Silvestre De León was the second son born to the influential De León family in Victoria, Texas

Victoria, Texas

Victoria is a city in and the seat of Victoria County, Texas, United States. The population was 60,603 at the 2000 census. The three counties of the Victoria Metropolitan Statistical Area had a population of 111,163 at the 2000 census,...

. He became the third alcalde

Alcalde

Alcalde , or Alcalde ordinario, is the traditional Spanish municipal magistrate, who had both judicial and administrative functions. An alcalde was, in the absence of a corregidor, the presiding officer of the Castilian cabildo and judge of first instance of a town...

 of Victoria. De León joined his brother-in-law Plácido Benavides

Plácido Benavides

Plácido Benavides was an early Mexican-born settler in De Leon's Colony, Victoria County, Texas. Benavides earned himself the sobriquet of the Paul Revere of Texas for his 1836 journey from San Patricio to Goliad to Victoria, warning residents of the approaching Mexican army. He was twice elected...

 to fight with Stephen F. Austin

Stephen F. Austin

Stephen Fuller Austin was born in Virginia and raised in southeastern Missouri. He was known as the Father of Texas, led the second, but first legal and ultimately successful colonization of the region by bringing 300 families from the United States. The capital of Texas, Austin in Travis County,...

 at the 1835 Siege of Béxar

Siege of Bexar

The Siege of Béxar was an early campaign of the Texas Revolution in which a volunteer Texan army successfully defeated Mexican forces at San Antonio de Béxar . Texians had become disillusioned with the Mexican government as President Antonio Lopez de Santa Anna's tenure became increasingly...

. He joined the rest of the De León family in New Orleans in 1836 after Brigadier General Thomas Jefferson Rusk

Thomas Jefferson Rusk

Thomas Jefferson Rusk was an early political and military leader of the Republic of Texas, serving as its first Secretary of War as well as a general at the Battle of San Jacinto. He was later a U.S. politician and served as a Senator from Texas from 1846 until his suicide...

 ordered the evacuation of Mexican families from Victoria. In 1842, he returned to Victoria and was murdered by persons unknown. Recorded Texas Historic Landmark

Recorded Texas Historic Landmark

Recorded Texas Historic Landmark is a designation awarded by the Texas Historical Commission for historically and architecturally significant properties in the state of Texas....

 number 6544 placed at Evergreen Cemetery in 1972 acknowledges Silvestre De León's contribution to Texas.

Early life

Silvestre De León was born in 1802 in Texas, the third child of empresario

Empresario

An empresario was a person who, in the early years of the settlement of Texas, had been granted the right to settle on Mexican land in exchange for recruiting and taking responsibility for new settlers. The word is Spanish for entrepreneur.- Background :...

 Martín De León

Martín De León

Martín De León was a rancher and wealthy Mexican empresario descended from Spanish aristocracy. He was the patriarch of one of the prominent founding families of early Texas. De León and his wife Patricia de la Garza established De León's Colony, the only predominantly Mexican colony in Texas...

 and his wife Patricia de la Garza De León

Patricia de la Garza De León

Patricia de la Garza De León was the matriarch of one of the prominent founding families of early Texas. Doña Patricia raised ten children, some of whom helped change the course of history. At age 49, she uprooted her life in 1824 to help her husband Martín De León establish the predominantly...

. Older brother Fernando De León

Fernando De León

Fernando De León was a co-founder of Victoria, Texas, and the first commissioner and colonization manager of De León's Colony. He fought against Antonio López de Santa Anna. De León was an aide-de-camp to provisional Texas governor James W. Robinson...

 had been born in Mexico in 1798. Sister Candelaria, who married José Miguel Aldrete, was born in Texas in 1800. They would eventually be joined by two more brothers: Felix (1806) and Agapito (1808). Five more sisters would also be born into the family: Guadalupe (1804) who married Desedrio Garcia; Maria (1810) who married Rafael Manchola

Rafael Manchola

Rafael Antonio Manchola was a politician and military officer in Mexican Texas. He twice served as commandant of Presidio La Bahía. He served two terms in the legislature of the state of Coahuila y Tejas. At his behest, the community which had grown outside the fort was renamed Goliad and...

; Refugia (1812) who married José María Jesús Carbajal

José María Jesús Carbajal

José María Jesús Carbajal was a Mexican freedom fighter, who opposed the Centralist government installed by Antonio López de Santa Anna. Carbajal was a direct descendant of Canary Islands settlers who emigrated to San Antonio, Texas in the 18th Century. As a teenager in San Antonio, he was...

; Augustina (1814) who married Plácido Benavides

Plácido Benavides

Plácido Benavides was an early Mexican-born settler in De Leon's Colony, Victoria County, Texas. Benavides earned himself the sobriquet of the Paul Revere of Texas for his 1836 journey from San Patricio to Goliad to Victoria, warning residents of the approaching Mexican army. He was twice elected...

