Houston at Gonzalez

Susanna Dickinson and Joe leaving the Alamo. Most likely they left from downtown San Antonio after an interview with Santa Anna at his Headquarters. He gave Dickinson two Mexican dollars and a blanket.


Susanna Dickinson and her daughter, survivors of the Alamo. Over the years she told several different accounts of the siege and fighting.

Houston at Gonzalez. Deaf Smith brought in Susana Dickinson, her infant daughter and Travis slave Joe. Fannin is supposed to bring the garrison North to Gonzalez. More men are arriving. An army is building.

One of the facts about the Texas revolution isn't mentioned much these days: In the early parts of the war, most of the fighting was done by new arrivals, NOT established Texas colonists. The colonists sat it out while the newcomers, most of whom had just arrived in the state, fought and died. The Alamo Garrison was lead by newcomer Travis along with Crockett and his Tenneseans and many other fresh faces. Now that the Alamo had fallen the established folks were beginning to wake up. Santa Anna was going to drive ALL anglo setters from the region.

More Joe.

The Mexican General sent an army toward Bastrop. General Urrea and his cavalry had won at San Patricio, at an Ambush on Agua Dulce Creek and were sweeping up the coastal plains toward Goliad. Settlers were fleeing East to get away in what would later be called the Runaway Scrape.

The spring in 1836 was rainy and the Nueces, Colorado and Brazos were all on the rise.

Other survivors.

Santa Anna lingers in San Antonio. He does have a band-new bride- the beauty from La Villita. He also thinks the story of the Alamo will panic settlers into fleeing East. He's partly right. Other Texicans are filled with a grim determination.

Houston rides to Gonzalez.

Erastus "Deaf" Smith

With the Texas Government declared at Washington-on-the-Brazos Houston gets on his horse and heads for Gonzalez. He says he's going to organize relief for the Alamo but he doesn't hurry. He takes five days to ride what ought to be covered in two, stopping two nights and a whole day at Burnam's Ferry on the Colorado to drink and talk.

When he rides into Gonzalez on Friday, March 11. The town is in a panic with news that the Alamo has fallen, Travis and the defenders killed to a man. He has two men who arrived from San Antonia arrested for spreading the news and sends Deaf Smith ahead. Smith Returns with Mr's Dickinson and her children. He doesn't lock them up. He sends a courier to Fannin at Goliad with orders to retreat to Victoria.

Weapons at the Alamo.

Kentucky Long Rifle or Pennsylvania Rifle. Calibers .36 to .45.


.61 caliber British Baker Rifle. Effective range 270 yards.


British Brown Bess. .71 Caliber.

The best firearm was a British Baker rifle that some elite Mexican Troops carried. It was a rifled black powder arm that was effective to 270 yards. .61 Caliber. The Mexican line troops were armed with .71 Brown Bess Muskets. They weren't much good over 70 yards. Mexican Cavalry Units had .61 Pagent carbines and pistols.

Texicans were armed with an assortment of military and civilian arms. Most carried their personal weapons. .36 caliber "squirrel guns" were common, though shotguns and pistols were as well. The best rebel rifles weren't much good over 250 yards, max, with 200 being the common effective range. Just not enough muzzle velocity from the powders of the day.

There is a rifle on display in the Alamo today which was said to have been pulled from the debris by a local and hidden. It was in in Pennsylvania by gunsmith Jacob Dickert. It has a 45 inch .55 caliber barrel and weighs 8 1/4 pounds.

Everyone had a knife of some kind as a weapon or a personal tool.

Hard to imagine the close quarters the combatants faced each other over. Texican artillery from their biggest cannon could shell downtown, though they only fired twice. Mexican artillery moved closer and improved their position and eventually would have collapsed every wall.

Day 10: Long Rifles.

 

  Davy's boys have the best rifles in the place.  Plenty of good guns around and bad, even Mexican Brown Bess's picked from the dead along with bayonets and cartridge belts.  Shotguns, horse pistols, tomahawks, knives of every sort.  Swords too.  Some cudgels and a couple cavalry lances.  The Gonzales boys came in well packed but already every man in the fort had a couple of rifles, a pistol, knife.  More cannon than we can powder, mount or crew.  If we can hold them here until Houston and Fannin ride in plus the other companies we stand a chance.  A good chance.  More than even.  They don't know what's coming.

