Remember the Alamo! 175th Anniversary (Feb 23-Mar 6)

As our freedoms erode ever quicker, and revolution seems to looming over the entire world, I want you to sit back, and ponder the events that happened 175 years ago, in a Spanish mission in central Texas.

225 men stood against insurmountable odds. 2,400 troops with a full supply line. Cannons and cavalry. The best military leader that Mexico had. These 225 men stood for freedom. They stood for justice. They stood for liberty. And they paid the ultimate price for it. But them paying the price gave others the courage to stand up for what they believed in. The paying of the ultimate price by these men, gave a country its freedom from an oppressive government.









The year is 1835. Mexico had declined from Federalism into a dictatorship. Texians revolted, and a small platoon of troops were sent into Texas. They marched to Gonzales to retrieve a cannon that was given to the people of Texas by the Mexican government. When the Mexican platoon arrived at Gonzales, they were met with a host of Texians. The cannon that they were to retrieve was pointed at the Mexican army, and a white flag flew above it. The flag said "Come and Take It!" This was the same phrase that the Texians had sent the Mexican government when the had requested the return, which prompted the movement of troops into Texas. Only two Mexican soldiers were killed in the skirmish. Texians had no deaths. It was not a as much a military victory, as it was a political victory. The Battle of Gonzales is called the Lexington of Texas. It propelled the Texians into a full on war with the Mexican government.

It took a year, but by 1836, Texians had pushed the platoon south of the Rio Grande, gaining a for in the process. This fort was called the Alamo. The compound was originally a small mission called Mission San Antonio de Valero. It's name was changed to the Alamo by a garrison of troops that was stationed there in 1805. It was named for a grove of cottonwood trees near the compound, known in Spanish as alamo,

Seeing the humiliation of his army, Santa Anna, the president of Mexico, decided to take matters into his own hands. He led a force of 2400 troops north of the Rio Grande. The first line of defense for the Texians was the Alamo. Men from all over Mexico, Texas, and the United States were garrisoned here. Men such as William Travis, Juan Seguin, David Bowie, Davy Crockett, Gregorio Esparza and James Bonham, too name a few.

The siege of the Alamo lasted one week. No reinforcements could be spared by the Texian general, Sam Houston. The men were on their own. On March 3, Travis, the military leader received a letter from Santa Anna demanding surrender, or else everyone in the compound would be killed. Travis called the Alamo defenders together, explained that defeat was almost certain, and read the letter of surrender; Travis then (having chosen to die instead of surrender) pulled his battle sword, drew a line in the sand of the Alamo, and asked for volunteers to cross over the line and join him, understanding their decision would be irreversible. All but one of the defenders joined Travis on his side of the line. Travis responded to the letter with cannon fire, and Santa Anna's buglers were ordered to play El Degüello, which meant no quarters would be given.

Then came that fateful day, March 6. AT 5:30AM, Mexican troops, surrounding the Alamo, began their march to battle. The cries of "¡Viva Santa Anna!" and bugles blaring, woke the sleeping Texians. The women and children were put into the chapel. Travis rushed to his post yelling, "Come on boys, the Mexicans are upon us and we'll give them hell!" and, as he passed a group of Tejanos, "¡No rendirse, muchachos!" ("No surrender, boys").

The Texian artillery tore apart the Mexican columns, as the troops continued to march to war. The texians did not have many cannon balls or canisters, but instead used any metal that they could find, including door hinges, nails, and chopped-up horseshoes, essentially turning the cannon into giant shotguns.

As the troops closed into the walls of the mission, the defenders were forced to lean over the walls to shoot. Travis was one of the first to die, firing his shotgun into the troops below him. The first wave of Mexicans over the ladders were beaten back, but the defenders were having difficulty reloading their weapons, while the masses of troops kept advancing. Somehow, the men succeed, and the Mexican army was repelled. The army tried a second time, and was repelled a second time.

