Porvenir massacre on Texas border haunts descendants 100 years later

AUSTIN — It has been 100 years since 15 unarmed men and boys from a small border town south of Marfa were executed in the middle of night.

“Men were dragged from their beds, and, without having been given time to dress, were led away in their night clothes to the edge of the settlement, where they were shot to death by the posse,” reads an El Paso Morning Times article published on Feb. 8, 1918, almost two weeks after the massacre. “The bodies of the men were found the next day where they had fallen, riddled with bullets.”

They were killed after a group of Texas Rangers, U.S. Army cavalry soldiers and local ranchers descended on their village, Porvenir, seeking revenge for a deadly attack at a nearby ranch a month earlier — although there was no evidence tying the villagers to it.

Details of the massacre shed light on the daily realities of one of the most violent periods in Texas history. As bandits from Mexico led raids in Texas towns, law enforcement officers responded to growing fear by being openly violent towards people of Mexican descent.

The massacre was the subject of an investigation by the Texas Legislature, which resulted in a reorganization of the Rangers.

The perpetrators never faced criminal charges, but their actions still are felt 100 years later by the descendants of those who were killed.

These same descendants refuse to let the massacre fade from Texas’ collective memory, inspiring historians to unearth new details about Porvenir and what happened there.

While it is one of the most well-documented atrocities of this period in Texas history, details of the massacre have been shrouded in mystery for decades. Many federal government documents about the killing were classified and the state refused to publish transcripts of the investigation until the late 1970s.

Jerry Patterson, the former Texas land commissioner, helped organize an archaeological dig at the site in 2015, along with a handful of historians. He also is behind an effort to produce a documentary about the massacre.

“I consider myself an amateur historian,” he said. "I’m interested in Confederate history, Tejano history, Buffalo Soldier history — the chapters that are misunderstood, have bad information or nobody knows about.

"Porvenir is a chapter in Texas history that nobody knows about.”

Arlinda Valencia was at her father’s funeral in 1996 the first time she heard the name Porvenir.

Her family had gathered after the burial, telling stories about her father’s life and her family’s history.

One story stood out: that of her great-uncle, Juan Flores, who was 96 years old. He described his early childhood living on the border in a peaceful village, until one night in January when 15 men were slaughtered — including his father.

“We basically laughed, because he said the Texas Rangers had killed them,” the El Paso resident said. “We told him there was no way that would have happened, because the Rangers are a good organization.”

But Flores insisted: The Texas Rangers had killed his father.

So, Valencia and her sister started researching their genealogy. She discovered that her family had deep roots in South Texas, in a little-known town named Porvenir.

When they discovered an article on the Texas State Historical Association’s website about the massacre, they realized Flores was telling the truth.

Texas State Historical Association: The Porvenir Massacre

His father, Longino Flores, had been killed along with 14 other men from his small village. Valencia’s grandfather, Rosendo Mesa, was one of the few men who survived, because he had traveled to a neighboring town for supplies and spent the night there before returning home.

So, why hadn’t Juan Flores told his story? Valencia said he had tried to tell his family several years earlier, but they didn’t believe him.

“They thought he was crazy,” she said. “He suffered with that his whole life."

Mesa died without speaking of the massacre. Valencia’s father died without knowing the atrocities in his family’s past.

“Until 1996, no one in my family had spoken about it,” Valencia said. “Nobody knew until my sister and I heard about it, started researching and discovered the truth. Then we had to start finding the real truth, not what had been recorded in history books, which was far from the truth.”

The year was 1918 and Porvenir was a remote village on the banks of the Rio Grande in Presidio County.

Despite its proximity to Mexico and the revolution raging within that country’s borders, Porvenir was a peaceful settlement where 140 people of Mexican descent worked as farmers and raised livestock.

But violence had spilled over the border into other areas of the state, and there were near-constant reports of raids and brutality perpetrated by revolutionary troops or bandits.

More: Museum exhibit explores border's bloody past

As the violence grew, the United States sent troops to patrol the border and Texas leaders increased the presence of Rangers in the region.

