Tip of the Texas Holocaust

Production note: this entry was originally written in mid-December 2007; I was waiting to post it until I had received permission from people mentioned in it. One of these permission-giving emails got waylaid by an overeager spam-detector. So, a little belatedly, here is a post marking the experience of researching the histories of indigenous peoples in the region of the Rio Grande delta.

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It's probably too soon to speak of the research I'm doing on South Texas history; perspective is often something found in the rearview mirror, rather than in the midst of an experience. But this blog is an attempt to document the process of writing the dissertation, and right now this process really hurts. I want to try to get at why, and something of what that means.

Most of the histories I have found -- whether written from Anglo or Latino/a perspectives -- begin with Spanish contact and conquest. I have not read one yet that has been seriously critical of the impact of that contact and conquest on the indigenous peoples, except for David Stannard's American Holocaust, which is written not just about South Texas but about the impact of contact, conquest and colonization on North and South America.

Let's start with a couple of basic findings. Tens of millions of people lived in the Americas before European contact. Within a few generations after initial contact, virtually every population experienced a 90 to 98 percent drop in numbers. In effect, one in twenty native people was left standing; over 100 million people died. Much of this decimation was due to the diseases inadvertently brought by the conquerors, to which indigenous American people had no resistance; but it would be disingenuous to shrug our shoulders over this inadvertency and ignore the brutal and deliberate murders, enslavement and exploitation perpetrated against the indigenous peoples.

Spanish and Anglo priests and preachers declared both disease and deliberate depredation God's will, clearing the path for those who would make better use of the land.

In many cases, disease dramatically reduced population numbers before conquistadors or colonists ever arrived in an area; this appears to have been the case in South Texas.

Archaeological findings show evidence of peoples living, hunting, gathering, farming and trading through the region for thousands of years before European contact. The earliest population counts in the Rio Grande river delta area are based on Spanish reports and indicate a population of at 15-19,000 around 1740; given the abundant food sources, this is probably low, and may indicate a population already reduced by disease. Given the likelihood of infection, sickness and deaths triggered by the first Spanish visits in 1521, and current estimates of 90-98% population crashes after initial contact, the delta population may have been as high as 300,000 pre-contact.

In any case, subsequent figures in later years are always lower, showing that the net result of Spanish contact was negative: figures for the region drop to 2,000 in 1772, 800 in 1773, 650 in 1798.

It is important to remember that these dropping numbers mean people dying and communities being dismembered, communities of individual human beings who are sickened, murdered, enslaved, and rendered hopeless by violence, rape and captivity.

I want to stop and remember these people, before moving so quickly into the Spanish and Mexican and Texan histories of this region.

The archaeological record shows the people of the Rio Grande delta trading with other peoples as far south as what is today central Mexico and with people as far north as present-day Wyoming. But what do shell beads and obsidian points tell us about people? I wonder about the women in particular: what stories did they tell? who and what was holy to them? how did they dance? when did they sing? how did they like their fish cooked?

I can move into a meditation of remembrance. The only part of South Texas where my recollections remotely match the pristine conditions of pre-contact Rio Grande delta area is South Padre Island. I can remember mornings on the island, watching the sun come up over sandy green surf, turning the water and sand gold, with no buildings in sight and only crying gulls for company. I can go into that memory, and let vision rise.

In this vision, far up the beach a band of people is walking away from me; the thin edges of a walking song comes along the wind to where I sit, watching. They begin to disappear, one by one, as though erased by a mirage on the horizon. But the disappearance is no mirage; I hold each vanishing figure in my heart as long as I can, straining to hear the song of life.

As I grieve what has been lost, in a devastated landscape and decimated peoplescape, I am helped to remember that not all American Indians are gone, and that mythologizing a living people is just another form of romantic oppression. It is important to see who and what is, today.

I am fortunate to witness the work of American Indians such as Peggy Larney, working in Dallas schools and churches and activist groups; to have been challenged by the words and wisdom of theologian Andrea Smith (Cherokee); to have been inspired by the leadership of Harley Eagle (Lakota). In a recent email, Harley commented on his own learnings about the history of South Texas and its indigenous peoples: "A people with a direct, spiritual relationship to the land, with a language that held the secrets and mimicked the rhythms of the land and the importance of relationships to all things is no more. That is what breaks my heart along with all the atrocities you mentioned."

It hurts to let the historical truths pass through, searing one's heart and mind. But these truths, too, will set us free. Let us open our eyes to see the dreams of justice alive before us today, for which we can all work.