During the third attempt, the Mexican troops found a hole in the defensive position, a makeshift section of wall on the north side of the mission. The wall was scaled, and the defenders killed quickly. Soldiers jumped down and opened the north gate. The Mexican army swarmed in through the open door. The cannon on the south wall was turned to fire on the troops coming through the north gate. This left the south unprotected, and the troops scaled the walls, and took control of the Texian's 18lb cannon. By this time, the eastern wall had also been breached, and troops flooded into the cattle pen area.

The Texians fell back to the barracks and the chapel. Defenders on the west wall were cut off from the barracks, so they they tried to retreat to the San Antonio River. Cavalry units followed the 25 men, but could not kill them. Re-enforcements were called, and the Texians were eventually killed.

The last Texian men left in the open were Davy Crockett, and his men, defending a low wall in front of the church. Unable to reload, the fought with knives, and used their rifles as clubs. It was not long before they were killed. The Mexican army now controlled the walls and the interior courtyards. A Texian flag flew over the barracks. The Mexican Army turned the Texian cannons on the barracks, blowing the doors off of each room. As the doors were cleared, troops swarmed into each room for the kill. Bowie, who was so sick he could not even walk, was in one of these rooms. His back against the wall, he fought with pistols and his famous knife, until he was over powered.

The last 11 Texians to die were the operators of the last 12lb cannon inside the roofless chapel. The Mexican army blew the doors off of the chapel. The Texians had time for one cannon shot and one volley of rifle fire before they were killed by bayonets. Almaron Dickinson, Gregorio Esparza and James Bonham were among these men. Texian Robert Evans, the master of ordnance, had been tasked with keeping the gunpowder from falling into Mexican hands. Wounded, he crawled toward the powder magazine but was killed by a musket ball with his torch only inches from the powder.

By 6:30 a.m. the battle for the Alamo was over. Even with all of the Texians dead, Mexican soldiers continued to shoot, some killing each other in the confusion. Mexican generals were unable to stop the bloodlust and appealed to Santa Anna for help. Although the general showed himself, the violence continued and the buglers were finally ordered to sound a retreat. For 15 minutes after that, soldiers continued to fire into dead bodies.

Weeks after the battle, stories circulated that Crockett was among those who surrendered. Ben, a former American slave who cooked for one of Santa Anna's officers, maintained that Crockett's body was found surrounded by "no less than sixteen Mexican corpses."

225 Texians killed 400-600 Mexican troops died that day, and another 200-300 were wounded. The Mexican were buried in a cemetary. The Texian bodies were stacked and burned.

Susanna Dickinson, Juana Navarro Alsbury, and the slave Ben were told to go to the Texians and tell them what had happened, and that the Mexican force was unbeatable.

As the Santa Anna continued his march into Texas, one of the generalsmarched up the coast of Texas towards Goliad. A large contingent of soldiers were in Goliad, under the lead of James Fannin. Sam Houston, hearing of the defeat at the Alamo, ordered Fannin to retreat. The Texians were too late, though, as the Mexican army surrounded them in the first stage of their retreat. The Texian Army surrendered, and were taken prisoner. A few days later, they were executed, and their bodies were torched.

Sam Houston ordered the evacuation of all civilians in Gonzales Even with the casualties at the Alamo, the Mexican Army still outnumbered the Texian Army by about 6-1. Santa Anna assumed that the news of the Alamo would discourage the insurgents, and they would walk away. It did not. In fact, it had the opposite effect, as men flocked to Gonzales to join Sam Houston.

On the afternoon of April 21, the Texian army attacked the Mexican Army at San Jacinto. The attack took Santa Anna's men by surprise. The battle cry of the Texians was "Remember the Alamo! Remember Goliad!" Santa Anna was captured the following day, and was forced to withdraw his troops from Texas.






I know I have been long winded, and I hope you enjoyed the little Texas history lesson.

But on top of that, I hope you realize that freedom and liberty should be defended at all costs. Though we may lose many battles, we will win the war.




Remember the Alamo! Remember Goliad! Remember San Jacinto!

Come and take it!

I made this post late at night.

