Year Sequoyah Died

The Summer of ’42

INTRODUCTION

Respected American Indian author Grant Foreman, who makes a strong case in favor of Nathaniel Gist as the father of Sequoyah, says Sequoyah’s birth was nearer to the year 1773 than the earlier dates given. “The father of Sequoyah could not have been the German clod whose existence is even not established, but must have been Nathaniel Gist, progenitor of many other distinguished Americans.”

From the Cherokee Advocate as told by “The Worm”

OFF TO MEXICO

Nine Cherokees departed from the Cherokee Nation late in the Summer of 1842, George Guess - Sequoyah - together with his son, Tessee and “The Worm,” along with six other companions got underway for Mexico with three pack horses.

Enroute, Sequoyah was “taken with a pain in his breast,” The Worm said, “which extended to different parts of his body.” The pain of the nearly 70 year old man continued as the nine riders plodded southward, but the pain together with a cough which had the effect of weakening him, continued.

The inventor of the Cherokee alphabet and “the talking leaves” then opted to send the six others back to the Nation, and he had his son, together with The Worm resumed their journey. “I desire to reach the Mexican country,” Sequoyah told The Worm, “you know the course,” and thus the trek resumed.

Several days down the road, they overtook a Shawnee hunting party who asked the old man where the three of them were going. “He replied that he had a great anxiety to visit the country of the Mexicans,” The Worm told the Cherokee Advocate editor, “but should return in a short time.”

Sequoyah then asked the Shawnee the direction of the nearest Mexican town or village “which they pointed out in the same course that I had been pointing,” The Worm said.

Encamped at a “very beautiful, bubbling spring,” however, the tiny group had their horses stolen one night by Tewockenee Indians.

With the wayfarers now on foot, Sequoyah bade them continue on without him, with instructions to go directly to the Mexican settlements where they could obtain other horses.

This is the well told part of the story where the two left the aging Sequoyah in a camp, in all probability somewhere in the Texas Hill country north of San Antonio, well provisioned and continued on. When they came to “about one hundred yards of the town, upon hearing a good deal of talking,” the Worm related, “we stopped an listened, hearing none but the Spanish language.” The place was San Antonio.

Having entered San Antonio, the two were greeted 10 officer who escorted them to the quarters of the Commanding Officer who eyed them suspiciously, declaring “that he did not at all like the Cherokees because they had been a short time previous warring against the Texans,” referring to the June 1839 incidents in East Texas. But the two Cherokees won him over in the ensuing conversation, and the Commander gave them “tobacco, pass ports and a very good axe,” but no horses, and they returned to Sequoyah’s camp. A safe retreat, a cave, was found some three miles from the encampment. Thus provisioned, Sequoyah remained there and the two set out on foot for the Mexican settlements to get horses.

THE RIO GRANDE COUNTRY

Herein is the part of the 160 year old saga which rings a bell geographically for residents of the Texas Mexico border. The Worm specifically tells first of a three days journey with a Comanche traveling group, and then another subsequent “fourteen consecutive days before reaching the frontier settlements of Mexico.” That was the normal two weeks plus traveling time from San Antonio to the Rio Grande. “Before reaching the town,” Worm says, “we came to a river which we could not cross and had to encamp,” If the Villa Rio Grande - present day Guerrero, Coahuila established January 1, 1700 and in 1841 the headquarters of the Partido de Rio Grande, today known as “Cinco Manantiales” - were their destination, which it certainly appears to have been, the river “that we could not cross” was indeed the Rio Bravo.

After shooting a turkey and roasting it for breakfast, the two Cherokees still found the river would not allow them to cross, and were in the process of making a raft when “a mounted Mexican appeared on the opposite bank, inquired who we were, and informed us that there was a ferry lower down.”

NOTE: Opposite Guerrero, Coahuila on the Rio Bravo were the two ancient Spanish Colonial fords from the Old San Antonio or Old Presidio Road, one, Paso Pacuache to the northeast of Guerrero five miles. the other Faso de Francis to the southeast an equal distance, both on the Rio Bravo.

“On arriving at the ferry,” the Worm continues, “we found the boat ready and a company of armed men in attendance.” (In all probability member of the Colonia Militar de Guerrero). There can be little doubt that the Cherokees crossed at Guerrero, for the officer accompanying them “to the principal man of the town,” (Alcalde Primero) told the Cherokees the. town was “about six miles distant.”

VILLA DE RIO GRANDE

The Worm’s description of the town fits the Spanish Colonial outpost and hub of Northern New Spain rather well: “The town was small - the houses made of large brick” (actually, travertine stone quarried nearby, of which the 1750 structure of the unfinished San Bernardo Mission still stands) the people dressed in different kinds of costumes. “The houses looked odd,” the Worm observed, “being low with flat roofs, many of the women were very pretty,” he added.

When at last they found a Spaniard who spoke English to act as interpreter, the Partido de Rio Grande authorities (Marcos Hernandez?) questioned the two at length regarding their presence there, and the purpose or object they had in view in visiting Mexico. they were also pointedly curious about what news they might have from the Texans, “whom he said the Mexicans had a short time before defeated in battle, and taken some three hundred of them prisoners.”

NOTE: If the chronology in the Worm’s tale began in August of 1842, the Cherokee journey and San Antonio happenings could certainly have put them already well into September of 1842. the capture of the Texans referred to here by the Mexican authorities of Guerrero, could well have referred to Mexican General Adrian Woell’s surprise attack on San Antonio in the second week of September in which the 52 prisoners were marched down that very same road to this very same Villa de Rio Grande (or Guerrero) and thence to Perote Prison in Vera Cruz State, an event of major proportions in the history of Maverick County, and of course, San Antonio. John Twohig and Samuel Augustus Maverick were two of those prisoners, As a meteorological sidebar, the September time frame could also account for the rise on the Rio Bravo, a rather common occurrence in its history lyre, which prevented their crossing.

“Having satisfied him on these points,” the Worm’s account continues” and given him to understand the two had not been dispatched to his town on any special business of a public nature, he expressed the pleasure it gave him and the other officers to see us, and insisted on our remaining that night in the town, as the day was too far gone for us to reach the Cherokee’ village, which, he informed us, was some thirty miles distant.”

NOTE : The five villas fed by the five springs (“Cinco Manantiales”) from which the modern day area derives its name, all lie to the west northwest of Guerrero, which was the 1841 headquarters of the Partido de Rio Grande: Allende, Nava, Gigedo (Villa Union) Morelos and Rosas (Zaragoza) as we read in the April 15, 1841 Report from the Sub prefect of the Partido de Rio Grande Marcos Hernandez in a Mexican document of the period, Rosas or Zaragoza some thirty miles distant. A modern day highway map shows Zaragoza Morelos to measure ten kilometers (6.21 miles), Morelos Nava twelve kilometers (7.45 miles), Morelos Allende eight kilometers (4.97 miles), Allende to Nava eight kilometers (4.97 miles, Villa Union Allende eighteen kilometers (11.18 miles) and Zaragoza Remolino twenty six kilometers (16.15 miles).

