During its existence, the Commandancy General encompassed the provinces of New Navarre, New Biscay, The Californias, New Mexico, New Santander, New Kingdom of Leon, Coahuila (formerly New Extremadura) and Texas.

Due to objections from the viceroys of New Spain, Gálvez was unable to implement his plan during his time as visitador, but a few years after his return he was appointed Minister of the Indies.

It is assumed that my actual title delivers in your favor that you have given the jurisdiction and extensive powers that you need as governor and captain General of the mentioned provinces and all its borders, I declare, by this Code and Royal Decree, that in your higher command are to be understood and adjoined the Subaltern governments of Coahuila, Texas and New Mexico with its presidios and all other administrative divisions that are situated in the established line on them from the Gulf of California to the Bay of the Holy Spirit, according to my rules and actual instruction given on September 10, 1772, that you shall observe in the most timely and in the same way as I was committed to my viceroy of New Spain.

Arizpe was the headquarters of the experimentally created Intendency by Gálvez in 1770, which covered the government of Sonora and Sinaloa: With the purpose that you always fall into the faculties to visit or give appropriate orders to the most distant places of your government, you will establish the capital of your residence in the town of Arizpe, situated on the Sonora river and close to the frontier of that province, being almost equidistant from the Californias and Nueva Vizcaya; and of course you can stay at the house next to the church that produced expatriate missionaries, meantime in another building in the same town or wherever convenient.Teodoro de Croix arrived to Mexico City in December 1776 and from there he began his tenure as Captain general in February 1777, arriving at the city of Durango in September of the same year.

On May 21, 1785, the districts of Saltillo and Parras were separated from the province of Nueva Vizcaya (today states of Chihuahua and Durango) and were incorporated into Coahuila, which was confirmed by the Captain general on May 30, 1787.

[4] By instructions of the Real Audiencia of Guadalajara Colonel Jose Antonio Rengel Alcaraz y Paez temporarily succeeded in office Neve until 1786, when Jacobo de Ugarte y Loyola was appointed, the Spanish king decided that the Commandancy would remain under the jurisdiction of the viceroy Bernardo de Gálvez y Madrid, who was particularly interested in the northern border because he had been governor of the Spanish Louisiana.

On June 18, 1770, the Viceroy Croix appointed Pedro Antarctica as interim mayor of Sonora and operating the Intendency of Arizpe under subordination of the governor of Nueva Navarra until both administrative offices were unified in 1777, remaining Corbalán in these functions until 1787.

The viceroy was confirmed in all its powers, but had to leave the affairs of the Royal Treasury in the hands of a deputy superintendent of Real Property which depended on 11 provincial governors.

[8] By order of the Spanish King in March 1787 the viceroyal authority was restored to the General Captain and on December 3, 1787, the viceroy Manuel Antonio Flórez Maldonado divided it into two general headquarters separated by the Guanaval River, only as for military jurisdiction, because the intendencies retained their functions: In 1787 it was considered to create a real audiencia with jurisdiction over the Interior Provinces, but the project was not put into effect.

In 1790 Ugarte was replaced by Pedro Nava in the west, who in 1791 also served temporarily in the East after the resignation of Ugalde, until the position was occupied by Ramón de Castro y Gutierrez.

He and his troops loot the Arizpe's Royal office, then was totally defeated by Mayor Brigadier Alejo García Conde in San Ignacio Piaxtla on February 7, 1811, returning with the remains of his division to Jalisco.

In 1819, the Adams-Onís Treaty was ratified between Spain and the United States of America, which set the limit of the Interior Provinces with the latter country, confirming the Spanish possession from Texas and to the Oregon Territory and Nootka.

On August 4, 1821, insurgent Celestino Negrete began the siege of the city of Durango, which was defended by the governor intendant Diego García Conde and marshal José de la Cruz, ending with their decision on September 6.

While, in the Western Internal Provinces Captain General Alejo García Conde pact with Negrete and joined the Plan of Iguala proclaimed by Agustín de Iturbide, making him swear it in Chihuahua on August 26 and then in Arizpe on September, 6.

This was noted by the German scientist, geographer and explorer Alexander von Humboldt in his Essai politique sur le royaume de la Nouvelle-Espagne: This struggle with Indians, which has lasted for centuries, and the necessity in which the colonist, living in some lonely farm, or travelling through arid deserts, finds himself of perpetually watching after his own safety, and defending his flock, his home, his wife, and his children against incursions of wandering Indians; and, in short, that state of nature which subsists in the midst of the appearance of an ancient civilization, have all concurred to give to the character of the inhabitants of the north of New Spain an energy and temperament peculiar to themselves.

To these causes we must no doubt add the nature of the climate, which is temperate, an eminently salubrious atmosphere, the necessity of labour in a soil by no means rich or fertile, and the total want of Indians and slaves who might be employed by the whites for the sake of giving themselves up securely to idleness and sloth.

In the Provincias Internas the development of physical strength is favoured by a life of singular activity, which is for the most part passed on horseback.Some indigenous groups such as the Coahuiltecans of the northeast, disappeared by the mid-19th century because of displacement, disease and war against Spanish-Mexican settlers and Comanche attacks.

In 1792 the Commander General was put back in charge of a remnant Provincias Internas consisting of Sonora y Sinaloa, Nueva Vizcaya, Nuevo México, Coahuila y Tejas.