Some of my favorite places I’ve visited are places that we spontaneously decided to stop at. In fact, it was by chance that we happened to pass through Goliad on our way back to our accommodations.
I had read a while back about Goliad and its history with the Alamo and the Texas Revolution, but I was not aware of the history you could walk among.
Presidio la Bahía was established in 1749 and is the site of the Goliad Massacre.
This tragic event occurred on Palm Sunday in March 1836 and is known as one of the bloodiest chapters in Texas’s fight for independence.
The beautiful church inside the fort, known as “Our Lady of Loreto,” has served both soldiers, Spanish settlers, and it is still used for worship today. It is the oldest building within the fort, having been in continuous use since its establishment in the 1700s. Interestingly, the first Texas Declaration of Independence was signed in the chapel in 1835, and it also served as a holding place for Fannin’s men before their massacre.
The Presidio La Bahía was one of the most fought-over sites in Texas. The longest siege in Texas military history occured at the Presidio.
The fort was originally built near Matagorda Bay in 1721 but was moved twice before being established in present-day Goliad.
The fort we see today is actually a reconstruction completed in the 1960s by the O’Connor Foundation to restore it to how it appeared in 1836.
Sources:
https://thc.texas.gov/state-historic-sites/presidio-la-bahia/presidio-la-bahia-history
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