In Samuel Maverick’s 1842 Journal which he kept as a prisoner of the Mexicans, we learn that the Texan prisoners and their captors crossed the Rio Grande September 22 “in two canoes” and were at the Presidio Rio Grande (Guerrero) September 23. “Town old.” Maverick wrote, “good labores (farm lands) northwest of it and on almost all the way to San Fernando.” On September 27th they “passed through a rich irrigable prairie all the way to Nava before reaching which we saw thousands of acres of corn without fence. Soldiers say this land is public, same kind of land at Las Moras to Nava. Kind, hospitable people. 26 miles.”

The Worm and Sequoyah’s son found the Mexicans quite hospitable as well, and ate from the fare placed before them that day. “What was given e I ate through politeness,” the Worm, like countless norteamericano visitors before and since, “but with some difficulty, so highly seasoned was it with pepper, some of which I was so unfortunate as to get into my eyes.” Breakfast the next morning was with a man at a place “where we obtained a breakfast which an Indian could eat without cost, for the man who gave it to us said that he could not be behind the Cherokees; he had been much among them without any expense, he could not therefore charge us; but hoped that we would take our meals with him while we remained there.”

SAN FERNANDO AT LAST

“This day we remained in town,” the Worm’s narrative continues, “but having passports, left the following morning, in company with a Mexican who went with us to a town called by the Mexicans “San Cranto”” (San Fernando de Rosas - Zaragoza) “some thirty miles distant. Upon arriving at San Cranto, we were informed that there were a couple of Cherokees in the place, but thinking it would be difficult to find them, we went with our Mexican companion to the house of his brother, where we spent the night, and by good luck met with our countrymen” (fellow Cherokees). “It gave us great pleasure to see this man, whose name is Standing Rock. He answered a great many questions, and assured us that it would give the Cherokees in Mexico great joy to see their brothers among them, and proposed to accompany as forthwith to their village, about ten miles distant. About seven miles from San Cranto we passed through a small settlement of runaway negroes, some two or three of whom I met with spoke the Cherokee language. three miles further, we arrived at the Cherokee village, situated within a large prairie, in a grove of timber, half a mile wide and some three miles long, and watered by means of a ditch, from a large spring some two miles distant.”

NOTE: We know from a number of sources (Cora Montgomery, “Eagle Pass, or Life on the Border,” Kevin Mulroy “Freedom on the Border,” Kenneth Wiggins Porter, “The Black Seminoles,” J. Fred Rippy, “Border Troubles along the Rio Grande, 1848 1860,” and others, that Mexico was a veritable refuge for runaway slaves. Porter says in “The Seminole in Mexico” that upwards of 3,000 such runaway blacks were living in Mexico near or in tie Santa Rosa mountains, directly west of San Fernando de Rosas (Zaragoza) and also in the Hispanic American Historical Review, February 1951. The existence of the “large spring” some two miles to the west, sound refreshingly familiar to the erstwhile residents of Hacienda Patinos. It is the origin of the “Rio Escondido,” for decades termed “Little River” by. the Norteamericanos. The Rio Escondido’s flow goes underground for some distance before again resurfacing to form the little life giving stream around which Captain Vicente Rodriguez and his group from this very same Presidio de Rio Grande on February 1, 1753 established their little settlement of Spaniards and called it San Fernando de Austria in the Valle de Las Animas present day Zaragoza.

THE PIECES FIT

“Our brothers were very glad to see us,” the Worm’s narration resumes, “and gave us a warm welcome to their little village. Being soon appraised that we came to obtain assistance to convey in the aged Sequoyah who was very anxious to visit them, they declared their readiness to afford us company, but could not furnish any horses, as all of theirs save those that were very poor, had died since they went to Mexico. they however promised to borrow some of the horses belonging to the Mexican Army at a neighboring town (Morelos?) But there being none, the Commanding Officer referred me back to San Canto, to which place we returned, after two days resting with the Cherokees.”

NOTE: The Mexican Army at the neighboring town has to be that of. Morelos a mere ten kilometers (6.21 miles) south of Zaragoza, where Don Migpel Patino would captain the military contingent. Interestingly, the ruins of e Cherokee village west of Zaragoza are located on the Hacienda Patinos, childhood home of Gloria Salinas de Rodriguez, wife of our host of March 17, 2000, Epigmenio Rodriguez, who traces his family ancestry line to Don Vicente Rodriguez himself, the founder of San Fernando de Austria.

“The officer there” (San Cranto) the Worm says, “could lend us but one horse, the others having been taken off a few days before, to some other post, but supplied us without solicitation with bread, meat, salt, sugar and coffee for the journey.”

“The company then, consisting of nine persons, immediately set off with the borrowed horse, crossed the river (Rio Bravo) against the ferry,and after constant traveling, on the seventeenth night, camped within a few miles of Sequoyah’s cave. Much solicitude was felt by us, for the safety of the old man,as we saw much ’signs’ of the wild Indians on our way. three men were accordingly sent on in advance to the Cave, with provisions to relieve his wants, if still alive, and in need.”

But the Cave where they had left the aged Sequoyah was empty and only a note left by him told of his misfortune of being driven from the Cave by rising waters. Happily, they followed his trail to find the old man “seated by a lonely fire.” Having been driven from his shelter by the waters, he determined to continue on towards Mexico on his own, but met with a band of Delaware Indians who urged him to return with them. “Come, let us now return to our own villages. We will take you to your door,” they urged. “No,” he replied, “I have sent forward two young men to the Mexican country, whom I shortly expect back. I am anxious to visit that country. Go with me there. We will shortly return to our own country.” But no deal was struck, and the Delawares left Sequoyah with a horse and returned to their own country.

“We remained four or five days at the camp,” the Worm’s narrative continues, “where we found Sequoyah and in the vicinity, until a stock of provision was killed, and then resumed our journey, and after traveling sixteen days, forded the river mentioned before, near the Mexican village” (Guerrero, Coahuila). “In a few days more, halting along for a short time at the different towns, where Sequoyah received the kindest hospitality from the Mexicans, the company arrived at the Cherokee village.”

It appears from the narration that the Worm spent some time with the Cherokees and then at the solicitation of the old man, returned with a party of Caddoes to the Wichitaw town to try to recover the horses which had been stolen from them. Before he had an opportunity to return to the Cherokee village west of Zaragoza, however, the Worm heard from a party of Caddoes arriving from Mexico the sad news that Sequoyah was no more, which was soon confirmed by a party of Cherokees. “The complaint that terminated his life was the cough which had long afflicted him,” says Grant Foreman, “combined perhaps with some disease common in that country. His death was sudden having been long confined to the house, he requested one day some food, and while it was preparing, breathed his last.”

