Santiago Tafolla (1837-1911) was born in Santa Fe, New Mexico one year after the Republic of Texas declared its independence from Mexico. He worked as a soldier, hunter, trader, famer, rancher, civil rights activist, Justice of the Peace, and preacher. He began his memoir, Memoir of a Mexican-American Civil War Soldier / Las memorias de un soldado méxico-americano en la Guerra Civil Americana (Arte Público Press, 2009), in 1908. He died of a heart attack while delivering a sermon at the pulpit of the Methodist-Episcopal church in Seguin, Texas, in 1911.