Alamo Traces

by Thomas Ricks Lindley

  The Invincibles originally came to Texas under the command of Captain John W. Peacock. From Nacogdoches, the company traveled to Bexar with two other units: Thomas H. Breece’s company of New Orleans Greys and Jacob Roth’s small unit from Nacogdoches. The three units reached San Antonio on November 26, 1836. Captain Peacock was seriously wounded in the storming of Bexar in December. Chenoweth was then selected to replace Peacock. The unit was reorganized starting on December 25, 1835. Houston assigned the unit to the Port of Copano to secure the area for the Matamoros expedition. In mid-January 1836 the company was spread out between Goliad and Refugio. A comparison of the February 1, 1836 Alamo voting list with Chenoweth’s muster roll shows Captain William Charles M. Baker, Edward Nelson, Patrick Henry Herndon, and J. M. Hays rode with Bowie to San Antonio on January 17.

  35 Muster Roll book, 1-4, 20-28, GLO; Alamo voting list, February 1, 1836; Telegraph and Texas Register, March 24, 1836; Muster Roll for M. B. Lewis’s company, R. B. Blake Papers, Box 3G300, CAH; Thomas J. Rusk’s company muster roll, R. B. Blake Papers, LXI: 303; Morning Report of the San Augustine Company, November 21, 1835, Captain Bradley’s Company muster roll, November 21, 1835, “Report of the Strength & conditions of the Nacogdoches Independence Volunteer company,” November 21, 1835, Austin Papers, CAH; Statement of Susanna (Dickinson) Bellows to Notary, J. Castanie, Harris County, Texas, November 21, 1853, James M. Rose Court of Claims file, number 7115, GLO. Bellows identified James M. Rose as being in David Crockett’s unit.

  36 W. P. Zuber to General William Steele, September 14, 1877, Iola, Grimes County, AJC-TSL.

  37 Ibid.

  38 Zuber, “An Escape,” 81.

  39 Travis to Convention, March 3, 1836; Williamson to Travis, March 1, 1836.

  40 Williamson to Travis, March 1, 1836.

  41 William B. Travis to Jesse Grimes, March 3, 1836, Bexar, Jenkins, ed., Papers, IV: 504-505.

  42 “Testimony of Mrs. Hannig,” September 23, 1876.

  43 Zuber, “An Escape,” 83.

  44 Almonte, “Private Journal,” 20; Jose Enrique de la Pena, Campaign Diary manuscript, 13, Jose Enrique de la Pena Collection, Box 2J146, CAH. This 109-page manuscript has never been translated or published. The handwriting appears to be identical to a sample of Pena’s handwriting found in an authentic Pena document in the Mexican Military Archives. Historian Jack Jackson first discovered this new Pena document in July 2000 but was unable to obtain a copy. This investigator, with the important assistance of Lee Spencer-While of Freer, Texas, obtained a copy of the Pena document.

  45 Almonte, “Private Journal,” 20; Filisola, History, II: 170-171.

  46 Zuber, “An Escape,” 84; Zuber, Eighty Years, 253.

  47 Douglas P. Hyatt interview, June 11, 1996. Mr. Hyatt, a retired U.S. Army lieutenant colonel, who served in World War II through the Vietnam War, informed this investigator that a day’s march for a modern infantryman is fifteen miles.

  48 Zuber, Eighty Years, 253; Houston to James W. Fannin Jr., March 11, 1836, Gonzales, Jenkins, ed., Papers, V: 52; J. H. Kuykendall, “Recollections of the Campaign,” edited by Eugene C. Barker, The Quarterly of the Texas State Historical Association, IV: 292; Webb, Carroll, and Branda, eds., Handbook, II: 514-515.

  49 Zuber to Steele, September 14, 1877. Because a copy of Steele’s letter to Zuber cannot be found in the Texas State Library and Archives, just how Steele obtained his information from Susanna Hannig is uncertain. Steele may have interviewed her or obtained his data from records on hand at that time.

  50 Zuber to Steele, September 14, 1877.

  51 “Testimony of Mrs. Hannig,” September 23, 1876. See Chapter Nine for a detailed explanation of Lt. Colonel James C. Neill’s departure from the Alamo.

