Cenizo Journal Spring 2016 | Page 16

P ORVENIR M ASSACRE ARCHAEOLOGY by Glenn Justice. Photos by Jessica Lutz. O Archeologist Sam Cason uses a metal detector to locate bullet fragments across the volcanic dike against which the men were murdered. ne January night in 1918, a mass murder took place in far northwest Presidio County. It happened not far from a tiny, little- known village called Porvenir. In Spanish, Porvenir means future; how- ever, there was no future for some 140 Mexicans living in the place, who sub- sisted by farming and raising goats, sheep, and a few cattle and horses. They occupied crude huts known as 16 Cenizo jacales, constructed with stone or adobe walls and thatched roofs of ocotillo. While some were U.S. citizens, many of the residents of Porvenir came to Texas to escape the terrible civil war that consumed Mexico during those years. Beginning in 1910 and lasting for a decade, the Mexican Revolution creat- ed havoc across Chihuahua as well as along the Texas border. On May 5, Second Quarter 2016 1916, a group of bandits attacked Glenn Springs, Texas, located in today’s Big Bend National Park. The raiders killed three troopers of the Fourteenth Cavalry and a four-year- old boy and set Glenn Springs ablaze. Then on Christmas Day, 1917, about 45 raiders thought to be Villistas attacked the Brite Ranch in western Presidio County. They looted the Brite store and hung mailman Mickey Welch from the rafters before cutting his throat to make sure they had killed him. These acts spread terror among Big Bend residents. Large numbers of peo- ple left their homes on the border, seek- ing safety in Marfa and other West Texas towns. There were heated demands for retaliation. Something had to be done. Sadly, these demands for vengeance developed into reality