Hello Al:

The municipio of Zacoalco de Torres is located in the southern part 
of Jalisco. The main pueblos in the municipio are Zacoalco, Santa 
Catarina, 3 Barrancas (Santa Clara, Otates, Laureles) and San Marcos 
Evangelista. Most of my family lines come from these pueblos and 
surrounding municipios.

Zacoalco is about midway between Guadalajara and Ciudad Guzman. The 
pueblos nearby Zacoalco de Torres are: Santa Ana Acatlan, Villa 
Corona, Techaluta, Atoyac, Atemajac, Amacueca, and Teocuitatlan. 
Also, Jocotepec, Ajijic and Chapala are really close.

I hope that helps you to locate Zacoalco on the map. And here's some 
history: It was on this municipio, actually on Santa Catarina, where 
my Apodaca ancestors are from, where a very important battle of the 
war of independence took place. A couple months after the Grito de 
Dolores, the insurgentes were trying to take control of a big city 
to maintain their strenght. In Jalisco, a man called Jose 
Antonio "El Amo" Torres was in charge of the insurgent army. In 
Zacoalco, he fought and defeated the Spanish forces (lots of indios 
from Zacoalco helped him), and thanks to that, he arrived to 
Guadalajara and took control of this city. Then, he offered the 
command to father Miguel Hidalgo. I'm not faking it, this is on the 
history books. The name of Jose Antonio Torres is not as known as 
Miguel Hidalgo, or Ignacio Allende, or Vicente Guerrero, but thanks 
to him and his army of indios and mestizos, the insurgentes 
controlled the second most important city in the colonia.

That's why my pueblo is now called Zacoalco de Torres, to honor this 
brave man and his army. It is really cool just to think that some of 
my ancestors and cousins probably fought with "El Amo" Torres, and 
helped Mexico to be an independent nation.


--- In ranchos@yahoogroups.com, "Al Duarte" <aduarte@c...> wrote:
> Good write up.
> 
> By the way, where is Zacoalco?  I know you said it is Jalisco, but 
where?
> 
> Alberto.
>