History of Galveston, Texas - Exploration and Settlement

Exploration and Settlement

Galveston Island was originally inhabited by members of the Karankawa and Akokisa tribes who used the name "Auia" for the island. The Spanish explorer Juan de Grijalva, who found the island in 1518, is generally thought to have been the first European to have discovered the island. Soon afterward Cabeza de Vaca and his crew were shipwrecked on the island (or nearby) in November 1528, calling it "Isla de Malhado" ("Isle of Doom"), and there began his famous trek to Mexico. Various Spanish explorers charting the region referred to the island as "Isla Blanca" ("White Island") and later "Isla de Aranjuez" ("Aranjuez Island"). In 1685 French explorer La Salle named the island "San Louis" ("Saint Louis") and the name became fixed for some time.

The earliest known map of the island and the bay was made by French explorer Bénard de La Harpe in 1721 who left the island unnamed but named the bay "Port François." In 1785 Spanish explorer José de Evia, during his own charting of the Gulf Coast, referred to the island as "San Luis" and the bay as "Bahía de Galveztowm" ("Galveztowm Bay"), in honor of Bernardo de Gálvez y Madrid, Count of Gálvez. The name San Luis for the island continued to be used by the Spanish and the Mexicans (and later even by Stephen F. Austin's colony).

The first permanent European settlements on the island were constructed around 1816 by the pirate Louis-Michel Aury as a base of operations to support Mexico's rebellion against Spain. In 1817, Aury returned from an unsuccessful raid against Spain to find the island occupied by the pirate Jean Lafitte, who took up residence there after having been driven from his stronghold in Barataria Bay off the coast of New Orleans, Louisiana. Lafitte organized the island's settlement into a pirate "kingdom" he called "Campeche", anointing himself the "head of government." Lafitte remained at Campeche until 1821 when he and his raiders were given an ultimatum by the United States Navy: leave or be destroyed. Lafitte burned his settlement to the ground and sailed under cover of night for parts unknown.

Following its successful revolution from Spain, the Congress of Mexico issued a proclamation on October 17, 1825, establishing the Port of Galveston, and in 1830 erected a customs house. During the Texas Revolution, Galveston served as the main port for the Texas Navy. Galveston also served as the capital of the Republic of Texas when in 1836 interim president David G. Burnet relocated his government there. In 1836, Michel Branamour Menard, a native of Canada, along with several associates purchased 4,605 acres (18.64 km2) of land for $50,000 from the Austin Colony to found the town that would become the modern city of Galveston. Menard and his associates began selling plots on April 20, 1838. In 1839, the City of Galveston adopted a charter and was incorporated by the Congress of the Republic of Texas. By this time the name "San Luis" for the island had been abandoned and "Galveston" had become the island's exlusive name.

The city of Galveston became important in the slave trade establishing itself as the largest slave market west of New Orleans. Census records from 1860 show a population of 1178 slaves (and two free blacks) compared to 6000 free persons living in the city. The proportion of slaves, however, was somewhat less than the rest of Texas. Tensions over slavery in the U.S. as a whole eventually led to the American Civil War, which Texas joined on the side of the Confederacy. The Battle of Galveston was fought in Galveston Bay and island on January 1, 1863, when Confederate forces under Major General John B. Magruder attacked and expelled occupying Union troops from the city, which remained in Confederate hands for the duration of the war. In May 1865, the Lark successfully evaded the Union blockade off of Galveston Harbor and headed for Havana, becoming the final Confederate ship to slip through the blockade from any Southern port. In the late 1890s, the Fort Crockett defenses and coastal artillery batteries were constructed in Galveston and along the Bolivar Roads.

Juneteenth, which is the oldest nationally celebrated commemoration of the ending of slavery in the United States, owes its origins to the announcement of the Emancipation Proclamation upon the return of Union forces to Galveston in 1865. Galveston was the first city in Texas to provide a secondary school and public library for African Americans.