Military Plaza

Contributed by Mariah Cavanaugh

The original name was “Plaza de Armas” which translates to “Military Plaza”

Military Plaza has been the site of much bloodshed over the centuries. San Antonians supported Mexican Independence war launched in 1810 by Father Miguel Hidalgo. In January of 1811 Las Casas, a retired militia captain led a group of army sergeants to stage a coup in San Antonio, Texas where they arrested the Spanish Governor of Texas, Manuel Maria de Salcedo. Manuel was able to convince a revolutionary soldier to let him go and six weeks later Governor Salcedo led a group of officers into Monclova, Mexico where Casas was captured and executed. His head was placed on a pole in Military Plaza as a warning to other revolutionaries.

In 1813, when San Antonians rose up to fight en masse for independence from Spain, they marched from Military Plaza to the Medina River so as not to endanger innocent civilians by staging a battle in town. The revolutionaries were massacred and those captured were marched back to Military Plaza where they were executed. In one day, San Antonio lost most of its adult male population, including leading citizens. This was the bloodiest day in San Antonio's history--not the Battle of the Alamo as commonly supposed.

· 1876 Barbed-wire salesman John Gates rented the plaza and constructed a corral to demonstrate the effectiveness of his new product, barbed wire. He filled the corral with Longhorn cattle and demonstrated their inability to escape. His demonstration was so successful it led to the opening of his company, American Steel and Wire. In the early 1900s he invested $20,000 in his friend’s Beaumont oil rig and named it the Texas company, which later came to be known as Texaco.

· Lore is a large popular part of the history of the Spanish Governor’s Palace (Comandancia). Perhaps one of the most haunted parts of the Governor’s Palace is the old, original patio near the rear of the building where the “Tree of Sorrows” is located. Before City Hall was built, the Comandancia was the site of municipal government. People were judged, tried and hanged here. It is alleged that 36 criminals were hung from the “Tree of Sorrows”

· The old City Hall building was dubbed the "bat cave" because of the number of bats that roosted in its eaves and walls. Construction of the new City Hall, right in the middle of Military Plaza put an end to San Antonio's signature open-air markets boasting such colorful characters as the Chile Queens who prepared flavorful tacos for the muleteers and cart-drivers and farmers selling their produce and handicrafts in the plaza. These characters were forced further west to what is known today as "Market Square."

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