The Massacre at Gracias a Dios: Mobility and Violence on the Lower Rio Grande, 1821–1856

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Alice L Baumgartner
Keyword(s):  
Rio Grande ◽  
Border Crossings ◽  
Native Peoples ◽  
Mexico Border ◽  
History Of ◽  
The Republic ◽  
Republic Of Texas ◽  
The U.S ◽  
Lower Rio Grande

Abstract On March 20, 1856, Mexican forces massacred a band of Lipan Apaches at a river crossing known as Gracias a Dios. Historians have described the massacre as an example of the growing violence against Native peoples in Mexico, motivated by a desire to control movement across the U.S.-Mexico border. But given the long history of border crossings in the region, why did Mexican forces massacre the Lipan Apaches in 1856, rather than at some earlier point? The Lipan Apaches had long used the border to their advantage, forging alliances with Mexico in 1822, with the Republic of Texas in 1838, and again with Mexico in 1853. These alliances show that the Lipans were important to the history of the U.S.-Mexico borderlands not only because their raids wrought devastation, but also because they were geopolitical actors in their own right. To understand why Mexican forces turned on their Native allies, we must examine how the policies of neighboring nations interacted with—and shaped—one another. Convinced that Mexico’s Native allies were raiding their ranches with impunity, Texans decided to launch an expedition against the Lipans in Mexico in 1855. This attack made Mexico’s alliance with the Lipans into a liability rather than an advantage. The massacre that resulted shows that the shift toward greater violence against Native peoples was, at its core, a transnational process.

Introduction

2011 ◽  
Author(s):  
Rachel St. John
Keyword(s):  
North America ◽  
Rio Grande ◽  
The United States ◽  
The West ◽  
Mexico Border ◽  
History Of ◽  
Southern Border ◽  
New Space ◽  
The U.S

This introductory chapter provides a history of the U.S.–Mexico border. Long before the border existed as a physical or legal reality it began to take form in the minds of Mexicans and Americans who looked to maps of North America to think about what their republics were and what they might someday become. Their competing territorial visions brought the United States and Mexico to war in 1846. Less than two years later, the border emerged from the crucible of that war. With U.S. soldiers occupying the Mexican capital, a group of Mexican and American diplomats redrew the map of North America. In the east, they chose the Rio Grande, settling a decade-old debate about Texas's southern border and dividing the communities that had long lived along the river. In the west, they did something different; they drew a line across a map and conjured up an entirely new space where there had not been one before.

scholarly journals Texas-Mexico Cross Border Truck Operations: Are Mexican NAFTA Trucks Unsafe?

2010 ◽  
Vol 47 (4) ◽  
Author(s):  
Jason West ◽  
Robert Harrison
Keyword(s):  
Public Safety ◽  
Border Crossings ◽  
Cross Border ◽  
Texas Department ◽  
Vehicle Inspection ◽  
Mexico Border ◽  
Service Rates ◽  
The U.S

Texas Department of Public Safety (DPS) border safety inspection facilities (BSIF) have been in operation, in temporary and permanent forms, since 2001. This paper presents inspection results on trucks inspected at Texas BSIFs from 2003 to 2006, comprising over 326,000 vehicle inspection records. Analysis indicated that Mexico domiciled trucks have lower out-of-service rates than U.S. trucks at most Texas/Mexico border crossings. This finding is noteworthy since border (drayage) vehicles are older on average than typical Texas highway trucks and counters the opinion that trucks from Mexico are unsafe and therefore should not be allowed to enter the U.S.

