Name Alonso de | ||
Alonso Rael de Aguilar was a high-ranking soldier under Diego de Vargas, serving as Secretary of State and War. Born in February 1661 in Lorca, Murcia, Spain, he arrived in what is now El Paso, Texas by about 1683. He accompanied Diego de Vargas on the 1692 reconquest of the New Mexico Territory for Spain, the anniversary of which is celebrated to this day as the Fiestas de Santa Fe. Rael de Aguilar later served as mayor of Santa Fe. He is the progenitor of the Rael surname throughout the southwest United States of America, notably New Mexico and Colorado.
Jewish Origins
Alonso Rael de Aguilar's departure from Spain "came on the heels of a renewed campaign against crypto-Jews by the Holy Office of Murcia in the early 1680s." The similarities between the surname Rael and the appellation Israel were apparent but never connected, from at least the 15th century, according to Stanley Hordes and his research. Hordes is a controversial author on things New Mexican.
Rael received a land grant near Cerillos, New Mexico, but apparently abandoned it, and in 1788, the ownership of this grant passed to Rael's granddaughter's husband, Jose Miguel de la Pena.