The Southwestern Historical Quarterly, Volume 71, July 1967 - April, 1968 Page: 487
686 p. : ill. (some col.), maps, ports. ; 23 cm.View a full description of this periodical.
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The Spanish Frontier in West Texas
sonally to the viceroy." Apparently Marin went much further in his
verbal report than he did in the one of September, for he took the
position that his first plan (extensive campaigns against the Indians)
would merely maintain the status quo in Nueva Vizcaya, while to
insure peace and prosperity it would be necessary to colonize the
province. Settlers should be recruited from Galicia, the Canary Islands,
and other provinces of Spain; they should be militiamen with all of
the exemptions from taxation and other privileges of the militia.
Sixty to seventy heads of households would be settled in each of the
towns, these to be placed at points generally used by the Indians in
approaching Nueva Vizcaya from the Despoblado. The government
would provide the settlers with arms, animals, seed, and farm equip-
ment. In order to avoid the expense and difficulty of the journey
overland from Vera Cruz to Nueva Vizcaya, Marlin suggested that the
settlers could be taken by boat to the mouth of the Rio Grande and
on up the river "very near to the place where they are to live on the
bank of the Rio Bravo del Norte," a curious proposal which reflected
the general lack of geographical knowledge concerning the Despo-
blado.
Marfn's colonization scheme was rejected as being too expensive,
but his other recommendations were accepted, including the sugges-
tion that presidial soldiers be granted parcels of land and be urged
to settle their families around the presidios to form nuclei of civil
settlements. A series of aggressive campaigns against the Indians, in
accordance with Marin's proposals, was carried out in the early 1690o's
and led to the subduing of the Indians, as Marln had foreseen.
But, as he had also foretold, this was not a permanent solution to the
Indian problem, which soon arose once more.
Aside from somewhat sporadic missionary activity at La Junta de
los Rios and military campaigns which served to add to the Spaniards'
knowledge of the Despoblado, there was no significant attempt to
penetrate the area until the time of the inspection visit of the north-
ern frontier carried out by Brigadier Pedro de Rivera y Villal6n in
1724-1728. When Rivera received his written instructions, he found
appended to them the comments of the auditor general, Juan de
OlivAn Rebolledo, a remarkably far-sighted official. He suggested that
Rivera investigate the desirability of moving the presidios of Nueva
2""Reply of the fiscal concerning various questions relating to the war with the hostile
Indians of the kingdom of El Parral which were raised by different reports of the viceroy
of Mexico, the Count of Galve, and by the opinion of Don Gabriel del Castillo, governor
of the said city of El Parral," April 1, 1698, ibid., 419-463.487
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Texas State Historical Association. The Southwestern Historical Quarterly, Volume 71, July 1967 - April, 1968, periodical, 1968; Austin, Texas. (https://texashistory.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metapth117145/m1/551/: accessed April 25, 2024), University of North Texas Libraries, The Portal to Texas History, https://texashistory.unt.edu; crediting Texas State Historical Association.