Hopefully some day time peeps will read it now

I remember the Alamo. It happened when i was a little boy

Just kidding, i love the Alamo. Living in San Antonio, you can't help but love it. It is a monument to the men who died to give Sam Houston the time he needed to win the revolution that made Texas a Nation. Still the only state that was once a country. I recently visited the Alamo a few weeks ago, and it still looks great. Nicely done. To bad everyone else is ignoring such true testiment to freedom. But not everyone can be born in Texas. Because it just wouldn't be Texas if they let just anyone in.

reply to post by Royal76


I get chills every time I go there.

I think the road to Texas independence should be a part of all US History classes.

reply to post by Lemon.Fresh


HA! Remember the Alamo....oh where to begin.

Americans migrated into Mexican territory and brought their slaves with them. Mexico officially outlawed slavery in 1829. To bypass the law, the settlers converted the slaves into indentured servants for life. How nice. Mexican officials outlawed the immigration of Americans into Texas. They still came. Finally, when Mexico had planned to take action against the illegal settlers, they revolted and declared themselves independent.

We all know the story from there.

The story of Texan Independence is little more than Slave owners wishing to keep their "property" against the laws of the land they were inhabiting. Very poor choice for a celebration.

Originally posted by Lemon.Fresh

Men such as William Travis, Juan Seguin, David Bowie, Davy Crockett, Gregorio Esparza and James Bonham, too name a few.

!

edit on 2/24/2011 by Lemon.Fresh because: Errors fixed

I think you may mean Jim Bowie...............not david..........

reply to post by Catch_a_Fire


soory.

My mind was going faster than my fingers :s

idiot move

reply to post by My_Reality



Did 225 men die fighting for freedom from an oppressive government?


Yes or no question.

Great post!

Texas is just a badass state.

-Proud Texan

reply to post by My_Reality


Oh, and just for you:

Response to: A recent Houston Chronicle guest editorial contended that the "Alamo is a lie," the Texas War of Independence was for the retention of slavery and that Mexico under Santa Anna lost Texas because he took the "high road" on the slavery issue. Was Santa Anna the Abe Lincoln of Texas?

Were the Alamo Defenders defending slavery? Was slavery an issue in the Texas rebellion?
Eugene Barker in Public Opinion in Texas Preceding the Revolution (Annual Report of the American Historical Association for the Year 1911) states "the truth is, so far as one may judge from the absence of discussion of the subject in Texas, that slavery played no part in precipitating the revolution." Barker found only "three contemporary references which might indicate a potential connection between the slavery question and the revolution: (1) In a Fourth of July address intended to stir the colonists to resistance R. M. Williamson, a prominent radical, declared that the Mexicans were coming to Texas to compel the Texans, among other things, to give up their slaves (a broadside in the Bexar archives; "Publications" of So. Hist. Assn. VIII, 7-18). (2) In a letter of August 21,1835, Stephen F. Austin said "Texas must be a slave country. It is no longer a matter of doubt" (Quarterly of Tex.State Hist. Assn, XIII, 271). (3) On August 28 the radicals issued a circular in which they quoted H. A. Alsberry, who had recently returned from Mexico, as saying that the Mexicans boasted that they would free the slaves of the Texans and set them against their masters (Broadside in the Austin Papers)."

Von Holst in Constitutional History of the United States 11, 553: "Settlers came with their slaves from the slave States [to Texas]. In this the heads of individual persons may have been haunted by far-reaching projects; but I can find no support for the assertion that back of it there was a definite plan of the South."

Unlike the clash between North and South in the United States, slavery was a non-issue in the clash between Texians (and all Mexican Federalist and Constitutionalists) and the centralist Mexican dictatorship. However, the archives are replete with the agony and the struggle of Anglo and Hispanic Mexican Texians with the short and long term moral, economic, political and legal consequences of slavery (See Correspondence Concerning Slavery in Texas and Slavery in Early Texas by Lester Bugbee, 1898). In this respect, a full study and understanding of the struggle and unfolding of the institution of slavery within Texas in 1820-1836 is as far as one need look to see the complicated interplay of region, climate, economics, principle, law and race to understand the institution as it unfolded in the United States.

