APACHE JUNCTION AZ [IFS] -- "La Matanza" (The Massacre) was a period of sustained, state-sanctioned violence between approximately 1910 and 1920 in Texas, during which hundreds, potentially thousands, of ethnic Mexicans and Mexican Americans were killed by the Texas Rangers, vigilantes, and other U.S. law enforcement and military groups.
The term does not refer to a single event or a specific large group of Spaniards, but rather a series of massacres and lynchings across the Texas-Mexico borderlands. Key Details of La Matanza Period and Context: The violence occurred amid the Mexican Revolution and was fueled by anti-Mexican sentiment, racism, and fears sparked by the Plan of San Diego, a manifesto by Mexican rebels that called for an uprising and the taking of land from white populations in the U.S. Southwest.
Perpetrators: State law enforcement, primarily the Texas Rangers, played a central role, often operating with impunity and working alongside local white vigilantes and sometimes the U.S. Army. Victims: Victims were primarily ethnic Mexicans and Mexican Americans, including prominent landowners and innocent civilians, who were often denied due process, detained without cause, and executed.
The exact number of victims is impossible to know, as many murders went unreported and bodies were concealed, but estimates range from 300 to 5,000. Methods: The violence included lynchings and mass executions without trial.
An infamous example is the Porvenir Massacre of January 28, 1918, where Texas Rangers and local ranchers executed 15 unarmed Mexican American men and boys outside the village of Porvenir, then burned the village to the ground.
Aftermath: The violence and lawlessness prompted state representative José T. Canales to launch an investigation into the Texas Rangers' conduct in 1919. The investigation confirmed widespread atrocities and led to the reorganization and reduction in force of the Rangers, along with the implementation of higher recruiting standards.
No Rangers were prosecuted for the killings, though some were dismissed. This period is known to Mexicans in South Texas as the "Hora de Sangre" or "Hour of Blood," and many families fled to Mexico to escape the violence.
The historical events of La Matanza were not widely acknowledged for many decades but are now being recognized through historical markers and public history projects like Refusing to Forget.
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| When the Texas Rangers killed and covered up. |
LA MATANZA: The Century-Long Shadow of Texas’s “Hour of Blood”
By SDCNewsOne
South Texas [IFS] — In the desert wind of the Rio Grande Valley, families still lower their voices when the conversation turns to the years between 1910 and 1920 — a decade locals quietly call La Matanza, The Massacre. A period when lawmen sworn to protect the peace turned their guns on Mexican and Mexican American civilians, leaving an estimated 300 to 5,000 dead across the ranchlands of South Texas.
More than a century later, descendants of the victims say the bloodstains never fully washed away. They live with the legacy — and the quiet, institutional cover-up — of the Texas Rangers, the state’s most famous and least accountable police force.
This is the story of those killings, the men who ordered them, the few who tried to stop them, and the families who bear the weight today.
I. A Borderland on Fire (1910–1915)
To understand La Matanza, you have to understand the border in the 1910s.
The Plan of San Diego (1915)
A manifesto discovered in South Texas called for Mexican, Black, and Indigenous liberation fighters to reclaim land from Anglo settlers. Though historians now agree the Plan’s threat was wildly exaggerated — and maybe never meant to be carried out — Texas officials used it as justification for mass violence.
Enter the Texas Rangers.
II. “Shoot First, Investigate Never” — The Rangers’ Reign of Terror (1915–1919)
The Rangers of this era resembled a paramilitary force more than a law enforcement agency. They were overwhelmingly Anglo, often politically connected, and almost never prosecuted for wrongdoing.
Notable Figures in the Violence
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Capt. James Monroe Fox – Commanded Ranger Company B; known for mass detentions and summary executions.
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Capt. Henry Lee Ransom – Led operations in the Valley infamous for brutality; later linked to lynchings.
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Sgt. John “Big John” Littleton – Ranger often cited in witness accounts of unprovoked killings.
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Local vigilantes – Ranch hands, “home guards,” and deputized posses who acted alongside the Rangers.
According to testimonies later collected in the 1919 Canales Investigation, Rangers routinely:
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arrested Mexican-origin men without charges,
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shot them in the back and claimed they “tried to flee,”
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hung bodies from mesquite trees as “warnings,”
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buried victims in unmarked graves or left them for animals.
The U.S. Army, stationed along the border in 1915–1917, documented numerous murders — but their reports were buried or ignored.
III. The Most Infamous Atrocity: The Porvenir Massacre (January 28, 1918)
Just before dawn on January 28, 1918, Texas Rangers of Company B, U.S. cavalry soldiers, and local ranchers surrounded the small, mostly Mexican American village of Porvenir in Presidio County.
The victims included:
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Manuel Moralez, 47
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Pedro Herrera, 25
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Longino Flores, 20
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Santiago Jiménez, 16
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Roman Nieves, 72…and ten others whose families kept the names alive only through oral tradition.
Afterward, the Rangers burned the village.
IV. The Cover-Up (1918–1919)
When word of the mass killing reached Austin, state officials closed ranks.
But one man refused to be quiet:
José Tomás Canales
A state representative from Brownsville, Canales launched a formal investigation in January 1919, presenting 19 charges of torture, murder, illegal executions, and civil rights abuses by the Rangers.
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bodies dumped in wells,
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executions staged as shootouts,
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detentions without warrants,
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theft of land and livestock,
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whole families driven off their property.
The Rangers responded with intimidation. Canales received death threats. Rangers sat in the courtroom staring down witnesses.
V. What Became of the Killers
When the hearings ended, the Texas Legislature refused to prosecute a single Ranger.
But the political damage was too great to ignore. Reforms followed:
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The Ranger force was cut from 100+ men to 32.
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Recruitment standards were tightened.
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Several Rangers — including Capt. Fox — were dismissed, though not charged.
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The Ranger leadership was reorganized.
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Captain Henry Lee Ransom quietly resigned.
It was a massacre without legal consequence.
VI. The Families Who Survived — A Legacy Written in Silence
For Mexican American families across South Texas, the trauma of La Matanza became an inheritance.
The Porvenir families
Most fled to Mexico within days. Their descendants live across Chihuahua and Coahuila today, still telling the story of los quince. Some returned to Texas generations later — but never to Porvenir.
Other Valley families
And for nearly 100 years, the official Texas narrative erased the murders entirely.
VII. Breaking the Silence (2015–Present)
The modern reckoning began only recently.
2015 — Refusing to Forget Project
Historians like Monica Muñoz Martinez, John Morán González, and Benjamin Johnson launched an initiative to place historical markers and push for public acknowledgment.
2018 — Porvenir Massacre Marker Dedicated
A state historical marker was finally placed in Presidio County, 100 years after the killings.
2019–2021 — Scholarship Expands
Books, documentaries, and museum exhibits opened the era to public understanding for the first time.
2023 — Texas Rangers Heritage Center Controversy
Advocates protested the state’s portrayal of the Rangers as heroic while minimizing La Matanza.
The fight over memory continues.
VIII. A Century Later: What Justice Looks Like Now
It is:
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official acknowledgment from the state,
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recognition that the Ranger badge once symbolized terror for Mexican communities,
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preserving stories so families don’t vanish twice — once in body, once in memory.
IX. Epilogue: The Echoes in Modern Texas
La Matanza isn’t just history. It shaped:
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land ownership patterns,
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political power in the Valley,
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policing attitudes toward Latinos,
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and the myth — the carefully polished myth — of the Texas Rangers.
There is a reason the state spent a century burying these stories.
Because once you say their names — the names of the men killed in Porvenir, in Brownsville, in San Benito, in Kingsville — you have to say the other names too:
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