New Mexico Office of the State Historian
Elena Gallegos, daughter of Antonio Gallegos and Catalina Baca, was one of the Hispanic colonists of New Mexico who was present at the time of the Pueblo Revolt. Gallegos was a child in 1680, and fled south with her family, returning sometime after the Spanish re-occupation of New Mexico in the 1690s.
Unlike English and early U.S. common law, under Spanish colonial law women retained ownership of property that they brought into a marriage Gallegos may have purchased the land as it does that Montoya would simply give away such a valuable tract to someone with no familial relationship to him. Indeed, Gallegos may have held a relatively high position in Hispano society, given that she registered her own brands with the Spanish colonial government and in these documents was referred to by the honorific “Doña.”
It is possible that Hispanic colonists occupied the grant prior to the Pueblo Revolt, though no documentary evidence of this occupation survives today. The large-scale destruction of legal documents during the Revolt, however, means that we will never know for sure. The documents that do survive make it clear that a private land grant for the tract was issued to Diego Montoya in 1694. The grant was re-issued in 1712 following the loss of the original grant papers. This re-issuance may have been spurred by the transferal of the tract to Elena Gallegos that year. Either Diego Montoya or his son, Antonio, gave or sold the land to Elena Gallegos that year or sometime shortly thereafter.
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