Was Santa Anna the Abe Lincoln of Texas?
To imply that the "Chameleon of the West," the one individual along with Creoles of similar vice-regal and corrupt self-serving philosophy, that represented the tragic subversion of the hope for a second democratic Federal republic in North America in the 19th century, can be in any way compared with Abe Lincoln is akin to claiming the same for Hitler, Stalin and Mao in the 20th century. It is an insult to the populist vision and sacrifices, however bloody, of Creole patriots Hidalgo, Morelos, Felix Hernandez (Guadalupe Hidalgo), Vicente Guerrero, Mier y Terán, and particularly reformers Gomez Farias who tried to work within the chaos of the Santa Anna regimes (see The Mexican Revolution). If Santa Anna was even intellectually capable of pondering, much less dissecting, the complicated moral, philosophical and economic issues related to human bondage and indenture, it was certainly a topic of no interest to him except to the extent that he could turn it to personal political advantage. Self-serving chameleonic personalities like Santa Anna enslaved the people of the great Mexican Republic both politically and economically from which Texas necessarily split and left a legacy from which their descendants are still recovering. A more appropriate comparison to Abe Lincoln in context of Texian history would be Stephen F. Austin or General Manuel Mier y Terán who strove unsuccessfully against hopeless odds to hold the Mexican-Texas "Union" together. For additional reading and links to the above, see Slavery in the DeWitt Colony and Texas.

Were the Alamo Defenders defending slavery? I am unaware of a complete personal history study on all Alamo Defenders which I hope will emerge sooner or later and for that matter all those in the service of Texian independence. However, there is no evidence that slavery even as a remote property issue would have been a motivational factor for the unique subset of defenders, the Gonzales Ranger Alamo Relief Force , who most clearly, aggressively and uniquely among Texians outside the garrison, demonstrated their willingness to defend the Alamo. This was after all "Houstonian" questions of doubt of centralist motives and resolve were disproved by the surrounding of the garrison and announcement of "deguello," no quarter by Santa Anna.

Of those from the DeWitt Colony capital Gonzales who successfully penetrated surrounding centralist lines, at least 22 were homestead and property owners (or members of families who were) of record in the colony, legal and loyal citizens of the Republic of Mexico. Not one was clearly a soldier of fortune, filibuster or adventurer. Three were civil servants of record, most were farmers and ranchers, two were merchants and two were skilled blacksmiths with shops in Gonzales, the best of developing regional Texian society. Not one (or their family) of record brought slaves into Texas or held a slave at the time. Although not for certain because of lack of records, this conclusion may extend to all Alamo Defenders from the DeWitt Colony whose contribution per resident was larger than any other single municipality or district of Texas. Members of families of the Municipality of Gonzales, who comprised only about 4% of the total population of Texas, accounted for 20% of the casualties at the Alamo. Put another way, over 4% of the total population of the DeWitt Colony, among them their most productive landholders, ranchers and farmers as well as merchants and civic leaders, died in the Alamo while total Alamo casualties represented less than 0.5% of the total population of Texas.

The personal histories, despite large gaps, of these Mexican citizens show clearly that they were motivated by immediate defense of family and their investment in the opportunity and promises given them by the libertarian principles of the Federal Republic of Mexico (see Andrew Kent story and William King family story). Personal loyalties to defenders in the garrison who were members of the community may have played a part. Secondary motivation was principle that they were defending personal and regional freedom to pursue a better life with minimal government interference, which most Anglo-Mexican immigrants had already gotten enough of in the land of their birth. This general conclusion may apply to the majority of Alamo Defenders and for that matter those who participated on the side of Texas and the Mexican Federalists, a surprising minority of Texas residents by the way, until the Mexican War of 1847.

