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Full Description
A richly detailed history of daily life for colonial Spanish soldiers surviving on the eighteenth-century Texas Gulf Coast.
In 1775, Spanish King Carlos III ordered the capture of American pelicans for his wildlife park in Madrid. The command went to the only Spanish fort on the Texas coast-Presidio Nuestra SeÑora de Loreto de la BahÍa in present-day Goliad. But the overworked soldiers stationed at the fort had little interest indulging a king an ocean away. Their days were consumed with guarding their community against powerful Indigenous peoples and managing the demands of frontier life. The royal order went ignored.
Wrangling Pelicans brings to life the world of Presidio La BahÍa's Hispano soldiers, whose duties ranged from heated warfare to high-stakes diplomacy, while their leisure pursuits included courtship, card playing, and cockfighting. It highlights the lives of presidio women and reveals the ways the Spanish legal system was used by and against the soldiers as they continually negotiated their roles within the empire and their community. Although they were agents of the Spanish crown, soldiers at times defied their king and even their captain as they found ways to assert their autonomy. Offering a fresh perspective on colonial Texas, Wrangling Pelicans recreates the complexities of life at the empire's edge, where survival mattered more than royal decrees.
Contents
List of Maps and Figures
Introduction
Chapter 1. Perspiring Walls and Incessant Insects: Environment and Education
Chapter 2. Strangling La BahÍa: Supply Lines and Smuggling
Chapter 3. The Work Seldom Ceases: Duties and Defense
Chapter 4. A Poultice of Lion Fat Fomentations: Manpower and Medicine
Chapter 5. A Most Dangerous and Desirable Profession: Desertion and Death
Chapter 6. La BahÍa Vice: Cockfighting and Card Playing
Chapter 7. How Best to Retrieve Stolen Horses: Diplomacy and Disobedience
Chapter 8. Suffocating under Animal Skins: Insubordination and Incarceration
Chapter 9. SeÑora TreviÑo: Courtship and Conjugality
Epilogue
Acknowledgments
Notes
Index