“So, you have, from both the federal, state and local level, a call to police people who look like they’re bandits or Mexican revolutionaries,” said Monica Muñoz Martinez, a professor at Brown University who has studied this era of violence in West Texas. "It’s really this period of pervasive profiling.”

When raiders believed to be supporters of Mexican revolutionary Pancho Villa waged a deadly attack on the Brite Ranch in Presidio County, law enforcement looked for the bandits at nearby Porvenir.

More: 1923: Pancho Villa, Lived and died by the Pistol

While there was no evidence linking the villagers of Porvenir to the raid, 15 men and boys between the ages of 16 and 72 were killed in retaliation.

Ranger Capt. J.M. Fox, who led the company that came to Porvenir, offered a different explanation for the attack and said residents of the village fired upon his company when they approached.

As the 15 men were executed, the survivors fled, fearing more violence at the hands of law enforcement officers or vigilantes. Many crossed the river into Mexico.

Harry Warren, a local schoolmaster who wrote an account of the massacre, summarized the events:

“The quiet little village of Porvenir with its peaceful farms and happy homes was no more!” he wrote. “The Rangers and four cow-men made 42 orphans that night.”

Warren lived several miles away from Porvenir, but was notified of the massacre the following day by Juan Flores, who was 13-years-old, and another one of his students.

He returned to the village with the boys and discovered the bodies of the 15 victims. Warren recorded their names and details from the scene.

"He was a scholar and he was a very able historian," said Glenn Justice, a historian and author who has studied Porvenir since the 1980s. "He is probably the best contemporary source on the massacre."

Justice said Warren also was a licensed attorney and he eventually took depositions from many of the survivors.

The morning after the massacre, a survivor returned for the bodies, which were buried in a mass grave across the river in Pilares, Chihuahua, in Mexico.

In the days that followed, troopers returned to the scene of the massacre and burned the village to the ground.

Motivated in part by the destruction of Porvenir, state Rep. José T. “J.T.” Canales of Brownsville launched an investigation into the actions of Texas Rangers in 1918.

A select committee heard weeks of testimony from people who were victims or witnesses of violence at the hands of the Rangers. Detailed testimony from those hearings is now available online.

Texas State Library and Archives: The 1919 Ranger Investigation

As a result of the investigation, the size of the Texas Ranger forced was reduced significantly and new recruiting standards were implemented. The Legislature also established a better system for Texans to file complaints about potential misconduct.

No criminal charges were filed against the Rangers involved in the Porvenir massacre, but the company was later disbanded by Gov. William P. Hobby. The five rangers connected to the incident were dismissed.

In 1935, the state combined the Texas Rangers and the Texas Highway Patrol, creating the Texas Department of Public Safety.

A spokesman for the department said the massacre "has no relevance to the modern day/current Texas Rangers or to DPS."

Canales was the only Mexican-American lawmaker in the Legislature at the time, and he was threatened for his push to investigate the violence.

“His role and who he was is more important now than ever,” said his great-nephew, state Rep. Terry Canales, D-Edinburg. “Texas has come far, but not that far.”

Canales said he always heard stories about his great-uncle growing up and learned about the anti-Mexican violence that was rampant in the early 1900s.

“It gives me pride that I have that heritage and that history and I’m able to continue that fight,” Canales said. “The sad part is that this fight still exists.”

Canales said he “invoked the name of J.T.” once during last year’s legislative session, when the House debated a controversial law to ban so-called sanctuary cities.

Opponents of the law, largely Democrats, argued that it is discriminatory and could lead to racial profiling.

“The Porvenir massacre is an example of the worst type of oppression, the worst type of retaliation against somebody because they are minorities,” Canales said. “It’s a reminder of just how bad things can get and it’s a reminder to not let it happen again.”

For decades, little was known about this period of violence — especially of violence perpetrated by the Texas Rangers.

Many early accounts echo the stance of the Rangers: the residents of Porvenir were thieves and when officers approached the village, they were met by gunfire from the village’s residents.

Some residents were wearing clothing from the store at Brite Ranch, which led officers to suspect that they were responsible for the raid. Other accounts suggest that the residents of Porvenir, like people in neighboring communities, shopped there.