THE CHEROKEE ADVOCATE

To put some flesh on the last days of Sequoyah, however, we must rely on the pages of the newspaper, The Cherokee Advocate. The Cherokee National Council on October 25, 1843, had authorized its publication both in English and in the Cherokee language in the characters of Sequoyah’s invention. The first issue of The Cherokee Advocate appeared September 26, 1844. The Advocate’s October 1844 edition plaintively asked of the absent Sequoyah, “But what has become of this remarkable man, whose native genius has struck light from darkness conferred inconceivable blessings upon his people and achieved for his own name an enviable distinction among those few truly great names, with which are connected imperishable honor. Is he still alive?” The Advocate asked, “Or does his venerable head repose beneath some unknown clod of the Grand Prairie. These are questions that we cannot now, satisfactorily, answer.”

In December 1844, the National Council passed an Act which provided that “in lieu of the sum allowed to George Guess, in consideration of his invention of the Cherokee Alphabet, passed December 10th 1841, and which is hereby repealed, the sum of three hundred dollars to be paid to the said George Guess out of the National Treasury, annually, during his natural life.” In the event of his death, the act said that his widow Sally Guess would receive the annual sum as long as she would live.

The October 1844 Cherokee Advocate admitted that “several reports concerning him have reached his friends in this country. That which seems to be most probable, when the hardships to which in his wanderings he has been necessarily exposed are remembered in addition to his decrepit condition, and the weight of many years, is that this truly great man full of years and of honors, sleeps the sleep of Death, in some wild and unknown spot, far from his wife, his country and his people.”

THE FIRST SEARCH

Late in 1844, the Cherokees asked Indian Agent Pierce M. Butler for funds to finance a search for Sequoyah, and the Indian Agent did so on November 23, presenting the case to the Secretary of War. On January 17, 1845, the Secretary of War authorized $200 of tribal funds in the effort to discover Sequoyah and bring him home.

By the date of its March 6, 1845 publication, however, the messengers were still further confused by The Advocate’s article: “George Guess Recent intelligence has been received which renders it highly probable that the inventor of the Cherokee Alphabet has not, as is generally supposed, been gathered to his fathers, but is still among the living.” The Advocate’s tone was more hopeful than factual, however, for it asserted, “if the intelligence be correct, he is now with some of his countrymen, who are living near Matamoros, Mexico. Some Cherokees are supposed to leave this country, in the course of a short time for Matamoros, for the purpose of restoring him to his country, if still alive.”

NOTE: The Matamoros reference in The Advocate thus gave rise to the presence of Sequoyah in that northern Mexico state at the mouth of the, Rio Grande. But in the light of his frail and failing health, his age, and especially in his repeated assurances that he would “return in a short while” t4 the Indian Territory and his home, along with the Epigmenio Rodriguez family tradition, we find the Matamoros reference unlikely.

A DOCUMENT TO BE CONSIDERED

Meanwhile, three Cherokees, Standing Rock, Standing Bowles and Watch Justice, having returned from Mexico, made their report:

Cherokee Agent Pierce M. Butler Warren’s Trading House
Red River
April 21, 1845

We, the undersigned Cherokees, direct from the Spanish dominions, do hereby certify, that George Guess of the Cherokee Nation, Arkansas, departed this life in the town of Sanfernando in the month of August 1843, and his son (Chusaleta) is at this time on the Brazos River, Texas, about 30 miles above the falls, and intends returning home this fall.
Given under our hands day and date above written.
Standing Rock (by mark)
Standing Bowles (by mark) Watch Justice (by mark)
Witness: Daniel G. Watson, Jesse Chisholm.

OO NO LEH’S STATEMENT

A month later, we have another statement from one of the messengers sent to search for Sequoyah which tells in some detail of the final days of Sequoyah:

P.M. Butler, Cherokee Agent Sir:

After reaching Red River on my way, I met with the following Cherokees from Mexico: Jesse (Tessee?) the leader of the party, the Worm, Gah na the Standing Man and the Standing Rock. The last named, the Standing Rock attended Sequoyah during his last sickness and also witnessed his death and burial. Isse sa de tah, the son of Sequoyah, remains on Red River. He is very sorry that the remains of his father are buried so far from his own country, and remains where he is on this account.

As Sequoyah was the object for which I had started in search, and having learned the fact of his death which I am communicating to those who sent me, it will be useless for me to proceed further. I will return toward home. He is dead without a doubt. His remaining family, widow, two daughters and a young man live somewhere in Skin Bayou District.
Bayou District, 15th May 1845
Oo no leh

APPENDIX

It will prove useful in the understanding of the lay of the land in this part of northern Mexico in this period. From the Mexican archives we have translated the following report from the Sub prefect of the Partido de Rio Grande, with headquarters at Guerrero, one Marcos Hernandez in the year 1841. The translation is ours.

Partido de Rio Grande
(Distrito de Monclova)

The Partido of the Rio Grande is one of those which make up the Monclova District, located northeast of the city of this name, which is the Capital of the District. It’s territorial jurisdiction runs from the confines of the Santa Rosa Valley to the border of the Department of Texas at the Rio Medina, a space estimated at 86 leagues by land, and 96 as the crow flies, and, t4 the borders of the Department of Tamaulipas and Nuevo Leon to the lands inhabited by the savage Indians of the north. The pueblos of these Indians are sporadic and for which reason their boundaries in this direction are not subject and not as yet known. the Partido de Rio Grande takes in the Villas of Guerrero, Nava, San Fernando de Rosas, Morelos, Allende and Gigedo. For its internal government it has a political sub prefect under the Prefect of the aforementioned city of Monclova, politically and legally a Justice of the Peace in each Villa, each judgeship answerable to the Prefect in civil and criminal cases.

In church matters, three Curates are attached to the Cathedral church of the Monterrey Bishopric in all spiritual matters.

It is a frontier against said savages and wandering nations and for this reason it has always been garrisoned from its inception by two companies of Presidial Cavalry at Rio Grande and Agua Verde under the command of a Military Commandancy called the Frontier, subject to the command of the General Commandancy at Saltillo. the aforementioned Juzgados Villas make up around 7,000 inhabitants of all sexes and ages, all of which, except those at Guerrero are for the most part farmers, since each one of the five settlements spoken of have springs for irrigation of the lands. these are excellent for the growing of corn, beans, wheat, sugar cane, chile, cotton and all kinds of fruit trees and vegetables.

In addition, the raising of livestock is on the rise, especially in the previously mentioned Villa de guerrero, the center of this same Partido, whose inhabitants, for lack of sufficient irrigation water for their farmlands are limited to the raising of livestock and other businesses. there are a few head of smaller stock, goats and sheep, and fewer still of horses, due to the constant threat of the incursions of the savage tribes.

This headquarters Villa, as well as the other five which make up this Partido, with their locations at the various points at the direction end distances from it, which are indicated on the map of the signet furnished. on Model No. 1, which you have. the outskirts around each settlement affixed to the individual notice which each Judge sent in.

