Out of the Alamo
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Santa Anna, who had been taken prisoner, came to terms with Houston to end the war. In , the United States annexed Texas.
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For many years afterward, the U. Army quartered troops and stored supplies at the Alamo. In , the state of Texas purchased the Alamo, later acquiring property rights to all the surrounding grounds. Today, more than 2. We strive for accuracy and fairness. But if you see something that doesn't look right, contact us!
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When the Battle of the Alamo ended at approximately a.m. on March 6, , fewer than were eventually placed under the protection of an officer and escorted out of the Alamo and imprisoned in the home of the Musquiz family. The Battle of the Alamo (February 23 – March 6, ) was a pivotal event in the Texas Several months previously, Texians had driven all Mexican troops out of Mexican Texas. About Texians were then garrisoned at the Alamo.
Because the western part of the state is mostly desert, most Coahuilans live in the cool, moist eastern highlands. Because of the wine production in the area, the city of Parras de la A country rich in history, tradition and culture, Mexico is made up of 31 states and one federal district.
It's true that the Bowie family made wide-bladed knives, but there is no single "Bowie Knife" and the large knife that's come to be known by that name probably wasn't used by Jim Bowie at all. Jim Bowie was a likable criminal. Though most people said he was friendly and charismatic, he was also guilty of fraud in several land speculation deals. His reason for emigrating to Texas was simple: He converted to Catholicism and married a local politician's daughter.
They had two children, and in , while Bowie was away, his new Mexican family died from cholera. He was a seasoned fighter, and assigned to the garrison at the Alamo. He was supposed to be under the command of William Travis, but his men, mostly volunteers, wouldn't follow young Travis, so they agreed to co-command.
Bowie also brought his slave Jim with him to the Alamo. Bowie was also a smuggler, and what he smuggled was slaves. In movies, Bowie is depicted as either fighting wounded on the battlements, or fighting bravely from his sick bed. The latter is closer to the truth: It's questionable that he was even conscious during the final battle. Contemporary reports have him "hiding under a blanket" but it's quite possible that he was simply too sick to move.
Travis was a young South Carolina lawyer. Saddled with debt, and under threat of arrest, he'd heard that Texas was a land of opportunity for lawyers, and he hoped to head there to escape prosecution and earn enough to pay his debts. Travis arrived in Texas in at the age of 21, and having been there five years before the battle made him one of the few men at the Alamo who had any experience living in Texas. After setting up shop as a lawyer, he became embroiled in the fomenting revolution and joined the militia as a lieutenant colonel of the calvary.
He was sent to the Alamo, which he considered beneath someone of his rank. After Bowie fell sick, Travis was in charge. As Santa Anna rolled into town, Travis wrote a series of famous letters pleading for help from other Texians and Americans still in the United States as well. A few dozen men did answer the call, but most did not, with the nascent government of Texas worrying itself with creating a new government. Houston and others encouraged Travis to abandon the Alamo as unimportant, but he refused. Legend has it that when Travis knew no help would be coming, he drew a line in the sand and asked every man who would fight with him to cross it.
Battle Of The Alamo
All but one, Moses Rose, did. This legend is in the official materials and video from the Alamo, though it's carefully worded as "Legend has it…". In fact, there's little evidence that this event took place, and there's even less evidence that anyone named Moses Rose was at the Alamo. The Alamo was filled with largely volunteers, and as such not everyone knew each other and there wasn't the record keeping one would find in an organized army.
The story of Travis drawing a line didn't appear until decades after the event. That didn't stop the placing of a brass line directly in front of the Alamo chapel to commemorate the likely non-event.
Guanajuato Guanajuato, the birthplace of famed muralist Diego Rivera, is also the site of Alhondiga de Ganaditas, a former town granary that became a revolutionary symbol after the heads of insurrectionists Hidalgo, Allende, Aldama and Jimenez were posted at the four corners of the It is believed most of the Tejanos left when Seguin did, either as couriers or because of the amnesty. The Texas Revolution was on. The increasingly dictatorial policies, including the revocation of the Constitution of in early , incited many federalists to revolt. But by this time, Santa Anna was in power, having seized control in , and he advocated the removal of all foreigners. When Mexican troops entered the kitchens, Charlie grabbed a young Mexican officer and threatened to kill him unless the soldiers spared his life and Bettie's. They were released hours later when Susannah Dickinson and Joe reached Gonzales and confirmed the report.
