The Handbook of Texas Online. But my dear Cousin John was not one of Walker's filibustering men. And why did he call the place Vigo???????

Mary M. Standifer

VIGO, TEXAS. Vigo was a rural community on Kickapoo Creek in southwestern Concho County, twenty-five miles southwest of Paint Rock, fifteen miles southeast of Vancourt (in Tom Green County), and twenty-eight miles north of Fort McKavett (in Menard County). The settlement was established by John T. Pruitt, who bought a seventy-nine-acre tract at the site about 1880. Pruitt, a member of William Walker's filibustering expedition to Central America in the 1850s, had been captured and imprisoned for a time in Vigo, Spain. After his release he returned to Manchaca, near Austin. He is reported to have established a newspaper in Austin and to have built a large collection of law books. Pruitt died in Vigo about February 28, 1908. A post office was established in Pruitt's home in Vigo in 1887, which superseded the post office at the nearby community of Erskine. In 1890 Vigo had eight livestock enterprises and a population of sixty. By 1896 a population of only three was reported there, but the business listing encompassed eleven livestock operations and two music teachers. The post office was discontinued in 1907, and by 1936 the community had disappeared.

THE FIRST SENTENCE LOCATING VIGO IS ONE OF THE GREATEST TEXAS SENTENCES EVER, TEXAS HUMOR AT ITS BEST.

I FIND THIS VERY STRANGE. COUSIN JOHN WAS A MEMBER OF LOPEZ'S EXPEDITION TO "FREE" CUBA IN 1851 AND WAS SEIZED AND SHIPPED TO SPAIN TO BE EXECUTED. HE WAS IMPRISONED AT WHERE? VIGO. SO WHEN HE CALLED HIS LAND A TOWN HE NAMED IT VIGO. GET IT, FROM THE PLACE WHERE HE MIGHT HAVE BEEN KILLED AND DID, HALF A CENTURY LATER, DIE.