Webb County
Laredo, Webb County, Texas
Marker Inscription
Formed from Nueces county; created January 28, 1848, organized March 16, 1848. Named in honor of James Webb, 1792 - 1856, attorney general and secretary of state of the Republic of Texas 1838-1841. Laredo, the county seat founded in 1755 by Tomas Sanchez.
Erected by Texas Historical Commission
The Story
Webb County was carved from Nueces County and created in January 1848, organized weeks later that March. It was named for James Webb, who served the Republic of Texas as attorney general and secretary of state before statehood. Its seat, Laredo, was already nearly a century old, founded in 1755 by Tomás Sánchez.
Why it matters
The county's 1848 birth marks the moment the newly annexed Texas borderland was being organized into the American governmental map, atop settlements far older than the United States itself.
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Related people
- · James Webb
- · Tomás Sánchez
Themes & tags
Nearby & related markers
Bruni Plaza
Laredo, TX
When Governor Juan Fernando de Palacios elevated Laredo to the status of a villa in 1767, he followed the Spanish colonial tradition of laying out the town around a central plaza. Such plazas were the beating heart of frontier settlements in New Spain, serving as marketplace, gathering place, and civic stage. This square has anchored Laredo's public life since the era of Spanish colonization on the northern edge of the empire.
The Ramón Family
Laredo, TX
The Ramón family's roots in Laredo reach back to the closing years of Spanish rule, when patriarch Ildefonso Ramón had settled in the area by 1800 and went on to serve repeated terms as alcalde, the town's chief magistrate. By 1869 the family held residential property on this site, having lived through the transitions from Spanish to Mexican to Texan and American governance. Their long tenure threads through much of Laredo's early civic history.
Benavides-Herrera House
Laredo, TX
Built about 1879 in Laredo's San Agustín district, this house is a fine surviving example of the region's vernacular Mexican architecture. Rancher Natividad Herrera raised it for his wife, Ester Benavides de Herrera, daughter of the noted local figure Captain Refugio Benavides. Its adobe-and-stone lines root the family firmly in the Tejano ranching society that shaped early Laredo.
Republic of the Rio Grande
Laredo, TX
In January 1840, Antonio Canales and fellow Mexican Federalists met near Guerrero, along the Rio Grande, to proclaim the short-lived Republic of the Rio Grande. They were loyal to Mexico's liberal 1824 constitution, which centralist leaders in Mexico City had set aside, and their breakaway state claimed lands on both sides of the river with Laredo as a capital. The republic lasted less than a year before Canales reconciled with the central government.