Austin, TX
From the Statesman archives: Newcomers did not control Indigenous Texas for centuries
In this “From the Archives” series — subtitled in jest “20,000 Years of Austin History in 20 Minutes” — we’ve introduced the concept for the series, and devoted one column to the arrival of humans in the Austin area.
This, the third column, looks at the arrival of Europeans and Africans 500 years ago.
As previously noted, Spaniard Álvar Núñez Cabeza de Vaca and an Arabic-speaking African named Esteban de Dorantes (Estevanico) were among 80 men shipwrecked on the Texas Gulf Coast. They were among the four survivors of those parties who spent the next years exploring the interior.
Cabeza de Vaca wrote about this initial incursion in his fascinating report, published as “La Relacion.” For their part, the Spanish claimed what is now Texas until Mexican independence in 1821.
Claiming, however, is not controlling.
When you look at a traditional map of North America during the 1600s, for instance, you see wide stretches of the northern and central regions as held by France.
Meanwhile, the English laid claim to much of the Eastern Seaboard; and the Dutch West India Company on the region around New Amsterdam, later renamed New York City, as well as land from Maryland to Connecticut and the Hudson Valley (at least from 1614 to 1664).
The Spanish planted their flags in Florida, Texas and the Southwest, especially the relatively populated area around Santa Fe, N.M.
By 1732, the Russian Empire had joined the imperial scramble, laying claim to the Pacific Coast territories of North America.
Yet as historian Pekka Hämäläinen argues in his magnificent book, “Indigenous Continent: The Epic Contest for North America,” the Europeans generally controlled only slivers of land around forts and settlements. Yes, they operated ports, mines, farms and trading posts, but it took hundreds of years to wrest the North America from the Native Americans.
Texas is a particular case in point.
While maps might have indicated that New Spain included much of what is now Texas, the Spanish, in fact, rarely controlled territory beyond a few scattered presidios, missions and villages. The exceptions might be found in the brushy South Texans land around San Antonio and La Bahía, where Tejanos operated productive ranches.
Similar things could be said about the French, who for a long while considered the entire Mississippi River watershed, which includes the Red River and Texas its tributaries, theirs. This claim sometimes included disputed territory as far south as Matagorda Bay.
These insubstantial claims did not improve much after the European powers departed. During the early 19th century, neither the Mexican central government, nor the American immigrants, who began arriving in numbers during the 1820s, controlled more than a few patches on the map.
It was not until the Red River War (1874-1875) that the United States — and its still relatively new state of Texas — controlled all of the state’s territory. That was after more than 50 years of almost constant conflict with Native Americans, who were either removed or nearly exterminated in the process.
What about Austin, you say? In 1730, the Spanish temporarily transplanted three East Texas missions to somewhere along the Colorado River in the Austin area. Those were moved to better fortified positions in San Antonio a few months later. Archeologists have unearthed no physical evidence of those incompletely documented missions.
Which means the Spanish presence in Texas, which lasted intermittently from the 1520s to the 1820s, made little direct impact on the area around Austin.
It was Indigenous land.