Juan N Seguin Research Paper

Barbers Hill Middle School North
Juan N Seguin's story
Reed Spurlock
Mrs. Mcdonald 7th grade

Reed Spurlock
Barbers Hill Middle School North
Mrs. Mcdonald 7th grade
Juan N Seguin story
“Did you know that Juan N Seguin was a Texas Senator, Mayor, Judge, and Justice of the Peace? Seguin was born in 1806 into a long-established tejano family in San Antonio. After Mexico won independence from Spain in 1821, Stephen Austin a friend of Seguín’s father received Mexican approval to found settlements of English-speaking people in the Mexican territory of Texas. Seguín and his father, convinced that Spanish-Mexican unrest and Mexican governmental interference were contributing to

economic upheaval in Texas, sided with Austin in his subsequent quest for autonomy for the region. Seguín became active in local politics, and he was elected alderman in San Antonio in 1829 and became that city’s mayor in 1833. Political tensions escalated between the Mexican government and both the Anglos (European-descended American settlers or European immigrants) and Tejanos in Texas, and both groups objected to Mexican Pres. Antonio López de Santa Anna’s harsh regime.Few details of his early life are known, but he became a harsh liberal critic of Santa Anna's centralization of authority in Mexico in the 1830's. Seguin's father had been a strong political ally of Stephen F. Austin, and Seguin himself played an active role in the Texas revolution. The Mexican government hardly welcomed Seguin with open arms.in 1890.
One of two sons born to an established San Antonio couple, Juan José María Erasmo Seguín and his wife, María Josefa Becerra, Seguín was largely self-educated.

When he was 19 he married María Gertrudis Flores de Abrego, who came from a leading San Antonio ranching family. Seguín became mayor of San Antonio in 1833. Seguín's father was an ally of Stephen Austin, and Seguín actively opposed increasing centralization of authority by the Mexican government.In 1835, Seguín led a band of other Texans of Mexican ancestry, known as Tejanos, against Mexican troops. Seguín was at the Alamo the following year but had slipped out to seek reinforcements, so he was not killed when the fort fell to. His was the only Tejano unit to fight with Sam Houston at the battle of San Jacinto, which was a decisive Texan victory. Later, Seguín was the only Tejano to serve in the Senate of the Texan Republic. In 1840 he was again elected San Antonio mayor and became embroiled in worsening tensions between Tejanos and English-speaking Texans. In 1842 Seguín helped defeat a Mexican incursion against San Antonio. In an effort to discredit Seguín, the Mexican commander claimed Seguín was a loyal Mexican subject. Opponents also used Seguín's business correspondence with Mexico in attempts to prove his disloyalty.Most remember him as a Texas army captain who opposed the centralist, anti-states-rights policies of Mexican Gen. Antonio López de Santa Anna and was dispatched from San Antonio for reinforcements for the Alamo in the days before it fell. Finding none, Seguín organized a company of soldiers that was the only Tejano unit to fight at the Battle of San

Jacinto.
Upon his arrival in Nuevo Laredo in 1842, the authorities arrested him and offered him a choice between serving in the army or extended imprisonment. He chose to join the army, and fought in the Mexican-American war against the United States. After the war Seguin received permission to return to Texas, and did so, but in 1867 continued harassment again prompted his return to Mexico. He died in Nuevo Laredo, just across the Rio Grande from the land for whose independence he had fought, in 1890. We will never forget when he went back and buried the mexicans after San Jacinto battle.”