Texas Almanac, 1956-1957 Page: 50
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50 TEXAS ALMANAC-1956-1957
Mission San Jose de Aguayo, San Antonio.
Mission San Jose de Aguayo, San Antonio.existence of a village in the Southwest is
found in the sheltered little valley where
the Rio Conchos and Alamito Creek flow
into the Rio Grande, from opposite di-
rections, in the Big Bend country. Here
a small patch of good soil in a vast, rug-
ged county and perennially flowing water
in the spring-fed Conchos undoubtedly
attracted settlers from the beginning of
aboriginal habitation in this region. Fur-
thermore, the valleys of the two oppos-
ing tributaries made a natural passage
of the deep valley of the Rio Grande.
Four Indian villages were here when
Cabeza de Vaca visited the area about
1535. It was called La Junta by the early
Spanish, now Ojinaga. It is on the Mexi-
can side of the river.
The expedition of Hernando de Soto,
after his death, entered Northeast Texas
about 1542 and penetrated an unknown
distance westward, possibly as far as East
Central Texas. Because of the rumors
about cities of gold, most of the early
exploration was in Western Texas, and
New Mexico.
La Salle and the French.
The second of the six flags to fly over
Texas, that of France, came with the
landing of Rene Robert Cavalier, Sieur de
Ia Salle, in 1685. According to the an-
nounced purpose of La Salle's expedition,
it was to have established a French set-
tlement at the mouth of the Mississippi.
Possibly La Salle was driven on the Texas
coast by storms. There is also evidence
that he sailed past the mouth of the Mis-
sissippi for the deliberate purpose of es-tablishing a French post within striking
distance of Spanish operations in north-
ern Mexico. He, too, had heard of the
Seven Cities of Cibola.
Landing at the head of Lavaca Bay, La
Salle established Fort Saint Louis from
which he made a number of expeditions,
some to the westward apparently in
search of the gold and silver mines of the
Spaniards, and later to the eastward in
search of the Mississippi. La Salle was
killed by one of his own men during an
expedition in 1687. The place of the ex-
plorer's death is usually fixed at a site
near present Navasota. After the leader's
death the colony at Fort Saint Louis was
soon destroyed by disease and Indians.
Its establishment in Texas had little
direct results. Indirectly it had a perma-
nent influence on the chain of historic
cause-and-effect, because it alarmed the
Spaniards in Mexico and made them give
serious thought to the matter of estab-
lishing settlements in the great region
north of the Rio Grande.
Early Spanish Mission
The Spanish had been so busy looking
for gold in the Upper Rio Grande Valley
that they had neglected East Texas. La
Salle's attempt to found a colony aroused
them to the danger of French conquest.
East Texas Missions.
In 1689 an expedition of Capt. Alonso
de Leon, Governor of Coahuila, set out to
destroy Fort Saint Louis. The expedition
was accompanied by Father Massanet,
whose purpose was to establish a mission
in Texas. The abandoned Fort Saint Louis
was discovered in 1690, and the expedition
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Texas Almanac, 1956-1957, book, 1955; Dallas, Texas. (https://texashistory.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metapth117138/m1/52/: accessed April 24, 2024), University of North Texas Libraries, The Portal to Texas History, https://texashistory.unt.edu; crediting Texas State Historical Association.