A Time to Stand: The Epic of the Alamo

by Walter Lord

  Bowie pitched in wherever he could—playing a major role not only in defense but in the garrison’s political life as well. For the defenders of the Alamo always had time for politics. Right now they were absorbed in a battle raging at San Felipe between the Provisional Council and Governor Smith. The Council had just fired Smith, and the Governor had retaliated by dismissing the Council. None of this made it any easier to get supplies for the Alamo, but the men’s main interest seemed to lie in their fear that the Council might come to terms with the Mexicans. The troops were virtually all “independence men” and strongly for Smith.

  On January 26 Bowie attended a mass meeting in support of the Governor, which ended by going far beyond that. It turned into a rousing rally for holding the Alamo. The garrison demanded $500 for defense, then declared that even if the money didn’t come, “We cannot be driven from the post of honor.” First man to sign the resolution, just after the chairman James Bonham, was none other than Jim Bowie.

  With soaring enthusiasm, the men returned to work, and Bowie contributed more of his special brand of talent. Since the troops’ demand for money seemed a long shot at best, he negotiated a $500 loan locally—quite a feat, considering the garrison’s nonexistent credit standing. Bowie also extended the scout service. By the end of January he was able to send out a detachment of “active young men” as far as the Rio Frio.

  “Active young men”—Bowie would never have used the phrase a month earlier. But now he felt dreadfully sick and it was only his determination that kept him going. The fort’s surgeon, Amos Pollard, was baffled and called in Dr. John Sutherland, a new arrival from Alabama. Sutherland, who had learned his medicine under what was vaguely described as “the old Thompsonian System,” was puzzled too. He could only say that the sickness was “of a peculiar nature, not to be cured by an ordinary course of treatment.”

  Bowie grimly carried on, bolstered by the mounting tempo of events. On January 27 Señor Cassiano galloped in with his details on Sesma’s force. There was something starkly real about his neat, meticulous figures, and a courier rushed off to San Felipe with another plea for “men, money, rifles, cannon powder.” On February 2 one of Bowie’s special contacts brought additional details: Besides Sesma’s men on the Rio Grande, there were 5,000 more Mexicans a little way back. “They intend to make a descent on this place in particular, and there is no doubt about it.”

  Time was growing short. Bowie decided formal resolutions were no longer enough to wake the government up, make it see the importance of holding San Antonio. On the 2nd he scribbled a strong personal letter to Governor Smith, urging all possible help. In it he carefully explained his views: “The salvation of Texas depends in great measure on keeping Bexar out of the hands of the enemy. It serves as the frontier picquet guard, and if it were in the possession of Santa Anna, there is no stronghold from which to repel him in his march toward the Sabine.”

  And lest anyone think there was still any chance of their pulling back, Bowie sternly concluded, “Colonel Neill and myself have come to the solemn resolution that we will rather die in these ditches than give it up to the enemy.”

  Houston never knew, to approve or disapprove. Fed up with the endless wrangling at San Felipe, he had gone off on furlough to deal with the Indians and wouldn’t be back till March.

  The course set, Bowie and Neill continued to strengthen their defenses. Thirty more men were due any day under William Barret Travis, and Neill already had plans for this dashing young figure. He would send Travis to harass the approaching Mexicans—cut off their supplies, make mischief in their rear, chop down the bridges over the Leona and Nueces rivers.

  It was just as well that Travis didn’t know. He had lost none of his ambition, but burning grass and chopping bridges was the work of a junior officer, and he now had his eye on higher things. In fact, that was what bothered him as he sulked his way toward San Antonio with only 30 men. He had really worked to wangle his lieutenant colonelcy in the cavalry-had even turned down a major’s commission in the artillery. Now here he was, stuck with a company officer’s command.

  Of course orders were orders, and when Governor Smith told him to reinforce the Alamo, Travis had to go. (He even put out his own money to buy tinware, twine and a five-dollar flag.) But that didn’t mean he liked the assignment any better. Still fuming, he slipped off to pay a last visit to his small son Charles, then headed for Bexar on January 23, leading his unimpressive little squad.

