Robert Bruce Blake

“ The invaluable services of Nacogdoches and its people in opening up the great northern regions of Texas, after the expulsion of the Indians, had the result, unfortunate for it but inevitable, of diminishing the population and importance of the town. New centers of agriculture and trade sprang up and became towns which attracted more and more people to themselves, and new opportunities presented themselves for business enterprise. It was easier to fence in the prairies than to clear the forest lands of East Texas. ”

“ Augustus Magee, who resigned his position in the United States garrison at Fort Jesup to take command of the American and Mexican forces in their effort to throw off the yoke of Spain.
It is said that every able-bodied man east of the Trinity river joined in this expedition. For a time it prospered, and by 1813 had successfully driven the Spanish military forces from Eastern Texas and pursued them to San Antonio, where Governor Manuel Salcedo and most of the high Spanish officials there were butchered. ”

“ American customs prevailed over those of former times, and the business fell into the hands of enterprising merchants and tradesmen from the States. The Indians to the northeast were impressed by the power and vigor of the new people and left them unmolested, although they also had increased until they greatly outnumbered the whites.
Business was thriving, the population was increasing, and new settlers were coming into the town, or taking up land in the country. ”

“ The tide of war never really rolled near to East Texas. For a time General Sam Houston was accused of intending to flee through Nacogdoches to the Sabine, where an American army was supposed to be expecting him, but he had other designs, which were consummated on the field of San Jacinto, and the danger was dispelled. East Texas, however, did suffer the throes of a paroxysm of panic. It was known that Mexican agents were 13 dispersed among the Cherokee and other Indians north of the settlements. ”

“ East Texas remained in a position of leadership, and furnished perhaps more than its share of the prominent officials of the Republic. The towns, including Nacogdoches, were alive with the discussions of governmental problems, and the advocacy of the names of the foremost citizens for high offices. After the repression of Mexican domination, politics arose to unprecedented heights, and everybody was affected by political fervor. Among the first officials of the new-formed Republic, Nacogdoches furnished Sam Houston for President, General Thomas J. Rusk as Secretary of War ”

“ The Americans built Fort Jesup, west of Red River, near Natchitoches, and in 1806, Governor Cordero, with 1500 Spanish troops, advanced to Nacogdoches to meet the American threat across the Sabine. As a result of the negotiations of Governor Cordero and General Wilkinson, there was formed The Neutral Ground, a strip of territory lying between the Sabine and the Rio Hondo, over which neither government exercised dominion, and which consequently became the rendezvous of the lawless, until the settlement of the present boundary between Texas and Louisiana. ”

“ After the annexation of Texas to the United States, Nacogdoches gradually settled down to the station of one of the many flourishing towns of the State, and lost the preeminence in political and social matters which had been its lots from the beginning of its history. With San Augustine it still continued to be the center of this section of the State, and the two towns cooperated harmoniously in the development of the surrounding regions.
Nacogdoches has always been an important social center. ”

“ James Bowie, who reached Nacogdoches a few days after the battle, agreed to convey the Mexican troops to San Antonio, and in his report stated that there were 33 Mexicans killed and 17 or 18 wounded; the Americans losing three men killed and seven wounded.
The Battle of Nacogdoches was the opening gun in the Texas Revolution, and resulted in the expulsion of all Mexican troops from the territory east of San Antonio, giving the Texans an opportunity to hold their Convention without military interference of the enemy. ”

“ General Thomas J. Rusk was a citizen of Nacogdoches until his death. Sam Houston frequently was a resident until his removal to Huntsville. Charles S. Taylor was very prominent in public affairs. William B. Ochiltree lived here for a time. Thomas J. Jennings, the elder, lived here until his removal to Marshall, as did Dr. James H. Starr. James Reily, who was minister to the United States, had his home here. These are some of the men more prominent in public life; among private citizens there were also many whose names were well known throughout the land. ”

“ The news of victory soon restored the minds of the people to sanity, and they entered with alacrity into the work of establishing the new government of the Republic. After the disorganization of the West and South, which were devastated by the advance of the enemy. ”

“ When the Spanish settlers began making their homes in the old Indian town, they found several mounds within the limits of the town, relics of the centuries of Indian occupation before the coming of the white man. Three of the larger of these mounds were located on what became the Nacogdoches University campus, now the high school campus. The importance of these mounds was not recognized by those who founded the university, and they were razed in an effort to level the ground of the campus. Only one now remains, on Mound street, so named because of these monuments to the antiquity of the town. ”

“ Greater business enterprises were undertaken and accomplished and various kinds of improvements were effected in the way of conveniences of living. For many years the village spirit remained among the people. Everybody knew everybody else, and each was interested in the welfare of all. ”

“ Nearly eighty years after De Soto’s visit, on the borderline between tradition and history, came the ministration of Mother Maria de Jesus de Agreda, “the angel in blue,” teaching the Tejas tribes the Christian religion, in 1620. So great was the influence of this saintly woman that in 1690 the chief of the Tejas told Massanet that they wished to do as she had done, and even wanted to be buried in blue garments.
The first definite description of Nacogdoches and its aboriginal population is in the account of LaSalle’s visit here in 1685. ”

