Laredo is a city in and the county seat of Webb County, Texas, United States, on the north bank of the Rio Grande in South Texas, across from Nuevo Laredo, Tamaulipas, Mexico. Laredo has the distinction of flying seven flags. Founded in 1755, Laredo grew from a village to the capital of the short-lived Republic of the Rio Grande to the largest inland port on the Mexican border. Laredo's economy is based on international trade with Mexico. Many major transportation companies have a facility in Laredo. The city is on the southern end of I-35, which makes it close to the manufacturers in northern Mexico. It has four international bridges and one railway bridge.
Tejanos are the residents of the state of Texas who are culturally descended from the Mexican population of Tejas and Coahuila that lived in the region prior to it becoming what is now known as the state of Texas before it became a U.S. state in 1845. The term is also sometimes applied to all Texans of Mexican descent.
Santos Benavides was a Confederate colonel during the American Civil War. Benavides was the highest-ranking Tejano soldier in the Confederate military.
Texas A&M International University (TAMIU) is a public university in Laredo, Texas. It is part of the Texas A&M University System and home to over 8500 students each academic semester. TAMIU offers over 70 undergraduate and graduate degrees in four colleges.
Juan Nepomuceno Seguín was a Spanish-Tejano political and military figure of the Texas Revolution who helped to establish the independence of Texas. Numerous places and institutions are named in his honor, including the county seat of Seguin in Guadalupe County, the Juan N. Seguin Memorial Interchange in Houston, Juan Seguin Monument in Seguin, World War II Liberty Ship SS Juan N. Seguin, Seguin High School in Arlington.
Henry Hopkins Sibley was a career officer in the United States Army, who commanded a Confederate cavalry brigade in the Civil War.
The New Mexico campaign was a military operation of the Trans-Mississippi Theater of the American Civil War from February to April 1862 in which Confederate Brigadier General Henry Hopkins Sibley invaded the northern New Mexico Territory in an attempt to gain control of the Southwest, including the gold fields of Colorado and the ports of California. Historians regard this campaign as the most ambitious Confederate attempt to establish control of the American West and to open an additional theater in the war. It was an important campaign in the war's Trans-Mississippi Theater, and one of the major events in the history of the New Mexico Territory in the American Civil War.
Juan Nepomuceno Cortina Goseacochea, also known by his nicknames Cheno Cortina, the Red Robber of the Rio Grande and the Rio Grande Robin Hood, was a Mexican rancher, politician, military leader, outlaw and folk hero. He was an important caudillo, military general and regional leader, who effectively controlled the Mexican state of Tamaulipas as governor. In borderlands history he is known for leading a paramilitary mounted Mexican Militia in the failed Cortina Wars. The "Wars" were raids targeting Anglo-American civilians whose settlement Cortina opposed near the several leagues of land granted to his wealthy family on both sides of the Rio Grande. Anglo families began immigrating to the Lower Rio Grande Valley after the Mexican Army was defeated by the Anglo-Mexican rebels of the Mexican State of Tejas, in the Texas Revolution.
The Cortina Troubles is the generic name for the First Cortina War, from 1859 to 1860, and the Second Cortina War, in 1861, in which paramilitary forces, led by the Mexican rancher and local leader Juan Nepomuceno Cortina, confronted elements of the United States Army, the Confederate States Army, the Texas Rangers, and the local militias of Brownsville, Texas, and Matamoros, Tamaulipas.
The Battle of Albuquerque was a small engagement of the American Civil War in April 1862 between General Henry Hopkins Sibley's Army of New Mexico and a Union Army under Edward R. S. Canby.
The San Elizario Spy Company or Coopwood Spy Company was an independent volunteer company of cavalry formed by Captain Bethel Coopwood and mustered into Confederate service on July 11, 1861 in El Paso, Texas.
Salvador Flores served as a volunteer in the Texan Army in 1835–1836. He was instrumental in organizing and commanding Texian volunteers in support of the Texas Revolution. He participated in many battles and would rise through the ranks to reach Captain status during the fight for Texas independence from Mexico. Salvador continued to provide protection for the ranches and settlers of Texas throughout the Republic years.
Bethel Coopwood (1827–1907) was born in Alabama, and moved to Texas and was a soldier in the Mexican–American War and an officer in the Confederate Army in the American Civil War. He was a lawyer, judge, and later a historian.
José María Jesús Carbajal (1809–1874) was a Mexican Tejano who opposed the Centralist government installed by Antonio López de Santa Anna, but was a conscientious objector who refused to take up arms against his own people. Mexican conscientious objectors paid a price for their refusals, in that Texan Brigadier General Thomas Jefferson Rusk confiscated the homes of those who wished to remain neutral in the war. In July 1836, Rusk ordered the Carbajal and other Tejano families of Victoria escorted off their own land. They took refuge in New Orleans.
Plácido Benavides (1810–1837) was an early Mexican-born settler in De Leon's Colony, Victoria County, Texas. Benavides earned himself the sobriquet of the Paul Revere of Texas for his 1836 journey from San Patricio to Goliad to Victoria, warning residents of the approaching Mexican army. He was twice elected alcalde of Victoria, Texas. He married into the powerful De León family, and with his wife Agustina became the father of three daughters. Benavides fought against the dictatorship of Antonio López de Santa Anna, but did not feel Texas should be separated from Mexico.
Silvestre De León (1802–1842) was the second son born to the influential De León family in Victoria, Texas. He became the third alcalde of Victoria. De León joined his brother-in-law Plácido Benavides to fight with Stephen F. Austin at the 1835 Siege of Béxar. He joined the rest of the De León family in New Orleans in 1836 after Brigadier General Thomas Jefferson Rusk ordered the evacuation of Mexican families from Victoria. In 1842, he returned to Victoria and was murdered by persons unknown. Texas Historical Marker number 6544 placed at Evergreen Cemetery in 1972 acknowledges Silvestre De León's contribution to Texas.
Fernando De León (1798–1853) was a co-founder of Victoria, Texas, and the first commissioner and colonization manager of De León's Colony. He fought against Antonio López de Santa Anna. De León was an aide-de-camp to provisional Texas governor James W. Robinson. In the war's confusion about Mexican loyalties, De León was first incarcerated by the Mexican army, only to be released and be incarcerated by the Texas army. When his brother Silvestre was murdered, he adopted Silvestre's sons. After the war, he legally recovered 50,000 acres of his land that had been redistributed to Texans. Recorded Texas Historic Landmark number 6541 placed at Evergreen Cemetery in 1972 acknowledges Fernando De León's contribution to Texas.
Martín De León (1765–1833) was a rancher and wealthy Mexican empresario in Texas who was descended from Spanish aristocracy. He was the patriarch of one of the prominent founding families of early Texas. De León and his wife Patricia de la Garza established De León's Colony, the only predominantly Mexican colony in Texas. They founded the town of Villa de Nuestra Señora de Guadalupe Victoria Nombre de Jesús on the Guadalupe River. The name referred both to the river and to Mexico's president Guadalupe Victoria.
This is a Mexican American bibliography. This list consists of books, and journal articles, about Mexican Americans, Chicanos, and their history and culture. The list includes works of literature whose subject matter is significantly about Mexican Americans and the Chicano/a experience. This list does not include works by Mexican American writers which do not address the topic, such as science texts by Mexican American writers.
The following is a timeline of the history of the city of Laredo, Texas, USA.
