Bexar County, Texas Genealogy

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History
The villa of San Fernando de Bexar was the first municipality in the Spanish province of Texas in 1731. In 1772 the seat of the government of Spanish Texas moved to Bexar. The original county was divided into 128 additional counties.

Parent County
1836--Bexar County was created on 17 March 1836 from Old Mexican Municipality. County seat: San Antonio

From the Texas Handbook: The first Europeans to explore the region came with an expedition in 1691 led by Domingo Terán de los Ríos and Fray Damián Massanet,qqv who evidently reached the San Antonio River near where San Juan Capistrano Mission was later founded. Nearby they found a group of Payayas living on the riverbank. The Indians, as Massanet recorded in his diary, called the place Yanaguana; he, however, renamed the site San Antonio de Padua to celebrate the memorial day of St. Anthony, June 13. The next group of Spanish explorers, an expedition led by two Franciscans,qv fathers Antonio de San Buenaventura y Olivares and Isidro Félix de Espinosa, and a military officer, Pedro de Aguirre,qqv did not reach the area until April 1709. Much impressed by the setting and the availability of water, they noted that the area might make a promising site for future settlement. In 1714 Louis Juchereau de St. Denisqv crossed the region on his way to San Juan Bautista.qv Espinosa again visited the site in 1716 on his way to East Texas with the expedition of Domingo Ramónqv and this time recommended San Pedro Springsqv as a mission site. Near that spot, in May 1718, Martín de Alarcónqv led the expedition that founded San Antonio de Valero Mission and San Antonio de Béxar (or Béjar) Presidio, named for Viceroy Balthasar Manuel de Zúñiga y Guzmán Sotomayor y Sarmiento, second son of the duke of Bexar.

Neighboring Counties

 * Atascosa
 * Bandera
 * Comal
 * Guadalupe
 * Kendall
 * Medina
 * Wilson

Web Sites

 * USGenWeb project. May have maps, name indexes, history or other information for this county. Select the state, then the county.
 * Family History Library Catalog