Stranded 40 years in the past by a spell of
Chief Sitting Bull, General George Custer and the
Seventh Cavalry join Davy Crockett to
win independence for Texas.
CUSTER
AND
CROCKETT
__________
AFTER THE ALAMO
By Gregory Urbach
After the Alamo by Doug Stambaugh
Copyright © 2016 by Gregory Urbach
All Rights Reserved. This alternate history book is a work of fiction. No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise without permission of the author.
Cover by Doug Stambaugh
Matthew Bernstein, story editor
Spanish translations courtesy of Claudia R. Colville
Art contributions by Kwei-lin Lum
Contents
List of Illustrations
History Matters
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Epilogue
Acknowledgements
References
Novels by Gregory Urbach
About the Author
.
Dedicated to the memory of
Thomas Ward Custer
1845-1876
In 1862, 16-year-old Thomas Ward Custer enlisted in the Union army as a private, successively earning the brevet ranks of lieutenant, captain, major, and lieutenant colonel. Barely 20-years-old when the Civil War ended, he had fought at Stones River, Missionary Ridge, the Atlanta Campaign, Cedar Creek, Five Forks, Namozine Church, and Sayler’s Creek. In 1865, he won the Medal of Honor twice for gallantry.
List of Illustrations
Thomas Ward Custer, 1845 - 1876
After the Alamo by Doug Stambaugh
The Buffalo Flag by Kwei-lin Lum
Victory at the Alamo by Kwei-lin Lum & Chris Stewart
Map of La Bahia by Joseph M. Chadwick
The War in Texas, 1836-1838 by Greg Urbach
Approaching the Cherokee Village, artist unknown
Mission San Gabriel, Sketch by Henry-Miller
Crockett’s Fort, artist unknown
Hanging in Coloma, after Leslie’s Illustrated
Custer’s Last Fight by Wm. Leigh & Samuel Bryant
San Antonio 1836 by Kwei-lin Lum
Battle of Buffalo Bayou by Kwei-lin Lum
Battle of Velasco by Kwei-lin Lum
Map of the Buffalo Flag Nations 1838, by Kwei-lin Lum
Keogh’s Marker published by Coffeen-Schnitger
.
History Matters
Our revisionist culture has made George Custer the great villain of the Indian Wars, but this is lazy history. Without doubt, Custer was egotistical, prickly to criticism, and annoying to many. So was General George Patton, but Patton lived to be sixty years old while George Custer died at thirty-six. Had he lived to 1898, Custer might have commanded American troops in the Spanish-American War and joined the ranks of Grant, Pershing and Eisenhower. Perhaps it would have been Custer who charged up San Juan Hill instead of Teddy Roosevelt. But that was not meant to be.
There is a story about Custer that you will never hear from his critics. In 1869, while searching for two kidnapped women in the Texas panhandle, Custer’s troops were poised to assault a Cheyenne village. He had overwhelming strength, but rather than attack, he rode into the village with only an interpreter at his side. Chief Medicine Arrow insulted him, refused to release the prisoners, and could easily have killed him, but Custer patiently negotiated. Eventually, the prisoners were released, and there was no battle. In fact, Custer made more agreements with Indians than he fought wars. If seeking blame for broken treaties, we should look to the corrupt politicians in Washington, not the poorly paid soldiers serving on a violent frontier.
History matters because it’s complicated. In September of 1962 at Rice University, President John F. Kennedy said, “We choose to go to the moon. We choose to go to the moon in this decade and do the other things, not because they are easy, but because they are hard, because that goal will serve to organize and measure the best of our energies and skills, because that challenge is one that we are willing to accept, one we are unwilling to postpone, and one which we intend to win.”
Kennedy understood that the challenges of our world cannot be reduced to a few trite phrases. The 1830s, and really, much of America’s early history were a product of hard choices. Generosity had to be measured against the lives of those you loved, and the future you hoped to build. If some failed the expectations of modern society, it should be remembered that their educations were often limited, their experiences more brutal, their life expectancy much shorter, and their idealism more pronounced. Judging people of the past by our own standards is never fair, and usually leads to flawed interpretations. You cannot learn from the past if you don’t place the culture in perspective.
I will take a moment to harken back to that professor from Dominguez Hills mentioned in Custer at the Alamo. In a television college course on the history of the Mexican-American border, this instructor claimed David Crockett came from Kentucky, was forced to flee the United States, brought slaves with him to Texas, and was an enemy of indigenous peoples. None of these assertions are true, but it’s what these young people were taught. This professor’s goal was indoctrinate his students, not educate them, and in the process subvert history to serve a political agenda. It’s fortunate that the great majority of educators in this country take a more responsible approach, and we should thank them, for their task is not an easy one.
Custer and Crockett is not a history book, it’s an adventure story. But I like to think the research that has gone into this work might inspire further investigations into the characters and the times in which they lived.
Greg Urbach
Reseda, California
.
Custer’s Victory at the Alamo
March 6th, 1836
“One crowded hour of glorious life is worth an age without a name.”
