A Time to Stand: The Epic of the Alamo

  Did Travis Draw the Line?

  Ever since William Zuber launched the story in 1873, historians have pondered over his tale of Colonel Travis’ last appeal to his garrison. Did Travis really draw a line on the ground with his sword, ask all who were with him to cross, and give any others the chance to escape? Did Louis Rose really hang back—the only man in the Alamo who preferred to live? Did he really vault the wall and escape?

  There were so many things wrong with the account, few scholars took it seriously for years. At best it was secondhand hearsay: Rose was illiterate and Zuber’s parents, who heard him tell the story, never wrote it down. William Zuber himself was an incorrigible raconteur—another of his tales had a Mexican tearing Jim Bowie’s tongue out.

  Worst of all, the story just didn’t fit the known facts: (1) Only one Rose was listed in the Alamo, and that was generally understood to be James M. Rose, ex-President Madison’s nephew and an impeccable hero. (2) Travis had not lost all hope on March 3—his letters that day were full of high spirits and detailed instructions on what the relief force should bring. (3) John W. Smith, who left the Alamo later that night, never mentioned the speech or the line.

  Nor, in fact, did any of the survivors, until long after the Zuber story was published. Then, versions by Enrique Esparza and Mrs. Dickinson began to appear … but obviously with heavy and not very skillful editorial assistance. In 1881, for instance, Mrs. Dickinson had the story backward—the line was to be crossed by anyone who wanted to leave. Far worse, she had it all happening on the first day of the siege.

  Then in 1939 came a thunderbolt. R. B. Blake, a conscientious office worker long interested in the Zuber story, uncovered some amazing evidence in the Nacogdoches County Courthouse. It showed convincingly that there was indeed a Louis Rose, that he had been in the Alamo during the siege, and that his testimony was accepted by the local Board of Land Commissioners in deciding claims filed on behalf of six different Alamo victims. On Claim No. 254 by the heirs of John Blair, for instance, Rose testified, “Left him in the Alamo 3 March 1836.”

  So Rose was there. But did he leave under the dramatic circumstances described by Zuber? Freshly uncovered information suggests that he did. This consists of a formal statement, never published, given by Mrs. Dickinson to the State Adjutant General, who was trying to develop a more definitive list of Alamo defenders. Dated September 23, 1876, part of her statement declares:

  On the evening previous to the massacre, Colonel Travis asked the command that if any desired to escape, now was the time, to let it be known, and to step out of the ranks. But one stepped out. His name to the best of my recollection was Ross. The next morning he was missing.

  Of course, she did say “Ross,” not “Rose.” But letters and spelling meant nothing to Mrs. Dickinson, who couldn’t read or write. At this distance, her statement looks good enough—especially since there was no “Ross” in the Alamo. Nor does it seem damaging that her statement postdated the Zuber story by three years. It doesn’t have the ring of a coached remark; and Mrs. Dickinson, who was exasperatingly uninterested in her historic role, didn’t have it in her to take off all alone on a flight of fancy.

  But the statement does throw great light on another point raised by Zuber’s critics: How could Travis have drawn the line on March 3, when his letters were still so hopeful and John W. Smith never mentioned it at all? The answer: It didn’t happen on March 3—it happened, as Mrs. Dickinson testified, on the evening of March 5. By then the picture had entirely changed. Moreover, the later date would fit perfectly with the course of battle on March 5, when Mexican fire did taper off around sunset.

  All that’s needed is to allow Rose the same leeway on dates as everyone else in the Alamo story. In the true frontier spirit, none of them cared very much—who ever saw a calendar? Ramón Caro said Santa Anna arrived on February 26; Seguin said February 22. Travis himself gave two different dates for the arrival of the Gonzales men.

  So Rose was there and Rose fled—but still, did Travis draw the line? In her statement to the Adjutant General, Mrs. Dickinson didn’t mention it. Now a recently uncovered Zuber letter casts further doubt on the story. He too was writing the Adjutant General about this time, apparently because his account had come under such heavy fire. In a letter dated September 14, 1877, Zuber acknowledged that he had made up Travis’ speech completely, although it was based on information supplied by Rose. Moreover, Zuber admitted that he invented one paragraph which did not come from Rose at all: “I found a deficiency in the material of the speech, which from my knowledge of the man, I thought I could supply. I accordingly threw in one paragraph which I firmly believe to be characteristic of Travis, and without which the speech would have been incomplete.”

