“Gregorio Cortez” was recorded by Pedro Rocha & Lupe Martinez in 1929. This song is a two part song, however you can hear the change from part one to part two. The style of “Gregorio Cortez” is Corrido. At first since this song is in Spanish, I assumed that Corrido meant “the run of”. But after doing research, I was able to find out that Corrido is also the name of Spanish Ballads.
The writers tell the story of Gregorio Cortez, who was a Tejano living in Manor, Texas. Gregorio Cortez was considered “… a folk hero among Mexican Americans in the early 1900s for evading the Texas Rangers…”. This song relates to Texas history due to the talks about Texas Rangers. The Texas Rangers were considered ‘border patrol’ between Mexico and Texas. This song holds a great amount of history. It was known for the Texas Rangers to be racist towards Tejanos.
Part one of the story of Gregorio Cortez starts because of a lot of mistranslating. On June 12, 1901, Cortez was encountered by a Karnes county sheriff and 2 deputies, one being a translator, due to needing information on a horse thief. The thief was described as a “medium-sized Mexican”. The sheriff approached Cortez and his brother because they were medium-sized Mexicans. The translator incorrectly translated Cortez respond of “You can’t arrest me for nothing.” To “No white man can arrest me.” Since the sheriff heard, “No white man can arrest me”, he felt the need to shot his gun. The gun shot wounded Cortez’s brother and missed Cortez. He responded by shooting and killing the sheriff. Cortez then fled the scene.
Part two of the story talks about how the Texans go about surrounding Cortez at a ranch. There were about 300 Texans, shots were exchanged and another sheriff died. Towards the end, Cortez makes his way to the Texan Rangers, they automatically take him and the song ends with “With this I say goodbye, with the shadow of a Cypress, here it ends up singing, the Cortez tragedy.”
The moral of this song is Cortez is a hero because he evaded the Texas Rangers. Tejanos saw him as a hero because he was able to not get caught for a long time. I think this song plays a big role in showing the divide between Mexicans and Texans. Although there was not a lot of information on the songwriters, I was able to find a lot about the story. Which leaves me wanting to find more articles about the songwriters to add to my final draft.
Lyrics:
In the county of El Carmen
A great misfortune befell;
The major sheriff is dead;
Who killed him no one can tell.
At two in the afternoon,
In half an hour or less,
They knew that the man who killed him
Had been Gregorio Cortez.
They let loose the bloodhound dogs;
They followed him from afar.
But trying to catch Cortez
Was like following a star.
All the rangers of the county
Were flying, they rode so hard;
What they wanted was to get
The thousand-dollar reward.
And in the county of Kiansis
They cornered him after all;
Though they were more than three hundred
He leaped out of their corral.
Then the Major Sheriff said,
As if he was going to cry,
“Cortez, hand over your weapons;
We want to take you alive.”
Then said Gregorio Cortez,
And his voice was like a bell,
“You will never get my weapons
Till you put me in a cell.”
Then said Gregorio Cortez
With his pistol in his hand,
“Ah, so many mounted Rangers
Just to take one Mexican!”
Works Cited
“Corrido De Gregorio Cortez, Pt. 2.” Instructional Technology Services, www.laits.utexas.edu/jaime/jrn/corridopic2.html.
“Corrido Test with Gregorio Cortez.” Instructional Technology Services, www.laits.utexas.edu/jaime/jrn/corridopic.html.
“Cortez Lira, Gregorio.” TSHA, 1 Aug. 1995, www.tshaonline.org/handbook/entries/cortez-lira-gregorio.
YouTube, www.youtube.com/watch?v=mUgMMGvlt2s.
University of Texas Press, Austin. From Paredes, Américo. With His
Pistol in His Hand. Austin: University of Texas Press, 1958. https://artsedge.kennedy-center.org/content/3742/3742_mexCor_cortezCor.pdf
