Doña Ana

The village was born of a flood. After the great Rio Grande flood of 1829, 116 residents of the El Paso district petitioned the Mexican government in 1839 for the unoccupied land called El Ancón de Doña Ana, and in the spring of 1843 fourteen of them risked the move. Doña Ana became the first permanent Hispano settlement in the Mesilla Valley. Its church was built in stages from 1852. When the land became American, sixty families crossed the river to stay in Mexico, and their new town, Mesilla, soon outgrew Doña Ana.

What the plaque says

Official Scenic Historic Marker Doña Ana (On the Camino Real) This site, named after the legendary woman Doña Ana, is first mentioned as a paraje along the Camino Real. Spanish rested near here as they retreated from New Mexico following the Pueblo Revolt of 1680. The community was founded in 1843 as the Doña Ana Bend Colony Grant. Today, both the village and the historic Catholic church, Nuestra Senora De Purificación, are on the National Register of Historic Places.

Where it stands

Worth the stop nearby

• Mesilla Plaza — 7.9 mi
  A plaza laid out in 1848 by people who meant to stay in Mexico, American six years later, a stage stop and Civil War headquarters, and scene of a deadly political riot in 1871.

More markers nearby

• Bartlett Garcia Continental Survey Point — steps away
• Shalam Colony, 1884-1901 — 0.9 mi
• Doña Ana (1604-1680) — 0.9 mi
• Rio Grande — 5.1 mi