  Speaking of knives there isn't a blade in the place you couldn't shave with, even the axes.  Tucked up under the wall all day we cook and folks sew and mend on tackle and gear and whet knives.   Teague is probably the best sharpener or at least talks it the most but several fellows could put an edge on an adobe brick. Bowie is a legend and men who knew him here early have stories. Says in his knife fights the other fellow couldn't see his big knife when it was edge-on toward them because it was so sharp. Could cut the leg off an ox with one swipe. I wouldn't test it.

  Davy's boys brought their squirrel rifles and deer guns.  Long rifles.  They keep them in beaded and fringed deerskin stocks and you never see one around unless it's being carried. 

  Lightly built but brassed and polished.  The maker picked careful wood.  Peter Bailey has one of the prettiest wood stocks a man has ever seen on a rifle, curlicued and polished deep, nearly black out of the sunlight, golden brown in it, but most of them are close.  They glow. 

  The men handle them like Davy handles his fiddle.  They never get laid down except on something soft.  At night the men pull them out and look them over, oiling and rubbing.  Davy was breaking pecan meat on the stock of Betsy and rubbing it into the wood.

  When they go out the rifles don't go.  They borrow a shotgun or a pistol and take a tomahawk and a knife.  Couple guys always stay behind.  I think it's just to keep those rifles company.

  They name 'em.  Davy has Betsy and a couple others.  Nelson has two he calls " Parson and the Po Boy."  Thomas Archer has his "Julie B."  Some of them got their rifles in trade but most of them had made guns. Davy says he shot near 200 bears with Betsy, all in the left eye.

  Seems most of those rifles can shoot.  Archer shot the shovel out of a man's hand digging the river battery.  All we could see was the space flashing over the dirt pile.  Had to time the shot just right.  Clanged like a bell.  Nelson killed three Mexicans dead with three different rifles when we caught them beyond the cow pens.  Quick as he could snatch.  They say the first was still standing when he shot the last. Davy says he's shooting more than we can eat. 

   The other day soldatos were chasing chickens out in La Villita way past rifle range.  Probably six or seven men trying to catch a flock thats been pecking under our guns for a week.  One man was standing in the open holding caught chickens by the feet as the others chased.  He had three or four in each hand.  Davy shucked the sock off Betsy and primed her, gave the ball a tap with the ramrod.  He rubbed a little oil off his nose with his finger and used it to slick up the front sight then sat with his back to a cannon carriage and Betsy resting across the sock on the wall.  The wind was gusting to raise dust.  250-275 yards.  I didn't think he was going to shoot until he pulled the hammer past half-cock.  Betsy barked and about two seconds later the dust jumped off that fellows jacket.  My, how the chickens flew!   That man turned to the side, fell to his knees and rolled over.  Except for the dead man there wasn't a Mexican in sight, just chickens shaking their feathers and calling each other.  Everybody was crowding up to the wall and passing around a spyglass to have a look.

  Davy patched out the lock on Betsy and winked. "I ain't sharing chickens with Santa Anna."

  That night one of the Kentucky boys went out with the picket carrying a rag and a tomahawk.  He was back before the moon came up with a cloth full of eggs.  Twenty or more.  Homed in on the night clucking like a bear on a honeybee hive.  We were pushing the ends of the cookfire in to get the heat up but Davy said we better send these to the women and chilluns in the chapel or there would be no end to it.  We kept enough for a skillet full and everyone awake had a bite.  One of the senora's came out to the fire and spoke.  Juan Abamillo was at the skillet and we looked at him.  "She says go get more," he said.

  Davy cracked a stick and poked it under the coals.  "There ain't no pleasing some women."

  It's Thursday, March 3, 1836.

Update:  Bonham back from Fannin and Goliad.  Fannin isn't coming.

Update II:  Shootout with Mexican forces north toward the river bottom and cover.  Soldatos think it's Texians foraging out.  Could be more reinforcements coming in.

Update III:  Bowie managed to get out and make a visit to all the men on the walls.

