One day in Texas in 1859, a man named Juan Cortina happened to be passing by a coffee shop on his horse when he saw the Brownsville sheriff hitting a Mexican man over the head with his pistol. Cortina got off his horse and got into a standoff with the sheriff to defend the farmhand. Cortina ended up shooting the sheriff in the arm and rode away with the farmhand, who happened to be Cortina’s former worker.
This started what became known as the “Cortina Wars” between Mexican landowners and Anglo settlers in Texas. The Mexican landowners were outraged that the white people in the area were attempting to claim their land and Mexican laborers were tired of being discriminated against. So Cortina made his home into the headquarters for the resistance movement for a couple of years.
He was eventually defeated and forced to flee to Mexico City.
Most people have never heard of this “Rio Grande Robin Hood,” but for those who have, many remember him as a hero while others begrudge his violent tactics.
Featured image: Juan Cortina (DeGolyer Library, Southern Methodist University)
I LOVE how at the end Cortina is blamed. No señor. It was only the racists fault, not the victims’. Including Cortina
Thank you for the positive comment on my great-great grandfather, viva Cortina, viva Brownsville!
Yesterday I found out he’s my great great great great grandfather.
There is a song from Oscar Chavez that talks about this great man.
“Corrido de Juan Nepomuceno Cortina”
Palo Verday Los Angeles, California in 1920 to 1958. Remember stories about my families life in Palo Verday before Dodger Stadium. I was born in Palo Verday in little
House on edge of town. My grand mother used to plant corn, tomatoes and vegetables on the little front yard. Angelos called Palo Verday “Dog Town”. The LA City Council deeded Palo Verday to Walter Omally, owner of New York Dodgers. The excuse was their was very little property taxes collected.