Camargo, Chihuahua

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Santa Rosalía de Camargo, originally called Santa Rosalia, is a city in the eastern part of the Mexican state of Chihuahua. It serves as municipal seat of its surrounding Camargo municipality. It is a colonial town steeped in vast history. The Mission Santa Rosalía is beautiful with a park. Camargo is within a short distance of a small pueblo called Chavirra, and a short distance up the road to the old Presidio San Francisco de Conchos near Lake Boquilla and Lake Colina known as places for tourists to come especially in the summer season as well as Los Filtros.

During the Spanish conquest of Mexico, the Spaniards came in and waged war against the Native Conchos Indians who lived there. During the Mexican Revolution, Pancho Villa also invaded Camargo. Other Native tribes such as the Apache Indians came down from the Ojinaga, Chihuahua, Mexico region not far from El Paso, Texas and waged war against the Conchos Indians. Some used the Rio Grande as well as the Conchos River to ride their horses into the region. The River provided water as a source supply for survival. The San Francisco De Conchos area was attacked by various tribes.

The region is known for agriculture, cattle, corn, almond trees and is surrounded by nearby mountains. There is a wide range of (race) mixture of a diverse culture such as Mexican, Spanish, Mestizos, Basque, Portuguese, French, Italian, German, Mennonites, South African Boers and Conchos Indians. The Tarahurama Indians come into Camargo to sell goods to the local people to make money they live throughout the region up in the mountains. Some reside in Creel and the Sierra Madres.

The Mexican census of 2005 showed a population of 39,149 in the city of Santa Rosalía de Camargo, while Camargo municipality had a population of 47,209. The municipality has the second-largest land area in the state (after Ahumada), and is also one of the largest in all of Mexico, with 16,066 km² (6,203.1 sq mi) of territory, almost all very sparsely populated except in the city of Santa Rosalía de Camargo, which is the seventh-largest community in the state in population.