The Battle Of The Medina - Texas Historical Markers on Waymarking.com

This Texas historical marker is a large gray granite marker placed here in 1936. It is at the intersection of US-281 and Martinez Losoya Rd/FM2537 in the south end of Bexar County.

In 1813, Mexico and the Texas state of Mexico were fighting to gain independence for Spain. The Royalist Army, composed of Spanish troops, was lead by General Joaquin de Arredondo had thousands of soldiers to this area to suppress and punish the rebels, known as the Republican Army. It is noteworthy to point out that a junior officer of the Royalist Army was the 19 year old soldier, Lieutenant Antonio Lopez de Santa Anna!

On August 13, 1813, the Royalist troops with 9 cannons and 1,800 troops fought hard against the Republican troops who had only 2 light cannons and 1,400 troops. The fight lasted four hours and in the end, only 100 Republican soldiers had survived. The others were either killed in battle or executed later by the Royalist. This battle ended, for now, the movement toward independence from Spain.

The Spanish Royalist soldiers were buried the next day. However, the dead Republican soldiers were left where they had fallen. It wasn't until 7 years had passed before the local government officials hired workers to gather the bones and bury those remains by an oak tree at the former battlefield.

It is interesting to note that Santa Anna was known to frequently leave the dead opponents on the battle field. Twenty-three years after this Battle of the Medina, Santa Anna was still leaving the opponent soldiers dead in the fields during the battles against General Sam Houston's army of the Republic of Texas.

Link to the Texas State Historical Association article:
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Marker Number: 12646 Marker Text: The Battle of the Medina was fought here on August 18, 1813 by an army of Spanish royalists commanded by General Jose Joaquin Arredondo which defeated with terrific slaughter the Republican Army of the North composed of Anglo-Americans, Mexicans and Indians commanded by Jose Alvarez de Toledo. Thus ended an attempt to free Texas and Mexico from Spanish rule. Erected by the State of Texas 1936

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Date Logged Log   09/11/2021 WayBetterFinder visited it