  Things grew rapidly worse. There was still no money, and Travis spent more of his own for blankets, coffee, sugar, more blankets. Morale sagged, and by January 28, nine of his original 39 men had deserted. As if supplies weren’t short enough already, deserter Andrew Smith even took a horse, bridle, blanket, rifle and gunpowder.

  “Volunteers can no longer be relied upon,” Travis gloomily wrote Governor Smith from the Colorado River on the 28th. “The patriotism of a few has done much, but it is worn down.” The more he thought about it, the more discouraged he grew. Here he was, making all these sacrifices, while nobody else lifted a finger. How little anybody appreciated him.

  He fretted all night, and on the 29th again wrote the Governor:

  I beg that Your Excellency will recall the order for me to go to Bexar in command of so few men. I am willing, nay anxious, to go to the defense of Bexar, and I have done everything in my power to equip the enlisted men and get them off. But Sir, I am unwilling to risk my reputation (which is ever dear to a volunteer) by going off into the enemy’s country with so little means, so few men, and these so badly equipped—the fact is there is no necessity for my services to command these few men. The company officers will be amply sufficient.

  He added that if his request was turned down, “I feel it is due to myself to resign my commission.” Dispatching this ultimatum by express, Travis then halted on the Colorado to await results.

  The Governor never even answered. Perhaps he was too used to Travis’ threats to resign—after all, this was the third time since November. Perhaps he knew his man well enough to feel that the storm would pass. In any case, he ignored the letter.

  Travis waited, seethed, finally gave up. He gloomily led his men on toward San Antonio. Just now he looked like anything but a man of destiny. Yet even heroes get discouraged. All men know such moments, and perhaps in the end the hero is the one who does march on.

  They arrived on February 3—William Garnett, a wandering Baptist preacher; John Forsyth, the restless medical student from Avon, New York; altogether some thirty tired, dusty men in buckskin shirts and blanket coats. Far from the snappy uniform prescribed in his cavalry regulations, Travis himself wore only a set of homemade jeans.

  In his impulsive way, Travis soon forgot his problems and jumped into the affairs of the Alamo. The political pot was boiling again, and on February 7, he played an active role in electing Sam Maverick and Jesse Badgett to represent the garrison at the coming Convention, called to set up a permanent government for Texas.

  Even politics were forgotten on the 8th. Into town from the east rode an unexpected group of gay, casual men. Colonel David Crockett had arrived with his amiable companions, “the Tennessee Mounted Volunteers.” Soldiers, citizens, everyone dropped what they were doing, poured into the Main Plaza to greet the great man. Someone got a packing case, and Crockett climbed on it. The air erupted with cheers and yells.

  He gave them the full treatment—all the best stories. And of course, he described once again how he told his constituents that if they didn’t elect him, they could go to hell and he would go to Texas. “And, fellow citizens, I am among you,” he concluded quietly, with a sudden change of pace that was quite unusual for him: “I have come to your country, though not, I hope, through any selfish motive whatever. I have come to aid you all that I can in your noble cause. I shall identify myself with your interests, and all the honor that I desire is that of defending as a high private, in common with my fellow citizens, the liberties of our common country.”

/>   It was a curiously touching finish that showed once again how the mere idea of liberty could capture a man’s mind at this time. Six weeks ago Crockett had never seen Texas—now he was speaking of “our common country.” In the past he had loved the favors and honors that were showered on him. Now all he wanted was to be a “high private.”

  This past week had brought in some remarkable men—and more were on the way. Three inseparable brothers named Taylor turned up from the town of Liberty. David Cummings delivered his father’s guns to the government and headed down too. Cleland Simmons and R. W. Ballentine arrived to make good their pledge “to defend our brethren at the peril of our lives, liberties, and fortunes.” Asa Walker, a young volunteer from Tennessee, hurried toward the Alamo with an almost haunting sense of urgency. Reaching Washington-on-the-Brazos, he took time only to scrawl a quick note to an involuntary benefactor:

  Mr. Gant—I take the responsibility of taking your overcoat and gun—your gun they would have had anyhow and I might as well have it as any one else. If I live to return, I will satisfy you for all. If I die I leave you my clothes to do the best you can with. You can sell them for something. If you overtake me, you can take your rifle, and I will trust to chance— the hurry of the moment and my want of means to do better are all the excuse I have… .