; and Francisca (1818) who married Vincente Dosal.

Alcalde

Along with his family, Silvestre was one of the co-founders of De León's Colony, becoming a colonial merchant, as well as co-founder of the city of Victoria, Texas.

De León became the third alcalde

Alcalde

Alcalde , or Alcalde ordinario, is the traditional Spanish municipal magistrate, who had both judicial and administrative functions. An alcalde was, in the absence of a corregidor, the presiding officer of the Castilian cabildo and judge of first instance of a town...

 of Victoria. Martín De León had been the first alcalde, while Silvestre's brother-in-law Plácido Benavides had been the second. After Benavides built the fortress known as "Plácido's Round House" (or the "Round Top House") the two brothers-in-law engaged in several attacks against the Tonkawa

Tonkawa

The Tickanwa•tic Tribe , better known as the Tonkawa , are a Native American people indigenous to present-day Oklahoma and Texas. They once spoke the now-extinct Tonkawa language believed to have been a language isolate not related to any other indigenous tongues...

 and Karankawa

Karankawa

Karankawa were a group of Native American peoples, now extinct as a tribal group, who played a pivotal part in early Texas history....

 Indian tribes.

War against Santa Anna

When Antonio López de Santa Anna

Antonio López de Santa Anna

Antonio de Padua María Severino López de Santa Anna y Pérez de Lebrón , often known as Santa Anna or López de Santa Anna, known as "the Napoleon of the West," was a Mexican political leader, general, and president who greatly influenced early Mexican and Spanish politics and government...

 revoked the 1824 Constitution of Mexico

1824 Constitution of Mexico

The Federal Constitution of the United Mexican States of 1824 was enacted on October 4 of 1824, after the overthrow of the Mexican Empire of Agustin de Iturbide. In the new constitution, the republic took the name of United Mexican States, and was defined as a representative federal republic, with...

 and installed his own political machine in 1833, many Tejano

Tejano

Tejano or Texano is a term used to identify a Texan of Mexican heritage.Historically, the Spanish term Tejano has been used to identify different groups of people...

s were opposed to the regime. Some of the De León extended family, specifically Benavides, Carbajal and brother Fernando, joined with John Joseph Linn to fight Santa Anna's dictatorship. De León contributed livestock and equipment for the Texan resistance. In 1835, he joined the Benavides unit and fought under Stephen F. Austin

Stephen F. Austin

Stephen Fuller Austin was born in Virginia and raised in southeastern Missouri. He was known as the Father of Texas, led the second, but first legal and ultimately successful colonization of the region by bringing 300 families from the United States. The capital of Texas, Austin in Travis County,...

 during the two-month Siege of Béxar

Siege of Bexar

The Siege of Béxar was an early campaign of the Texas Revolution in which a volunteer Texan army successfully defeated Mexican forces at San Antonio de Béxar . Texians had become disillusioned with the Mexican government as President Antonio Lopez de Santa Anna's tenure became increasingly...

 campaign to drive out Martín Perfecto de Cos

Martín Perfecto de Cos

Martín Perfecto de Cos was a 19th-century Mexican general. He was married to Lucinda López de Santa Anna, sister of Antonio López de Santa Anna.-Background:Cós was born in Vera Cruz in the year 1800, the son of an attorney...

.

Louisiana exile

Although many Mexicans were opposed to Santa Anna's regime, they were not necessarily in favor of Texas becoming an independent state. On July 20, 1836, Brigadier General Thomas Jefferson Rusk

Thomas Jefferson Rusk

Thomas Jefferson Rusk was an early political and military leader of the Republic of Texas, serving as its first Secretary of War as well as a general at the Battle of San Jacinto. He was later a U.S. politician and served as a Senator from Texas from 1846 until his suicide...

 ordered Mexican families in the Victoria area to be evacuated in an attempt to stem any assistance being given to Santa Anna. The Carbajal, Benavides and De León families left for New Orleans, forced to abandon their money and possessions.

Death

In 1842, De León returned to Victoria to try and reclaim the family's property, and was murdered by persons unknown. He is buried at Evergreen Cemetery in Victoria, Texas. Recorded Texas Historic Landmark

Recorded Texas Historic Landmark

Recorded Texas Historic Landmark is a designation awarded by the Texas Historical Commission for historically and architecturally significant properties in the state of Texas....

 number 6544 placed at Evergreen Cemetery in 1972 acknowledges Silvestre De León's contribution to Texas.

Personal life

Silvestre De León married Rosalie de la Garza. The couple had two sons, Martín and Francisco. Upon Silvestre's death, the sons were adopted by Silvestre's brother Fernando De León. On April 12, 1833, they received a 4,428-acre tract of land from the Mexican government. The town of Nursery, Texas

Nursery, Texas

Nursery is an unincorporated community in Victoria County, Texas, United States. It is part of the Victoria, Texas Metropolitan Statistical Area....

was founded in 1884 on part of that land.