Batesville, Texas

Batesville is on the Leona River at the intersection of U.S. Highway 57 and Farm Road 117, fifteen miles east of La Pryor in northeast Zavala County. The first settlers in the area were ranchers Mont Woodward in the mid-1860s and the Bates family around 1869. By 1870 the Bates brothers, Elijah, Felix, and Finis, had developed a large ranch in the area; it spawned the development of a small community known as Bates Ranch. Elijah Anderson Bates chartered the Comanche Irrigation Company in 1876 in partnership with his two brothers to develop the region's first irrigation project on two sections of land granted to them by the state of Texas. To comply with provisions of the state-subsidized project Bates proceeded to dam the Leona River and channel its water through a canal system to over 500 acres of farmland. The Bates brothers sold the irrigated area in two-acre plots. The farm complex matured as a community and was thereafter known as Bates Ditch. With the organization of Zavala County in 1884, Bates Ditch became the county seat, and its name changed to Batesville. The Zavala county courthouse was built in Batesville in 1884 from bricks made of Leona River soil on land donated by Elijah Bates. It was the county's first rock structure and became the social center for the surrounding area. The same year a post office was established in the community. Throughout the 1880s residents of Batesville joined with those of Loma Vista for camp meetings at the Leona River; these early summer religious meetings were the social event of the year. By 1892 Batesville had an estimated 500 inhabitants, three churches, a gristmill, and three general stores. In 1897 the community had two schools, three teachers, and a student body of sixty-one; by 1908 Batesville's three schools had an enrollment of 130 and four teachers. In 1914 the community had Baptist, Christian, and Methodist Episcopal (South) churches, telephone connections, and a weekly newspaper, the Herald . The Holmes Hotel, built on the southwest side of the courthouse plaza, burned down in 1915. Although Crystal City became the Zavala county seat in 1927, Batesville remained a trading center for the northeastern part of the county. Aggressive water-well drilling into the Leona gravel by a Mr. O'Keefe and the subsequent clearing of over 500 acres for irrigation south of the city ushered in large-scale farming. By 1933 Batesville had an estimated population of 200 and four businesses. In the late 1930s the population was two-thirds Anglo and one-third Hispanic. Immediately after World War II the community installed electricity and developed an even larger irrigation system. In 1947 it had six businesses and an estimated population of 200. Neglect in maintaining the dam and canal system throughout the 1950s and a period of extreme drought until late in the decade led to the expiration of the Comanche Irrigation District Charter in 1959. In 1963 Batesville had 250 inhabitants and thirty businesses. Over the next decade, though, it lost over one-third of its population and nearly half its businesses. Local tradition indicates that political and racial tensions in Crystal City in the 1960s helped fuel a modest population increase in Batesville ( see CRYSTAL CITY REVOLTS ). By 1988 Batesville had an estimated population of 200 and twelve businesses, three churches, and a school; numerous cafes and service stations were located on the frontage road for U.S. Highway 57 on the north edge of town. The community continued to revolve around its circular town plaza and its adjacent post office in 1990, when the population was 1,313. In 2000 the populaton fell to 1,298.

Edward Dixon Westfall, early settler of Zavala County and Texas Ranger, was born on December 22, 1820, in Knox County, Indiana. His father, Abraham, moved the family to Jasper County, Illinois, in 1841. Edward Westfall left Illinois in 1843 to go to Missouri, intending to join a wagon train to Oregon. Instead he traveled and held various jobs until he came to Texas in 1845. Westfall moved from Hopkins County, Texas, to San Antonio in 1845 or 1846. The Mexican War had broken out, and he joined the company of Capt. John Conner in Col. Peter Hansbrough Bell 's regiment. Later he served in Capt. William G. Crump's company. After the war in 1848 Westfall built a cabin on the Leona River, seven miles south of the site of present-day Batesville in east central Zavala County. Westfall is believed to be the first settler in the area of Zavala County. He spent the next twenty-nine years in that vicinity, farming under the constant threat of Indian raids and serving as a guide for settlers, rangers, and soldiers with his good friends William A. A. (Bigfoot) Wallace and Henry Robinson. He was a stage guard when Wallace had the contract to carry mail to El Paso. When Wallace was commissioned by Governor Bell to raise a company of rangers for frontier defense, Westfall was one of his lieutenants. Westfall returned to his cabin after his service under Wallace sometime in 1855 and was severely wounded in an Indian attack; his dog "George Washington" died of a lance wound defending his master. During the Civil War Westfall moved his livestock to the Nueces Canyon near Camp Wood; in 1874 he moved to Bexar County, where he farmed on Calaveras Creek about sixteen miles from San Antonio. Westfall moved back to San Antonio in 1877. He married Josephine Susan Dillon in 1881. Westfall's journals, which he kept from 1886 to his death in 1897, reveal that he was a man who loved to read, although he had little formal education. When he died of fever on June 12, 1897, he left his estate to his wife and stipulated that after her death it was to be applied to the establishment of a free public library in San Antonio, or if one were already established, it was to be used for improving existing service. By the time Mrs. Westfall died, on January 4, 1940, San Antonio had a public library system, and in June 1963 the Westfall Branch Library, built partially with the proceeds from Westfall's estate and partially from city funds, was opened. Both Westfall and his wife were buried at Elmendorf. The journals of Edward Dixon Westfall were on repository in the San Antonio Public Library in 1990.

