Alejo Guerrero Sr., Who Died

Sunday, Joined Texas Rangers

to Avenge Death of Brother

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     Funeral services for Alejo Guerrero Sr., 82, who died at the home of his son Alejo Guerero Jr., 104 Pardee Street, Sunday morning, were held Monday afternoon from San Fernando Cathedral, directly in front of which Mr. Guerrero started the first butcher shop in San Antonio, 67 years ago, at the age of fifteen years. The butcher shop was established with a large chinaberry tree as the roof, on Main Plaza. When the city market house on Market Street was built years later, Mr. Guerrero moved his shop there.

     When he was selling meat under the china tree, he never was known to cut a steak or small piece of meat, the aged man boasted. In those days, when a person wanted meat, he was sold a whole quarter at a time. Mr. Guerrero retired from active business at the age of 74.

     The signal for Mr. Guerrero to arise in the morning and prepare for the day’s work under the chinaberry tree, was not the sudden ringing of an alarm clock, but a sign which he said served the purpose just as well. It was the passing of the freighters in the early morning and the cracking of their long whips, sounding much like a pistol shot, that helped awaken early San Antonio residents.

Mr. Guerrero was born in San Antonio and made this place his life-long home. For more than 50 years he lived in his birthplace at the corner of Durango and South San Saba Streets, south of what is known as Produce Row. At the time of his death he was on a pension from having participated in wars against the Indians.

     The story of how Epitacio Guerrero, brother of Mr. Guerrero, was killed in 1865, shortly after leaving Eagle Pass for San Antonio with a cargo of freight, was told by Alejo Guerrero Jr., the son. As a result of his brother’s death at the hands of a band of Indians, Alejo Guerrero joined the Texas Rangers, who were recruiting forces to fight the Cherokees in the country below San Antonio.

News of the death of his brother was brought to Mr. Guerrero in most dramatic fashion by the only one of the band of the eight freighters murdered by the Indians, who was able to escape, although badly wounded in doing so. Two or three years after the killing, Alejo Guerrero Sr., received into his home a visitor, who told how the freighters had been slain near Eagle Pass. The man himself was the only survivor, and two or three days after informing Mr. Guerrero of the fate of his brother, he died as a result of his wounds received in the encounter.

     Vowing vengeance upon the Cherokees, the tribe which is supposed to have slain his brother, Mr. Guerrero in 1870 volunteered along with 60 other San Antonians to go on an expedition in the Indian territory.

     Mr. Guerrero is said by his son to be the last member of the group of men, the only other living man, Nick Peters, father of Charles Peters, deputy Bexar County Sheriff, having died a few years ago.

The only encounter of which the elder Guerrero told his children was one with a band of 200 Cherokees on Bear Creek, located southwest of this city. The Indians, due to such a large force as compared with the 60 Rangers, easily held their own and more, forcing the whites to retreat 30 miles. By the time that re-enforcements could be summoned, the Indians had given up their attack.

After the Indian trouble had been settled the company of which Mr. Guerrero was a member was called to Austin, where the men were discharged.

     Surviving Mr. Guerrero are: Two sons, Alejo and Epitacio Guerrero; two daughters, Mrs. Maria Morin and Mrs. Santos Alvarez; two brothers, Angel and Joaquim Guerrero, and two sisters, Miss Salome Guerrero and Mrs. Vincente McClellan.

San Antonio Express, Tuesday, 20 August 1923, page 11.

Notes on Alejo Guerrero, Sr.

Alejo Guerrero, Sr., born 18 January 1845 (Indian Wars pension record), was the son of Jose and Petra Guerrero (1850 Bexar County federal census, family number 543). Alejo’s father was one of the many cart-men in San Antonio at the time (1850 census). Alejo married Josefa Perez (Perres) at San Fernando Church on 24 September 1865 (# 501). Josefa died in 1897 (Indian Wars pension record). Alejo died on 19 August 1923 and was buried the next day at San Fernando Cemetery # 2.