Travis was one of the first killed during the battle. His slaves fought by his side right up until the moment he was killed, and then went into hiding, their service done. There have been attempts by Hollywood to depict the Alamo's slaves as loyal beyond their enslavement, but in reality they knew they were slaves, and they knew this wasn't their fight. If there's one thing that's true about the Alamo, it's that you can find lots of different, conflicting facts.
While most historians put the number of Mexican casualties at around , and the Texan casualties at around , some lower the Mexican figure to 78 dead, and raise the number of dead Texans to Those who wish to immortalize the defenders of course want to imagine them fighting fiercly, taking down 10 for every man they lost. But there's a lot to consider here. The siege didn't last a day, but instead took place over two weeks.
During the day, Mexican artillery blasted the fort, while defenders took cover. At night, they were forced to reinforce their battered perimeter. With dwindling supplies and very little sleep, the men of the Alamo were likely exhausted. We also don''t know how many men were inside the Alamo.
There were at least , with being officially commemorated. Some put the figure as high as Santa Anna had 1, troops, though many times his entire army of 6, is reported as being there. When the actual battle started, it was short, and took place at dawn while most of the defenders were sleeping. Some say the battle lasted only 30 minutes, others stretch that to 90 minutes or two hours. The Mexicans charged the walls before the sun came up, and it makes sense that they'd lose a lot of men.
References & Further Reading
The defenders were shooting cannons and long guns from behind barriers at men standing in a line out in the open. Santa Anna fully expected to lose one third of his force. So yes, the Alamo defenders did cause more casualties than they received, but this is not surprising in any way.
It's become popular to suggest that the Alamo was a battle for slavery. Slavery was part of the reason Texas wanted to secede from Mexico. There's barely a mention of slavery at the Alamo today, but many of those who went to Texas in the s were pro-slavery, and intended to uphold the institution. At all times until the end of the American Civil War, Texas was strongly in favor of slavery.
List of Texian survivors of the Battle of the Alamo
Not only was slavery legal, it became illegal to free slaves. And those freed slaves who already lived there had virtually all their rights revoked. If they were ever found guilty of a crime, they were slaves once again. What's more, the few Indians living in Texas were also denied citizenship.
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There is much irony in people claiming to fight on behalf of lost rights subsequently removing the rights of others. But to say The Alamo and and the Texas Revolution were all about slavery is to go too far.
It was more about land speculation, and starting a new life in a fresh country. Texas has a very bad history when it comes to race, but slavery is just a part of the Texas birth story. The Alamo is literally larger than life, and while it was an important event, the reasons why we should remember it aren't obvious. Under Iturbide, American colonists had been allowed to settle in Texas.
About the only condition to owning land was that all immigrant landowners had to be Catholic, an easy enough problem to overcome for non-Catholics. William Travis, for instance, became Catholic to purchase land, but remained a staunch Methodist until the day he died at the Alamo. Unfortunately, the fledgling Republic of Mexico was born bankrupt and ill-prepared for self-government.
In fact, during its first 15 years of independence, it had 13 presidents. All of them struggled for power, shifting between the liberal-leaning Federalists and the dictatorial Centralists. The first president was a Federalist, General Guadalupe Victoria, a hero of the revolution who had changed his name from Miguel Felix Hernandez to honor Our Lady of Guadalupe, patroness of the Americas, for his victory. It was he who established the liberal Constitution of that so infuriated Santa Anna and that would lead to the Battle of the Alamo 12 years later.
When Mexico redefined its territories in , Texas was the only separate territory to lose its independence. Armed citizens gathered in protest. In September , they petitioned for statehood separate from Coahuila. They wrote out their needs and their complaints in The Declaration of Causes.
