Background
He was the son of Francisco Marin del Valle and Manuela Saenz de Tejada.
He was the son of Francisco Marin del Valle and Manuela Saenz de Tejada.
Francisco Antonio Marin del Valle was baptized in the Villa del Lumbreras, Murcia, Spain, on July 12, 1722. All them were residents and natives of this village. When he came to Americas, he settled in the state of Potosí (in modern Bolivia), where he worked in the mines of Charcas.
Later he emigrated to Mexico, where became a merchant.
Marín del Valle became mayor of Mexico and between 1754 and 1760 was Governor and Captain General of Province of New Mexico. In 1754, he commissioned Spanish engineer and cartographer Bernardo de Miera y Pacheco to make the new map of El Paso, where he had lived since 1743.
His work was the first accurate and detailed map of southern New Mexico, in El Paso (in this time, El Paso was part of New Mexico, joining Texas in the second half of the nineteenth century). He named the church as Nuestra Señora de la Luz (Our Lady of Light).
lieutenant was basically a military chapel, so later was called "Louisiana Castrense" (The Military).
Francisco Marin del Valle formed two brotherhoods: Nuestra Señora de la Luz and the Nuestra Señora de Valvanera. He was replaced by Mateo Antonio de Mendoza in 1760. The altarpiece of Nuestra Señora de la luz was moved to the Cathedral of Santa Fe in 1859, because the military chapel had fallen to ruin.