Santa Anna and His Legacy

2015 ◽  
Author(s):  
Will Fowler
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
The United States ◽  
Mexican War ◽  
Early National Period ◽  
The Public ◽  
Early National ◽  
History Of ◽  
The Republic ◽  
The Alamo ◽  
The U.S

Antonio López de Santa Anna (b. Xalapa, February 21, 1794; d. Mexico City, June 21, 1876) was one of the most notorious military caudillos of 19th-century Mexico. He was involved in just about every major event of the early national period and served as president on six different occasions (1833–1835, 1839, 1841–1843, 1843–1844, 1846–1847, and 1853–1855). U.S. Minister Plenipotentiary Waddy Thompson during the 1840s would come to the conclusion that: “No history of his country for that period can be written without constant mention of his name.”1 For much of the 1820s to 1850s he proved immensely popular; the public celebrated him as “Liberator of Veracruz,” the “Founder of the Republic,” and the “Hero of Tampico” who repulsed a Spanish attempt to reconquer Mexico in 1829. Even though he lost his leg defending Veracruz from a French incursion in 1838, many still regarded him as the only general who would be able to save Mexico from the U.S. intervention of 1846–1848. However, Mexicans, eventually, would remember him more for his defeats than his victories. Having won the battle of the Alamo, he lost the battle of San Jacinto which resulted in Texas becoming independent from Mexico in 1836. Although he recovered from this setback, many subsequently blamed him for Mexico’s traumatic defeat in the U.S.-Mexican War, which ended with Mexico ceding half of its territory to the United States. His corruption paired with the fact that he aligned himself with competing factions at different junctures contributed to the accusation that he was an unprincipled opportunist. Moreover, because he authorized the sale of La Mesilla Valley to the United States (in present-day southern Arizona) in the 1853 Gadsden Purchase, he was labeled a vendepatrias (“fatherland-seller”). The repressive dictatorship he led donning the title of “His Serene Highness” in 1853–1855, also gave way to him being presented thereafter as a bloodthirsty tyrant, even though his previous terms in office were not dictatorial. Albeit feted as a national hero during much of his lifetime, historians have since depicted Santa Anna as a cynical turncoat, a ruthless dictator, and the traitor who lost the U.S.-Mexican War on purpose. However, recent scholarship has led to a significant revision of this interpretation. The aim of this article is to recast our understanding of Santa Anna and his legacy bearing in mind the latest findings. In the process it demonstrates how important it is to engage with the complexities of the multilayered regional and national contexts of the time in order to understand the politics of Independent Mexico.

The War With the United States and the Crisis in Mexican Thought

1957 ◽  
Vol 14 (2) ◽  
pp. 153-173 ◽  
Author(s):  
Charles A. Hale
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Rio Grande ◽  
The United States ◽  
Peace Treaty ◽  
National Defense ◽  
The North ◽  
Military Revolutions ◽  
Mexican Government ◽  
History Of ◽  
The Republic

After a border skirmish at the Rio Grande on April 25, 1846, A Mexico and the United States were at war, and within a few months Zachary Taylor’s troops had overrun the north, reaching Monterrey and Saltillo. At the same time an expedition under Winfield Scott landed at Vera Cruz and pushed inward along the ancient road of conquest, reaching the gates of Mexico City by August, 1847. Mexican resistance was heroic and determined in spots, but disorganization and poor leadership played havoc with any attempt at national defense. The capital fell and was occupied by the invaders, the Mexican government fled to Querétaro, and an ignominious peace treaty was negotiated and accepted by the helpless Mexicans, though not without serious opposition from the radical (puro) element which favored a last-ditch resistance. With the rapid subjection of the country and the loss of more than half its territory, the once proud and optimistic nation of Iturbide was left stunned; and it turned to bitter reflection upon its paralyzed condition and its flagrant display of weakness when faced by a small and not too efficient force of invaders.The very independence of Mexico was now threatened. Such an easy victory by a powerful neighbor would mean that Mexico might at any time be absorbed by the United States, especially when there was a movement for that purpose already afoot north of the Rio Grande. The easy optimism of the early days of the republic had now vanished. The shock of military disaster, after the dismal decade of mediocrity and humdrum military revolutions, accentuated a crisis in Mexican thought. Both liberals and conservatives now saw the necessity of imposing radical changes upon the course of independent Mexico. Since the overthrow of the radical Gómez Farias government in 1834, the country had been allowed to drift, and when the Americans invaded, its vigor appeared to be gone. In spite of the presence of a sizable moderate party, the factions became sharply differentiated as they had never been before in the history of the republic, except perhaps for the year 1832. Liberals and conservatives appealed to their traditional programs for solutions to Mexico’s crisis of 1847, and the seeds were sown for a great conflict.