  As these came, a few others left. Most of the adventurers and overnight patriots were already gone; now it was the turn of the sick, the tired and the rascals. Lieutenant S. Y. Ream came down with measles and was carted off to Gonzales. Nathaniel Kerr died of an unnamed fever. A Tennessee man returned home, saying there was absolutely no money in Texas at all.

  Watching them go, David Cummings wrote his father in Pennsylvania, “Many it is true have left the country and returned home to their friends and pleasures, but of such Texas has no use… . We want men of determined spirit that can undergo hardships and deprivation.”

  And this was exactly how the garrison was shaping up. By the 10th of February it numbered 142 hard, tested, dedicated men. They came from everywhere—but two-thirds were recent arrivals from the States and only a couple had been in Texas as long as six years. They were everything in peacetime: clerks, doctors, blacksmiths, lawyers, brickmasons—but not one was a professional soldier.

  On the night of the 10th, they jammed a fandango celebrating Crockett’s arrival. Like most good fighting men, the Alamo defenders liked to play hard too, and the party was going strong around one o’clock, when a courier arrived with fresh word of the Mexican advance. Bowie, Travis and Crockett huddled over the message together. In the end they correctly decided that it was nothing urgent, and the party rolled on.

  But the huddle itself was significant, for Colonel Neill was not included. It was no particular mystery. He had simply suffered the fate of many a good second-rater when abler, more imaginative leaders appear on the scene of a crisis. He had been gently nudged aside.

  Next morning Neill left on “twenty days’ leave.” The explanations were various—sickness in the family, a special mission to raise defense funds. Colonel Travis, at least, sensed he wouldn’t be back.

  Before pulling out, Neill appointed Travis to take command of the garrison. A logical choice, for he was the senior regular army officer present, but the free-wheeling volunteers weren’t inclined to be logical. It was one thing to put up with the somewhat pedestrian Neill—he had at least been in charge from the start—but Travis had been around only a week. Moreover, Neill was 46; Travis only 26. Why take this emotional, melodramatic boy when they also had Jim Bowie, the best-known fighter in Texas?

  Bowie did nothing to discourage the mood. He had always gotten along with Travis—but serving under the man was quite a different matter. He didn’t need his big knife to prove no one was his master; those cold gray eyes and his quiet, firm manner took care of that. Sam Houston understood, usually let Bowie run his own show. How could a 26-year-old newcomer hope to command him?

  Travis felt the pressure. He wavered, then ordered an election for command of the volunteers. If he hoped to win through, it was a poor gamble. The men happily voted for Jim Bowie.

  The result was an impossible split. The proud, moody Travis, still commanding the regulars and the volunteer cavalry, had no intention of suffering further humiliation. For his part, Bowie always did what he wanted anyhow. And to make matters worse, he was ill again—feeling worse than ever.

  On the 12th he burst into town, roaring drunk, his resistance shattered by sickness. He loudly claimed command of the whole garrison. He stopped private citizens going about their business. He ordered town officials to open the calaboose and let everyone go. When one of the freed prisoners, Antonio Fuentes, was thrown back in jail, Bowie exploded with rage. He called out his men from the Alamo, paraded them back and forth in the Main Plaza. They were all drunk now, shouting and cheering, waving their rifles.

  “I am unwilling to be responsible for the drunken irregularities of any man,” Travis primly wrote Governor Smith on the 13th, describing the whole sorry mess. He went on to say he would leave in an instant, were it not for the Alamo. But he too had fallen under the spell: “It is more important to occupy this post than I imagined when I last saw you. It is the key to Texas. …”

  Sick and drunk as he was, Bowie knew it too. In the harrowing morning after of February 14 he was more than willing to let bygones be bygones. As quickly as the storm had broken, he and Travis came to an amazingly simple agreement. They would keep their separate commands, but take all major steps together. And high time; as they jointly wrote Governor Smith, “There is no doubt that the enemy will shortly advance upon this place, and that this will be the first point of attack. We must therefore urge the necessity of sending reinforcements as speedily as possible to our aid.”

