Still some progress continued to be made. On Maury’s recommendation, General Magruder, formerly of the Confederate States army, was placed in charge of the land office, under whom was to be a large number of surveyors, most of whom were former Confederates. Among the other prominent men who had come to Mexico in the summer of 1865 were: Generals Kirby Smith, Shelby, Slaughter, Walker, and Terrell of Texas; Governor Price of Missouri; Ex-Governor Isham G. Harris and General Wilcox of Tennessee; General Hindman of Arkansas; Governor Reynolds of Georgia; Judge John Perkins, Colonel Denis, and Pierre Soulé of Louisiana; and Major Mordecai of North Carolina. Across the frontier had been brought horses, artillery, and everything that could be transported. Both large and small bands of Confederate soldiers had come over into Mexico, and some 2000 citizens had left the United States with the intention of colonizing Sonora in Northern Mexico, though Maury had no connection with this undertaking. He did, however, send General Price, Judge Perkins, and Governor Harris as a commission to examine lands near Cordoba in the state of Vera Cruz. They handed in a very favorable report, and here a colony, named the “Corlotta” in honor of the Empress, was planted. Of its prospects Maury wrote enthusiastically: “In the olden times Cordoba was the garden spot of New Spain. There stands on one side, and but a little way off, the Peak of Orizaba, with its cap of everlasting snow, and on the other the sea in full view. These lands are heavily in debt to the Church, and as the Church property has been confiscated—not by the Emperor, though—Max. took possession of these lands for colonization. The railway hence to Vera Cruz passes right through them; and I am now selling these lands to immigrants, as fast as they can be surveyed, at $1.00 the acre on five years’ credit. There are about forty of our people already there. Perkins has bought himself a house and has sent for his family; so has Shelby, and so have a number of others. Mr. Holeman of Missouri, an Episcopal clergyman, with his family—nice people—has been engaged by the settlement as pastor and teacher. I am going to reserve land for a church, cemetery, and school-house. Thus you see, my sweet wife, colonization is a fact, not a chimera. By the time these lands are paid for they will be worth, even if no more settlers come to the Empire, $20, $30, or even $100 the acre, for they produce everything under the sun, and yield perpetual harvests”.