In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:

the 49-mile march from Laredo to Ramireño in Zapata County, which my own company was to garrison, was something of a military idyll. After the first 15 or 20 miles the region was sparsely inhabited and with the border road a trail rather than a highway, shifting whenever ruts on an old route suggested another would be better. Now and then there was a gate through which to pass, marking the boundary of some great ranch. The second night’s camp was on a stream known as Dolores Creek, among eroded earth canyons. The coyotes howled about in an unbroken circle. The nights were clear and balmy and our camps were a sort of bivouac-de-luxe—each man unloading his cot from the company escort wagon and sleeping under the stars which in this section of Texas seem brighter than any place from which I have ever seen them. Yet, not so long before, some of the nights in this section had not been safe ones. At a little store and a few houses called La Perla, some distance south of Dolores Creek, there was a small detachment of troops, their camp surrounded by a wall of earth held in place by a brushwork revetment on each side. The proprietor of the store, a white American, wore a heavy revolver and a dirk, while a Winchester carbine hung on the wall just behind him as he stood at the counter. At San Ygnacio, further to the south, there was a long parapet about 3½ feet high with a one-foot trench behind it, guarding the front of the camp of the two companies of infantry and a troop of cavalry which formed its garrison. This defense had not been there on the night of 9 Ramireño Ramireño 107 June 14 when Luis de la Rosa and his bandits had attacked the 24 cavalrymen who had then formed the garrison of the place. Three of the cavalrymen were killed, some while sleeping on their bunks, we were told, and it might have gone badly for the rest except that a full troop, travelling down the river, had reached San Ygnacio that night after dark and encamped nearer the river. They entered the fight almost immediately as a surprise to the assailants, who fled forthwith, the Americans in pursuit. Some 15 of the raiders were killed and five captured. These latter, I knew were in jail at Laredo, and I believe were eventually hanged. Many of the houses in the town were bullet-marked. An old American doctor living there—the only non-Mexican American in the town, I think—described vividly to the first sergeant and I who visited him, the events of the night. He had been active in treating the wounded and was quite bitter against the local druggist who he said had barricaded his doors when the attack started and apparently had been most reluctant to open them again badly needed as his medical supplies were for the wounded.1 The border road swung away from the river at San Ygnacio, and late that afternoon, some six miles further on, my own company turned to the right down a side trail and after a mile or two came into the friendly Mexican village of Ramireño near the river bank. Ramireño had not been garrisoned previously and the placing of a garrison there now was said to have been at the request of the Ramirez family who owned the region about it and who were the employers of all who lived in the village. There were a good many cattle and horses, some of the latter very fine ones, and while the Ramirez family lived humbly enough in a vine-covered cottage, I have no doubt that they were people of considerable wealth who profitably might have been held for ransom. Isolated as it was, the place would have been an easy objective for a raid before it was garrisoned. The land beyond the river on the Mexican side also belonged to this family, as I recall it, but it was seldom used and I believe the cattle and horses from it had been brought to the American side—or perhaps stolen. I saw no signs of any activity over there except an occasional Mexican patrol. Our arrival that evening was something of an event. The whole male population turned out to greet us. They filed by our officers, each man shaking...

Share