  52 Zuber, “The Escape of Rose,” 1.

  53 Ibid., 3.

  54 Webb, Carroll, and Branda, eds., Handbook, I: 501, II: 665.

  55 Zuber, “The Escape of Rose,” 4.

  56 Travis to Convention, March 3, 1836; Almonte, “Private Journal,” 19-20; Pena, Campaign Diary, 13.

  57 William P. Zuber, “Last Messenger From the Alamo,” The Quarterly of the Texas State Historical Association, V: 263.

  58 Ibid., 264.

  59 Ibid., 266.

  60 John W. Smith and William Lindsey testimony for James L. Ewing heirs, first class headright certificate, number 475, Bexar Land District Clerk Returns, GLO.

  61 Townsend to Adriance, February 26, 1836; “Testimony of Mrs. Hannig,” September 23, 1876; Joseph D. Clements affidavit, Joseph D. Clements file, AMC-TSL; Davis, Three Roads, 416; P. Caldwell to William Patton, May 30, 1837, Camp Lavaca, William Patton file, AMC-TSL. William Patton appears to have entered the Alamo with Crockett, but he has never been identified as having died at the Alamo. The William Patton Texian army discharge shows that he served in the army from June 21, 1836, to May 30, 1837. This Patton should not be confused with Captain William H. Patton, who had an infantry company at the Alamo but did not die there.

  62 Richard Penn Smith, Col. Crockett’s Exploits and Adventures in Texas (1836; reprint: New York: Nafis & Cornish; Philadelphia: John B. Perry, 1845), 200.

  63 L. L. Cunningham quote is found in George Alfred Hill, The Centennial Celebration of the Battle of San Jacinto (Washington, D.C.: U.S. Government Printing Office, 1936), 8.

  64 Holley, Interviews, 20. The story of Houston’s line in the sand at Columbus is somewhat verified by another Houston statement concerning his soldiers’ readiness before the Battle of San Jacinto. The statement comes from Houston’s February 28, 1859, U.S. Senate speech, as quoted in Sherman, Defense of Gen. Sidney Sherman, 8. Houston said: “After the men had taken refreshments, the rolls were called and it was found that a good many men had sore feet, and some were sick and had pale faces [italics added]; after deducting these we had only five hundred and forty (540) effective men.”

  Sidney Sherman answered Houston’s statement with these words: “Fellow soldiers of San Jacinto, many years have elapsed since we met on the battlefield, and many of our companions have gone down to the grave. But those who survive! How do your brave hearts respond to this slander? which of you had sore feet? which of you all feigned to be sick? and who had pale faces on that glorious day? Will you not, one and all reply, if there was one who faltered on that day, or at any period before, it was the Commander-in-Chief?”

  Chapter Six

  Louis and Stephen Rose:

  At the Walls of the Alamo

  Louis Rose appeared before the Board of Land Commissioners as a witness for sixteen applicants for certificates, and in two instances the only corroborating witnesses were Mexican citizens. In other cases the corroborating witness was Adolphus Sterne, a member of the board. In no instance was the testimony of Rose rejected as lacking in credibility.

  R. B. Blake1

  For the first thirty-eight years of the twentieth century, William P. Zuber’s story of Moses Rose’s alleged escape from the Alamo was an unsubstantiated tale accepted by few historians. Now, in the early years of the twenty-first century, Zuber’s story is accepted by many historians, writers, and Alamo enthusiasts as a “particle” in the Alamo “body of truth.”

  In 1989 the Daughters of the Republic of Texas, the Alamo overseers, stamped the Rose yarn as the truth with the installation of a brass rod in the flagstone in front of the Alamo chapel to represent Travis’s sacrificial line of courage. Also, the story has been incorporated in the history talk that is given to Alamo visitors. The organization’s actions demonstrate that attitudes toward Rose and Travis’s alleged line in the sand have traveled from disregard to acceptance during the past century. Why the change?2

  Acceptance of the Rose tale as the truth occurred because of the discovery of documents that seem to verify Zuber’s story of Moses Rose. The first evidence came from Nacogdoches land grant records that archivist R. B. Blake discovered in the 1930s. This is the documentation that writer Walter Lord described as “amazing evidence.” He wrote: “It showed convincingly t
hat 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 Alamo victims.”3