The waters of the five aforementioned Villas are healthy and delicate. The tastiest, that of Nava, produces in the great abundance of its headwaters catfish, otter and beaver, containing these and others of different names in the rivers which flow from the north and empty into the famous Rio Bravo, known as the Escondido, San Antonio, Remolino, San Diego, San Rodrigo and the Arroyo de Las Vacas. Their banks, moreover, abound with weeds of pecan, groves of poplar, oak and mesquite. for its part the mentioned Rio Bravo or Grande flows in an easterly direction.

According to reports, it has its origin in New Mexico and enters into Tamaulipas. South and west of it are the hills which link up in this region with the mountain range called that of Santa Rosa.

The unpopulated region between the Rio Bravo and the Medina is fed by a number of different water sources, easily tapped (for irrigation) for a Pueblo. the San Saba, Nicas, and the Frio and the Arroyos named El Carrizo, La Leona, El Tenuacan, and the Arroyo Hondo, all of which have the capability (of growing) all the above mentioned woods, their fields enriched with an abundance of pasturelands for horse herds and cattle raising. In addition, these mountains provide both large and small game hunting.

This area is widely known by all the inhabitants throughout Coahuila for its bloodthirsty dangers, which is the reason the mention of it remains omitted.
Marcos Hernandez,
Sub Prefecto,
Partido de Rio Grande to the Sr. Prefecto del Distrito de Monclova,Villa de Guerrero 15 abril 1841,

As found in the Luis Alberto Guajardo papers,
Western Americana Collection,
Beinecke Library, Yale University,
New Haven Connecticut.

THE SWINGING DOORS

INTRODUCTION

Historian Robert Weddle called the Presidio San Juan Bautista crossings of the Rio Bravo “The Gateway to Spanish Texas,” and rightfully so, for beginning with Alonso de Leon in 1686 and continuing on for the next one hundred plus years, Paso de Francia and Paso Pacuache earned their reputations for well travelled highways into La Provincia de Teas.

But even a cursory study of the history of the area which lies within a 3050 mile radius of present day Eagle Pass Piedras Negras will reveal a bumper crop of activity from both sides of the Rio Bravo, especially closer to the mid 19th century.

There were so many forays back and forth across the future international boundary that the concept “Swinging Doors” might be justly applied to these fords of the Rio Bravo, especially in the year 1842.

Interestingly, we find in the 1837 General Land Office map of Texas compiled by Stephen F. Austin a point on the Rio Bravo above Presidio de Rio Grande marked “Nogal,” some 15 20 miles to the northwest. This is remarkably close to the “Adjuntos” of the Rio Escondido coming out of Mexico from the west and flowing into the Rio Grande a scant three miles south of present day Eagle Pass Piedras Negras.

“Una legua antes de llegar se toca de nuevo con el rio Escondido,” wrote Col. Emilio Langberg in the November 4 entry of his famous 1851 Itinerario, “cuyo vado se llama el paso de la Aguila ....”

(Emilio Langberg, “Itinerario de la Espedicion de San Carlos a Monclova el Viejo hecha por el Coronel D. Emilio Langberg, 1851”
Beinecke Library, Yale University).

We find in General Miguel A. Sanchez’ map of the 1842 expeditions minor geographical misrepresentations:

(1) The 23 February 1842 Vasquez route correctly shows San Fernando de Rosas as the point of origin, but Rosas is, unhappily, positioned halfway to Laredo on the Mexican side, and Rio Grande is omitted.

(2) Perhaps a map maker’s equivocation might also explain the 24 August 1842 Adrian Woll route originating below Zapata, and proceeding due north, far removed from the route closely outlined in Woll’s report to Isidro Reyes, aptly indicated by both Robert Weddle and Al McGraw.

Republic of Texas President Sam Houston knew all too well the Cherokee Indians and their ways. It should also not surprise us that in late 1842 he knew of their presence in the Distrito de Rio Grande. It appears General Alexander Sommervell’s November 1842 counter strike against Mexico did not go through the well oiled Swinging Doors, but went instead south to laredo, which was not as heavily guarded as San Fernando.

(Sommervell to Hill, Secretary of War and Marine, Washington, February 1, 1843, as found in Joseph Milton Nance, “Attack and Counterattack.”)

For the Republic of Texas President wrote to Sommervell on the eve of his departure for the border November 23, 1842: “The roost efficient fore of the enemy will be at the Presidio (Rio Grande). You will find the Cherokees and the warriors associated with them the most efficient and dangerous enemy that you could encounter on the other side of the Rio Grand, They are located in the neighborhood of the Presidio.”

(Writings of Sam Houston 111, 201 202, in Nance, “Attack and Counterattack”)

Ever since his defeat at San Jacinto in April of 1836, Mexican General Antonio Lopez de Santa Ana seethed with the desire to again recapture the Provincia de Teas. Our investigative efforts into the presence of the Cherokees near present day Zaragoza have revealed some interesting and pertinent data of import to the preservation of the historical significance of the area within a fifty mile radius of Eagle Pass piedras Negras. Indeed, enroute to San Antonio de Bejar, Santa Ana’s own army had crossed the Rio Bravo in late February of 1836 at the famous old Paso de Francia southeast of present day Guerrero, Coahuila. In addition, not many are aware that Camargo Attorney Antonio Canales, author of “The Revolution of the Northern Towns,” suffered his final defeat at our “Cinco Manantiales” town of Santa Rita de Morelos, March 24 25 1840, at the hands of General Mariano Arista, Commander in Chief of the Army of the North Corps.

Three days after re assuming the reins of the Central Government, Santa Ana on December 9, 1841 ordered General Mariano Arista, headquartered at Lampazos to proceed immediately “to harass the Texans, dispatching as soon as possible the expedition against San Antonio de Bear.”

The Texans were aware of the Mexican intent to attack the fledgling Republic. We read in the Austin City Gazette of December 23, 1840 the editor’s three reasons why the Mexican invasion would not be attempted just yet: “The season of the year presents an obstacle not easily to be overcome,” the paper said, “it is not likely that Arista would attempt the invasion of Texas without cavalry and artillery.” The season of the year “would be impossible for him to find grass for his horses, or to make forced marches during the wet and stormy winter months.”

In addition, the Gazette thought, “it is said that General Woll is in New Orleans with $600,000 purchasing munitions of war,” for which assumption Arista “would be more likely to wait until he received his supplies.”

Thirdly, “it is far more probable that Mexico will first endeavor to quell rebellion at home, rather than seek another foe.”

(“Anticipated Invasion by Mexico,” Austin City Gazette, December 23, 1840, as found in “Despatches from U.S. Ministers to Texas, 1836 1845,” RG59, microfilm T728, Roll I, National Archives, Fort Worth).

Wily old Mariano Arista picked up on this cheery disposition of the Texans when he assured President Mirabeau Lamar in April of 184l that “the Indians ferocious and sanguinary and perfectly faithless should be driven beyond the bounds of civilization. And, it effect this,” Arista advised, “a force will soon move from the banks of the Rio Bravo.”