William Davis Kincaid, founder of the Kincaid Ranch, learned the cattle business as a young man in West Texas. In 1905 Kincaid brought his family to land he purchased southeast of Uvalde, in Uvalde and Zavala Counties. Before his death in 1914, Kincaid served as President of the Unvalde National Bank and the Uvalde School Board. In 1927, his wife and children built the Kincaid Hotel at the intersection of North and Getty Streets in Uvalde in his honor. During the area's ranching heyday, the hotel served as the business hub and social center of the Uvalde area, and ranchers from Texas and surrounding states often made "The Kincaid" their area headquarters. (2008)

Zavala County was created in 1858 from Maverick and Uvalde counties. Named for Lorenzo de Zavala, a veteran of the Battle of San Jacinto, the county was not organized for judicial purposes until 1884. In that year citizens elected county officials and selected Batesville as the county seat. Batesville originally was known as the Bates Ditch community or Bates City. Elijah A. and Ellen J. Bates are credited with its founding. They came to the area in the late 1860s and became a prominent ranching family. Bates, who is credited with the first irrigation project in the area, began selling two-acre plots of the irrigated farmland, and a settlement grew up near his home. After the selection of Batesville as the Zavala County Seat, Bates conveyed a portion of his land for use as a courthouse square. The first county courthouse and jail were constructed at this site in 1885. Built of burnt bricks made from Leona River soil, the two story courthouse featured offices downstairs and a courtroom upstairs. The structure was used as the county courthouse until 1928, when the seat of government was moved to Crystal City. The old courthouse then was used for a variety of purposes until it was torn down in 1947. (1984)

Mujeres Por La Raza, the women's caucus within the Raza Unida Party , represented the merging of Chicano nationalism and Chicana feminism and advanced the political interests of Chicanas during the Chicano movement. Its development corresponded with the rise of the Chicana feminist movement in Texas. Women had belonged to the Raza Unida Party from its beginning at the county level with Ciudadanos Unidos in Zavala County in 1969. The group elected Luz Gutiérrez as its first Raza Unida county chair in January 1970. At the founding state convention in October 1971 in San Antonio, thirty-one of 104 attendees were women, and Evey Chapa helped write the party platform, which asserted the significance of La Mujer , La Familia, and equality for women. That the platform provided for a state executive committeewoman and for equal rights for women should probably be attributed to Chapa. Several women-in addition to the state committeewoman-held leadership positions at the Texas and national levels of the Raza Unida Party. Virginia Múzquiz, who ran for the Texas legislature in 1964, served as Raza Unida Party national chair from 1972 to 1974, and María Elena Martínez was the last Texas chair (1976–78). Nevertheless, sexism permeated the organization, and most of the Raza Unida Party's leaders and candidates were male. Even while women fought for inclusion in the party leadership, some men in Raza Unida considered women "groupies" or hangers-on. However, women in the Raza Unida Party believed that since local organizing efforts were carried out by women, they should assume leadership roles. Consequently, in 1973 women decided to form the Mujeres Por La Raza caucus to obtain leadership positions for women in the Raza Unida Party and to elect Chicanas to office. Raza Unida Party activist Ines Hernández Tovar has credited Ino Alvárez, Evey Chapa, and Marta Cotera as founders of Mujeres. Mujeres largely organized through Conferencias de Mujeres Por La Raza Unida. They held conferences on August 4, 1973, in San Antonio; on September 19, 1973, in Corpus Christi; and on December 1, 1973, in Crystal City. The first conference referred to itself as "la primera conferencia politica/educativa de Chicanas Activas en el Movimiento Pro-Raza Unida en Tejas." The conference program was in Spanish. Organizers included Chelo Avila, Evey Chapa, and Irma Mireles (San Antonio); Marta Cotera (Crystal City); and Juana Bustamante y Luera (Laredo). Sessions included "State and Local Political Structure"; "How to Organize in Rural, Semi-Rural Communities"; and "How to Organize in Urban Areas." María L. de Hernández , an orator since the 1930s, facilitated one workshop. Attendees passed a resolution condemning the use of public funds for the Texas Ranger Hall of Fame . Apparently at the same event they also passed a resolution against "unwarranted acts of violence and death at the hands of law enforcement agents," a reference to the death of Santos Rodríguez , a Dallas youth killed by the police. On September 19, 1973, Mujeres sponsored a conference at Lorenzo De Zavala Elementary School in Corpus Christi to "help educate the Mexican American women in the local community and surrounding areas in religious, political, and educational involvement." Topics included "Consciousness and Women's Development"; women in education; community organizing; and how to run a campaign. Múzquiz, Zavala county chair at the time, was a speaker. Mujeres also organized in their own localities. They could be found in San Antonio, Austin, Houston, Dallas, Laredo, Corpus Christi, and the rural and semi-rural communities of Crystal City, Temple, and Mercedes. High school and university students were also involved. La Delegación de Mujeres del Colegio Jacinto Treviño presented resolutions in support of the Farah strike , the National Farm Workers Union, and the right to bear arms in self-defense. Mujeres also battled racism and classism among Anglo women. They obtained the Texas Women's Poli

Community established along waterway of Leona Irrigation and Agricultural Association, formed in 1874 by Greenville and W. B. Bowles, A. B. Dillard, Charles T. Rose, A. J. Spencer, and T. E. Taylor. Irrigation produced rich crops; many families settled here. A schoolhouse doubled as church and community center. Settlers gathered in from a large area for dances, weddings and other festivities-- often prolonged. In 1894 flood ruined the farms, and people moved away-- many to Uvalde, to become substantial citizens there. Only a cemetery remains (1 mi. W) of "Ditch" settlement. 1970