The many missions scattered around Texas are all a result of Spanish rule and the first European language spoken in Texas was Spanish. From 1821, Mexico would govern Texas as a combined state with Coahuila. Anglos in Texas wanted independence, not from Mexico, but from Coahuila, becoming their own state. Mexico's heavy handed response to the independence movement led to an uprising in 1835, the Texas Revolution.
1847 - The Corpus Christi Rangers(known as the Mustang Greys) were mustered out of service July 21, 1847, at Camargo. A ballad arose about Mustang Gray and his adventures, and was sometimes used as a lullaby. It was recorded in Andrew Jackson Sowell's Rangers and Pioneers of Texas (1884), and begins "There was a noble ranger, / They called him Mustang Gray; / He left his home when but a youth, / Went ranging far away."
1851 - Notorious outlaw Sam Bass was born in Indiana on this day; his short and violent life also ended on July 21, in 1878. Bass arrived in Texas in the fall of 1870 and, after trying his hand at a number of occupations, began robbing stagecoaches and trains in 1877. In the spring of 1878, Bass and his gang robbed four trains within twenty-five miles of Dallas. They did not get much money, but the robberies aroused citizens, and the bandits were the object of a spirited chase across North Texas by posses and a special company of Texas Rangers headed by Junius Peak.
Bass eluded his pursuers until one of his party turned informer. In Round Rock on July 19 Bass and his men became engaged in a gun battle in which he was wounded. The next morning he was found lying helpless in a pasture north of town and was brought back to Round Rock. He died there on July 21, his twenty-seventh birthday. He was buried in Round Rock and soon became the subject of cowboy song and story.
1863 - On July 21, 1863, the Trans-Mississippi Department ordered the establishment of a prison camp at Camp Ford(four miles northeast of Tyler) and transferred the prisoners of war then located at Shreveport, Louisiana, to Tyler for confinement.
[ https://tshaonline.org/handbook/online/articles/qcc15 ]
1865 – German immigrant August Thielepape and other Union sympathizers raised the Union flag over the Alamo after the Civil War. Two years later, he became San Antonio’s mayor.
1876 - The newspaper, The Jacksboro Echo of July 21, 1876, estimated that some 73,000 cattle were driven up The Western Trail in the first part of that year alone, and by 1880 the annual figure surpassed 260,000. The drives ended in the mid-1880s with the coming of the railroads, but they played an important role in drawing settlers to the area.
The Western Trail supplanted the farmer-laden Chisholm Trail to the east. By 1879 the Western Trail was the principal thoroughfare for Texas cattle bound for northern markets. The last reported drive on the Western Trail was made in 1893 by John Rufus Blocker to Deadwood, South Dakota. By then, three to five million cattle had been driven to northern pastures and markets along the route. [ https://tshaonline.org/handbook/online/articles/ayw02 ]
1884 - Cayton Erhard died in Bastrop. This veteran and prisoner of the Texan Santa Fe Expedition was a native of Munich, Germany. He immigrated to Texas in 1839 and joined the Santa Fe Expedition in 1841. He was taken prisoner by Mexican troops and spent two years in Mexican prisons. Afterward, he was active in organizing the government of Hays County, where he served as the first county clerk and first postmaster. After Reconstruction he moved to Bastrop. There he was elected judge and delegate to the Constitutional Convention of 1875. He later wrote reminiscences of the Santa Fe Expedition for the San Marcos Free Press. Erhard is buried in the Bastrop city cemetery.
1901 - Homer Garrison, Jr., Texas Ranger chief and director of the Texas Department of Public Safety, son of Homer and Mattie (Milam) Garrison, was born in Kickapoo, Anderson County, Texas, on July 21, 1901. Colonel Garrison became director of the Department of Public Safety and chief of the Texas Rangers in 1938. Under his leadership numerous major programs were developed, and the organization grew to a total of some 3,400 employees. The programs included crime control, police traffic supervision, driver licensing, vehicle inspection, safety responsibility, accident records, safety education, defense and disaster service, and police training.
1988 - The Texas Parks and Wildlife Commission purchased Big Bend Ranch in Presidio County to form Big Bend State Natural Area. Big Bend Ranch State Park in southwestern Brewster County and southeastern Presidio County is the largest park in the state system; it comprised more than 299,000 acres in 2004. At one time the Big Bend Ranch was among the ten biggest working ranches in Texas.
[ https://tshaonline.org/handbook/online/articles/gibfk ]