Battle of Medina ... try it again

[pushback]

fyi to all.... just got this from Dan Arellano who has been searching for the site of the Battle of Medina in south San Antonio:






MEDIA ADVISORY Contact: Dan Arellano

July 13, 2009 512-826-7569



The “Battle of Medina,” Archeological Research



On Saturday July 18 volunteers will depart at 7:30 AM from the McDonalds-Shell station on the corner of loop 410 and Hi 281 south. Please note the change!! From there we will be led onto private property. This is a small place and we should be done by noon. This place is on Hi 16 and it faces the hiway about I mile south of 1604. The owner has found what he believes are human bones on his property that he insists they could be from the battle.



Please bring your lunch and water along with shovels and metal detectors. This is not a finder’s keeper’s event; all artifacts will be cataloged and photographed.



Over a thousand Tejanos were left out there to rot for over 9 years. Your help in finding them is truly appreciated. This will be the last dig until the fall.



For more information: Dan Arellano

darellano@austin.rr.com

512-826-7569


I guess I'll have to miss this hunt due to family duties. Been to all the others so far, so naturally this is the one that will probably hit paydirt. Good luck and bring lots of cold water. This is true relic hunting, open to all, and it's always a lot of hard-working fun.

 

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[Joe(TX)]

..........I went to the last one..............not enough time to take off from work .......since it is happening this Saturday........the hunt in June was really too hot for me.....probably almost got heat stroke..................Hope the BATTLESITE IS FINALLY FOUND.................if there is another hunt I will wait for cooler weather in the fall.....................IF ANYONE CAN GO......I would encourage you to go.........it is a great thing to be of a bigger group that is doing this to COMMENORATE THE BATTLE.....This is the largest battle site in Texas and it is sad that the original site has been lost for almost 200 years......GO AND BECOME A PART OF HISTORY IN THE MAKING......................HH.........Joe

 

[TexasDigger1]

Wish I could make this hunt but this doesn't give enough notice, can't change my plans, sure wish this had been planned out. Good luck to all that go. HH John

 

[Joe(TX)]

fyi to all.... just got this from Dan Arellano who has been searching for the site of the Battle of Medina in south San Antonio:






MEDIA ADVISORY Contact: Dan Arellano

July 13, 2009 512-826-7569



The “Battle of Medina,” Archeological Research



On Saturday July 18 volunteers will depart at 7:30 AM from the McDonalds-Shell station on the corner of loop 410 and Hi 281 south. Please note the change!! From there we will be led onto private property. This is a small place and we should be done by noon. This place is on Hi 16 and it faces the hiway about I mile south of 1604. The owner has found what he believes are human bones on his property that he insists they could be from the battle.



Please bring your lunch and water along with shovels and metal detectors. This is not a finder’s keeper’s event; all artifacts will be cataloged and photographed.



Over a thousand Tejanos were left out there to rot for over 9 years. Your help in finding them is truly appreciated. This will be the last dig until the fall.



For more information: Dan Arellano

darellano@austin.rr.com

512-826-7569


I guess I'll have to miss this hunt due to family duties. Been to all the others so far, so naturally this is the one that will probably hit paydirt. Good luck and bring lots of cold water. This is true relic hunting, open to all, and it's always a lot of hard-working fun...
..............Dan must have just found this new info (discovery of bones) very recently and is just eager to find the site!!.........i wish that more time was given........so I could have adjusted my plans.......But June was too hot.......July is going to be a Scorcher.............Due to work obligations plus my health...........I'll have to wait for the Autumn or Winter Hunt...........GOOD LUCK DAN.........HOPE You find it this time!!......................HH.............Joe

 

[Tin Nugget]

Dang, I am not sure I can make it but I am going to try.

 

[texan connection]

Post pics!

 

[MoSi]

Hello All,
Just joined Treasure Net. Some of you already know me like Texan Connection, 21stTnCav, Joe (Tx) and some other folks from our June dig in Losoya. Yesterday I attended my fourth Battle of Medina Dig. Have some pictures of our dig I would like to post as soon as I can figure out how to do it.

Moe

 

[texan connection]

Hey Moe I hope to see the pics soon did yall find anything?

 

[MoSi]

Good to hear from you Albert,
We found a few interesting things, but nothing significant to the battle. The present owner has a few bones that he showed us and other artifacts that he found. The original owner which already passed away claimed that his property was where the battle took place and what is really exciting is that he found a cannon ball and we weren't able to see it because hewas buried with it when died. The place also has a giant oak tree that if it could talk would probably tell us alot. I found what appears to be hole in the tree that made my detector sound off but we could not retrieve what was inside cause it was too deep and we didn't want to tear up the tree anymore.

Moe

 

[texan connection]

Was the sight further south than originaly hunted?

 

[pegleglooker]

bump

 

[MoSi]

Was the sight further south than originaly hunted?

The sight was a few miles further south from the Site we hunted in January 2008.

 

[texan connection]

Thats what Im thinking also. Great avitar. enjoy the forum

 

[MoSi]

Here are the pics from Saturday's dig.

Pic 16 ---land owners' previous finds---could be part of human rib bone, and part of an old botte.


Pic 17---land owners' previous finds--rib bone, chalice,weighing scale,bone fragments, spoon with U.S. printed on it.


Pic 18----Giant old oak tree and remains of a house.---Spent over an hour unearthing objects, tabs, nails etc. Dan and I spent half hour carefully diging out what turned out to be a Tonka truck almost two feet deep.