Update IV:  The Texicans are mostly shooting a Dupont gunpowder that is of high quality.  It's probably imported through New Orleans.  The Mexicans are using Spanish or indigenous powder that the defenders consider little better than coal dust. 

  

Day 7: The Hard Passage of Secundino Alvarez.

  The light fades and the pickets go over the wall to watch the night. No careless men and no fools. They take a blanket. Most go tomahawk and pistol. A few take a shotgun. Bill King goes and went last night. He wears two deerskin shirts, moccasines and carries Rutherford's double gun. He slides over the wall like a shadow and you don't hear a thing until he tosses a pebble on top to let you know he is back. Says he sits a different place every night so the Mexicans won't puzzle him out. Him, Milsap and Navarro trade. Last night he wasn't over the wall an hour when we heard Rutherford's shotgun. One barrel: Cu-Tonk!

  Then nothing. We ran to the wall but on top I could see Milsap motioning with his hand. Stay back. Stay down.

  A fringed deerskin rifle sock hung off the top ladder rung.

  Then it started. Wheezing. Then like a kind of a grunting. "Ump. Ump. Huh." A whispering mumble. Something. "Mio. Mio."

  The parapet filled up with low eyes watching the dark. The water was gurgling down at the river. "Mio. Dios. Aeg. Mumbling. Something....something. Dios."

  "Rutherford's double. One barrel. Best sit tight. King'll be up in a minute." Milsap was whispering.

  But he wasn't. Not that hour. Not as the stars swung around and Jupiter dipped low. I lined my rifle up on the whimpering. The blue gun bunch edged the cannon around. One of the Greys came over and checked his watchface on a blown coal off the fire now and then. Four oclock.

  "Mia. Miodios. Something something. Umph."

  A pebble bounced off the adobe with a click and King stepped out of a blue shadow and passed me the shotgun up. Right barrel was faintly warm and you could smell a trace of Dupont. He came over the wall and flowed down the ladder. Couple people rose from around the glowing firecircle below. Milsap handed him the cup of broth he was sipping.

  "Mexican Scout." King let out a deep breath and shook himself from the chill. "Nearly stepped on me. He's done, just not quite yet. Gawd cold. I thought they might come for him, but they never. It'uz either shoot him or let him under the blanket. Knocked him off in some muddy weeds."

  Dawn began to pick out some treetrunks and King pointed out the place. You could hear him wheezing and see his leg slide up for a minute, then back down. Navarro listened with his hands behind his ears. "He's calling his mother and his God."

  By the time the sun came over the East ridge half the fort had been up. Not much to see but you could make him out plain enough. He'd lie still and silent and we would decide he had travelled and then that leg would slide up and he'd start whispering again.

  The day filled with work. The Mexican batteries plonked away. Milsap and King rolled up in blankets and slept, faces to the wall. We would check and he would be still. Then we would check again and see that leg move. Quite a debate about putting another ball in him, but it wasn't enough to shoot at. A whole company marched around the East end of the fort past the trees. Esparza called out to the man in a voice you could hear in the downtown plaza but nobody came and never an answer.  Just two wrens in a treetop rasping back and forth.

  "I could stick him," said one of Davy's boys, but nobody moved.

  "Mio. Dios. Diodiohhh."

  We ate dinner and listened as the sun fell. Two of the Greys had bootheeled a big circle out in the plaza and were trying to get bets about how many cannonballs would be inside it by morning. Nobody was much interested.

  Milsap went up at dark out of the firelight to get his night eyes. King went with. Navarro.  King went over with his blanket under his arm. Milsap spit and said, "got dang," and went too. Navarro followed emptyhanded. Knife probably. I heard one little gravel crunch but otherwise they were smoke.

"Dio. Dios. Something. Uhh. Uhh."

  Three minutes later they came rushing back. Dang the noise. Had that man in the blanket. We reached over and hoisted him up, then Navarro. Milsap. King crouched in a shadow and when I looked a second later, the shadow was empty.

  In the room below we rolled the man out of the blanket. His right hand was mangled, gone like he put it over the muzzle and his side a bloody pulp. Smell of entrails and stale blood. Burnt mud. Lung. Maybe both. Navarro whispered to him while Enrique wiped his face. He was grinding his teeth and that leg was clenching still. Bowie's nurse Candalaria leaned into the firelight and squatted down like a man. She took a twig from the fire, popped off the flame on a rock and lifted his jacket with the glowing end.  "Muerto," she said and was gone in a swirl of skirts.

