With Sam Houston in Texas / A Boy Volunteer in the Texas Struggles for Independence, When in the Years 1835-1836 the Texas Colonists Threw Off the Unjust Rule of Mexico, and by Heroic Deeds Established, Under the Guidance of the Bluff Sam Houston, Their Own Free Republic Which To-day is the Great Lone Star State

by Edwin L. Sabin

1691—Don Domingo Teran de los Rios appointed first Spanish governor of the provinces of Coahuila and Texas.

1714—Captain Louis Juchereau de Saint-Denis is sent from the French post at Mobile into Texas, to report upon colonizing it.

1716—The Spanish captain, Domingo Ramon, and party of sixty-four men and women, are sent to locate missions and colonies in East Texas and oppose the French, who have advanced to the Red River.

1718—The Spanish presidio of San Antonio de Bejar (Bexar), the site of the storied town, is founded. Here arises also the mission San Antonio de Valero, predecessor to the famous Alamo.

1720–1722—Other missions and forts are established, along the Sabine River, the Spanish frontier in Texas.

1721—The French claim to the Sabine River, from the east. Captain Bernard de la Harpe is ordered to reoccupy Fort St. Louis at Matagorda Bay. The landing party are driven off by Indians.

1722–1762—The French out-posts along the Red River and the Spanish out-posts along the Sabine River are separated by only some twenty miles; but the Spanish hold Texas.

1744—The mission later known as the Alamo is rebuilt at San Antonio.

1762—France cedes to Spain all the Province of Louisiana as presumed to be the country from the Mississippi River to the Rio Grande River and the Rocky Mountains. Under Spanish and Mexican rule for virtually seventy-five years, Texas progresses little except through the efforts of American settlers.