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Civil War Trail Imperial Mexico Matamoros

Rio Grande Valley Civil War Trail College of Liberal Arts

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Imperial Mexico - Related Links

  • Benito Juarez
  • Matamoros
  • Mexico from 1846 to 1876
  • Mexico and the U.S. Civil War
  • Porfirio Díaz
  • The Franco-Austrian Invasion

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RGV- Civil War Program
The University of Texas Rio Grande Valley
1201 W. University Dr.
LAMR 1.103
Conference Room LAMR 1.104
Email: chaps@utrgv.edu
Phone: (956) 665-3231

Quick Links

CHAPS RGV Civil War “Cotton Times” Film Discovery Trails Sponsorship Opportunities Blue and Gray on the Border: The Rio Grande Valley Civil War Trail The Civil War on the Rio Grande, 1846–1876

Matamoros

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(also known as Izucar de Matamoros and Heroica Ciudad de Matamoros)

The city of Matamoros, home to some 490,000 people, lies on the south bank of the Rio Grande twenty miles from the Gulf of Mexico. The community was founded in 1774 by José de Escandon, who issued land grants to 113 families. Because of its proximity to the fertile lands along the Rio Grande and northeastern México, Matamoros grew steadily. By the late 1850s, about 40,000 people lived there. Among its residents were Mexicans with substantial land holdings, as well as several hundred Anglo merchants. These included Mifflin Kenedy, Richard King, and Charles Stillman, men who shaped the history of the river's north bank.

In the 1850s, the enormous commerce generated after the establishment of a free trade zone, and the presence of nearby Bagdad as a Confederate port, allowed Matamoros to prosper until the end of the U.S. Civil War. John Warren Hunter, who transported cotton to Matamoros, described it as a “great commercial center” filled with “ox trains, mule trains, and trains of Mexican carts, all laden with cotton coming from almost every town in Texas.” But the town’s population declined rapidly after the Civil War ended. By 1880, Matamoros' economy had stagnated, with barely 8,000 people remaining

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La ciudad de Matamoros alberga 490 000 habitantes, y se encuentra ubicada en la margen meridional del Río Grande, a veinte millas del mar y el Golfo de México. La población fue fundada en 1774 por José de Escandón, quien emitiera 113 concesiones de tierras. A causa de ubicación en la fértil cuenca del Río Grande y el noreste de México, la localidad creció de manera sostenida y para 1850 ya vivían en ella unas 40 000 personas. Entre sus residentes se incluían importantes terratenientes mexicanos así como diversos comerciantes anglosajones, como Mifflin Kenedy, Richard King y Charles Stillman, tres hombres que configurarían la historia de la ribera norte del río.

En la década de 1850, el gran tráfico comercial que se generó después del establecimiento de una zona franca en la frontera, así como la cercana ubicación de Bagdad como puerto confederado, alimentó la prosperidad de la ciudad hasta el final de la Guerra de Secesión estadounidense. John Warren Hunter, un comerciante de algodón, describió el lugar como «un gran núcleo comercial», lleno de «tiros de bueyes, mulas y carruajes mexicanos cargados del algodón procedente de casi cada ciudad y pueblo de Texas». Pero, después del final de la Guerra de Secesión, la población de la localidad disminuyó, y para 1880 la economía de la ciudad se encontraba asfixiada, y apenas 8 000 habitantes permanecían en el lugar.

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