Today, the Texas State Library and Archives Commission website says the Rangers of that era "wrote a black chapter in the history of their organization."

Justice, the historian, said the massacre was misunderstood for so long because government officials wanted the truth to stay under wraps.

"This thing has been covered up very successfully for 100 years now,” he said. “I’m a careful historian, and there is no question that the massacre took place. The only thing now we don’t know is exactly who pulled the triggers that night."

Until recently, it was believed that the attack was carried out by the Texas Rangers and local ranchers with weapons. New evidence uncovered from the site by Justice and other historians revealed the presence of U.S. cavalry forces in the village, too.

Justice first discovered the site of the massacre with the help of Juan Flores, who had given an interview to a filmmaker at the request of his family, which had only recently discovered the truth about his childhood.

In 2015, Justice returned to the site with a group of historians and archaeologists — including Patterson. David Keller was the principle archaeological investigator on the project.

The group discovered bullet and cartridge casings belonging to weapons that were typically carried by the U.S. cavalry.

More: 'Obscurities' tells weird and wonderful Texas tales

“There’s enough ballistic evidence to make a court case about it,” Justice said.

Standing at the site of the massacre now, Patterson said it would be almost impossible to tell that a village stood there 100 years ago.

“There’s nothing there and it’s a very desolate area,” he said. “If you were in Mexico and you wanted to sneak into the U.S. and you’re standing on the south banks of the Rio Grande, when you wade across that shallow river and you’re standing on the U.S. side, you’re no better off than when you were standing in Mexico. There’s no place to go and the terrain is pretty unforgiving.”

Descendants of the men killed that January night in 1918 gathered at the Texas Capitol on Sunday to commemorate the 100th anniversary of the Porvenir massacre.

State Sen José Rodríguez, D-El Paso, presented Senate proclamations commemorating the massacre and a staff member with the Mexican American Legislative Caucus shared House resolutions with a similar message: Texans won't forget the massacre.

Valencia, who organized the centennial event, addressed the crowd and shared a saying she grew up hearing, that people die three deaths — the first when the body stops functioning, the second when the body is buried and the third when a person's name is said for the last time.

To remember those who were killed that night in Porvenir and keep them alive another day, Valencia read aloud all 15 names as descendants lit a candle in their honor.

Brandi Tobar, the great-great-granddaughter of Juan Flores' father, shared an original song with attendees.

"Porvenir, where 15 men died in cold blood," she sang. "Porvenir, a village of hope turned to dust."

Valencia said uncovering the truth about her family’s history has, in a way, resurrected the community of Porvenir, which was lost so long ago.

“We were all kind of lost and had gone our separate ways,” she said. “This has brought us together. I am now in contact with my relatives across the country, people I never knew before I started looking into this.”

Amanda Shields moved to Florida with her family in the late 1970s, putting more than 1,500 miles between them and the site of her great-grandfather’s death: Porvenir.

Her great-grandfather was Manuel Morales, who owned ranchland in Porvenir, as well as other property in the area. Her grandfather was young at the time and survived, along with several other siblings.

Unlike Valencia’s family, Shield’s family spoke frequently of the massacre. Her father grew up hearing about it from his grandmother, who survived the killing, and he was sure to share the story with his children.

“I don’t ever remember not knowing about it — this story has been a burden of my father's for a long time,” she said. “It was a horrific thing that happened and our family lost a great deal.”

More: Scholars: State admits Rangers' violent past

Shields and her father traveled to Texas in the 1980s to research the massacre and try to track down other descendants, but they were largely unsuccessful.

“Everywhere he turned, there was a closed door; there was no information. He kind of put it to rest back in the '80s, because of that.”

She said the recent archaeological discoveries at the site of the massacre and the new historical resources available online have given her father and her family closure and a chance to connect with other descendants.

“When you think about the relationships that our families had 100 years ago — if that tragedy had not happened, our families would still have been connected in one way or another,” she said. “There are bonds and friendships there that will be lifelong-lasting.”

Madlin Mekelburg is a reporter with the USA Today Network Austin Bureau; she may be reached at 512-479-6606; mmekelburg@elpasotimes.com; @madlinbmek on Twitter.