En la Ciudad de Leona Vicario a los cinco dias del mes de Mayo, de mil ochosientos treinta y dos anos : ante mi el ciudadano Juan Gonzales, Regidor del Y. Ayuntam'to de esta Ciudad y alcade sgundo en turno, en ella y su jurisdiccion por infermedad del propietario que autuo por receptoria a falta de escribano que no lo hay en el termino de la ley y testugoes instrumentales que al fin se nominaran; parecieron presentes los ciudadanos Lic Jose Maria de Aguirre, Tomas Vega y Rafael Aguirre ... otorgan que dan y confieren todo su poder tanto cuanto se requiera ye en derecho sea necesario a Don Samuel May Williams ... para que a nombre de los otorgantes y en representacion de sus propias personas, derechos y acciones, tan luego como lo permita la ley de colonizacion de veinte cuatro de Marzo, de ochosientos vienticinco ...
A power of attorney document granting Samuel May Williams power of attorney to represent three Mexican landowners, Jose Maria de Aguirre, Rafael Aguirre, and Tomas de la Vega in Texas, in selling their eleven-league grants they received from the Mexican government as permitted under the law of March...
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| Other Authors: | , |
| Format: | Book |
| Language: | Spanish |
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[Leona Vicario] :
[Ayuntamiento],
[1832]
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| Subjects: |
| Summary: | A power of attorney document granting Samuel May Williams power of attorney to represent three Mexican landowners, Jose Maria de Aguirre, Rafael Aguirre, and Tomas de la Vega in Texas, in selling their eleven-league grants they received from the Mexican government as permitted under the law of March 24, 1825. The document is signed in ink, "Identificado Maceo Garcia Ramos," perhaps a clerk or notary public in the governmental office at Saltillo, the capital of Coahuila y Tejas. The document identifies the place of execution of the document as "Leona Vicario," which was the official name for Saltillo between 1827 and 1831. |
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| Item Description: | Title from first lines of text. Following the Mexican government's reworking of the Colonization Law of Coahuila and Texas in April 1832, Americans were barred from attaining empresario status in Texas. Tracts of land measuring eleven leagues were thereafter available for purchase by wealthy Mexican ranchers and speculators. Some of these Mexican speculators bought or obtained eleven-league grants from Mexico and then re- sold them to Anglo-American land developers such as Stephen F. Austin or his right-hand man Samuel May Williams. Austin and Williams had for a long time held a virtual monopoly on land acquisition in central Texas, and they tried to retain their position by buying eleven-league plots from Mexican speculators whenever possible. The tracts of land relevant to the current document, belonging to the Aguirre brothers and Tomas Vega, were situated along the Brazos River near modern-day Waco. The Vega tract would later become the source of a controversial legal battle. After Austin's arrest in Mexico City in 1833, Williams sold the Vega grant to Austin's cousin, Sophia St. John for $2,500. When the tract was re-sold in the 1840s, a dispute arose after Vega claimed he had never given Williams permission to sell the land and that the power of attorney supposedly signed by Vega was a forgery. Vega admitted that he and the Aguirres granted Williams permission to mark off their eleven-league tracts, but he denied ever giving Williams the power to sell the land. The Cushing Library/Chapman Texas Collection copy is part of the Floyd & Louise Chapman Texas & Borderlands Collection. |
| Physical Description: | 1 sheet ; 22 x 29 cm |