Sir Walter Scott
Chapter One
THE ROAD TO GOLIAD
We had defeated the white soldiers at the Little Big Horn. Hundreds of wasichu lay dead on the hills across the river from our village, the bodies stripped and sent scarred into the next world. Two of the Cheyenne women claimed the Long Hair lay among them, a man of great courage and little wisdom. The circles of the People celebrated. Our cousins, the Northern Cheyenne, claimed much of the glory. Perhaps too much. Of the Lakota nation, there were the Oglala of Crazy Horse, Lame Deer’s Miniconjou, as well as the Sans Arc, Brule, and many others. And my own people, the Hunkpapa. Some said the Arapaho had joined our battle, but I did not see them fight.
All that was gained would be for nothing. Seeking a vision at the sun dance on the Rosebud, I had cut a hundred strips of flesh from my arms that the future might be revealed. What truth could Wakan Tanka offer to save us from the white man? The answer held no hope, for the People were doomed. Our way of life would perish on the reservations through disease and starvation. But I would not accept this judgment. I prayed for a new path- a trail not taken that might lead to a better world.
My prayer was answered, or so I believed. Lifted among gray clouds with many birds scouting my path, I returned to the world of my youth. I was no longer Tatanka Iyotake, a leader of the Strong Hearts. No longer a medicine chief of the Great Sioux Natio
n. I was a boy again, learning and eager. Sage and solemn. My sister, who had died, lived once more, and the future of my people was yet to be decided.
The ways of Wakan Tanka can be strange. My new path would be even stranger.
____________
March 17th, 1836
“General, sir! Colonel Custer’s respects. Says thar’s a Mex’ikan army up ahead. At the river crossing,” Corporal Jimmy Allen reported, offering a brisk salute.
His white-legged Sorrel was lathered from a hard ride, his blue cotton shirt and rawhide britches thick with trail dust. Though only nineteen, Allen had proven himself at the Alamo, possibly saving my life. But he was still a youngster.
“Did my little brother say how many Mex’ikans?” I asked, disguising my disappointment. For I had hoped to take the enemy unawares.
“A lot, sir. Hell of a lot. I’m supposed to warn Doctor Lord,” Allen said, quickly galloping off.
“What the hell are you looking at, Crockett?” I said, seeing the old bear hunter giving me the eye. The lanky former congressman, now fifty years old, was dressed in stained brown leathers and spoke with a Tennessee drawl.
“Just a mite curious, George. How’s you gonna deploy ‘gainst a hell of a lot of Mex’ikans?” Crockett responded, smiling the whole time.
“The Seventh still needs work on our communication skills, I’ll grant you that,” I said. “But the answer is always the same. I will look for a weakness in the enemy position and attack.”
“Odds don’t worry you none?”
“The odds never worry me. If they did, I wouldn’t have turned Stuart back at Gettysburg, and the United States would have become two nations.”
“And you was what? Twenty-three? Saved the whole damn country all by yer’self? Hell, I didn’t save the whole damn country ‘til I was mid-forty,” Crockett mused, giving his mount a soft kick.
As word spread down the line, the entire column gradually picked up the pace. Hundreds of horses, wagons, oxen, and even a few cattle. Each troop rode under their own red and white swallowtail guidon, but the Stars and Stripes guidon that we had brought with us to Texas had been retired, for this Texas was not part of the United States. We had adopted a new symbol, the Buffalo Flag, a white banner with green stripe along the bottom and a bison proudly painted on the field. I gave Traveller a nudge. The big spotted gray stallion shook his head but complied.
“And how’d you do that, Davy? Jumping the Mississippi or riding a bolt of lightning?” I asked.
“Told Andy Jackson his Indian removal policy was nothin’ less than murder,” Crockett responded. “Couldn’t stop him from doin’ it, but the country knows I’m right. Someday thar’ll be a reckonin’.”
I knew from my own history that wasn’t true. The last Cherokee tribes in the east would be driven to Oklahoma on the Trail of Tears. A death march. And Andrew Jackson would retire as one of America’s greatest presidents. There was a time I wouldn’t have cared, but much had changed since then.
“Slow? Slow, where are you?” I called.
The young Indian boy we had found on the windswept Texas plains during our journey south was soon riding at my side, sitting Vic like he’d done it all his life. I was a bit jealous, as Vic was my favorite warhorse.
The boy’s heavy fur coat was pulled up against the March cold, but he wore no hat. His long black hair was held back with a red headband. The dark eyes gazed with curiosity.
“Yes, General,” Slow said in his Lakota accent.
“President Crockett was remarking on the plight of the Cherokee,” I said. “There seems nothing we can do to help them. Have you any ideas?”
“Many speak of the Tsalagi. Their lodges lay north along the Red River, among the Texas hills,” Slow said, having listened to many stories. But a month before, he had barely heard of the Cherokee.
“Most still live in the United States,” I said.
“Their days are done,” Slow pronounced.
“Is this the word of the Great Spirit?” I asked in jest.