  Robert Bruce Blake, a former printer and small-town newspaper publisher, was a court reporter when he found the documents that he interpreted in a way that suggested Louis Rose, a resident of Nacogdoches, was Moses Rose of the Zuber story. He introduced the new evidence in a paper he delivered at the 1938 meeting of the Texas State Historical Association. The presentation impressed J. Frank Dobie, who convinced Blake to turn the paper into an article for the Texas Folklore Society’s publication. Blake, with Dobie’s assistance, wrote “A Vindication of Rose and His Story,” which appeared in a collection of folklore articles titled In the Shadow of History in 1939.4

  In regard to the Alamo defenders that Louis Rose gave testimony about, Blake wrote: “Taking these applications in the order in which they appear on the docket of that board, in the case of F. H. K. Day, Lewis Rose testified that he ‘died with Travis in the Alamo.’ In the application of John Forbes, administration of M. B. Clark, Rose ‘states he saw him a few days before the fall of the Alamo.’ In the application of the ‘Heirs of John Blair, decd., by J. Lee, administrator,’ the testimony of Louis Rose is even more specific, when he states that he ‘left him in the Alamo 3 March, 1836.’ Again, in the case of Charles Haskell, Rose testified that he ‘knew him four years, supposes him killed in the Alamo.’ In the application of ‘The Heirs of David Wilson,’ Rose testified that he ‘knew him before the 2nd May 1835, was in the Alamo when taken.’ And finally, in the application of ‘The Heirs of Marcus Sewell,’ Louis Rose stated that he ‘knew him in the Alamo and left him there three days before it fell.’ ”5

  Old stone fort at Nacogdoches

  Photo courtesy of Texas State Library and Archives Commission

  At first glance, this does indeed seem to be unassailable corroboration of Zuber’s escape story. But Blake’s article, despite its acceptance by historians and writers, does not reflect the true nature of the evidence. Blake’s notes and transcriptions differ in crucial ways from the primary source materials of the Louis Rose land grant testimony.

  In evaluating the Louis Rose evidence and Blake’s presentation of it, two questions must be addressed. Was Rose a creditable and truthful witness? Then, because the world only knows of the Louis Rose evidence through Blake’s interpretation, one must ask: Is Blake’s study a professional and creditable work?

  Blake believed Rose was creditable and presented his evidence in a way that, with a superficial examination, appears to support the conclusion that Louis Rose was Moses Rose, who escaped from the Alamo as reported by William P. Zuber. Walter Lord’s faith in the testimony notwithstanding, the evidence does not show “convincingly” that Louis Rose was in the Alamo. On the other hand, Lord and other individuals’ acceptance of the Louis Rose statements being proof positive that Louis was Moses demonstrates their extremely low threshold for historical proof and accuracy. Just because Louis Rose made statements that identified a number of men as Alamo defenders does not mean he was in the Alamo and left. He may have lied. He might have been mistaken. He may have had knowledge of the men being in the Alamo for a reason or reasons other than having been in the fort himself.

  Nor does the Rose testimony verify Zuber’s Moses Rose story. Both sources stand alone. The only elements the two sources have in common are the name “Rose” and the date of “March 3, 1836.” Blake and other believers simply assume that because Zuber said Moses Rose left the Alamo on March 3 and Louis Rose reported that he left two men in the Alamo on March 3 that Moses and Louis were the same man. Moses Rose supporters, knowing that proving a negative is very hard, often argue there is no conclusive evidence that proves a man named Moses Rose did not escape the Alamo on March 3, 1836. The previous Rose chapter, however, addressed that question. Also, there is solid and sufficient evidence that suggests Louis Rose’s 1838 statements may not be the truth or they may represent an Alamo situation for Rose that is different from the one described by Blake.

  First, Blake’s presentation of the Louis Rose evidence is compromised by Blake’s failure to include in his article all of the relevant Rose data he had found in the land grant materials. Blake claimed: “In no instance was the testimony of Rose rejected as lacking in credibility.” Evidence from Blake’s papers, however, reveals that Blake, early in his investigation, found evidence that in one case Rose’s testimony appears to have been rejected because it was untrue.6

  The evidence of a Rose rejection is from the second application in which Louis Rose gave testimony for an alleged Alamo defender. The man was Henry Teal, a longtime and well-known resident of Nacogdoches. An early Blake research list, based on post-revolution land grant testimony, contains an entry that reads: “HENRY TEAL, [1] emigrated in 1835, [2] single man, [3] died with Travis in the Alamo. #140.” A second Blake list identified “William S. Blount. A. [Albert] Emanuel and Lewis Rose” as the witnesses for the Teal headright application. It appears that, given the order of the data and the witnesses, Rose furnished the Alamo death statement.7