  The parson came and sponged his neck with warm water. We straightened him but he kept rolling on that side and drawing up that leg.

  An hour later Navarro came to the corner room where the fire was still glowing. "He was Secundino Alvarez of San Luis." Nav shrugged a little deeper into his coat. "He had a hard passing."

It was Monday, February 29, 1836.

When the sun came up I went back to the post. The body was rolled in the blanket with blood soaked through the middle. Two cannonballs and a big ring of shrapnel sat in the circle. King was at the cookfire. "If you think I'll say I'm sorry I shot," he said to nobody in particular, "I ain't."

Day 6: Campfire tales.

  Always a work crew going. Dig the well. Dig a trench. Shore up a platform. Carve a loophole. Stuff a hide and bulldog it into position. The pickets watch while men work.

  One of the Greys is a big man. Taller than Crockett and stout like an ox. They joke that riding out from New Orleans when his horse wore out he just carried it. He's not too smart but he's game and strong and anytime a load has to be shoved over or boosted up they call for Bull.
Of course, then it's: "put a little Bull on it." A crew was trying to push a post back into place on the North wall and Esparza was chanting "listo! Bull, listo!" So now it's: "put a little listo on it." He wandered over to look at the well crew and they were saying, "Dawg it! Don't send him down her, we'll never dig him out!"

  Good bunch.

  The worst guy in the company, kind of a mean drunk from down on the coast has dried out. The one man who looks like trouble still fits in. He was sleeping down in the Long Barracks and his snoring drove out the night pickets. One of them stole his hat and when he woke up there was hell to pay. Lots of sand kicked but he when went up top to take his post looking over the cattle pen the dead Mexican leaning on the tree was waving at him. And wearing his hat. He stomped right out there cussing a blue streak. Nevermind the Mexicans shooting.

  Davy gave Bull one of the yellow cats that's always winding around the crowd at the cookfire corner and he's been carrying it around for a couple of days. The cat has taken to sleeping on him. Cottle gigs him about cooking his cat, "say Bull, let's cook that kitty!" And Crocket warns him back: "Don't let Cottle cook that cat now Bull." Bull is always watching Cottle out of the corner of his eye. "Don't cook a kitty Wash."

  And the stories. Around the campfire day or night there are two or three going. We've heard all the famous ones: Riding the lightning bolt across the river, possum in a whiskey jug, blizzard in the bear's den, grinning the coons out of the hickory. One that really probably happened is about the dogs backing a big mama cougar into a hollow tree and one of Davy's guys saw the tail through a knothole, pulled it out and cut it off with a knife. Davy made him bow and apologize to the catamount and then they leashed the dogs and left. The boy traded it for drinks in a bar and they said for a year all they heard was stories about a mad mama bobtailed cougar up the country. Or it would be a drunk in a saloon with the tail talking up some wild story about how HE cut it off. On the packet boat coming up the Arkansas a card player told them their story, except this time it was HIM that treed the cat and cut the tail off. Had the very tail for a hatband. Davy kept pulling a surprised face and saying: "That so? My nevers! You ever heard such a thing Clark?" When all along Clark was the one who had to apologize to the big cat.

  The Greys have some swamp stories: one showed a scar around his wrist where he cut off his hand in a sawmill. Said a black witch doctor put it back on in trade for an alligator hide. Another has a big tattoo of a woman on his breast. He says he paid for drinks by showing her off in saloons. We can see her for two bits.

  The Tejanos catch most of it, everyone crowding in while someone winds the yarn. Crockett told a long story about what language horses speak. Says the Arkansaw horse he bought does everything backwards. Go forward is back up, speed up is slow down, hasn't seen a smart horse since Memphis and says the Tejano mustangs look at him funny. One of the Tejanos bunks his horse in the room under the wall where he sleeps. He gave a low whistle and that horse popped right out of that room looking at us. He made it spin, circle right, turn left, back up, with clicks and whispering and little hand signals. He floated his hat out on the ground and the horse picked it up and put it back on his head. Crockett tossed his coon hat out and the horse wrinked up his brow, snorted and looked at it like he was worried. Blew out the whole bunch.