  Under the new joint command, the Alamo hummed with increasing excitement. There was still no money, still not enough food, still a lot of grumbling; but there was greater determination than ever. Almeron Dickinson and his artillerymen wrestled their guns into place—by mid-February all but three were mounted. Dr. Pollard bustled about his hospital on the second floor of the long barracks—somehow he found instruments, all he needed except syringes and catheters. Sam Blair, the fort’s 29-year-old ordnance chief, supplemented the meager supply of cannonballs by chopping up horseshoes.

  The men now worked hard too, although they still had an exasperating way of wandering off at odd moments. On February 14 David Cummings went to the Cibolo Creek to do a little prospecting. William Garnett, the Baptist preacher, went back to Velasco, “to clean up business.” Travis of course stayed at his post, but he too thought about business. All February he ran an ad in the Telegraph and Texas Register about his new law partnership with Franklin J. Starr: “One or both of them will be constantly found in the office at San Felipe.”

  And of course they all continued to play. The Alamo garrison was determined, but no band of angels. Men like the Arkansas jockey Henry Warnell and wild young William Malone of Georgia weren’t about to ignore the pleasures of the town. Seaman William Jackson and John McGregor, the jaunty Scot from Nacogdoches, felt the same. Nor were the officers immune—Captain Carey talked not too seriously of marriage with a pretty senorita.

  Over them all—whether at work or play—there was a new spirit in the air. The volunteers discovered that Travis wasn’t so bad after all—a little self-centered perhaps, but no one worked harder. Travis’ regulars, in turn, soon fell under Bowie’s spell. The garrison had finally become a solidly knit group of men—resourceful and self-reliant, yet drawing strength from each other too.

  On February 16 Green Jameson wrote one of his most optimistic letters to Governor Smith. He was full of his latest improvements, full of new ideas for an even stronger, “diamond-shaped” fort. Pleased with the garrison’s accomplishments, he also had a few caustic words about an earlier Mexican attempt to fortify the Alamo: “They have shown imbecility and want of skill in the fortress as they have in all things else.”


  That same day a dusty horseman galloped into town from the south. Riding up Potrero Street, he reined in at the last house before the rickety bridge over the San Antonio River. This was Ambrosio Rodriguez’ place, and the horseman was Mrs. Rodriguez’ cousin Rivas. As a good member of the family, he had come all the way from Laredo to warn them that they must leave at once. Santa Anna was about to cross the Rio Grande and head for Bexar.

  Señor Rodriguez, friendly to the Texans, sent for Travis at once. The Colonel came readily—he had grown to know the Rodriguez family well, liked to stop by and chat with them on his way to and from the Alamo just across the river. Now he listened carefully as Rivas repeated his warning. No, Travis finally decided, it just couldn’t be. The Mexicans were coming —no one knew better than he—but not so soon.

  On the 18th Rodriguez heard another alarming report, again passed the news on to Travis. But again the Colonel was politely skeptical. Rodriguez, a bit of a strategist himself, suggested pulling the garrison back. Travis had heard that advice all too often.

  On the 20th still another horseman appeared. This was Blas Herrera, who had been recruited by his cousin, Captain Juan Seguin, to serve in a company of local Mexicans supporting the Texan cause. This group was an important addition to the defense, for Seguin came from an influential family in San Antonio, and his men knew the country intimately. As tension mounted, he had sent Herrera to the Rio Grande to watch for enemy movements; now Herrera was back with his own piece of alarming news—he himself had seen Santa Anna’s army crossing the Rio Grande, plunging into Texas.

  At nine o’clock that night a council of war convened in Travis’ room. Herrera repeated his story, and the Texans argued for hours whether to believe him. Some were convinced, but more were doubtful—they had heard these stories before and nothing ever happened. In the end, Travis ignored the warning.