The Presidio de San Luis de las Amarillas, Menard TX

Last weekend we were in Menard Texas visiting some friends and on the way home we stopped by the The Presidio de San Luis de las Amarillas, know today as the Mission San Saba, just out side of Menard, to take some photos of the ruins.    The following is an excerpt of the information that was listed about the old Spanish fort displayed at the site. 

Presidio de San Luis de las Amarillas was founded in April 1757 to protect the Mission Santa Cruz de San Saba, established at the same time for the conversion of the Eastern Apaches.  The Presidio (fort) and Mission were also intended to promote Spain’s presence in the area and to help deter potential French territorial claims.  

 Although the Apaches frequented the Mission, they never entered into it to stay.  By befriending the Apaches, however, the Spaniards gained their enemies.  On March 16, 1758, the allied northern tribes (principally Comanche and Wichita) some 2,000 strong destroyed the Mission, killing two of the three priests and at least six other Spaniards.  The Presidio sent a small relief force to the Mission, but the solders were driven back. 

 The attack represented the first armed conflict between Europeans and the Comanches in Texas.  It was also the first time the Spaniards had confronted large numbers of Indians with firearms,  acquired in trade with the French.  The Mission was never rebuilt. 

 More than a year after the destruction of the Mission, Colonel Diego Ortiz Parrilla, Presidio commander, led a force of 600 Spanish militiamen and Indian auxiliaries in a campaign to punish the natives responsible for the attach.  He was repulsed with heavy losses at the Taovya (Wichita) village on the Red River near present-day Spanish Fort and subsequently was relieved of command.  Parrilla’s successor, Captain felipe de Rabago y Teran, replace the log stockade with the stone compound, a portion of which was replicated as a Texas Centennial project begun in 1936.  The original rectangular structure measured some 300 to 360 feet long, had walls ranging from 6 to 20 feet height, contained upwards of 50 rooms, and had towers in the corners for defense.

 During the years that followed there were numerous attacks against both the Presidio and residents in the area.  Rabago continued to occupy the post – “an island in a sea of Indian hostility” – until June 1768, when he abandoned it without authority.  It was reoccupied briefly in 1770 by Manuel Antonio de Oca, then permanently abandoned to the ravages of time. 

This entry was posted on Monday, September 28th, 2009 at 6:38 pm. It is filed under Land scapes, Uncategorized and tagged with Menard Texas, Mission San Saba, Presido, Spanish fort. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed.