The Southwestern Historical Quarterly, Volume 107, July 2003 - April, 2004 Page: 207
660 p. : ill. (some col.), maps, ports. ; 23 cm.View a full description of this periodical.
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The 1780 Cabello Map
rent site of said fort. Indeed, it is unbelievable that one who had any experience
whatever in the military should have constructed the fort in such a place [as the
current site].
This information serves only to inform Your Lordship of [my] having complied
with your orders. There remains to draw up the corresponding representation
that will spell out the other circumstances which indicate how essential to the serv-
ice of the king and the welfare of this region is the relocation of Cibolo Fort from
its present site to the one I have chosen. To this end I will see ifI can draw up a map
of the entire region [emphasis added] so that Your Lordship can verify what I shall
set forth concerning the matter. I shall do these things as soon as I can disencum-
ber myself of the great number of duties that have devolved upon my scanty re-
sources.
I am persuaded that Your Lordship will be satisfied with the effort I have ex-
pended in carrying out this inspection. And since I inspected the terrain of the
ranches along the San Antonio River when I went to La Bahia Presidio, I am well
aware of the situations of them all. This enables me with full knowledge and le-
gitimacy to dictate the most suitable place for the new site of Cibolo Fort, in view
of the present ominous situation [caused by Indian hostilities].
Our Lord protect Your Lordship's life many years. S[a]n Ant[oni] o de Bexar,
September 14, 1780.2
Shortly after the publication of Los Mestejios, I became aware of the se-
ries of maps that Father Jos6 Antonio Pichardo compiled to illustrate
points made in his extensive 1812 treatise on the boundary between
Texas and Louisiana. One of these maps (No. 17) had what appeared to
be the Cabello information implanted on a larger and very poor map of
Texas attributed to Manuel Agustin Mascar6. In an article on this subject
for the Southwestern Historical Quarterly, I speculated that perhaps the Za-
catecan missionary Jos6 Maria de Jesis Puelles had been responsible for
relaying the information about the San Antonio and Guadalupe Rivers to
Pichardo-either copying a map found in his research on the boundary
question or drawing it himself.'
Moreover, based on Pichardo's map No. 17 and its legend "El Cibolo"
on the lower of the two fort symbols, I concluded that the upper (un-
named) symbol represented where Cabello wanted to move the fort. This
mistake was carried over into my more ambitious study of early Texas car-
tography, Shootzng the Sun.4 It seemed logical at the time because Indians
University Press, 1986), 214.
2 Cabello to Croix, Sept 14, 1780, Bexar Archives Translations, vol. 102, pp. 15-19, box 2C42
(Center for American History, University of Texas at Austin; cited hereafter as CAH). For an ex-
cellent summation of Cabello's military career see Donald E. Chipman and Harriett Denise
Joseph, Notable Men and Women of Spanish Texas (Austin: University of Texas Press, 1999), 202-2 5.
It does not appear that Cabello had any formal training as a maker of maps, perhaps accounting
for the crude nature of this specimen.
SJack Jackson, "Father Jose Maria de Jesis Puelles and the Maps of Plchardo's Document 74,"
Southwestern Hzstoncal Quarterly, 91 (Jan., 1988), 317-347.o207
2003
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Texas State Historical Association. The Southwestern Historical Quarterly, Volume 107, July 2003 - April, 2004, periodical, 2004; Austin, Texas. (https://texashistory.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metapth101224/m1/251/: accessed April 27, 2024), University of North Texas Libraries, The Portal to Texas History, https://texashistory.unt.edu; crediting Texas State Historical Association.