Coastal Bend History

Herndon Williams Ph.D. writes about local history, lost treasure, wars, tribal history and more.

Coastal Bend Chronicle: The Book that Saved the Lives of Settlers and Soldiers

Captain Randolph B. Marcy wrote the book, The Prairie Traveler, in 1859 and it became a bestseller for the rest of the century. It was written as a guide for the cavalry and the cross-country settlers headed overland to California, Oregon and Utah. Marcy was an explorer, a surveyor, a map maker and a military leader. His book distilled his decades of experience on the frontiers in the West and Northwest. The book was comprehensive, detailed, illustrated and easy to read, despite its 200 page length. The Prairie Traveler was authorized by the War Department and sold for one dollar. It was indispensable reading for any settler venturing by wagon train to the West Coast, as well as any military expedition dealing with the Indians.

Coastal Bend Chronicle: The Bluest Blue Norther in Texas

Can’t really tell the date of the bluest or coldest “blue norther” in Texas because the systematic recording of weather data did not happen until about 1895. Prior to that, references to weather appeared only in personal accounts or journals of explorers and settlers. However, the use of the term “blue norther” is unique to Texas and has been in use since the early 1800s. It refers to a cold front from a mass of Artic air pushed south by the jet stream. The front can advance at speeds of 40 miles per hour and wind speeds in the front can reach 80 miles per hour. Northers are characterized by a steep drop in temperature, often from balmy conditions, accompanied by high winds and freezing rain, sleet or snow. They are followed in a day or so by clear skies and low temperatures. Temperature drops of 60 to70 degrees in a matter of hours have been seen in northers.

Coastal Bend Chronicle: Cabeza de Vaca, Faith Healer to the Karankawa

Cabeza de Vaca became a reluctant faith healer to the Karankawa, but it saved his life and those of his three Spanish shipwreck companions. Cabeza de Vaca was one of 80 Spanish explorers who were shipwrecked on an island, usually taken to be Galveston, on November 6, 1528, where they were the first Europeans to encounter the Karankawa. The Karankawa on the island were very helpful in feeding (fish and roots) and caring for the destitute and marooned Spaniards, even when the Spaniards resorted to cannibalism.

Stephen F. Austin in Love

Stephen F. Austin barely had time for love in his life because of his commitment to the survival of his colony in Texas and then to Texas independence. When Stephen was 27, he inherited the burden of the colony upon his father’s death in June 1821, and also the family debts that his father had incurred.

Disease in Early Texas and Hazardous Remedies

Illness in frontier Texas was often fatal, but you might recover if you survived the medical treatment. Not only were medical facilities scarce to nonexistent, but the state of medical knowledge was primitive by modern standards.

Santa Anna Lost His Leg to the French Navy

The Republic of Texas owed great thanks to the French Navy in 1838. The small Texas Navy had been destroyed at Galveston by “Racer’s Storm” on October 7, 1837.

Coastal Bend Chronicle: Castilian Law Found in Modern Texas Code

We are governed by a surprising amount of law from the Province of Castile in Spain as a part of our Mexican heritage. Texans adopted these provisions of Castilian law because they were viewed as an improvement to English common law and fit well with the frontier conditions in Texas. Texas was governed under the laws of Spain and Mexico until it gained its independence in 1836. The system of laws in the new Republic of Texas was mainly based on Anglo-American common law and was often modeled on the laws of the Southern states from which many Texans originated. One important element of that English system was trial by jury, although a person accused of a crime could not testify in their own defense until 1889.

Coastal Bend Chronicle: Disease and Illness in the Americas before Columbus

The cause of population decline among the indigenous inhabitants of the Americas after the coming of Christopher Columbus has long been attributed to the advent of the European epidemic diseases. These diseases were smallpox, influenza, measles, typhus, cholera, mumps, yellow fever, pneumonia, whooping cough, and tuberculosis, which were chronic in Europe and Asia. The combined impact of all these diseases was to cause the deaths of 80 to 90 percent of the indigenous American population within about 100 years. Estimates of the pre-Columbian population in the Americas are uncertain, but a number of 50 million is possible. By 1650, only about eight million were left.

Coastal Bend Chronicle: The Book that Saved the Lives of Settlers and Soldiers

Captain Randolph B. Marcy wrote the book, The Prairie Traveler, in 1859 and it became a bestseller for the rest of the century. It was written as a guide for the cavalry and the cross-country settlers headed overland to California, Oregon and Utah. Marcy was an explorer, a surveyor, a map maker and a military leader. His book distilled his decades of experience on the frontiers in the West and Northwest. The book was comprehensive, detailed, illustrated and easy to read, despite its 200 page length. The Prairie Traveler was authorized by the War Department and sold for one dollar. It was indispensable reading for any settler venturing by wagon train to the West Coast, as well as any military expedition dealing with the Indians.

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