The Quarterly of the Texas State Historical Association, Volume 10, July 1906 - April, 1907 Page: 29
ix, 354 p. : ill. ; 23 cm.View a full description of this periodical.
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The Louisiana-Texas Frontier.
for expansion which this illegal practice opened to the English
after they became established at Natchez. With the Missouri af-
fording a highway into the interior they could not be wholly ex-
cluded, and O'Reilly in self-defense was forced to use Natchitoches
as a center from which to supply munitions to certain of the
tribes.1
An attempted retrograde movement on the part of the Spanish
home government followed the visita -of the M'arques de Rubi in
1767, and threatened still further to complicate the border situa-
tion. Some five years after the report of Rubi the Spanish king
issued, September 10, 1772, an order known as the "New Regula-
tion of Presidios,"2 which practically embodied Rubi's proposals.
In effect his "New Regulation" marked an attempt at temporary
relinquishment of Spain's uncertain hold on a large part of the
territory between the Rio Grande and the Mississippi, in favor of a
greater concentration near the valley of the former. With Spain
in control of both Texas and Louisiana, the latter colony became
the rampart against English aggression, thus removing the neces-
sity for missionary and presidial outposts 'in eastern Texas. At
the same time the peril from the Apaches ,and other hostile Indians
far within the interior provinces measurably increased. Conse-
quently prudence demanded the abandonment of useless stations on
the Texas-Louisiana frontier with a concentration of forces upon
the San Antonio and Rio Grande rivers, whence an exterminating
war might be waged against hostile natives.
To carry into effect this proposed defense of the more populated
portions of the viceroyalty, a line of fifteen frontier forts, forty
leagues 'apart, was to extend from Bahia del Espiritu Santo, near
the mouth of the San Antonio River, to the head of the Gulf of
California. Beyond this cordon of forts two ,outposts, San Antonio
de Bexar, in Texas, and Santa Fe, in New Mexico, were to repre-
sent the extreme garrisons of New Spain. The forces at Bexar
and at Bahia were to be increased by the abandonment of Adaes
and Orcoquisac, while the military efficiency of all the presidios
was to be increased by the appointment of a new general officer,
the inspector comandante of the interior provinces. To this office
'Bonilla, in THE QUARTERLY, VIII 66, 68, 69.
'The essential features of the "Regulation" are summarized by Bolton
in THE QUARTERLY, IX 79-81.
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Texas State Historical Association. The Quarterly of the Texas State Historical Association, Volume 10, July 1906 - April, 1907, periodical, 1907; Austin, Texas. (https://texashistory.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metapth101040/m1/37/?rotate=270: accessed April 24, 2024), University of North Texas Libraries, The Portal to Texas History, https://texashistory.unt.edu; crediting Texas State Historical Association.