Pic 19---Some artifacts owner had previously found--some interesting rocks, a large bowie type knife, hatchet, spikes, bone fragments, and an arrow head found by his grandaughter.


Pic 20---I found this old iron buried by a mesquite tree. These irons were heated by placing them on wood stoves or wood heaters.


Pic 21---Looks like a door from bbq barrel.


Pic 22---Found this fork that has U.S. and medical corps insignia.



Pic 23---Some of our combined finds for the day.


Pic 24---Some of our finds including a scorpion encased in resin.

 

[texan connection]

cool finds, And thanks for working on the pictures thing. I hope to be there next time my own reasherch seems to indicate further south than the medina river. I hope to be there next time Albert

 

[Joe(TX)]

..........MoSi......Where is the picture of the Tonka Truck??.......LOL.......Sorry that I missed out but notice was so short that I did not have time to change my plans........Tell Dan to do the next hunt in October or November.....and give us at least a month to make arrangements......THANKS.....Joe

 

[MoSi]

..........MoSi......Where is the picture of the Tonka Truck??.......LOL.......Sorry that I missed out but notice was so short that I did not have time to change my plans........Tell Dan to do the next hunt in October or November.....and give us at least a month to make arrangements......THANKS.....Joe

Joe--Good to hear from you again. Hope you are over your near heat stroke. We were so tired of careful digging that after we took it out I forgot to take a pic of it. The truck was about a foot long and yellow in color. Maybe some kid buried it hoping to come back and dig it up years later. Anyway I left it for him by the tree.

This dig was kind of an emergency. The present land owner had previously heard about the Battle of Medina and that the deceased orginal land owner had found a cannon ball and was so proud of it, that he was buried with it upon his death.

He found out through the internet that Dan has been looking for the battle site for years, so he called Dan and told him about the bones he had found and the big oak tree that he has on his property.

Dan called me and told me about this info. He was trying to get a local group together. We just couldn't wait for cooler weather. So we were six of us and we were eager to start detecting heat or no heat. It was very hot but we kept going, drinking water, taking breaks in the shade. I think we should try again, maybe next time we will have better luck, you never know what you will unearth.

I guess now we will probably have to wait for cooler weather and hope you make it to the next one. We are having a memorial to the battle in August at the Losoya church grounds and we are hoping we can get more landowners to invite us to their properties.

Moe

 

[OldSowBreath]

Hello to all. I've been doing extensive research regarding the battle, and I'd like to thank TNet for introducing me to the subject. I've gone back and read the original sources (Arredondo's battle report, etc.) and probably looked at well over 70 old Texas maps, back to the 1700's (to ascertain the old royal roads). A couple of things I would like to note:

There is no doubt in my mind that the battle occured on the south side of the Medina River. Every report puts it south; though I did see one report that hinted it was on the north side.

Looking at an 1823 map of Texas, which I found in the Texas Room of the Houston Public Library, at a point about 20 miles south of San Antonio and on the Old Laredo Road are the words, very faint, "Toledo .... (probably the word "defeated" in Spanish). Toledo commanded the rebel army. This wording appears also on later Texas maps. An 1850 report says that Arredondo had his army situated on the old royal road in a >, with the point situated in the road and the open end facing San Antonio.

According to Arredondo's report, the Royalists fired over 900 cannon rounds. Any battlefield is also going to be covered in musket rounds as the battle lasted for hours.

In modern times, a body was found during road construction that had a grape-shot round lodged in the neck vertebrae. One of the rebel leaders was said to be killed from a cannon shot in the neck. I found in an old San Antonio newspaper article that this body was found on Blue Wing Road, south of San Antonio. Remember, that rebels fled toward the Medina and back into San Antonio, and probably used the Loysola and Garza crossings, and one other. Survivors were hunted down and killed all the way to the Medina, into San Antonio, and beyond.

The battle, according to history, actually occured in a huge stand of oaks. North and East of the town of Poteet you will find fields of oaks, which is very strange for that landscape. Several weeks ago, I made a driving tour, just to look over the land. I saw those majestic oaks, and got the willies, thinking, "this is where it started". My car almost got bogged down in fine sand on county roads, which is what the armies had to contend with at the time of the battle while trying to move artillery that was sinking beneath their feet.

I have other information. I realize as I type this that I left my main file at home, so some of this is from memory. I would love to hear from anyone with an interest; especially anyone that would be good at getting landowners' permission. I have several places picked out on Google Earth. Look north and east of Poteet, Texas for these huge fields of oak. They are just inside the Atascosa County line.

I actually saw several oaks that were about three times the trunk size of the one in the picture above. I'm willing to bet that these are witness trees.

Again, I would love to share info with anyone interested. I really feel that we are close. I'd love to do a fall hunt, but am open to options. Thanks again.

 

[Marc]

Welcome to TNet OldSowBreath.....

I have to say I have been a bit out of touch on this subject... but after some recent reads... I wonder if the battle wasn't quite a bit farther east that I previously thought. S - SE of Bexar....

The (albeit brief) history of Bexar is SO rich.

I will try to add more soon.... I will need to dig up my latest research...

 

[MoSi]

OldSowBreath-----That's great info. I suggest you contact Dan Arellano at 512-826-7569. ----He is the person leading this effort and I'm sure he would like to hear the info you have uncovered.
Moe