Refusing to Forget

Refusing to Forget members are @ccarmona.bsky.social, Juan Carmona, John Morán González, Sonia Hernández, @benjaminhjohns1.bsky.social, @leahlao.bsky.social, Monica Muñoz Martínez and @alacranita.bsky.social, another co-founder is @gonzalest956.bsky.social. /13

Refusing to Forget (@refusing2forget.bsky.social) An award-winning public history project committed to sharing the history of state-sanctioned violence against Mexicans and Mexican Americans in Texas.

This thread is a part of the #OTD in Ranger history campaign that refusing2forget.bsky.social is running this year. Follow this handle or refusingtoforget.org/ranger-bicentennial-project/ and visit our website refusingtoforget.org to learn more. /12

Revolution in Texas A gripping narrative about a dramatic episode in the history of the American West—and a major contribution to our understanding of the origins of Mexican A...

Information for this thread comes from yalebooks.yale.edu/book/9780300... and www.hup.harvard.edu/catalog.php?... and www.lynchingintexas.org/items/show/354. /11

Matanza of 1915 - Refusing to Forget From summer through late fall of 1915, Texas Rangers indiscriminately shot and killed dozens of Mexicans without questioning, solely based on the assumption

In October of 2017, a state historical marker commemorating the victims of La Matanza, petitioned for by @refusing2forget.bsky.social, was placed near the site of Muñoz' murder, referenced in @benjaminhjohns1.bsky.social's speech. /10 refusingtoforget.org/historical-m...

“the greatest danger immediately,” wrote a S. Texas Justice Department source to his supervisor in Washington, D.C. several weeks later, “is in controlling ourselves.” The worse of the violence of the 1910s would soon descend on the valley. /9

Moreover, Muñoz’ murder was endorsed by local Anglo leaders; the Lyford Courant endorsed the killing, arguing that “Lynch law is never a pleasant thing to contemplate, but it is not to be denied that it is sometimes the only means of administering justice.” /8

Canales also argued that after this incident, “every person who was charged with crime refused to be arrested, because they did not believe that the officers of the law would give them the protection guaranteed to them by the Constitution and the laws of this State.” /7

J.T. Canales’ description of the Muñoz lynching. Canales hearings, p. 858-9

During hearings about the Rangers four years later, Rep. J.T. Canales cited Muñoz’s killing as an example of egregious Ranger conduct, and alleged that Hinojosa acted “in concert with certain citizens, among them some leading citizens not only of San Benito but of Harlingen." /6

“A photograph taken in 2020 of Texas Ranger Museum display of a photograph of Daniel Hinojosa and Hinojosa’s Ranger commission.”

In 1918 Hinojosa rejoined the Ranger Force, serving until his dismissal in February 1919 as Canales went public with his charges against the force. Hinojosa has been featured in Texas Ranger Museum displays honoring Hispanic Rangers, with no mention of his misdeeds. /5

The next day, travelers on the San Benito-Brownsville road saw his mutilated corpse hanging from a tree. Local authorities did not seek to identify the assailants, or to hold Carr and Hinojosa accountable for their dereliction of duty. /4

William Morrison’s description of the supposed abduction of Muñoz from the custody of Carr and Hinojosa. Canales Hearings, p. 27-8.

Hinojosa and Carr, as they later admitted, removed Muñoz from San Benito’s jail at 10:00 that evening, with the stated purpose of taking him to the Cameron County jail in Brownsville, 22 miles away. They claimed armed masked men stopped them on the road and seized Muñoz. /3

Austin American Statesman, July 29, 1915. From Lynching in Texas project, https://www.lynchingintexas.org/items/show/354

Muñoz, whose names are given as “Rudolfo” or “Muñiz” in some sources, had been arrested under suspicion of robbery, and there were also rumors that he had attempted to rape a young girl. /2

Daniel Hinojosa. https://www.tshaonline.org/handbook/entries/hinojosa-daniel

#OTD in 1915, Adolfo Muñoz was tortured, riddled with bullets, and hung from a mesquite tree two miles south of San Benito after mysteriously disappearing from the custody of deputy sheriff Frank Carr and former and future Ranger Daniel Hinojosa. /1 www.tshaonline.org/handbook/ent...

