De León Plaza

Victoria was founded as a Mexican town. On April 8, 1824, Martín De León, a rancher from Nuevo Santander who had already driven herds to New Orleans, petitioned to settle forty-one Mexican families on the lower Guadalupe, and the grant came through five days later. He named the town Nuestra Señora de Guadalupe de Jesús Victoria, for Mexico's first president. His son-in-law José M. J. Carbajal platted it, and the main street was the Calle de los Diez Amigos, for the ten principal citizens charged with the colony's welfare, De León, his sons Fernando and Silvestre and his sons-in-law among them. It was the only predominantly Mexican colony in Texas, though Irish families under John J. Linn and a few Anglos joined it. De León's cattle carried what the Handbook calls the first brand in Texas.

The family backed the Texas cause in 1835-36 with horses, cattle and provisions, and Urrea's army arrested Fernando and Silvestre as traitors. After San Jacinto it did them no good. Agapito De León was murdered by Mabry Gray, who was rustling De León cattle; Fernando was wounded; and the De León, Benavides and Carbajal families fled for their lives to Louisiana, leaving their land and herds. Patricia de la Garza De León came back years later to recover the property and largely failed.

Plácido Benavides's fortified Round Top House near the plaza sheltered the town in the Comanche raid of 1840. The De Leóns are honored with markers in Evergreen Cemetery.