  Blake’s article made no mention of finding Rose’s testimony concerning Teal. Blake had a powerful reason for ignoring the Teal data when he went to press. Teal had been a member of Thomas J. Rusk’s company at the siege of Bexar in 1835. Teal was in Nacogdoches from February 18 to March 5, when he left with his company to join the main army. Teal and his men reached Houston’s army on March 23, while the army was camped on the Colorado River. Teal remained in the army until the fall of 1837, when he was shot and killed while sleeping in his tent at Camp Independence. Rose’s claim that Teal had “died with Travis in the Alamo” probably confused Blake because it appears to be conclusive proof that Rose may have lied or been mistaken in the testimony he gave to the land board. And there is other evidence that supports that conclusion.8

  A bounty certificate for alleged military service offers additional evidence that Rose was most likely a liar and may have been involved in a land grant fraud scheme when he gave testimony to the land board. The certificate had been issued to Louis Rose by Adjutant General James S. Gillett in February 1854 for service in the Texian army from June 22, 1836, to September 22, 1836. Rose sold the certificate to John H. Primer, who registered it with the General Land Office on June 2, 1858. The certificate was suspended the same day. The Court of Claims, which had been set up in 1858 to detect fraudulent certificates for military service, rejected the certificate on September 28, 1860.9

  The Court of Claims file for the bounty certificate reads: ‘Examd. Genl Ld Office Register – correct in Voucher 2602 Gillett. No other evidence. Black List.” Gillett appears to have been James S. Gillett, the Texas adjutant general. Governor E. M. Pease fired Gillett on February 4, 1854, because of a fire that destroyed the Adjutant General building and the department’s military records. It was and is believed that the fire was an act of arson to destroy the military service records so the documents could not be used to detect fraudulent land grant certificates for military service. In sum, the final words on the Rose certificate, “Black List,” suggest that either Rose’s name was on a roster of noncredible persons or was placed on such a roll after the submission of the fraudulent certificate.10

  That Louis Rose’s testimony might have been untrue and fraudulent is buttressed by the conditions that existed at the time. Texas land historian Thomas Lloyd Miller wrote:

  The words “land” and “fraud” were almost synonymous in Texas. . . . It confronted the first land commissioner, John P. Borden, who served from 1837 to 1840. . . .

  The members of the county boards were dealing with their friends and neighbors, and they found it hard to reject their claims. One county land board commissioner told Borden about the demands made upon the board in these words: “Now Sir please imagine to yourself a Board crowded with near 200 applicants on the first day of the opening of the land office and on
subsequent days from 50 to 100. . . .”

  Commissioner Borden in his report of November 7, 1839, stated that only 25 fraudulent claims had been detected but added that this resulted not from search but by accident. He further wrote: “So great have been the facilities for manufacturing them that the individual holding less than 10 for a league and a labor [a family headright] each is considered a small operator in this line.” There is little doubt that the local land commissioners were not always told the truth, for Borden wrote: “That frauds have been practiced in procuring the certificates from the Board of Land Commissioners must be evident to all.” At least one citizen agreed with this for he declared: “But oh-i-the perjury and fraud that have been practiced. May God forgive them as individuals and us as a nation.”11

  Blake did acknowledge that fraudulent claims were submitted to the land board. He, however, argued that such claims were not approved. As evidence for his view, he quoted Dr. James H. Starr, the board’s president: “The office was of much responsibility, and the duties of extremely difficult performance; especially in Nacogdoches County, which embraced the most populous region of Eastern Texas, including a large number of native Mexicans. Many citizens, especially Mexicans, had already received their headright grants from the former government; but it soon became known to the board that numerous persons of this class were fraudulently presenting claims for certificates. ‘Americans’ (as citizens of the United States were called) were mainly the criminal instigators of these attempts, bribing the applicants to give false testimony, and agreeing to purchase their certificates when issued. By severe scouting the Nacogdoches Board met with gratifying success in detecting and defeating the attempted frauds; though on more than one occasion threatened with violence by men of mob power (some of them men of prominence) whose applications by the score or more had been rejected.”12