Following the Rodriguez-Chamuscado expedition of 1581, interest increased in the area now known as New Mexico and Texas, and concern grew for the safety of Fray Rodriguez and Fray Lopez, who had remained there. In 1582 Fray Bernardino Beltran, a Franciscan priest from Santa Barbara, Mexico, organized an expedition to find the missionaries, with a military escort led by Antonio de Espejo, a former Santa Barbara merchant and rancher living in voluntary exile because of a legal dispute with the Spanish authorities. The expedition left the mining outpost of Bartolome in November 1582 and by the following January reached the El Paso area. In present New Mexico they learned that Fray Rodriguez and Fray Lopez had been killed by Indians. Fray Beltran then led a small party back to Mexico, but Espejo and several companions remained to investigate Indian accounts of silver mines and wealthy pueblos. During their journey the Spaniards became the first explorers in the region from the Pecos River Valley to the Junta de Los Rios, the junction of the Choncho River and the Rio Grande, and reports of their explorations further heightened interest in the area.