Our Catleolic Heritage in Texas
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exaggeration he estimated the total to be 200,000--including Indians, immigrants since 1836, and Mexicans. About 12,000 of these he thought were Catholics, more than half of whom were pioneers who had come to Texas before 1836; they were, consequently, either nominal or Mul- doon Catholics, who had been perfunctorily baptized or married with little or no instruction or examination. Nacogdocl,es District. In the distant outpost of Nacogdoches there were about six hundred Catholics-half of them Mexicans, he had been told. There still lingered among them the memory of the tragic death of their last pastor, Fray Antonio Diaz de Leon. In his stead a poor beadle, aged, infirm physically, and weak morally, had been leading small groups in congregational prayers on Sunday, in the recitation of the rosary, and in the prayers at funerals. That was the extent of the spiritual care of the flock. Timon pointed out that the abandonment in which Catholics found themselves in Nacogdoches had enabled the Methodists to begin erecting a meetinghouse on the site of the ancient church, destroyed in 1838 by local factions during an abortive renewal of hostilities between Texans and Mexicans. To the southeast, as far as San Augustine, Catholic immigrants dotted the landscape-squatters on the rich lands of the Sabine and the Angelina. Colonel Philip Sublett invited Timon to be his guest when conditions permitted him to visit the area. He was anxious for Timon or one of his missionaries to come to administer the Sacraments to the scattered settlers and correct many existing abuses. Colonel Sublett, Major Roberts, and General Houston had recently joined in a project to found a new town at the mouth of the Sabine (present Orange?). Desirous of providing every facility possible to prospective Catholic immigrants, the founders of the new town offered to furnish a town site and build a church at their expense, if Timon would send a resident priest to the area. East of the Sabine there were some one hundred souls, Timon reported. Old _!:3... Baliia District.:. In the regi~n of La Bahia, now better known as Goliad, there were about twenty Catholic families, mostly Mexicans-so he had been informed. Timon reported that the beau- tiful old Church of Our Lady of Loreto still bore ugly scars of war, but was not beyond repair, standing abandoned, without sacred vessels, vestments, or furnishings. Some thirty miles south was Refugio with about forty Irish Catholics.
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