Refusing to Forget members are @ccarmona.bsky.social, Juan Carmona, John Morán González, Sonia Hernández, @benjaminhjohns1.bsky.social, @leahlao.bsky.social, Monica Muñoz Martínez and @alacranita.bsky.social, another co-founder is @gonzalest956.bsky.social. /23

Refusing to Forget (@refusing2forget.bsky.social) An award-winning public history project committed to sharing the history of state-sanctioned violence against Mexicans and Mexican Americans in Texas.

This thread is a part of the #OTD in Ranger history campaign that refusing2forget.bsky.social is running this year. Follow this handle or refusingtoforget.org/ranger-bicentennial-project/ and visit our website refusingtoforget.org to learn more. /22

The Texas Rangers were enlisted to protect the powerful and the wealthy in Texas from ordinary people, creating not the landscape of the self-made man, but of an economic elite. /21

Range war - Wikipedia

The “fence-cutting wars” can also be understood as historically a part of the “Range Wars” of the Southwest more broadly, which situates them as the ongoing project of settling land by way of often brutally violent means. /20 en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Range_war

The “fence-cutting wars” continued, albeit in different forms, until the implementation of the Taylor Grazing Act 1932. But the 1880s had solidified the policing of Texas’ private property regime both materially and culturally in Texas. /19

The militarized strategy was quite quickly reeled in by the governor. /18

https://www.texasranger.org/texas-ranger-museum/hall-of-fame/ira-aten/

And so we return to the year 1888, when Ira Aten attempted to introduce mines into these operations. Given this background, it would be difficult to read this as anything other than upping-the-ante in a failing mission to protect the property of powerful land-owners. /17

It is unclear if there was a “battle” between the Rangers and the fence cutters, or if the fence-cutters, here named Amos Roberts and Jim Lovell, were shot as they ran away. /16

The Texas Rangers were asked to serve as infiltrators into the lives of primarily property-less ranchers. Rangers with Company F, including Ira Aten, were documented as ambushing fence cutters in Brownwood, Texas. Two men were killed in this operation. /15

By 1886, the Rangers campaign was still not particularly effective. Even so, King Ranch, which had been paying for protection by hiring private detectives to find individual perpetrators, revived its undercover operations but now with the help of the Rangers. /14

https://www.hmdb.org/m.asp?m=95987

This did not stop the Rangers from intimidating fence-cutters by other means. For example, they are documented as violently ambushing fence cutters on G.B. Greer's land during this time, killing one. /13

Even as Texas Rangers attempted to apprehend fence cutters, it was difficult for them to secure jail time for cutting wires. Legislation from Austin was not being applied evenly. /12

The Texas Rangers, as a policing force that could be manipulated by a few for the benefit of a few, was charged with eradicating fence destruction across the state, in part because local police were either ambivalent on the issue, or even supported fence cutters. /11

Andrew Graybill writes in Policing the Plains that with this “Austin had demonstrated its resolve to protect private property and to defend an industry of unquestioned economic value to the state.” (140). /10 a.co/d/gWPzXoU

By 1883, the Texan government was being lobbied by powerful ranchers, like from King Ranch, to call in the Texas Rangers to deal with the fence-cutters, and in 1884 it passed new fence-cutting legislation. /9

https://king-ranch.com/about-us/history/timeline/

Powerful property owners, sometimes called Cattle Kings, held sway in Texan government and asked for greater protection against this “nuisance”. /8

For many, their livelihood depended on these prior agreements. As quickly as property owners mounted these fences, they also started to notice that their fences were being cut to maintain the use of old grazing pathways. /7