De León's Colony

Attracting new settlers to this area was part of an effort by the Mexican government to develop Coahuila y Tejas, which was sparsely populated.

Others were Stephen F. Austin, Green DeWitt, Haden Edwards, David G. Burnet, Lorenzo de Zavala and Sterling C. Robertson.

[2] In both 1807 and 1809, Martín de León petitioned the Spanish government in the Viceroyalty of New Spain for permission to colonize in this area.

[3] On April 13, 1824, prior to the 1824 Constitution of Mexico enactment on October 4, the provisional Mexican government approved a contract allowing De León to settle forty-one Mexican families on the lower Guadalupe and Lavaca rivers, in the vicinity of Coleto, Garcitas, Arenosa, and Zorillo (Placido) creeks.

A conflict arose when the Coahuila y Tejas state government granted an empresario contract to Green DeWitt on April 15, 1825.

The new government had not yet received notification of where De León had established his grant's settlement of Guadalupe Victoria, and included that area in DeWitt's contract.

[7] Martín De León died of cholera in 1833, during an epidemic that swept towns along many of North America's waterways.

Other empresarios granted colonization contracts under the Mexican government were Stephen F. Austin, Green DeWitt, Haden Edwards, David G. Burnet, Lorenzo de Zavala and Sterling C. Robertson.