CAMARGO PREDATED U.S.,TEXAS, AND BROWNSVILLE; WAS ORIGIN OF 1ST SETTLERS OF CITY AND CAMERON COUNTY

By Juan Montoya

Twenty-seven years before the the 13 colonies issued their Declaration of Independence from England, a full 87 years before Texas broke away from Mexico, and 104 years before Brownsville was incorporated in 1853, Camargo, Tamaulipas already existed.

This March, Camargo – and Reynosa downriver – will celebrate the 277th anniversary of their founding.

The first settlement to be founded on the Lower Rio Grande was that of Nuestra Señora de Santa Ana de Camargo.

Camargo is located almost directly across the river from Rio Grande City.

It was founded on March 5, 1749, with the dedication to Señora Santa Ana by captain Don Blas Maria de la Garza de Falcon at the eastern edge of the San Juan River near its confluence with the Río Grande.

The foundation had 85 families – a total of 531 persons. Most of the settlers for this township came from Cerralvo, Cadereyta, Monterrey and surrounding townships

Following that, another settlement, Reynosa, 10 leagues downriver, was founded by Colonel Jose de Escandon. Reynosa was named after the Spanish town of Reynosa located in Cantabria (Spain).
The new settlement was dedicated to the Virgin of Guadalupe.

Reynosa was established on 14 March 1749, in an extensive fluvial plain. Most of the initial settlers were from the New Kingdom of León.

In 1846, when Zachary Taylor invaded Mexico through the Nueces Strip, Camargo was occupied by the US Army.

This river port served as a jumping off point for the invasion on Monterrey and Saltillo. The Army was transported via steamboats from the mouth of the river area, and Matamoros. Disease plagued the troops and it is said that hundreds of U.S. soldiers were buried in Camargo, and between that city and Monterrey, in unmarked graves. The command was said to have made the fatal mistake of establishing camp below the confluence of both rivers, where raw sewage and waste from the city drained into the water they used to drink.

Since the Battle of Palo Alto just north of present-day Brownsville in May 1846 signaled the beginning of the Mexican American War, the town of Camargo has close historic ties with our city.

In fact, the founder of the first ranch in Cameron County came from there. Rancho Viejo was established by Salvador de La Garza in 1770 and the King of Spain gave him the royal grant in 1781.

His daughter, Doña Estefana Goseascochea de Cortina was born in Camargo in 1782 (the Rio Grande wasn't a border then) and died in 1867 on her El Carmen Ranch ( named after her daughter) at 85 years of age.

Carmen Avenue connected these two ranches. Santa Rita (now Villanueva, and the first seat of Cameron County) was also founded by Doña Estefana. The marker indicates where her ranch cemetery – which was destroyed with the building of the river levee along Military Highway – used to be.

She had three sons, Sabas Cavazos, and his half brothers Jose Maria and Juan Nepomuceno Cortina, the latter known as the rebel who  defied Texan authorities following the loss of Mexican territory north of the Rio Grande after 1848. Sabas was one of the wealthiest land owners in the new entity and Jose Maria was elected treasurer of the newly established Cameron County.

In September 1959, Juan "Cheno" Cortina would battle a militia from Brownsville, Texas, the Texas Rangers and U.S. forces. He once occupied the border city looking for the enemies of the Mexicans, but after several "wars" was exiled to Mexico City by dictator Porfirio Diaz at the request of U.S. authorities, where he died.