“It is the history of your people. Do you think I have not asked these questions of Butler and Hughes?” he answered.
Smart kid. I shouldn’t have teased him.
“Ya gots any suggestions?” Crockett asked, leaning across me to look at Slow. I pushed him back.
“The Tsalagiyi Nvdagi must choose a new path. They can be friends or enemies,” Slow replied.
“An’ if they be enemies?” Crockett said.
“Then General Custer will attack. There will be no mercy,” Slow declared.
“For God’s Sake, son, I don’t go attacking without mercy,” I protested, for it had never been my way. Despite some unflattering press notices.
“Your ways of mercy come to an end, as the former lives of the Tsalagiyi Nvdagi come to an end. They have no choice. Either do you,” Slow said.
“We’ve got some trouble up ahead. I want you to stay with the supply wagons. Protect Morning Star and Isabella for me,” I urged.
“These soldiers from Mexico, have they come so far to die?” Slow asked.
“They want to defend their country,” I answered.
“Warriors of the People fight for our families. We fight for our hunting grounds,” Slow remarked. “Do these soldiers not live far away? Beyond the big desert?”
“They do,” I admitted.
“Then they are fools,” Slow decided.
He pulled Vic up, waited for E Company to pass by, and then rode to the rear of the column where his sister Morning Star was riding with Isabella Seguin.
“Kinda blood-thirsty, don’t ya think?” Crockett observed.
“Sioux,” I replied, for it said all that was needed.
We rode on for another hour through rolling foothills. I did not deploy the regiment, for we were still a good ten miles from Goliad. And dividing the command without knowing the enemy’s whereabouts seemed unwise. I’d learned that such tactics do not always work out for the best.
The trail ran south parallel with the San Antonio River, which was somewhere off to our right. Low sage covered mountains rose on the left. My five companies, along with the wagons and artillery, were strung out for two miles.
Just after noon, Sergeant James Butler rode toward us at a steady gait. Jimmy was a true veteran. Thirty-two years old, five and a half feet tall, he had gray eyes, sandy hair, and the ruddy complexion of a cavalryman. His civilian occupation had been New York farmer before enlisting in the army. After the Alamo, I had offered him a lieutenant’s commission. His reply was that of a proud non-commissioned officer, in language that may not be repeated here.
“Colonel Custer’s respects, sir,” Butler said, not bothering to salute. “We got a Mexican army ‘bout three miles up ahead blocking the river crossing. Mostly light infantry. Tom’s guessing its General Urrea, but we never did find out where Santa Anna went after he retreated from Béjar. We saw a few elements of Sesma’s cavalry.”
“Colonel Custer’s suggestions?” I inquired, suspecting he had some.
“Says it might be good to scout the fords to the left, maybe cross downriver and make contact with Fannin,” Butler said.
“What direction does this river run? How deep? How fast? Is the enemy spread out or concentrated?” I asked, my voice higher when excited.
“Can’t say for sure, but probably a good ford every few miles, running west to east, then turns south.”
“The river will not be deep until the spring thaw,” Captain Juan Seguin said, riding a spirited mustang.
The son of my new business partner, Erasmo Seguin, Juan was just a few months short of thirty. Lanky, smart and easy-going. Of French and Mexican descent, his family was prominent in San Antonio and respected throughout Texas. Formally an officer in Houston’s army, Seguin’s knowledge of the terrain was proving indispensable.
“Captain, please report to General Keogh. Have your rangers seek Urrea’s right flank,” I ordered.
“Si, General Custer. Gracias,” Seguin sai
d, waving his company to follow.
“Voss,” I summoned.
The twenty-six year old corporal came running. Blond-haired, blue-eyed with a light complexion, Voss served well as my regimental trumpeter.
“Yes, sir,” Voss reported in his Hanoverian accent.
“Officer’s Call,” I ordered, letting Voss blow the bugle. There could be no harm if the enemy already knew we were coming.
Within a few minutes, Crockett, Algernon Smith and Bill Cooke were in attendance, accompanied by John Baugh, Almaron Dickenson and Mario Sepulveda. Captain Nathaniel Brister, leading B Company, was still a mile back. My officer were a combination of the original Seventh Cavalry and men who had served me at the Alamo.
Colonel Juan Almonte rode up a moment later, still uncomfortable acting as my adjutant. Abducted into my service following General Castrillón’s surrender, Almonte was in his early thirties, an intelligent staff officer born in Nocupétaro. He had lived for a time in New Orleans and spoke perfect English. His father, the Mexican patriot José María Morelos, had been executed for treason twenty years before.
“We have a situation,” I explained. “Seems Tom got stopped at the ford and can’t get across without our help.”
“Maybe Crockett can fly us across?” Cooke teased.
“No time for comedy, Canada. This could be serious,” I said. “If Urrea has a free hand to hold the river crossings, Goliad must already have fallen.”
“We’re too late?” Baugh asked.
“Urrea may be using a holding force to delay us while pressing La Bahia,” Keogh suggested.
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