The continuous struggle of self-righteous academics and other apologists as Señor Olvera ("The Alamo is a Lie" article) for self-serving centralists, who view the world through "race war" glasses, to put the image of loss of and fear of liberation of bonded blacks in the minds of these patriots as they rode to Bexar and penetrated centralist lines as well as their co-defenders in the garrison is an interesting exercise in sociology (socio-pathology?) rather than historical perspective. 08/09/98 War Room Alamo de Parras

Link

Or simply . . . where in the Texian Deceleration of Independence, does it mention slavery as a reason why they were upset?

Here is a link to help you out.

Feel free to let me know when you find it.

reply to post by Lemon.Fresh


HA....so Texans fighting to keep their slaves illegally is a sign of oppressive government?
You truly need to reevaluate what you consider oppressive.

American Texans, in that time period, were nothing more than illegal slavers that fought off the law and order that would have freed the Texan slaves. As I said earlier, that is nothing to celebrate.

You can claim repressive dictatorship all you like. The fact remains that the first Texan settlers were slavers that illegally kept their slaves while ignoring the national laws of the land that they were inhabiting. Freedom fighters? HA. Freedom for themselves and let the Mexicans and Slaves be damned.

This is all verifiable by unbiased history. You may consider your Alamo Texans freedom fighters but I see them only as merciless slavers who forced their slaves into indentured servitude, for life.

As I stated earlier....This is nothing to celebrate.

reply to post by Lemon.Fresh

[Ugartechea said that it would be useless to make explanations, unless the colonists would prove their loyalty by surrendering the radical leaders to the military authorities. This was later confirmed by Cos. The radicals were not surrendered and the commissioners went no further---Barrett and Gritten to Cos., Aug. 9, 1835, Bexar Archives; Publications of So. Hist. Assn., VIII, 343-344]

I will give you for the sake of argument that the rebellion was not about slavery even though that issue was one of the most important.

The simple fact that this paragraph explains is that the Texans had no ideas of surrendering to Mexican military authorities. Their(the Texans) radicalism brought on the war. They would not negotiate. They would not compromise. They wanted their way of life and Mexico and Mexico City would not have a say in the matter. In modern world terminology, the Texans would be considered Terrorists.

No matter how many biased sources you present, the Texas-Mexico issue was about slavery. The Mexicans abolished it in Mexican territory and the Texans would not accept that. Please keep in mind that Texas was a Mexican province at this time. It is proven how the Texans circumnavigated the Mexican slavery laws. Indentured Servants for life? HA.

The Texan rebellion was not a war against oppression. It was a war to keep their privileges and slaver way of life independent of the nation that they had immigrated to.

Texans could not persuade Mexico to leave them to live how they wished. So, they rebelled against the legal authorities and preserved the institution of slavery in Texas until the American Civil War.

Celebrate it all you like. It does not change the fact that you are celebrating slavery.

reply to post by My_Reality


Stars for you my friend. Damn, "Remember the Alamo?" should be "Remeber how we got slaves because Mexico abolished slavery?"

There isn't anything as racist as stating "Remember the Alamo," since the reason was that Mexico abolished slavery and pushed tensions forward for the slave owners of which Anglo-Americans felt threatened their well being.

One issue notably absent from the Texas declaration--and from all previous Alamo movies--was slavery. Almost a quarter of the original American settlers in Texas owned slaves. When the Mexican government abolished the practice, Texans viewed it as yet another infringement on their liberty. "The colonists were overwhelmingly southerners," says William C. Davis, author of Lone Star Rising: The Revolutionary Birth of the Texas Republic, "and they felt they needed slaves to capitalize on that vast arable land in the eastern part of the state." To take away slavery, they felt, was to take away Texas.
www.usnews.com...

This is also spoken more about on Wikipedia:

The issue of slavery became a source of contention between the Anglo-American (called that because they spoke English) settlers and Spanish governors. The governors feared the growth in the Anglo-American population in Texas, and for various reasons, by the early 19th century, they and their superiors in Mexico City disapproved of expanding slavery. In 1829 the Guerrero decree conditionally abolished slavery throughout Mexican territories. It was a decision that increased tensions with slaveholders among the Anglo-Americans.
en.wikipedia.org...

If it were not for people like you, the OP flawed history would prevail. Stars for you "My_Reality."