El Quartel (El Cuartel)

San Antonio, TX

This memorial in San Antonio is dedicated to all the men and women wounded across the nation's wars. Rather than singling out one conflict, it gathers the sacrifice of the injured from every generation of American service into a single tribute. San Antonio, long a garrison city with deep military ties, is a fitting home for such a remembrance.

San Antonio, TX

Built in 1734 for prominent Bexar citizens Geronimo and Javiera Cantu de la Garza, this block-long Spanish colonial compound had limestone walls three feet thick and lush gardens. Generations later, José Antonio de la Garza used its vault to safeguard merchants' valuables and, granted royal permission in 1818, minted the small coins called 'jolas'—making the home likely the first mint in Texas. During the 1835 Siege of Bexar, Ben Milam's troops battled two days to seize the fortress-like compound as their headquarters, and Milam died taking the city.

San Antonio, TX

This marker honors a Vermont-born soldier who served in the army of the Republic of Texas from 1836 to 1837, the perilous first years of Texas independence. Like many volunteers who came from the Northern states, he stayed on after the fighting, and he lived in Texas until his death in 1876.

San Antonio, TX

In the autumn of 1835, as the Texas Revolution opened, Texan volunteers—Anglo and Tejano alike—besieged the Centralist garrison at San Antonio de Bexar. On November 26, scout Erastus "Deaf" Smith spotted an approaching Mexican pack train rumored to carry silver payroll, and a sharp skirmish erupted near the creek junctions west of town. When the captured animals were unloaded, the packs held not treasure but fodder grass, giving the clash its wry name and setting the stage for the storming of Bexar weeks later.