  Zuber never said what the passage was, but the omission itself is significant. The line was the crux of the whole speech—the center of all the controversy. If his concoction (“without which the speech would have been incomplete”) was not the line, it seems he would have said so, for this was the one thing everyone wanted to know.

  Summing up his account of the speech, Zuber said all he was trying to do was show “That on the afternoon of the 3rd day of March 1836, Travis in a formal address explained to his command their real situation and offered to every man who might be disposed to accept it an opportunity to risk the chances of surrender or escape.”

  Again, no mention of the line. But perhaps it was just as well. If Zuber was hiding a gentle fabrication, he was also protecting a shining legend—and what harm in a legend that only serves to perpetuate the memory of valor and sacrifice? As matters stand, there’s still room to speculate, and every good Texan can follow the advice of J. K. Beretta in the Southwestern Historical Quarterly: “Is there any proof that Travis didn’t draw the line? If not, then let us believe it.”

  Who Was the Last Messenger from the Alamo?

  John W. Smith gets all the glory and deserves much of it, for he carried Travis’ last dispatch to the Convention on the night of March 3. But another messenger left later with a final appeal to Fannin. This man reached Goliad on March 8, and his arrival is noted in two different letters—Burr H. Duval to William P. Duval, March 9, 1836; and John Sowers Brooks to James Hagerty, same date.

  The courier to Goliad evidently left the Alamo considerably after Smith, for his report is much more gloomy. On March 3 the walls were “generally proof against cannon balls”; now “every shot goes through, as the walls are weak.” Clearly the later report was sent after the Mexicans erected their new battery on March 4 just to the north of the Alamo.

  The evidence indicates that this last courier was 16-year-old James L. Allen and that he rode from the Alamo “after nightfall” on March 5. He left no written account, but through the years he told his story to others. At least three of these listeners have independently set down his story, and none seem to doubt his word. Allen himself was a responsible citizen-later tax assessor, justice of the peace, and Mayor of Indianola.

  Did Travis Wear a Uniform?

  No, despite all the portraits. He had ordered one from McKinney & Williams, but judging from his letter of January 21, 1836 to Captain W. G. Hill, it wasn’t very far along. Since he left for the Alamo on the 23rd, there’s little chance it caught up with him before the siege. Sergeant Felix Nuñez, who appropriated Travis’ coat after the battle, said that it was of homemade Texas jeans.

  Where Was Bowie Killed?

  A wide variety of sources give six different places. The favorites: a small room on the north side of the church; the second-floor room in the southwest corner of the long barracks; a small room in the low barracks. Of these choices, the best evidence points to the low barracks. Authorities: Mrs. Alsbury, who was Bowie’s sister-in-law; Captain Sánchez Navarro, Sergeant Loranca, and Sergeant Nuñez, all of the attacking force; Francisco Ruiz, who had the job of identifying Bowie’s remains for Santa Anna. On Sanchez Navarro’s plan of the Alamo, Bowie’s room is clearly marked in the low barracks, just to the east of
the main gate.

  Did Travis Commit Suicide?

  According to Antonio Pérez, one of the first friendly Mexicans to reach Gonzales after the massacre, Travis stabbed himself to avoid capture. Houston believed the story, and it was widely circulated. But later and more reliable evidence indicates that the Colonel was killed by enemy gunfire.

  This certainly is the opinion of those who were there. Travis’ slave Joe is emphatic on the point, and he was standing beside his master on the north battery. Captain Sánchez Navarro and Colonel José Enrique de la Peña, who wrote detailed firsthand accounts from the Mexican side, both agree that Travis fell fighting.

  Much has been made of the report by Francisco Ruiz, who identified Travis’ body for Santa Anna. In her celebrated thesis on the Alamo, Miss Amelia Williams pointed out that Ruiz said Travis’ only wound was “a pistol shot through the forehead.” But Ruiz never mentioned a pistol, and to one observer at least, there seems nothing remarkable about a soldier being shot in the head during battle.