  Horse came up behind Mirelez in the firelight and hung his head over the man's shoulder while he talked. Sweetest love you ever saw.

  Davy can fiddle now and those boys dance. McGregor blows the pipes up and plays with a red face. Even Bull got up and struttin when one of the rancheros who doesn't speak much started whirling a loop and jumping in and out of it. After a minute he roped the coffee cup out of Bill Clark's hand, roped the shako of one of the commandantes. Somebody yelled: "Rope Bull's cat!"
Everybody kind of froze. One of the Tejanos said something in Spanish and they all started laughing, then we all did.

  "You could put a rope on Bull's kitty," said Davy, " But I doubt you could hold it." Bull just glowered at Wash like it was his fault.

  It's Sunday, February 28, 1836.

  The Parson wanted to pray over the stew, since it was Sunday. About the time we all stood up with out hats off and he started rolling we heard the North battery go. You could tell it was their big howitzer putting up a shell: Puh-bloom! We could hear it fluttering in way up in the air. The Parson, he didn't QUIT praying, no sir, he speeded up. OurGodinHeavenwhosetendermerciesdecendonallsinfulmen. All of a sudden Davy shouts AMEN! and everyone scattered.

  We laughed till we were crying.

Big talk about what's going to happen when Fannin gets here. I can't wait to see them ride up behind that north battery. Several men will be happy to line up rifles on those boys when they come out from behind those dirt baskets.

  Santa Anna killed a courier from Houston and intercepted his letter. 1000 armed men and eight cannons on the way. He sent troops to guard the road, but it's empty to the horizon.

Day 5: Cannonball Stew.

  South view over the fortified main gate.  Crockett and his men along the low palisade with treetops on the ground outside it.  18 pounder on the left lower corner.  Downtown to the left.  North wall at the top.  Chapel on the right.

  Dawn comes with the North wind still whistling at 39 degrees.  Everyone is a windburnt and strung out from waiting and watching for relief and news.  The men are stretched thin to cover the walls so sleep is only done at your post.  The Mexican artillery is lobbing shells in and pounding on the walls.  You have to watch yourself in the open plaza.   Men are digging handy trenches and policing up the scraps for anything useful.  Nearly everyone can identify various Mexican cannons by the shrapnel left behind.  The north gunners must be bored.  They shoot a brass ball, then an iron one, then another brass.  Martial arts.

  In town Santa Anna's quartermasters and cooks are hustling around trying to find supplies to feed the troops.  They packed light on the trip up, for speed and now everyone is hungry.  The town has been stripped of everything the citizens haven't hidden.  Patrols go to the local ranchos to find cattle, pigs, corn.  Anything.  Might have to eat those shoes.

  The Texicans are cooking beef and conserving firewood.  128 fighting men burn through a couple of cows a day, especially in this cold wind, plus corn and beans.  Folks are getting creative around the cookfires as the salt, peppers and vegetable remmnants run out.  Not very fancy cuisine.  Everyone is trying to find a new part of a steer to eat, but it's the same old parts.  The hides are going to make sandbags and barriers to fortify the Long Barracks rooms. 

  Quite a bit of speculation about how to defend if the Mexicans get inside.

  A few housecats lurking around the old mission.  They're eating scraps or hunting mice around the walled compound.  Couple of them are tame enough to pet.  Wash Cottle says he knows how to make cathead soup.  God help us.  Knowing Wash, he might.

  Plenty of jokes about wellwater, beans and going downtown to have a drink.  "The whiskey may be gone", quips Crockett, "but at least our bagpipe player is sober."

  When that damn Fannin rides in he better have a bottle.

  Quite a few stiff bodies on the ground outside.  The East picket searched some when he went out after midnight, passed the weapons back over the wall and then stood one up against a tree as a joke.  His arm is up and he looks like he's waving.  The Tennesseans joke about shooting the cooks first, next time.  Steal their dang spoons and salt.

  Next time.