“ He promulgated the first Book of Ordinances for the government of the city in 1780, the original of which is now in the Nacogdoches Archives in the Capitol at Austin.
The new city grew apace, and by the beginning of the Nineteenth Century embraced a population of several hundred souls. In 1792 General Don Ramon de Castro sent Don Juan Antonio Cortez, captain of cavalry at LaBahia, to Nacogdoches for the purpose of conducting an investigation of the irregularities of verbal land grants made by Ybarbo, as well as of his illegal traffic with the French and Indians. ”

“ Business enterprise was at an end, and the great stores gave place to little shops, which barely supplied the necessities of life. The soldiers came home and went back to their farms, but the old plantations had disappeared and the fields barely produced a living for their owners and workers. ”

“ It brought new business, new people and new ambitions to the place which soon began to be built up in brick in place of the old wooden houses of the earlier years. Soon cotton wagons assembled, bearing bales of wealth, and in the autumn season the streets were filled with people from surrounding counties selling their crops and buying supplies. ”

“ Willie, with a pistol as his gavel, at which time General Thomas J. Rusk delivered one of his famous orations, which has been preserved to us in our court records.
Even the transfer of title to the old house from Vicente Cordova brings an element of tragedy and in some respects even comedy. Cordova was the leader in the so-called Cordova Rebellion in 1838, in which Zechariah Fenley was murdered and one of his slaves taken away. Following this, in 1840, Rebecca Fenley filed suit for damages against Cordova, not for the death of her husband, but for the loss of her slave. ”

“ The Charter from the Grand Lodge of Louisiana was granted September 22, 1837, and was received in the Lodge on its meeting November 20, 1837.
Upon suggestions from Holland Lodge No. 36, Houston, Texas, a committee consisting of Adolphus Sterne, I. W. Burton, Thomas J. Rusk, Charles S. Taylor and Kelsey Douglass, was appointed to attend a meeting in Houston to consider the formation of the Grand Lodge of Texas. Their mission was accomplished in the city of Houston on February, 1838, with the organization of the Grand Lodge of Texas, and this lodge became Milam Lodge No. 2. ”

“ For one hundred fifty years tradition has thrown a veil of romance around the old building that formerly stood at the corner of Main and Fredonia streets, facing the northeast corner of the Plaza Principal in Nacogdoches, where the two main branches of El Camino Real merged. ”

“ The coup of Edwards was at first successful, and he and his followers were able to seize the “Stone House” and fortify it; but the citizenship of Nacogdoches and the surrounding country was not behind the movement, and it was doomed to failure from its inception.
The Fredonian rebellion resulted in many of the prominent citizens of the town being expelled in 1827—among whom were John S. Roberts, Haden and Benjamin Edwards, Adolphus Sterne and Martin Parmer. ”

“ Home built before the Texas Revolution.
Don Juan Antonio Padilla, site now occupied by Westminster Presbyterian church on North street. Born in Nacogdoches on Rancho Santo Domingo; died in Houston 1839, while there on business. Served as an officer in the Spanish army; Secretary of State of Coahuila and Texas; Land Commissioner for Eastern Texas; delegate from Victoria county to the convention which declared Texas independent; member of deputation that demanded the surrender of Goliad, and volunteer to the Army of the Republic before San Antonio. ”

“ Following the formation of the new government, the business men of Nacogdoches entered upon a period of expansion, resulting in the laying out of numerous new towns in the then Nacogdoches county, extending almost to the Gulf of Mexico on the south and including Dallas on the north. ”

“ L. E. Griffith came to Nacogdoches from San Augustine about 1850 and was one of the builders of modern Nacogdoches. The park was dedicated to Dr. Griffith and the early pioneers of Nacogdoches.
INDIAN MOUNDS.—On the corner of the school campus at Mound and Arnold streets, was a large Indian Mound 150×75 feet and about fifteen feet high. On the corner opposite was a circular Mound about 75 feet in diameter. These Mounds were leveled to make room on the campus. One small mound still remains on the front lawn of the T. M. Reavley home. An oak tree of considerable size grows from the summit of it. ”

“ The Mexican general, Ahumada, who occupied Nacogdoches upon this occasion, was a genuine diplomat, and with the assistance and advice of Stephen F. Austin, who came to Nacogdoches with Ahumada, soon had the old town peaceful again. However, the man whom Ahumada selected as comandante here proved to be an unfortunate choice, and Colonel Jose de las Piedras soon aroused the hostility of the American settlers with his high-handed, arbitrary methods, as was the case with Col. ”

“ Growth of American Influence
Nacogdoches now became more and more American in its character. In 12 1834 the neighboring municipality of San Augustine was organized, and the two sister towns grew in numbers and influence. ”