National Register Listing

Presidio Chapel of San Elizario

a.k.a. Nuestra Senora del Pilar y de Glorioso San Jose'

S side of plaza, San Elizario, TX

San Elizario, often spelled San Eleazaro, was originally founded at Nuestra Señora del Pilar y Glorioso Senor San José near the mission of Nuestra Señora de Guadalupe in present Ciudad Juarez, Mexico. The move, which came as the result of the Marquis de Rubí's recommendation that troops from Presidio de Guajuqulla in Nueva Vizcaya be moved to the Valley of San Elizario, was moved in 1773, and the presidio was renamed San Elizario (Handbook of Texas. Vol. II, p. 550). When in use as a presidio chapel, San Elizario was served by Franciscan missionaries.

Before 1814, the presidio was moved to another site, but the chapel and the town, which grew around the presidio, remained The town of San Elizario prospered in the nineteenth century and William H. Emory estimated the population to be 1,200, making it the largest of the valley towns south of El Paso.

San Elizario was the county seat of El Paso County from its organization as a county from 1850 until 1876. United States troops were first stationed in San Elizario in 1850 and during the Civil War, the California Column was a Union force composed chiefly of California volunteers who held the area to prevent a Confederate invasion of California.

The present church is not the old post chapel known as Nuestra Señora del Pilar y el Glorioso San José but is a structure of comparatively recent date. The chapel building which preceded it was destroyed by the flood waters of the Rio Grande. The walls of the present chapel building date from 1877; the interior, however, has been rebuilt subsequently to a fire in 1935 which completely destroyed the interior.

Local significance of the building:
Listed in National Register of Historic Places in 1972.