  Several men coming back across the ditch last night with armfuls of firewood and scroungings when Green Jameson fell.  Mexican balls were popping on the wall and everyone was running hunched over but Esparza leaned back out and hissed, "Verde! Don't drop those onions!"  Cracked us up.

  Couple guys snagged Mexican Besses and shakos when they burning huts.  They insist on wearing them and being addressed as "commandante."  The muskets aren't much.  One of the hats has a .61 caliber hole in it.  They were shooting at each other in the dark.

  The Mexicans are moving batteries closer.  The sappers are digging all night.  The Generalissimo decides the La Villita battery wasn't moved enough and they have to move it up in the daylight.  The rifles pick a few and punch holes in a few more.  One guy shoots a chicken off a post in Plaza Valera and everyone gives him hell about it.  He retorts he's not going to share it when he gets it tonight.      

  The irrigation ditch is finally diverted.  It's all well water now.

  Someone counts the lead bullets and comes up with 19,000+ rounds, but the powder supply is worrisome.

  It's Saturday, February 27th, 1836.

  

  Night falls and the menu is seared beef and tortillas under the 18 pounder platform or two choices of stew and beans in the chapel.  You can get it to go.

Day 2: Shoes, Cannon, Corn and a Recon.

  San Antonio held 7000 citizens in 1836.  When Mexican troops poured in the town bulged.  Houses were seized for officers and men.  Food, horses, cattle, mules, hay, corn and beans were confiscated for military use.  On the 24th the Mexican Army opened the homes and stores of missing Anglos and sympathizers and inventoried the take.  Santa Anna was out and about by 9:00 overseeing the issue of shoes to some of his lead regiments.  These may have been from stores owned by Texican settlers.

  Mexican artillerymen placed a battery 350 yards from the West, (town) side of the mission just off Potero Street and began a bombardment with two light cannons and a howitzer.  The cannons go to work on the adobe walls, the howitzer lobs grenades over it.

  In the Alamo Bowie had fallen seriously ill.  He was moved to an isolated room off the chapel and cared for by a curandero.  He passed joint command of the garrison to Travis.  The Texicans ranged outside the walls searching for supplies in nearby houses and huts.  They found 80 or more bushels of corn and beans.  They already have 30 head of cattle penned up against the east side of the compound.

  At 11:00 Santa Anna took a horseback circuit of the Alamo.  On the South side he passed within musket range of Crockett's position when he rode through La Villita, a little suburb that usually held families of Mexican soldiers assigned to the Alamo.  He sends cavalry to cut the roads leading to Gonzalez and Goliad.  Mexican units are still strung out on the road all the way to the border.

  The rebels had plenty of artillery, but not many cannonballs or powder.  Their 20 pieces were never all mounted at the same time.  They ranged from the 18 pounder down to a ship's gunade (small, short range anti-personnel piece) that had found it's way to the fort.  A Mexican shell hits the 18 pounder and wrecks the carriage.  The Texicans repair it.

  It's Wednesday, February 24, 1836.

  

Update:  The 18 pounder is a monster.  JC Neill and Green Jameson positioned it pointing into town off the southwest corner of the fort.  It's bigger than anything the Mexicans have.  

  It was shipped from New Orleans to Velasco, Texas in Oct, 1835.  A blacksmith mounted it there with two wagon wheels on a carriage.  It is about nine feet long and weighs two tons.

Update II: Bowie has Typhoid fever or something similar.  His wife, children and in-laws had died of a similar illness a few years before.  He's taken to the bottle more and more.  Travis and Bowie have feuded since artilleryman Col. JC Neill (sent to destroy the Alamo but who instead rebuilt it), left to check on his family on Feb 14.  Bowie realizes he is in trouble and turns his volunteers over to Travis.

Update III:  The captured Soldato is deciphering Mexican bugle signals for the Texicans.

Update IV:  Travis assigns Crockett and his Tennesee men a low wall area facing La Villita and adjoining the Chapel on the south side.  It looks like the weak point but they will hold it.  Travis has 146 men at this point, not half enough to man the cannons and the walls.

Update V: People are still moving between the Alamo and town.  The Mexican staff reports they have a spy inside the walls.  Bowie's curandero nurse, Madame Candaleria is suspected.  Travis has sent out several messengers to Houston, Fannin and others.