In 1854 he served as brigadier general in the volunteer Mounted Militia of New Mexico (Territory) formed for the purpose of protecting communities against Native American attacks.

The land was originally applied for in 1794 as one of the genízaros community grants being established on frontiers for the purpose of buffering larger towns, such as Santa Fé, against raids.

Following a period of about 20 years of development to meet the grant requirements, individual parcels of land were allotted by don Pedro Bautista Pino in the name of Governor Fernando Chacón's verbal order of March 12, 1803.

This vicinity of the Pecos River valley was a long time meeting place for trade between the Plains and Pueblo tribes, a passage through the Sangre de Cristo Mountains for the Pueblo Indians of the Rio Grande valley to access the plains for buffalo hunting, as well as passage for the later Spanish explorers, frontier traders, buffalo hunters, Indian fighters, the Santa Fe Trail, Civil War armies, and later still for the Atchison, Topeka and Santa Fe Railway portion of a southern route of a transcontinental railroad system.

[5] San Miguel del Vado was an early frontier outpost serving to protect larger cities such as Santa Fé from marauding Plains Indians.

A customs house and soldiers stationed in the area also served to prevent smuggling and tax evasion related to trade along the Santa Fé Trail.

Gallegos was married to Josefa Gutierres, at an age four months shy of his 16th birthday, on November 18, 1843, at San Miguel del Bado Church by the Father José Francisco Leyba.

The 1860 Census for San Miguel County indicates a family of four children at that date: Ladislado, Bernabe, Maria Viviana and Juan de Dios.

Eleven years after Jose Guadalupe's death, railway work crews struggled to build the line between La Junta and Raton, and the first Santa Fe train entered New Mexico December 7, 1878.

According to Ralph Twitchell, "without exception, in the days of construction of the Santa Fe railway into the Southwest, there was no town which harbored a more disreputable gang of gamblers, desperadoes, and outlaws than did Las Vegas.

Notice was served upon every 'undesirable' to leave forthwith and in this manner the town was rid of as desperate a gang of cutthroats and "bad men" as ever congregated in one place in the Southwest.

...Although the subject of the By Laws was not referred to the Committee, it has drawn up a number, to facilitate the organization of the Society which are herewith submitted and unanimously recommended."

The Act to Incorporate the Historical Society of New Mexico[13] was passed February 2, 1860, and signed by José G. Gallegos as Territorial Legislature Council President.

Other members were appointed to sections Geography, Indian Races, Geology and Mineralogy, Antiquities and Collections, Natural History, Agriculture, Statistics, Botany, Biography, Meteorology and Climatology.

Your manhood calls upon you to be on the alert and to be vigilant in the protection of the soil of your birth, where repose the sacred remains of your ancestors and which was left by them as a rich heritage to you, if you have the valor to defend it.

On August 26, 1861, Gallegos was commissioned as a staff and field colonel in charge of the Third Regiment (1,000 men), New Mexico Volunteers, in the Army of the United States.

The Department of New Mexico, which at this time included the Territory of Arizona, had the most officers of Hispanic descent, serving in nineteen units of the Union army.

At least one company of dragoons, detached from the garrison at Fort Union, was kept posted at Hatch's Ranch to protect that area and scout south and east for Indians and Texans who might threaten the settlements.

Colonel, and Manuel Baca of Socorro and Joseph Cumming of Santa Fe as Majors, the Hatch's Ranch assignment was described: "...instructing the Commanding Officer to keep his scouts constantly in the field and to extend their operations to the Canadian and Red River on the East and down the Pecos far enough to give timely warning of the approach of troops from either quarter.

As originally organized it was composed of fourteen companies, several of them mounted, which were mustered into the U. S. service at Fort Union and Albuquerque, from August 30 to October 10, 1861, for six months.

Seven companies of the 3rd, under command of Lieutenant-Colonel Valdez, were stationed at Fort Craig, forming part of the force concentrated at that post to oppose the further advance of Sibley's Texan brigade.

Nonprofessional troops, as opposed to regulars or professional army soldiers, were recruited by both sides in the Civil War for a specific purpose, such as Sibley's campaign, and for a set period of time.

José Guadalupe Gallegos, Simon Delgado and Miguel E. Pino, and that in making this manifesto, our sentiments demonstrate the esteem that we had for our noble countrymen, now deceased, for their brilliant careers in our age, for their lives, principally upon maturing into men, which were such that it is not possible that we pass in silence, without doing full justice to their memories.

Resolved in addition: That we empathize with the grief and sentiments of every person in the families and relationships of our illustrious deceased, and our regards, truly feeling with our purest hearts, the loss as faithful husbands, as tender parents, and as such honorable brothers.

Resolved in addition: That we reverently bow to the dispassion of the supreme being, regulator of the universe, whose designs are incomprehensible to men, and call upon him, to receive into his mansion, the souls of our....