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THE LADY IN BLUE

by Tumbleweed Smith

A legend in Houston County tells of a Franciscan nun in Agreda, Spain in 1620 who was able to communicate physically and/or telepathically with Indians in East Texas, specifically around the Mission San Francisco de los Tejas at Weches, the first mission in Texas (established in 1690, now known as Mission Tejas, a State Historical Site). Dorothy Harrison of the Houston County Museum says when the missionaries arrived, they were surprised to find out that the Indians knew about Christ.

“Some of them asked to be baptized and they wanted a church because they said the Lady in Blue had told the Indians that the missionaries were coming and to ask for these things. She had also instructed the Indians how to greet the missionaries, with garlands of flowers and a cross. The missionaries had thought they were going to confront savages, but the Indians were civilized and knew about the Christian religion.”

The amazing part of this story is the Lady in Blue never left Spain.

“She would go into a deep trance, “ says Dorothy, “and when she came out of this trance, she told the other nuns about visiting this land and described the terrain and the people.” Dorothy has done lots of research on the Lady in Blue. Much of her information is from the Internet.

“Her real name was Maria Jesus de Agreda. Her parents gave their castle to the monastery, then her father and her brothers became monks. Her mother, her sisters and she became nuns. She had wanted to be a missionary all her life, but the church wouldn’t allow her to go to the new world.”

The Lady in Blue is featured in parades in Houston County. Dorothy’s daughter represented her in a July 4th parade in Crockett.

“She dressed in a Franciscan habit,” says Dorothy, “but she had a blue cape. That’s how she appeared to the Indians in the evenings just at dusk. They said she appeared to have a blue haze around her and she would teach them in her language.”

Dorothy says the word for what the Lady in Blue did is called bi-location, being in two places at one time. There are also stories of the Lady in Blue appearing in New Mexico and Arizona before the missionaries came. The Spanish Inquisition called her to testify but could find no evidence to dispute her word. She said she had traveled thousands of miles more than 500 times without ever leaving her monastery. A scouting missionary, Father Biviendos, who had visited East Texas, corroborated her descriptions of the Indians and where they lived. The Indians told him about visitations from the Lady in Blue. When he returned to Spain, he visited with her.

A campground called Pine Springs near Weches is said to have a ghost, which may be the result of some metaphysics, ancient religion and faith. At least one novel and several articles have been written about the Lady in Blue.

more articles by Tumbleweed Smith