The colorful saga of Captain Tom Ross
By Robert Mendoza
Arguably, Captain Tom Ross is the most colorful and historically well-connected Texan to be neglected by the otherwise comprehensive, multi-volume Handbook of Texas, published by the Texas Historical Commission.
Thomas M. Ross was born in 1871 in Atascosa County . Great-grandson of Colonel José Antonio Navarro, one of the signers of the Texas Declaration of Independence in 1836, Ross joined the Texas Rangers in 1895, ascending through the ranks to become one of the first Hispanic captains.
In 1896, Private Ross was assigned undercover duties in Governor Charles Culberson's effort to prevent the Bob Fitzsimmons-Peter Maher world's heavyweight championship fight from being fought in Texas . Despite the dispatch of Adjutant General Mabry and 13 Rangers, promoter Dan Stuart (assisted by Bat Masterson and Judge Roy Bean) managed to stage the “Fistic Carnival” on a sandbar in the middle of the Río Grande .
In 1910, one of Ross' sergeants in Ranger Company B enacted a drunken scene that was later to become a staple of Western movies. Sergeant Roscoe Redus rode his horse into an Ysleta saloon, pistol-whipped the proprietor, and shot up the premises. The El Paso Morning Times was not amused, noting that the community did not appreciate the Ranger's attempt to convert the Alamo Saloon into “a livery stable and a morgue.”
The editorial, concluding with a demand for the abolition of the Texas Ranger force, was read in Austin . On February 12, the Adjutant General fired Ross for failing to control his subordinate, although Ross protested that he fired Redus upon learning of the incident. Both the Adjutant General and the Governor ignored a petition supporting Ross' character signed by 33 of Ysleta's leading citizens, and Ross formally resigned on February 19.
Disconsolate, Ross moved to San Antonio and tried his hand at real estate, but soon became bored and restless. Fortuitously, less than a month later, two rangers and a deputy sheriff were ambushed near San Benito , and Ross was hired to lead a group of vigilantes.
The ambush stemmed from an altercation involving an Anglo engineer and Jacinto Treviño, a “bad Mex” who would become a South Texas icon and subject of a well-known corrido. Despite Ross' best efforts and the assistance of every Ranger and county lawman within a day's ride of Cameron County , Treviño vanished into Mexico .
Reluctant to return to real estate, Ross remained in Cameron County as a deputy sheriff. On October 1, 1910, he arrested fellow Ranger Charles Craighead for killing a mexicano. This incident appeared to be yet another repercussion from the San Benito ambush nine months earlier. Although Craighead claimed self-defense, area mexicanos were convinced that the victim, an associate of Jacinto Treviño, was sacrificed in vengeance for the wounding of Craighead's brother. At trial, Cameron County political boss Jim Wells represented Craighead, and the presiding judge directed the jury to find the defendant not guilty.
Ross apparently served as Cameron County deputy for an additional two years. In January 1913, he was summoned to Webb County as character witness for ex-Ranger Alonzo Allee, charged with the murders of prominent ranchers Francisco and Manuel Gutierrez. Unfortunately, no record survives of Ross' testimony, but Allee was acquitted after a jury decision that generations of mexicanos have viewed as a gross injustice (see Beatriz de la Garza's A Law for the Lion, University of Texas Press, 2003).
Ross returned to South Texas just in time for the Plan de San Diego raids. On June 10, 1916, as a special employee of the US Bureau of Investigation, he led a posse that prevented the burning of the Webb Station railroad trestle. Three raiders were killed and three captured, including two officers wearing Constitutionalist uniforms. Ross personally confiscated their red and white Plan de San Diego flag.
A week later, one of Ross' mexicano informants warned him that raiders were planning to attack the US army camp near San Ignacio. The outpost was immediately reinforced and the raiders repelled, after suffering heavy casualties. Ross was promoted from Special Employee to Special Agent of the Bureau of Investigation.
On the evening of July 7, Ross went to the Webb County jail and had Jesse Mosley released to his custody. That was the last time “Carranza's Negro” was seen alive, unless you count the testimony of Deputy US Marshal Allen Walker, who provided the alibi that exonerated Ross from a murder charge.
Overall, Ross' commission as Special Agent was painful, nasty, and short. He had long fought a losing battle with alcoholism, and his cork leg was rumored to be the result of shooting himself while drawing his gun in a drunken stupor. By the end of 1916, colleagues were forced to continually report his incompetence to their supervisors, and Bureau Chief A. Bruce Bielaski wired a reprimand to Ross in September. Ross continued to drink, and reports to San Antonio described him as “constantly under the influence of liquor,” and his conduct “a disgrace to himself and the Department he represents.” He was fired from the Bureau on New Year's Day, 1917.
Ross remained in San Antonio and worked as federal court interpreter from 1925 until his death in 1946. He is buried in Atascosa County, in Rossville, named for his Scottish great-grandfather and a part of his great-grandfather Navarro's Spanish land grant.