Arista thus attempted to assure the Republic of Texas President “with the frankness of a soldier” that the expedition “has not in view, as might , be supposed, a surprise upon those (Texas) colonies, but simply the chastising of the ferocious enemies of humanity. This expedition will not commit any acts which will injure any of the inhabitants or citizens of the country through which it may pass.” The differences between Mexico and Texas can be settled at some better time, Arista claimed.

(Mariano Arista to Mirabeau Lamar, April 21, 1841 from Lampazos, in “Diplomatic Correspondence, Republic of Texas, No. 90,” as found in SWHQ Volume VII, October 1903).

In what could very well be a translation glitch, General Rafael Vasquez’ First Brigade of General Isidro Reyes’ Second Division was stationed at San Fernando de Rosas “some 53 miles southeast of Piedras Negras,” Mexican military historian General Miguel A. Sanchez says erroneously in his “The Second Mexican Texas War, 1841 1843,” whereas San Fernando de Rosas lies some 30 miles as the crow flies west southwest of present day Piedras Negras.

“These hostilities are by all means necessary,” Santa Ana’s December 9, 1841 order to Arista insisted, “since the Texans have been assuring themselves that there exist in Mexico distinguished and influential persons who are in opposition to the undertaking of a campaign, inaction is not only perilous, but even dishonorable for the nation.” Arista was ordered to arrange for an expedition of 400 500 cavalry troops .... “to march under command of General Rafael Vasquez to Bejar, to surprise its garrison and to take it captive, or to put it to the knife should it offer obstinate resistance.”

(Santa Ana to Gen. Mariano Arista, December 9, 1841, in Archivo de la Defensa Nacional, File 1738, 134 135).

On January 6, 1842, on the Feast of Los Tres Reyes, Arista issued the instructions to General Rafael Vasquez for carrying out the expedition confided to him with the objective of harassing the Texans from San Fernando de Rosas. This would be the first of two 1842 attacks on San Antonio de Bear staged from within 30 miles of present day Eagle Pass Negras. Another, from the lower Valley would march on Corpus Christi, Goliard and Copano as a diversionary tactic.

The March winds across this mesquite and cactus covered country were whispering Winds of War. On March 12, the “Civilian and Galveston Gazette” carried newly reelected Texas President Sam Houston’s proclamation to the citizens of Texas, warning of the impending Mexican invasion:

“Particulars have not been furnished to the Executive,” Houston admitted, “but the facts are sufficient to justify immediate preparation for defensive war ....If war should come upon us, we will make it our business. We will be authorized to meet and pursue our enemies with vengeance,” Houston said.

(“Proclamation to the Citizens of Texas,” in the Civilian and Galveston Gazette, March 12, 1842, found in “Despatches of U.S. Ministers to Texas, 1836 1845,” RG59, microfilm T 278, Roll I, National Archives Fort Worth).

On that very same day in that very same March 12, 1842 issue, some eleven days before Rafael Vasquez’ Expedition began the march from San Fernando de Rosas, Arista, the Commander in Chief of the Northern Army of the Republic of Mexico published his own proclamation in the “Civilian and Galveston Gazette” insisting that Mexico “will never consent to the separation of that territory.” He even furthermore warned that “Mexico is determined to recover her rights through the only means left to her, that is, persuasion or war.” Arista insisted, however, that the hostilities would not be directed against all the inhabitants of Texas, “but only against those who sustain and fight to maintain that nationality, that independence which my country will never admit.”

The wily old General was, of course, aware of the problems of the new Republic: “Reflect and consider your interests ...all the inconvenience, calculate the elements you have ....and the difficulties of a war that Mexico cannot forbear making you until she recovers her rights.”

“The true interests of those who live in Texas is their union with the Mexican Republic,” Arista urged, “acknowledging the national Government.” But after all the wheedling and cajoling, Arista left no doubt: “We are coming.”

(Arista to the Inhabitants of Texas, in “The Civilian and Galveston Gazette,” Saturday March 12, 1842, in “Despatches of U.S. Ministers to Texas &133;” ut supra).

From his General Headquarters in Monterrey January 8, 1842, then, Arista’s order to General Vasquez was to take the town of San Antonio de Bejar “with the objective of harassing the Texans,” with 241 Regulars and 159 Irregular Presidials and Defenders. there were 25 Rio Grande (Guerrero) Presidiales under Bvt. Lt. Col. Juan Menchaca, ten Rio Grande Defensores under Bvt Squadron Commandant Captain Manuel Quintero, plus 25 Agua Verde Presidiales under Bvt. Lt Col. Juan Galan. With the Vasquez expedition we also find 34 Caddo Indians, but no Cherokees this time.

General Rafael Vasquez’ 391 man strong column finally rolled out of San

Fernando de Rosas on February 28, 1842 and arrived “at the Rio Grande Mission” (Rio Grande Guerrero) the following afternoon. We have an itinerario of sorts from General Miguel A. Sanchez, which indicates the Vasquez expedition took the Pacuache crossing of the Rio Bravo, some five miles to the Northeast of Villa Rio Grande, thence “El Cuervo,” “El Caracol,” and “La Rosita” to “Palo Blanco Ranch.” By his own admission, historian Sanchez was unable to identify a number of these places.

On February 26, they crossed “La Pena,” “El Saladito,” “La Espantosa,” and “el Barrosito” to the Nueces River.

On February 27, they passed “Tortuga Creek,” “Del Negro Canyon,” and “Buena vista Village” to the Ures Ranch.

On February 28, from Ures, they crossed “La Leona Creek,” “No to Digas,” “Los Olmos to Laguna Seca.”

On March 1, from Laguna Seca they forded the Rio Frio and bypassed “Tierras Blancas” to the Arroyo Seco.

On March 2, this day they waded the “Tehuacano” and Hondo Creeks, through the Gaspar Flores site to the Francisco Perez Ranch. Here Vasquez sent two scouts toward Bejar who upon arriving at the Medina River spotted a party of Tehuacano Indians.

On March 3, Vasquez’ party crossed the Chacon Ranch, forded the Medina River to “Enmedio Creek.”

On March 4 they waded De Leon and Del Alazan Creeks and arrived at the outskirts of San Antonio:

“In ten days of uninterrupted marching,” military historian General A. Sanchez narrates, “the troops had traversed 300 kilometers or 186 ½ miles that lay between San Fernando de Rosas and San Antonio de Bear.”

(Gen. Miguel A. Sanchez, “The Second Mexican Texas War, 1841 1843”)

NOTE: - General Miguel Sanchez is not alone in his confusion. Joseph Milton Nance’s map of the Vasquez campaign in March of 1842 shows a starting point at Lampazos through Laredo and thence a northerly route to Bejar. The page 18 map of his studious work “Attack and Counter Attack” thus indicates Vasquez’ route came up from the Laredo area. If one calculates the San Fernando to the Rio Bravo settlement Villa Rio Grande leg as 30 miles, and then six to the Pacuache crossing, and another 150 to San Antonio, the General’s math is fairly accurate.

