cordero, with characteristic stubbornness, replied that the decision rested with the commandant general. He regretted he could do nothing about the matter, but assured Wilkinson's emissary that he was sending the proposals with all haste to Salcedo. Herrera, more practical than diplomatic, realized there was no time to lose. When Burling returned to the Sabine on November 4 with the noncommittal reply of Cordero, he again seized lllCordero to Herrera, October 19, 1806. Nacogdoches Archives, XI, pp. 2-3. lJJSalcedo to Cordero, October 24, 1806. Bexar Archives. 114McCaleb, 0 ,p. cit., 149; Wilkinson to Secretary of War, October 21, 1806. State Papers and Publick Docrmrents, II, 176-177. msee page 260.
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