Matamoros, officially known as Heroica Matamoros, is a city in the northeastern Mexican state of Tamaulipas,[2] and the municipal seat of the homonymous municipality. It is on the southern bank of the Rio Grande, directly across the border from Brownsville, Texas, United States.[3]Matamoros is the second largest city in the state of Tamaulipas.[4]As of 2016, Matamoros had a population of 520,367.[5]In addition, the Matamoros–Brownsville Metropolitan Area has a population of 1,387,985,[6] making it the 4th largest metropolitan area on the Mexico–US border.[7] Matamoros is the 39th largest city in Mexico and anchors the second largest metropolitan area in Tamaulipas.[8]
The economy of the city is significantly based on its international trade with the United States through the USMCA agreement,[9] and it is home to one of the most promising industrial sectors in Mexico,[10] mainly due to the presence of maquiladoras.[11] In Matamoros, the automotive industry hosts the assembly and accessories plants for brands such as General Motors, Ford, Chrysler, BMW, and Mercedes-Benz.[12][13] Prior to the growth of the maquiladoras in the 2000s, Matamoros' economy had historically been principally based on agriculture,[14] since northern Mexico's biggest irrigation zones are in the municipality.[15] PEMEX announced a multibillion-peso offshore drilling project for the port of Matamoros,[16] one of the future prospects for Mexico's oil industry.[17][18][19]
Matamoros is a major historical site, the site of several battles and events of the Mexican War of Independence,[20] the Mexican Revolution,[21] the Texas Revolution,[22] the Mexican–American War,[23] the American Civil War,[24] and the French Intervention[25] that allowed the city to earn its title of "Undefeated, Loyal, and Heroic".[26][27] The Mexican National Anthem was played for the first time in public at an opera house, the Teatro de la Reforma (sometimes known as The Opera Theater) in Matamoros.
Matamoros has a semiarid climate, with mild winters and hot, humid summers.[28] Matamoros and Brownsville, Texas, are home to the Charro Days and Sombrero Festival, two-nation fiestas that commemorate the heritage of the U.S. and Mexico which are celebrated every February.[29][30]
The Indigenous people of the area are known as the Esto’k G’na or by their colonized name, the Carrizo Comecrudo Tribe of Texas. There are hundreds of members across South Texas, with many more descendants in the Brownsville-Matamoros metropolitan area, however, due to the violence of colonialism in the area, many residents are unable to trace their family history far back enough to know if they are descendants or not.
In 1519, the same year that Hernán Cortés arrived at the port of Veracruz,[31] a captain named Alonso Álvarez de Pineda carried out a brief expedition to the region of northern Tamaulipas, where he named the town known today as Rio Bravo (Rio Grande) as Rio de las Palmas (Palms River).[32] Nevertheless, the actual founding of Matamoros began in 1686, when Captain Alonso de León explored the area and concluded that the Rio Grande was an excellent route for navigation, and that the area of Matamoros was an ideal spot for cattle raising.[33]
In the year 1749, thirteen enterprising families, twelve from Camargo and one from Reynosa, decided to invest and begin a new, influential cattle industry in the area.[34] Former landowners were skeptical that this new investment would be successful, since the frequent overflow of the Rio Grande caused severe floods, and because ranches were occasionally attacked by Indians. Nonetheless, these thirteen families effectively carried out their business plan and created 113 cattle-raising sites. In the year 1774, they officially named the area San Juan de los Esteros Hermosos, known today as Matamoros.[35]
In 1793, to colonize the province of Nuevo Santander, two Franciscan missionaries named Francisco Pueyes and Manuel Júlio Silva established a parish in the main plaza of Matamoros. They proposed a new name for the community: Villa del Refugio, in honor of the parish and patron saint, Our Lady of the Refuge of the Estuaries.[36]
In 1826, the governor Lucas Fernandez dispatched a decree to change the name of the city to Matamoros, in honor of Mariano Matamoros, a hero of the Mexican War of Independence, who participated along with José María Morelos.[37] During the Texas Revolution (1836), Matamoros was the fortress for many Mexican soldiers against rebel attacks.[38]