But at San Antonio de Bejar, the Texan spies along the well known route had alerted the town, and Vasquez could no longer count on surprising them. the 260 Texan defenders, however, were convinced to evacuate the city, whereupon Vasquez reported to Arista from Bejar March 5, 1842:

“The National flag is once again flying over the city of Bejar, and the Mexican eagles are again today treading the soil they have been deprived of for the length of six years ....”

(Arista to Secretary of War and navy, March 12, 1842, Archivo do la Secretaria de Defensa Nacional, file no. 1728, 229 231)

Provisional President Santa Ana in Mexico City, however, was furious and disgusted with the outcome of the Vasquez expedition, “since he has failed in his principal duties, as the government did not send him to occupy Bejar, but to take by surprise and capture or put to the knife the garrison of adventurers who had taken possession of that town”

(Secretary of War and navy to Mariano Arista, March 21, 1842, Archivo de la Secretaria de Defensa Nacional, file no. 1728, 235 238)

“After knocking in the heads of 327 kegs of powder and dumping the kegs into the San Antonio River,” says historian Joseph Milton Nance, “the Anglo Texans evacuated the town by way of the east side, without firing a shot.”

(Joseph Milton Nance, “Attack and Counter Attack.”)

Here is where a man famous in Eagle pass and Maverick County history and known as “the Father of Eagle Pass,” Irish Catholic John Twohig does his legendary thing, attaching slow burning fuses to a number of kegs of powder in his storehouse, so that the Mexican Army would not benefit from the provisions.

Vasquez was subsequently summoned to account for his actions at Mexico City. The following month the order came from Mexico City for another assault on Bejar. General Isidro Reyes took over command of the Army of the North Corps at Monterrey June 4, 1842, and selected General Adrian Woll for the execution of the operation. Preparations got underway June 4, 1842, and our second move northward through the Swinging Doors was about to get underway.

Reyes succeeded in storing up about 10,000 pounds of salted meat and 480 bushels of flour at Villa Rio Grande. Reyes Surveyed the Rio Grande line at matamoros, then went to lampazos July 27, returning to Villa Rio Grande August 8th, to confer with Woll on immediate high level preparations.

The column would be composed of 1,082 troops with two artillery pieces, over twice the size of Rafael Vasquez’ expedition. among the Presidial cavalry 243 strong we note 40 troopers from the Agua Verde Company and 50 from the Rio Grande Company. Of the 122 Defensores (Defenders) were 50 from Rio Grande under orders of Capt. Juan N. Seguin, former Alcalde of Bejar. An additional note are the 20 Cherokee and eleven Caddo Indians as scouts directed by their interpreters Vicente Cordova of Nacogdoches and Manuel Flores. Cordova would be killed at the Salado Creek, Flores seriously wounded in that encounter just east of Bejar.

We will note that Woll would not follow the same route to San Antonio that Vasquez had used in his unsuccessful surprise attack on the town. Woll would, in fact, “carve a new road in the wilderness.”

Woll’s expeditionary column marched out of Rio Grande August 24, 1842 “in the direction of Nogal Pass” (Pacuache) “on the Rio Bravo then proceed some 30 kilometers - 18.64 miles - northwest of Rio Grande.”

NOTE: Clearly, Woll did not proceed directly east as Vasquez had done, but follow the river roughly to where the Rio Escondido empties into the Rio Bravo, just south of present day Eagle Pass, “to reach the old smuggling trail,” says Robert Weddle, “hoping to take San Antonio by surprise.” The route lay some 20 miles North of the Upper Presidio Road, Weddle points out, which had been laid out shortly after 1800 as a more direct route between Presidio de Rio Grande and San Antonio de Bejar.

(Robert Weddle, “San Juan Bautista: Gateway to Spanish Texas”)

August 25 30 was occupied in traversing the Rio Bravo, already swollen due to heavy rains in two launches. This was an operation, said General Isidro Reyes in his Instructions to Woll of August 27, article 5 “The incursion that will be undertaken shall last one month at the mist, ’after which the section ought to retire, either toward this point, or toward Matamoros.”

(Reyes to Woll, Rio Grande. 27 August 1842 in Archivo de la Secretaria de Defensa Nacional XI / 481.3 / 1731)

By September 11, 1842, Woll’s force had reached San Antonio de Bejar:

“Our march was made across the desert,” Woll wrote from San antonio de Bejar to General Isidro Reyes at his General Headquarters at San Fernando de Rosas September 12, “overcoming all obstacles, cutting open a road through the forest, traversing the head of the Ugalde (Uvalde) Canyon, and following the head of the Ugalde Canyon and following the slope of the San Saba hills, so that the Texan scouts, reporting from the Leona and the Nueces River (crossings) that no sound could be heard along the customary roads from Rio Grande and Laredo to Bejar City, the enemies had abandoned themselves to confidence to such an extent, that the Court Justices appointed by the so called government of Texas, had arrived to open the Court sessions.”

(Report from General Adrian Woll to the Secretary of War and navy, September 20, 1842, Archivo de la Secretaria de Defensa Nacional, 20 September 1842, file no. 1735, 31 38)

“Although a French soldier of fortune,” says Al McGraw, “General Adrian Woll has traditionally been credited for blazing a military road through the rugged South Texas brush land north of the Upper Presidio Road, he may have actually followed the traces of the Canyon Road, an old mission trail that had fallen into disuse when that facility was abandoned.” McGraw is perhaps referring to the two unsuccessful and short lived Canyon missions of the Franciscan missionaries near Camp Wood and Montell in the 1760s, targeted to missionize the Apache Indians, but their short duration casts some doubt on McGraw’s supposition.

“Ironically,” McGraw continues, “Wolfs route was soon adopted by Texians as a road of commerce Woll’s Road may therefore, be considered among those trails which over time became viable portions of the Camino Real network. In the 20th century, U.S. Highway 90 between San Antonio and Uvalde approximately follows the route of Woll’s Road.”

“After its re establishment in 1842,” McGraw adds, “Wolfs Road became a vital component in the network of South Texas roads. When the Mexican War began in 1846, Brigadier General John E. Wool invaded Mexico Via Woll’s Road,” McGraw informs. The swinging Doors moved the other way.

(A. Joachim McGraw et alii “A Texas Legacy the Old San Antonio Road,” 1991)

General Woll reported to his Commander in Chief that the force arrived at Leon Creek at 2 PM on September 10, “at approximately three leagues 12 miles distance from San Antonio de Bejar.”

With a view to heighten the element of surprise, Woll ordered the march to resume at 7 PM that same evening. Thus favored by darkness, the column pulled up in the vicinity of the city and occupied all avenues of access to await the daylight hours to make the entry, managing to apprehend the members of the Court.

(Isidro Reyes, September 20, 1842 Report to Secretary of War and navy from San Fernando de Rosas. File no. 1735, sheets 31 38, Archivo de la Secretaria de Defensa Nacional)

Upon reaching the San Pedro Creek, a halt was called and detachments of Bear and Rio Grande Defensores and of presidial soldiers were dispatched to the Alamo Mission and all exits from the city were secured, cutting off all avenues of escape. The city was thus secured by midnight. part of the overall plan was for Capt. Juan N. Seguin with the remainder of the Bejar and Rio Grande Defensores to occupy the Military parade Ground.