  Did David Crockett Surrender?

  It’s just possible that he did. A surprising number of contemporary sources suggest that Crockett was one of the six Americans who gave up at the end, only to be executed on Santa Anna’s orders.

  Colonel Peña flatly said so in his Diario, first published in September, 1836. Colonel Almonte told a similar story, according to a letter from Sergeant George M. Dolson in the Detroit Democratic Free Press of September 7, 1836. So did an unidentified Mexican officer (who sounds suspiciously like Ramón Caro), according to a letter appearing in the Frankfort, Kentucky, Commonwealth of July 27, 1836. A similar account also came from Captain Fernando Urizza after San Jacinto, according to Dr. N. D. Labadie. Urizza said the prisoner’s name was “Cocket,” but Labadie had no doubts whom he meant.

  Nor are all the sources Mexican. Passengers on the schooner Comanche, arriving in New Orleans on March 27 with first details of the massacre, also reported how Crockett and others had tried to surrender “but were told there was no mercy for them.” The New Orleans Post-Union picked up the story, and it quickly spread to the Arkansas Gazette and elsewhere. Even Mary Austin Holley, that most loyal of Texans, finally included it in her 1836 guidebook.

  But it must be stressed that most early Texan accounts declared that Crockett fell in battle. “Fighting like a tiger,” to use Andrew Briscoe’s words. Both Joe and Mrs. Dickinson also believed he was killed in action, although neither saw him till after he was dead.

  So there’s a good chance Crockett lived up to his legend, and in some circles it remains dangerous even to question the matter. A few years ago when The Columbia Encyclopedia ventured the opinion that Crockett surrendered, an angry retort in the Southwestern Historical Quarterly declared that Texas would need better authority than “a New York publication.” Next edition, the New York editors meekly changed their copy.

  How Many Survivors?

  At least fourteen people in the Alamo lived through the siege. Three were Americans: Mrs. Dickinson, her daughter Angelina, and Travis’ slave Joe. Some early sources also listed a slave belonging to Bowie (variously called “Sam” and “Ben”), but this was actually Almonte’s cook Ben, detailed to escort the others to Gonzales. Mrs. Dickinson, Joe and Houston are all firm that only three Americans came out alive.

  A minimum of ten Mexican women and children also survived: Mrs. Alsbury and her baby, her sister Gertrudis Navarro, Mrs. Gregorio Esparza and her four children, Trinidad Saucedo, and Petra Gonzales. There were probably others, but the evidence is conflicting. On the other hand, Madam Candelaria—one of the better-known claimants—definitely was not in the Alamo.

  One member of the garrison almost certainly survived—Brigido Guerrero, who talked himself free by claiming to have been a prisoner of the Texans. Both Almonte and Gregorio Esparza mention him, and he later made a good enough case to get a pension from Bexar County in 1878.

  There is also evidence that Henry Warnell lived through the assault but soon died from his wounds. A sworn statement in a land claim filed in 1858 declares Warnell “at the massacre of the Alamo … that he was wounded at the said massacre but made his escape to Port Lavacca, where he died in less than three months from the effects of said wound.” (General Land Office, Court of Claims Application No. 1579, File W to Z, July 30, 1858.) This document seems stronger than an unsupported story that Warnell was fatally wounded while serving as a courier to Houston.

  Finally, there is the bare possibility of two other survivors. The Arkansas Gazette of March 29, 1836—when it was still generally believed that the Alamo was safe—carried an intriguing item about two men (one badly wounded) turning up in Nacogdoches, “who said San Antonio had been retaken by the Mexicans, the garrison put to the sword—that if any others escaped the general massacre besides themselves, they were not aware of it.” The item appeared a week before the Gazette carried Houston’s “express” reporting the defeat. In the thirty-one other newspapers examined, the General’s announcement was invariably the first word received.

  None of these possibilities seem strong enough to detract from the Alamo as a genuine example of a group of men who knowingly sacrificed their lives rather than yield to their enemy.

