|
|
Texas
Ghost Town
VANCE, TEXAS
Real County, Texas
Hill Country
A dispersed rural community
FM 335 and 2631 at the Nueces River
N of Camp
Wood
N of Uvalde
NW of Leakey
SE of Rocksprings
Book Your Hotel Here & Save
Uvalde
Hotels |
History in
a Pecan Shell
Vance was originally called Bullhead, after nearby Bullhead Mountain,
but was renamed after a settler (Xavier Wanz) who was one of Henri
Castro's Alsatian colonists.
1874: Henry Wells became the first settler
1875: Bullhead's first church was established
1878: the Bullhead Post Office was granted
1883: the townsite was laid out and Edwards County was also established.
Bullhead served as county seat until
1884, when an election relocated the Edwards County seat to Leakey.
1886: the town was renamed after an Anglo spelling of Wanz's name.
The population of Vance has stayed below 50 persons for the entire
20th century. The post office closed in 1955.
Currently only a church, cemetery and scattered dwellings make up
Vance, Texas.
Nearby Towns in Real County
Leakey, Camp
Wood, Rio Frio
Book Your Hotel Here & Save
Uvalde
Hotels >
Kerrville Hotels >
More
Texas Hotels > |
Vance Texas
Forum
A historical
tid-bit on Vance, Texas:
In February 1905, a bank was held-up in Rio Gallegos, Santa Cruz,
Argentina, by two young men, both described as English-speaking.
Mr. Allsop, a patent-medicine salesman in Rio Gallegos, said his
father-in-law had a ranch near Vance, and that some years earlier
he (Allsop) had known one of the bandits, whom he called Brady,
at the ranch. He said that Brady had a sister in nearby Punta Arenas,
Chile.
Other writers have identified the two bandits as Henry Thompson
and Lewis Nelson, or William Wilson and Robert Evans. Wilson, we
know from other sources, was born 17 August 1885 in Texas Wilson
and Evans, who were both bandits, were killed in 1911 in a gunfight
with the Argentine Frontier Police.
Source: "Wild Bunch Bank Holdup in Argentina," Daniel Buck &
Anne Meadows, National Outlaw-Lawman History Quarterly, vol. XII,
no. 3, Winter 1988.
I'm passing along
this information in the hopes that perhaps one of our readers might
know something additional about Allsop's father-in-law's Vance ranch,
or about Brady himself. - Daniel Buck, September 02, 2005
Vance, Texas
I lived in Vance for about 10 years. I heard all the stories about
one of the men who robbed that bank being buried with his treasure
around where our house was. I explored everyday for about 5 years
looking for anything out of the ordinary. My great-uncle claimed
that he actually located a wealth of treasure but was forced to
leave it and never returned for some reason unknown to us. I did
locate a fenced off area that was about the size of a grave, metal
detectors didn't indicate anything. I did however find a ton of
arrowheads.
The cemetery is pretty old and very interesting to walk through.
I am glad you are doing this. Keep Up the Good Work - C Mitchel,
December 01, 2005
If anyone has information, photos or stories on Vance, Texas - please
contact
us.
© John Troesser
|
|
|
