Was Juan Cortina a bandit or a hero? [South Texas History]

Q. Were the Cortina Wars started by Juan Cortina part of the sequence in regard to the Mexican-American civil rights movement in Texas?

A. Juan Nepomucena Cortina - "Cheno" - certainly called attention to the discrimination endured by Mexican-Americans, but he did so for his own ends. He has been portrayed, depending on one's angle of vision, as a hero or villain, as a Mexican patriot or bandit, as an outlaw leader or champion of social justice. But I think you would have to be desperate for a hero to idolize the gringo-hating Cortina.

Cortina came from a prominent family. His mother's family had the Spanish grant of Espiritu Santo, on which Brownsville sits. As a young man, Cortina was at the battles of Palo Alto and Resaca de la Palma in Mariano Arista's army. In 1859, Cortina led a mob that captured Browns-ville, held it for three days, and committed several murders in the process. Cortina issued a proclamation declaring himself the protector of all Mexicans in Texas.

Two days after Christmas, 1859, Texas Rangers under "Rip" Ford and U.S. Army troops under Maj. Samuel Heintzelman crushed Cortina's forces - the Cortinistas - in a battle at Rio Grande City, and pushed him across the river into Mexico.

Cortina, though he couldn't read or write, was later named a general and was twice governor of Tamaulipas. It was common knowledge he was behind the cattle-stealing raids in South Texas in the 1870s. He was the mastermind behind the Nuecestown Raid in 1875.

Cortina was imprisoned in Mexico City and almost executed for these cross-border raids. He died of pneumonia in 1894.

Was he a bandit leader or a champion of civil rights? Or was he simply good at using the conditions of the time - the widespread discrimination against Mexican-Americans - for his own ends? He may have had a social conscience, but he made a fortune off of other people's cattle and the killings committed by his followers would fill a fat volume. No honest narrative of events can portray Cortina in a favorable light.

Murphy Givens can be reached at 886-4315 or by e-mail at givensm@ caller.com. His radio commentary airs on Wednesday and Friday mornings at 7:30 a.m. and Friday evenings at 6:30 p.m. on KEDT (90.3 FM) and KVRT-Victoria (90.7 FM).

NUECESTOWN RAID OF 1875. The Nuecestown raid of 1875, also known as the Corpus Christi raid, can best be explained as part of a cycle of violence between Mexican citizens, Hispanic Texans, and Anglo Texans. By 1875 raids and murder were common on the part of both ethnic groups. Raiders from Mexico were particularly active from 1871 to 1875, when the raiding of South Texas ranches reached a climax. Richard King'sqv ranch was raided twice in the spring of 1875. There was a lucrative trade in stolen cattle and horses in Mexico (see CATTLE RUSTLING). Skinning wars or "hide-peeling" incidents were also common at the time. Persons of Mexican descent worked in collusion with the raiders or were intimidated by them. In the case of the Nuecestown raid, however, cattle theft was apparently not the raiders' goal. Juan N. Cortina,qv Mexican outlaw and later Mexican general, was probably an instigator of the raid, if not actually involved. The Mexican raiders concentrated their efforts on Nuecestown and the surrounding area, but other areas between Nuecestown and the Rio Grande were also hit. In late March 1875 a number of men left Mexico in small groups and met about twenty miles from where the raid began. They were joined by others with fresh horses. The first overt act of the raid was against a man named Campbell and occurred near Tule Lake, where horses were stolen. Next, the raiders robbed the Page home, less than nine miles from Corpus Christi, and took Mr. Page hostage. On March 26, eighteen to twenty raiders arrived at Frank's store on the Juan Saenz ranch, demanding and taking all valuables as well as supplying themselves with horses and saddles from passersby. A Hispanic who worked for Frank was killed after he refused to join the raiders. Eleven Anglos and a number of Hispanic women and children were taken captive at Frank's. The raiders then left, driving their captives before them, and headed toward Motts (Nuecestown, then located about thirteen miles northwest of Corpus Christi in Nueces County). Arriving at the store of Thomas Noakes, they found it closed. Noakes shot the first raider to open the door. Immediately afterward a man known as "Lying" Smith rushed out and was shot and killed. The building was set on fire, but Noakes escaped through a door in the floor to a trench that had been dug for this purpose. All of Noakes's property was destroyed. The raiders stayed about an hour, freed the female captives, and left for Penitas.
When word of the raid reached Corpus Christi, two companies formed to pursue the raiders, one led by Nueces county sheriff John McClane and the other by Pat Whelen. The latter group of ten caught up with the raiders (who numbered about thirty-five) near Hunter's place and attacked them. One of Whelen's men, John Swanks, was shot and killed, and the Anglos retreated when they ran out of ammunition. Subsequently the raiders released the male prisoners. Sheriff McClane's posse caught the raider shot by Noakes; he was hanged by a mob a few days later. The Mexican raiders sent two escorted wagons of plunder ahead. Though this should have slowed them down, neither posse made further contact. The raiders passed through Piedras Pintas, shooting and killing a man for his horse. On April 2 they surrounded the town of Roma in Starr County with the intent to rob the customshouse but were stopped by United States troops in the area. It appears also that several people were killed by the same bandits in Hidalgo County and Laredo. Once back in Mexico, some of the raiders were identified, and Mexican authorities arrested them, but Cortina was able to assist them in avoiding trial.
Anglo residents of South Texas retaliated with a vengeance. Bands of volunteers organized "minute companies" in every county from the Nueces to the Rio Grande. They proceeded to hunt down Mexican outlaws, peaceful rancheros, and merchants; the avengers looted property and burned homes. Since saddles were among the goods stolen by the raiders, Mexicans seen with new saddles were killed. Retaliation extended outside of the immediate geographical area, as well. In Encinal County at La Parra, the jacales of squatter Mexicans were burned. The Anglo avengers also killed all the adult males at the Mexican-owned La Atravesada Ranch in what is now Kenedy County. Similar incidents occurred at El Penascal, Corral de Piedra, and El Mesquite. Those killed were farmers and stockraisers. Stores at La Atravesada and El Penascal were also burned down. After the devastation, Mexican rancheros in the area fled in fear for their lives. According to the Corpus Christi Gazette,qv "good Mexicans" were afraid to travel to Corpus Christi. Sheriff McClane requested the assistance of the Texas Rangers,qv who thereafter disbanded the companies and reported that the acts committed by "Americans" were "horrible." While the Texas Rangers prevented the "minute companies" from further acts of violence, raids and atrocities from across the Rio Grande continued, as often as not against Hispanic Texans. After Noakes died, his sons sought a $50,000 claim from the Mexican government, but it was to no avail until 1945, when the Mexican government paid $7,125 to his heirs. Hispanics in Texas received no recompense for the violence they suffered.
BIBLIOGRAPHY: Ruth Dodson, "The Noakes Raid," Frontier Times, July 1946. William Hager, "The Nuecestown Raid of 1875: A Border Incident," Arizona and the West 3 (Autumn 1959). Leopold Morris, "The Mexican Raid of 1875 on Corpus Christi," Quarterly of the Texas State Historical Association 4 (October 1900). U.S. House of Representatives, Texas Frontier Troubles (Report of the House Special Committee, 44th Cong. 1st Sess., Report No. 343, February 29, 1876).

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