Nicholas Bluntzer, a native of the French province of Alsace, came to Texas at age nine with his parents and other Alsatian families led by colonizer Henri Castro. The Bluntzer family settled in DeWitt County in an area along Coleto Creek that would become the town of Meyersville. In 1856-57 he served as a scout in a punitive expedition led by Col. Robert E. Lee against Comanche Indians in West Texas, and in 1858 he married Justina Peters. Later, as a member of the Confederate army, he participated in the last battle of the Civil War at Palmito Ranch in May 1865. After the war he became an influential rancher, acquiring large tracts of land in Nueces and other counties, investing in Corpus Christi real estate, and establishing a large cotton-growing operation near this site in the 1890s. A settlement grew in the area and was named Bluntzer. After his death in 1901, he was buried in a San Patricio cemetery. The Bluntzer home not far from this site remained in the family until 1961, when it was bequeathed to the Sisters of the Incarnate Word and Blessed Sacrament. He was posthumously inducted into the South Texas Cowboy Hall of Fame in 1967.