Pancho Villa’s surprise attack on border town

In the wee hours of Mar. 9, 1916, peasant guerrillas cut a hole in the international fence 60 miles from El Paso and scurried toward Columbus, New Mexico. A desperate Pancho Villa had launched the first armed invasion of the United States since the War of 1812.

Careful not to bite the hand that fed him, Villa for years avoided alienating Americans in general and Texans in particular. Flattering press reports transformed the former bandit into the Robin Hood of the Rio Grande, hailed north of the border as the savior of the Mexican masses.

But the long honeymoon came to an sudden end in October 1915, when President Woodrow Wilson recognized Venustiano Carranza, Pancho’s latest rival, as the legitimate ruler of the chaotic country. In the naive belief he had the power to stop six years of bloodshed, Wilson halted the flow of American arms to the villistas.