scholarly journals Understanding of Mexican Migration to the United States: Rifts and Challenges

2021 ◽  
Vol 8 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Rana Basam Khan ◽  
◽  
Muhammad Nawaz Bhatti ◽  
Ghulam Mustafa ◽  
◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
El Paso ◽  
Rio Grande ◽  
The United States ◽  
Mexican Migration ◽  
Mexican Migrants ◽  
Social Defense ◽  
Basic Segment ◽  
Mexico Border ◽  
The U.S

It has been decades since legislative issues have thought about social, defense, and compassionate issues of migration which has become a touchstone in U.S strategy discussion. Mexican migration to the U.S started in 1848. It has proceeded to the present with no critical interference, something that makes this work movement very particular as a basic segment of the American work advertise. Generally started with enormous development, driven by starvation, political problems, open doors in the U.S; that point eased back, tightened, or unexpectedly finished, from 1850 to 1882, similar to the case of the Chinese. The details show that Mexico is a key source of settlers in U.S and has long been a major source of enemy contact with refugees, but so many have been focusing on Mexico and not the other countries which have also become major sources of illegal immigrants. The United States and Mexico are bordered with California, San Diego, and Baja California, Tijuana, and the Pacific Ocean. The boundary stretches eastward to El Paso, Ciudad Juarez and Chihuahua, Texas, on the Rio Grande. From that point the border continues south-east along the Rio Grande River until the end of it in the Gulf of Mexico. Border stretching of over 1945 miles is insufficiently regulated. Only old solid markers, rusty safety clasp and spoiled dry fence posts can be found in many parts of the place, and the river Grande that over the centuries has continuously changed its course separating both nations. U.S endeavors to control passages and exit adequately have been focused principally along the most profoundly dealt transit courses driving to north. U.S. powerlessness to control all the Mexican boundary has proven that any Mexican involved in operating in the U.S seldom discovers that the frontier is an unlikely trap Through the span of the most recent 170 years, Mexican migrants have to a great extent worked in horticulture, farming, mining, and railroad development.

scholarly journals Breast Cancer Knowledge and Early Detection among Hispanic Women with a Family History of Breast Cancer along the U.S.-Mexico Border

2010 ◽  
Vol 21 (2) ◽  
pp. 475-488 ◽  
Author(s):  
Yelena Bird ◽  
John Moraros ◽  
Matthew P. Banegas ◽  
Sasha King ◽  
Surasri Prapasiri ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Breast Cancer ◽  
Family History ◽  
Early Detection ◽  
Hispanic Women ◽  
Cancer Knowledge ◽  
Mexico Border ◽  
History Of ◽  
Breast Cancer Knowledge ◽  
The U.S

Freedom Interrupted

2018 ◽  
pp. 251-274
Author(s):  
James David Nichols
Keyword(s):  
African Americans ◽  
Foreign Relations ◽  
Fugitive Slaves ◽  
Runaway Slaves ◽  
Depth Analysis ◽  
Mexico Border ◽  
History Of ◽  
The U.S

Scholars have long suggested that nineteenth-century runaway slaves turned the U.S.-Mexico border into a line of freedom. However, as this chapter argues, such an interpretation of the border is somewhat problematic. A closer examination of the history of northern Tamaulipas explains why. From 1820 onward, African Americans began to arrive to that region in search of freedom and a changed racial milieu, but this process was deeply fraught. U.S. American jurisprudence could continue to affect Mexican space formally and informally from the outside, greatly troubling Mexican sovereignty and its foreign relations in the process. Hence, the freedom found by African Americans in Mexico—guaranteed by Mexican law—was never particularly secure in practice. This chapter builds upon the previous chapter and provides an in-depth analysis of a specific case study of fugitive slaves’ struggles for freedom in the Texas-Mexico borderlands.

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