In 1851, the city of Matamoros was again heroic for defending against attacks by troops under José María Jesús Carbajal, many of whom were recruited from within Texas, who sought to establish a federal republic against the centralist government of Mexico City. The federal troops of Francisco Avalos were able to repel their enemy,[39] and the state congress granted Matamoros the title of "Heroic", countersigned by the Mexican Congress, hence the city's official name of Heroica Matamoros.[40]
The future of the city radically changed after Matamoros declared itself an international free trade zone in 1858.[41] This transformation brought upon urbanization, industrialization, and the expansion of the Bagdad Port, which experienced an economic boom for being the only entrance port for mercenaries for the Confederate States of America during the American Civil War.[42] The Port of Matamoros, also known as the Port of Bagdad, was during the American Civil War one of the leading commercial ports of the world.[43]
The city of Matamoros was a strategic and fortified city during the Texas Revolution. The Matamoros Expedition was launched to attack Matamoros and defeat the forces of Antonio López de Santa Anna. It proved controversial and divisive. The roots of the controversy lay in the division within the provisional government between Governor Henry Smith and the General Council over whether to remain loyal to the Constitution of 1824 and support the liberals of Mexico in the Federalist cause against Santa Anna or to declare independence from Mexico and seek to become an independent territory. The division, on the other hand, was mirrored within the provisional government and among the commanders in the field, who compounded the situation and contributed to the near destruction of the Texian army.[44]
At the beginning of the American Civil War, the city of Matamoros was simply a sleepy little border town across the Rio Grande from Brownsville.[45] It had, for several years, been considered a port, but it had relatively few ships arriving. Previous to the war, accounts mention that not over six ships entered the port each year.[46] Nevertheless, in about four years, Matamoros, due to its proximity to Texas, was to assume a new status as a port, and multiply its population. A Union general in 1865 described the importance of the port in Matamoros:
Matamoros is to the rebellion west of the Mississippi what New York is to the United States—its great commercial and financial center, feeding and clothing the rebellion, arming and equipping, furnishing it materials of war and a specie basis of circulation that has almost displaced Confederate paper ... The entire Confederate Government is greatly sustained by resources from this port.[47]
The cotton trade brought together in Bagdad, Tamaulipas, and Matamoros over 20,000 speculators from the Union and the Confederacy, England, France, and Germany.[48] Bagdad had grown from a small, seashore outpost to a "full-pledge town".[49] The English-speaking population in the area by 1864 was so great that Matamoros even had a newspaper printed in English—it was called the Matamoros Morning Call.[50] In addition, the port exported cotton to England and France, where millions of people needed it for their daily livelihood,[51] and it was possible to receive fifty cents per pound in gold for cotton, when it cost about three cents in the Confederacy, "and much more money was received for it laid down in New York and European ports".[52] Other sources mention that the port of Matamoros traded with London, Havana, Belize, and New Orleans.[53][54] The Matamoros and New York City trade agreement, however, continued throughout the war and until 1864, and it was considered "heavy and profitable".[55]
By 1865, Matamoros was described as a prosperous town of 30,000 people,[56] and Lew Wallace informed General Ulysses S. Grant that neither Baltimore or New Orleans could compare itself to the growing commercial activity of Matamoros.[46] Nevertheless, after the collapse of the Confederacy, "gloom, despondency, and despair" became evident in Matamoros—markets shut down, business almost ceased to exist, and ships were rarely seen.[57] "For Sale" signs began to sprout up everywhere, and Matamoros returned to its role of a sleepy little border town across the Rio Grande.[58]
The conclusion of the American Civil War brought a severe crisis to the now abandoned Port of Bagdad, a crisis that until this day the port has never recovered from.[59] In addition, a tremendous hurricane in 1889 destroyed the desolated port. This same hurricane was one of the many hurricanes during the period of devastating hurricanes of 1870 to 1889, which reduced the population of Matamoros to nearly half its size, mounting with it another upsetting economic downturn.[60][61]