Friday, February 12, 1914. The assault on Clemente Vergara.

Texan Rancher Clemente Vergara of Laredo was arrested in Mexico by Mexican Federal troops on the Rio Grande.  He had previously filed two complaints with the Webb County sheriff over allegations that Mexican Federal troops were stealing horses that he was allowed to graze on the Mexican side of the river.

He had traveled into Mexico to meet with the Mexican commander and was ambushed in route.  His nephew, who had accompanied him, escaped.

Vergara's wife and daughter crossed into Mexico the following day and found him severely beaten and jailed in the Hidalgo garrison.  The next day, the women were informed he had been moved to Piedras Negras.  The Wilson Administration became involved and started to internally debate what to do about the situation.  On the 16th, the commander at Piedras Negras reported he had been released, and the horses ordered returned, but witnesses told American officials they had seen Vergara's body hanging from a tree from February 15 onward.  On March 7 his body was delivered to his family in Texas, apparently recovered by friends and ranch employees who risked their lives to locate his grave and exhume him, although this is disputed.  He was reburied in Cavalry Catholic Cemetery in Laredo, where a prominent tombstone remains.

Some Mexican officials or those who were partisan to some degree claimed that Vergara was smuggling arms to the rebels, although there is no evidence of that. Some even claimed he wasn't murdered at all, but had crossed the border to join them, which is clearly erroneous.

Texas sought to press criminal charges against the Mexican officers, and there was some discussion of sending law enforcement into Mexico.  The Wilson administration forbade that.

Clemente was 44 years old at the time of his murder.  He left his wife, Antonia, daughter Clara, and a son, Jesus.  He also had two sisters.  His daughter Clara lived until 1962, and is buried in the same cemetery. What happened to his wife I was not able to determine, but as his daughter and siblings remained in Laredo as late as the 1960s, she likely did as well.  

Of some interest, and showing the nature of the border at the time, and perhaps now, both of Clemente's parents were born in Mexico.  They had immigrated to the U.S.