“Capitan Gonzales, of course I know Capitan Gonzalez!” Manuel shot back. “He not only was with Villa, but he was with Zapata as well.” 

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As the story unfolded, it seems that at the age of 9 or thereabouts, Mr. Gonzalez, who was an orphan, joined an uncle fighting with Zapata’s irregulars below Mexico City. Gonzalez’s job was to tend the horses when the men fought on foot. However, because of his horsemanship and skill with a rifle, he soon became a warrior himself.  He met Villa during the brief period that Villa and Zapata occupied Mexico City and volunteered to join Villa in the north. Thus, the 11-year-old boy soldier became a captain in Villa’s army in command of a hundred men, doubtlessly the youngest such officer in Mexico. His youthful appearance also allowed him to serve Villa unobtrusively as a spy. Wounded three times in battles in the deserts of northern Mexico, the last when he attempted to lasso a machine gun still in the hands of the gunner, Gonzalez was released from duty by Villa.

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The mercurial and unpredictable Villa thought so much of the boy soldier that he paid for Gonzalez’s care as he recovered from his wounds. Gonzalez eventually fled to Texas to escape the violence of the Revolution, later returning to Mexico where he met and married his wife, Ana Maria. The couple later settled in Baytown and raised a large family, Mr. Gonzalez worked as the mechanic at the local ice house retiring at the age of 80. His wife was a custodian at Carver Elementary School. Although the couple had little formal education and limited resources they were determined that their children would go to college.

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The story does not end here. My colleague Dale Adams, chair of the Lee College English Department at the time and an authority on the history of film, and I decided to host a lyceum program at the college on the Mexican Revolution. With my friend Urbina serving as moderator, we did a series of lectures on the conflict, screened the Marlon Brando film Viva Zapata, and concluded the program with a question and answer session featuring Capitan Gonzalez who wore the new but 1916 style uniform given to him by the Mexican government. Capitan Gonzalez insisted that his daughter Raquel, the youngest of his children, sit with him on the stage. And, of course, the entire Gonzalez family was our honored guests. What a thrill it was for me to watch Raquel, a delightful young woman who was in many ways a typical American teenager, discover the role her father played in one of the Western Hemisphere’s most defining moments!