The agreed upon signal to begin the assault was the call of reveille. But that heard was that of the Texan defenders. Woll ordered the cannon fired, and the assault was on, despite a dense fog which caused the skirmishers upon entering the plaza to turn to the right. “At the sight of a white` flag, I ordered the firing to cease,” Woll wrote to General Isidro Reyes in his report No. 239. “Several Commissioners (William E. Jones, Samuel A. Maverick, George Van Ness and C.W. Peterson) who presented themselves to me offered to surrender their arms provided they should be permitted to retire. I replied that if they did not surrender at discretion, they were to be exterminated without exception. They requested the time necessary to consult with the others, which having been conceded to them, they did, returning to announce that they were resigned to their fate. Moved by a spirit of humanity and in order that they might recognize Mexican generosity, I guaranteed them their lives, and the surrender of arms followed.”

(Woll to Reyes, No. 239, San Antonio de Bejar, September 11, 1842 in Joseph Milton nance “Brigadier General Adrian Woll’s Report of his Expedition into Texas 1842” SWHQ LVII, April 1955)

The list of 52 Texans who surrendered on the Plaza includes a number of names familiar to Maverick County historians: Louis Colquhoun, John Twohig, Robert S. Neighbors, John Riddle, Samuel A. Maverick, and W.I. Riddle. “But only 52 of them could be made prisoners,” General Miguel A. Sanchez has observed, “since the remainder succeeded in making their escape under cover of the fog, over the back wall of the house that faced the wooded banks of the San Antonio River.”

Following the Bejar action of September 11, Woll recommended Juan Nepomuceno Seguin, Commandant of the Bejar Defensores, “who lent his most important services during the march and in combat ....did fulfill this time what he had offered to the government, and what his friends had expected of his steadfast character and his well, accredited valor, having drawn his sword, he fights under the Mexican flag, and the Fatherland can expect a great deal from this honorable citizen in the forthcoming conquest of the usurped territory, with his talent, bravery and vast knowledge of the Department of Texas &133;as for our Cherokee friends,” the General added, “I also second the recommendation of Captains Manuel Flores (Captain of the Rio Grande Defensores) and Vicente Cordova, since these officers leading our friends the Caddo and Cherokee Indians hold promise of very good services, whether against the Comanches, or against the Texas adventurers.”

(General Isidro Reyes Report of Secretary of War and Navy. General Headquarters, San Fernando de Rosas, 20 September 1842. Archivo de la Secretaria de Defensa Nacional, File no. 1735, sheets 31 38)

CHEROKEES AT THE SALADO BATTLE

Following the capture of the Bejar prisoners, Woll sent Capt. Juan Seguin to reconnoiter the Guadalupe River area. But the Texans were preparing the counter attack.

Having ordered the start of the return march to Rio Grande on September 18th, Woll “considered having fulfilled the mission entrusted to him, having succeeded flying the Mexican flag once more and for the last time, Miguel Sanchez observes over San Antonio.”

Abruptly the Alamo Mission bugle signaled the approach of the enemy and Woll ordered his troops to give chase, “until reaching the Salado Creek at a distance of three leagues 12 miles from the city,” Woll reported to General Reyes September 26. “the Texans suddenly veered off into the woods, and I learned that they had assembled at a strength of about 300 men under Col. (Matthew) Caldwell.”

In the ensuing action at the Salado we learn from this report that “Capt. Vicente Cordoba of Nacogdoches died as he had always lived, defending his fatherland, officers Castaneda of the Bahia Company and my Adjutant Ambrosio Martinez as well as Captain Manuel Flores of the Rio Grande Defensores ....were all wounded ....”

Woll’s report also recognized more names increasingly familiar, to the history of this Swinging Doors area: “Mr. Juan N. Seguin, Commandant of the Bear Defensores, and the intrepid Bvt. Lt. Col. Antonio Perez, Captain Manuel Leal and Manuel Flores (Captain of the Rio Grande Defensores) have rendered important services, and so did Lieutenant manuel Carbajal and Manuel Patino .....”

(Adrian Woll to Gen. Isidro Reyes. Bejar. September 20, 1842, in General Miguel A. Sanchez, “The Second Mexican Texas War, 1841 1843”)

NOTE: Joseph Milton Nance, chronicling these events from the Texas side of the Rio Bravo, assures us that there were indeed 40 Cherokees under Vicente Cordova at the Battle of the Salado:

“Cordova was in the act of firing when he was shot dead by a ‘yeager ball’ sent the full 90 yards by John Lowe,” reported John Henry Brown, a member of the Texan force and later the author of “Indian Wars and Pioneers of Texas.” Brown said Lowe “was standing within three feet of where I stood ...there could be no mistake about it. Others saw the same.” No one knew it was Cordova till his men were driven from the position.” A New Madrid Spaniard recognized him, as did others later,” Nance adds, “like Augustus C. Allen of Houston, who had known him while a resident of Nacogdoches. Thus ended the career of the Mexican agent from Nacogdoches who had fled from Texas in 1839. Fourteen Cherokees fell with him.”

(Telegraph and Texas Register, October 12, 1842, as quoted in Nance, “Attack and Counter Attack”)

We find an interesting depiction of the Texan prisoners led back to Rio Grande enroute to Mexico City and the famous Perote Prison in the journal of Samuel A. Maverick, from whom Maverick County was named.

“Sunday morning at daybreak, September 11, 1842,” wrote Mary Adams Maverick in her Memoirs of the famous attack on San Antonio de Bejar, “General Adrian Woll, with a large force of Mexicans consisting of cavalry and artillery to the number of 1300, suddenly appeared before San Antonio and captured the place. Court was in session at the time, and including the members of the bar and Judge of the District Court, 53 Americans were captured, one of whom was Mr. Maverick.”

Sam Maverick kept a journal while a prisoner. Especially of interest to us here is the escorted trip through “The Swinging Doors.” On September 19 he wrote, “We cross pretty Leona and the Nueces and camp on the head of laguna de Espantosa, seven miles west of the Nueces.”

On September 22, they crossed the Rio Grande in two canoes. “Horses made to swim, three or four drowned. Men astonishing swimmers.” They crossed “at the upper crossing at the lone pecan tree on the east side (Pacuache). River about 350 yards wide.”

On September 23 they proceeded the four miles to Presidio Rio Grande (Guerrero Coahuila). “Water plenty but salt and unfit for drinking. Sheep and cattle around. Old mission (San Bernardo) east of town. Town old. good labores (farm lands) northwest of it and on almost all the way to San Fernando (de Rosas.)”

Apparently Woll’s force rested at Rio Grande, for Maverick’s journal resumes on September 27. “Passed through a rich irrigable prairie all the way to Nava before reaching which we saw thousands of acres of corn without fence. Soldiers say this land is public.”