This document was designed to convince the Federalists that the Texans desired only to preserve the Constitution, which guaranteed the rights of everyone living on Mexican soil. But by this time, Santa Anna was in power, having seized control in , and he advocated the removal of all foreigners. Come and take it! Although the only casualty was one Mexican soldier, Gonzales became enshrined in history as the Lexington of Texas. The Texas Revolution was on. More than of his men lay dead, and as many more were wounded. He signed papers of capitulation, giving the Texans all public property, money, arms and ammunition in San Antonio, and by Christmas Day, the Mexican army was back across the Rio Grande.
To the Texans, who lost about 20 men, including Ben Milam, the victory seemed cheap and easy. He whipped together a force of 8, men, many of them foreign adventurers from Europe and America. One of his deadliest snipers was an Illinois man named Johnson! Santa Anna, the self-styled Napoleon of the West, marched at the head of the massive army; he was determined to stamp out all opposition and teach the Texans a lesson.
Early History of the Alamo
The word went out to his generals: In this war, you understand, there are no prisoners. Although it was midwinter, Santa Anna pushed his army mercilessly toward Texas. The frigid, wind-battered deserts of northern Mexico took their toll. Men and animals died by the hundreds and were left on the trail, and the brigades strung out for uncounted miles. When the big siege guns bogged down in one of the many quagmires, Santa Anna pushed on without them.
Nothing would stop him. Neill had assumed command of the Alamo garrison, which consisted of about 80 poorly equipped men in several small companies, including the volunteers. The rest of the soldiers had returned home to their families and farm chores. In this command were an artillery company under Captain William R. On January 17, , Sam Houston, the commander of the revolutionary troops, sent Colonel Jim Bowie and 25 men to San Antonio with orders to destroy the Alamo fortifications and retire eastward with the artillery.
But Bowie and Neill agreed that it would be impossible to remove the 24 captured cannons without oxen, mules or horses. And they deemed it foolhardy to abandon that much firepower—by far the most concentrated at any location during the Texas Revolution. Bowie also had a keen eye for logistics, terrain, and avenues of assault. Knowing that General Houston needed time to raise a sizable army to repel Santa Anna, Bowie set about reinforcing the Alamo after Neill was forced to leave because of sickness in his family.
Colonel William Travis arrived in San Antonio on February 2 with a small cavalry company, bringing the total number of Alamo defenders to about Although spies told him that Santa Anna had crossed the Rio Grande, Travis did not expect the dictator before early spring. He sent letter after letter, pleading for supplies and more men. He and Bowie also competed for command of the garrison before it was decided that Bowie would command the volunteers and Travis the regular army.
Alarmed by the Mexican army on the outskirts of town, Travis vigorously renewed his pleas for help. I shall never surrender or retreat…. Travis sent the message out with Captain Albert Martin. To the triumphant music of a military band, he took possession of the town, set up headquarters on the main plaza, and began the siege. He had his standard-bearers climb to the top of the bell tower of San Fernando Church and unfurl the scarlet flag of no quarter.
Inside the Alamo, Travis and the Texans fired their message to Santa Anna with a blast from their pounder. Santa Anna ordered his men to pound the fortifications with cannon and rifle fire for 12 days and nights. His idea was to wear out the defenders inside, giving them no chance for rest or sleep. He reasoned that a weary army would be an easy one to defeat. But the noise worked on his own army, too. Unable to hear clearly through the din, they allowed courier after courier to escape from the Alamo.
The total number of Alamo defenders now stood at between and Just as dawn was breaking, the Mexican bloodcurdling bugle call of the Deguello echoed the meaning of the scarlet flag above San Fernando: At the third charge, one Mexican column attacked near a breach in the north wall, another in the area of the chapel, and a third, the Toluca Battalion, commenced to scale the walls.
Out of men in the Toluca Battalion, only were left alive. Fighting was hand to hand with knives, pistols, clubbed rifles, lances, pikes, knees and fists. The dead lay everywhere. Blood spilled in the convent, the barracks, the entrance to the church, and finally in the rubble-strewn church interior itself. Ninety minutes after it began, it was over. All the Texans died. More than Mexicans lay wounded, their groans mingling with the haunting strains of the distant bugle calls.