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Expedition reaches future site of San Antonio
On this day in 1709, an expedition led by Franciscan fathers Antonio de San Buenaventura y Olivares and Isidro Félix de Espinosa reached the site of what is now the city of San Antonio. They named the nearby springs San Pedro Springs and the river San Antonio de Padua. Olivares and Espinosa, escorted by Capt. Pedro de Aguirre and fourteen soldiers, had set out from San Juan Bautista on April 5, hoping to befriend the Tejas Indians on what is now the Colorado River. The expedition reached the Colorado on May 19, but discovered that the home of the Tejas was still three days' journey away. Because Aguirre's orders did not authorize them to proceed farther, and because they learned that the Tejas were not well disposed toward the Spanish, the expedition then returned to the Rio Grande.
- Links to Related Handbook of Texas Online Articles
- OLIVARES, ANTONIO DE SAN BUENAVENTURA Y
- ESPINOSA, ISIDRO FELIX DE
- AGUIRRE, PEDRO DE
- SAN ANTONIO, TX
- SAN ANTONIO RIVER
- SAN PEDRO SPRINGS
- SPANISH TEXAS
- Other Texas Day by Day Articles for This Date
- Millionaire Robert Mills, erstwhile "duke of Brazoria," dies (1888)
- First Knights of Columbus council in Texas established in El Paso (1902)
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