September 28 “All the way a splendid irrigable plain, just after leaving Nava and before ascending the higher plain it is all live oak thicket, very rich.”

“To San Fernando de Agua Verde. Population 5 6000. Twelve miles. This is the Headquarters of General (Isidro) Reyes.”

(Dorothy Ostrom Worrell, “S.A. Maverick’s Portrait Tangs in Court House,” Eagle Pass News Guide, April 21, 1949 and Centennial Edition October 1949)

NOTE: Maverick here refers to San Fernando de Agua Verde, since the garrison at the San Diego River installation of that name had been moved to San Fernando de Rosas.

The Swinging Doors would also welcome the Cherokee Indians again later in 1842. We read in Oo ohee ah’s (the Worm) account of the painful and eventful trip of the aging Sequoyah and his son to Mexico in search of the “lost tribe” of Cherokees who had fled East Texas in 1839 and settled near “San Cranto” (San Fernando) in Mexico. The Worm’s account of the trip, published June 26, 1845 in The Cherokee Advocate in the syllabary invented by Sequoyah, and edited by William P. Ross, is a near textbook description of the San Antonio to Rio Bravo distance, the rain swollen Bravo, the Mexican Presidiales from Presidio Rio Grande, and their “escorting” of the tiny Cherokee group into the Presidio six miles distant for questioning before the Alcalde, and the subsequent journey to San Cranto (San Fernando de Rosas) some 30 miles distant.

“Upon arriving at ‘San Cranto’,” the Worm’s narrative reads, “we were informed that there were a couple of Cherokees in the place, but thinking it would be difficult to find them, we went with our Mexican companion to the home of his brother where we spent the night, and by good luck met with our countryman. It gave us great pleasure to see this man, whose name is Standing Rock,” the Worm said.

The 1845 narrative also enabled us to pinpoint the location of the tiny Cherokee village southwest of San Fernando de Rosas, now the town of Zaragoza, Coahuila:

“About seven miles from San Cranto we passed through a small settlement of runaway negroes, some two or three of whom I met with spoke the Cherokee language,” the Worm noted. “Three miles further we arrived at the Cherokee village, situated within a large prairie, in a grove of timber, half a mile wide and some three miles long, and watered by means of a ditch from a large spring, some two miles distant.”

(Grant Foreman, “The Last Days of Sequoyah,” in the Chronicle$ of Oklahoma, Volume XII, 1934)

NOTE: This account of Worm’s journey and of the death and burial of Sequoyah southwest of San Fernando de Rosas is the backbone of every search for the tomb of the legendary Cherokee Cadmus even to the year 2001.

EPILOGUE

Looking to a speedy reprisal for Wolfs incursion into the Republic of Texas, the Texans moved at once to organize an expeditionary force to cross the Rio Bravo to sack the Villas del Norte. The plan was to invade Mexico in November o 1842, under Alexander Sommervell.

General Isidro Reyes, Commander in Chief of the Ejercito del Norte, had the First Division under artillery Col. Pedro Ampudia First Brigade, and Col. Anastacio Parrodi, Second Brigade at Matamoros with 13 artillery pieces and 1,370 men.

Upriver, General Adrian Wolfs Second Division at San Fernando de Agua Verde, consisting of 796 men excluding the presidial forces, and Col. Rafael Vasquez’ Reserve Brigade at Sabinas consisted of 281 men.

But it appears General Alexander Sommervell’s November 1842 counterstrike against the northern towns of Mexico was not designed to go through the well oiled Swinging Doors, but headed instead South to Laredo, which was not as heavily guarded as San Fernando.

(Sommervell to Hill, Secretary of War and Marine, Washington, February 1, 1843, in Joseph Milton Nance, “Attack and Counter Attack”)

Here Republic of Texas President Sam Houston, who was all too familiar with the ways of the Cherokees, wrote to Sommervell on November 23, 1842:

“The most efficient force of the enemy will be at the Presidio (Rio Grande). You will find the Cherokees and the warriors associated with them the most efficient force and dangerous enemy that you could encounter on the other side of the Rio Grande,” he warned. “They are located In the neighborhood of the Presidio.”

(Writings of Sam Houston, III, 201 202 as quoted in Joseph M. Nance)

Note: Mexican documents of 1843 44 indicate a number of Cherokee Indians and their families were also living at Santa Rosa (Muzquiz) according to the Padron de Extranjeros of 1844, including one Santiago Van, identified specifically as “Indio Caraqui,” along with his wife and four children. The famous Cherokee village southwest of present day Zaragoza on the Hacienda Patinos, however, was more probably the source of the 40Cherokee contingent in Adrian Woll’s Army.

On November 11, 1842, General Reyes reported from San Fernando de Rosas that he had news of 1,600 Texan aventureros with six artillery pieces organizing at San Antonio de Bejar to sally forth to harass the Villas del Norte. Reyes thus prepared for another Tejano assault on the area. The Swinging Doors would be ready this time. With the Second Division and Reserve Brigade at Rio Grande, Reyes could cross the Rio bravo and attack the adventurers.

On November 7, 1842, Reyes entered Rio Grande with the Second Division and the Reserve Brigade, roughly 1,500 men strong. Three Texan generals had converged at San Antonio, he learned, with 3,000 volunteers, with the clear intent of invading Mexico through Laredo or Rio Grande (Villa de Guerrero Coahuila) or possibly along the Las Moras Road (to the north on the Rio Bravo) or possibly along the river to break through as far as San Fernando de Rosas where they could place themselves at the rear of the Mexican force. Reyes, however, would not be outflanked.

On December 1st, General Reyes wrote from Villa Rio grade that his force reported the Texas volunteers had left San Antonio on November 25th with one artillery piece and moved against the border. Reyes declared his intent to move his Second Division and the Reserve Brigade to take up position at the Adjuntas (the confluence of the Rio Escondido and Rio bravo) some 60 kilometers north of Villa Rio Grande (General Miguel A. Sanchez claimed) from where he could observe enemy movements apparently directed against San Fernando de Rosas.

NOTE: Los Adjuntos was for years an Indian trail crossing of the Rio Bravo at the Rio Escondido and an old smugglers’ trail. The site was also called Paso del Aguila by the Native Americans long before either Spaniard or Mexican came. On the North bank of the Bravo, indeed, here the first site of the town of Eagle Pass had sprung up in 1847, according to Cora Montgomery.

(Cora Montgomery, “Eagle Pass: or Life on the Border,” Putnam 1852)

On December 5, then, General Reyes sent word from Paso del Aguila that he had been encamped there since December 3, from which he could equally well strike out toward San Fernando, or else toward Villa Rio Grande, depending on the movement of the Texan adventurers.

But the Swinging Doors would not, however, see action a third time around in 1842. Sommervell’s expedition chose the more lightly defended towns of Laredo and Mier. After receiving word of Sommervell’s appearance December 7 at Laredo, Reyes considered it advisable to leave his camp at Paso del Aguila and return to Villa Rio Grande where he arrived on December 10th at the head of his force.