  How Many Texans Fell in the Alamo?

  Figures range from 180 to Santa Anna’s ludicrous 600. Best estimate seems to be 183. This is the final figure given by Ramón Caro, the Mexican general’s secretary. Also by Jesse Badgett, one of the first Texans to supply details to the U.S. press (Arkansas Gazette, April 12, 1836). Francisco Ruiz, in charge of burning the bodies, listed 182—but he missed Gregorio Esparza, the only defender Santa Anna allowed to be buried.

  How Many Mexican Casualties?

  Nineteen different sources give nineteen different answers—ranging from 65 killed and 223 wounded (Colonel Almonte) to 2,000 killed and 300 wounded (Sergeant Francisco Becerra). Most Texan sources claimed a thousand Mexicans killed and wounded, while General Andrade’s official report acknowledged 311 casualties. Both probably reflect wishful thinking, and the problem is complicated by the Mexicans’ tendency after San Jacinto to say absolutely anything that might please a Texan—until they got back south of the border.

  Best estimate seems about 600 killed and wounded. This is in line with figures worked out by Captain Reuben M. Potter, a contemporary Texan authority with firsthand knowledge of Santa Anna’s army; also with a Mexican study made in 1849, when enough time had passed for a little perspective. In addition, it fits figures reported by Dr. Joseph H. Barnard, a Texan physician captured by the Mexicans and sent to San Antonio to tend their injured. He was told that 400 men were wounded in the assault; an additional 200 killed would be about right, or 600 casualties altogether.

  The estimate goes with what is known of the Mexican Army. Judging from Filisola’s battle order figures and Santa Anna’s attack order of March 5, there were no more than 2,400 Mexicans in San Antonio, or 1,800 in the actual assault. A casualty rate of 33 per cent is a stiff price, even if 600 seems a modest figure. No Texan need feel cheated.

  What Was the Alamo Flag?

  Traditionally the Alamo flew a modified Mexican flag, but the best evidence indicates that this was not the case.

  The early Texan sources mention no specific flag, but in 1860 Captain R. M. Potter remedied the omission. In the first of several accounts he did on the subject, Captain Potter declared that the Alamo flag was the regular Mexican tricolor, but with the date 1824 substituted for the usual golden eagle. This was based on no evidence but on Potter’s theory that the Texans were fighting for the Mexican Constitution of 1824, until the Declaration of Independence was formally passed on March 2, 1836. Since the Alamo defenders knew nothing of this event, the theory ran, they went down still fighting for a liberal Mexico. The irony of Potter’s theory was appealing; others backed it up and it lingers on.

  But the theory does not jibe with the facts. Actually, Texas had stopped fighting for the Constitution of 1824 long before the Alamo. The
old Constitution had been a good enough goal for many during the fall and December, but early in 1836 popular opinion swung violently and overwhelmingly for independence. In the elections to the Convention, the independence candidate won a smashing victory in every Texas municipality.

  As loyalty to Mexico ceased, so did the trappings. Down came the old 1824 flags; up went new, strange banners—each designed according to the maker’s whim, but all proclaiming the idea of independence. There was the flag with the azure blue star raised at Velasco … another based on the stars and stripes at Victoria … a hodgepodge of red, white, blue and green at San Felipe. There was no time to wait—events had outstripped such formalities as conventions, declarations and official flags.

  The men in the Alamo were no different. By February only Seguin’s handful of local Mexicans seemed hesitant; the rest wanted no part of 1824. “All in favor of independence,” Colonel Neill assured Governor Smith on January 23. The men’s letters bore him out. “Every man here is for independence,” wrote Private M. Hawkins. “God grant that we may create an independent government,” prayed Amos Pollard.

  These men, like the rest of Texas, had their improvised flags. The New Orleans Greys carried their azure blue. Travis’ regulars had the five-dollar flag he bought en route to San Antonio (no description remains). Seguin’s nine men might well have carried a Mexican tricolor with two stars standing for Coahuila and Texas as separate states—one was seen in Bexar as the Mexicans approached—but the Anglo-Americans remained all for independence.