Part 10

Three times the Mexican infantry charged with great spirit and coolness; each time they were driven back. They finally retreated, carrying with them their dead and wounded, and leaving the Texans in possession of the field.

This victory was offset by the defeat of a company of fifty-three Texans on their way to join Caldwell. They were commanded by Captain Nicholas Dawson.

General Woll met these men in his retreat from the river Salado, and attacked them in a small mesquit thicket where they were halted. After an unequal contest of half an hour, Dawson hoisted a white flag. The firing ceased, but as soon as the surrender took place, the prisoners were set upon by the Mexican soldiers and many of them killed. Dawson was killed after he gave up his arms. Out of his fifty-three men, thirty-three were killed and eighteen were made prisoners. Two only escaped; one of these, a lad named Gonzales Woods, seized the lance thrust at him by a Mexican cavalryman, jerked his assailant to the ground, then leaped upon his enemy’s horse and galloped away.

The morning after these skirmishes General Woll abandoned San Antonio and returned to the west side of the Rio Grande River. His prisoners, among whom were Judge Hutchison and ex-Lieutenant-Governor Robinson, were sent to the Castle of Perote (Pā-ro′tā), a prison near the city of Mexico.

5. THE BLACK BEANS.

Before the echoes of the bugles which sounded General Woll’s retreat had finally died on the air, volunteers came flocking to San Antonio eager to pursue him, and determined to cross the Rio Grande at all hazards and release the Texans languishing in Mexican prisons.

On the 18th of November seven hundred men, armed and equipped for a campaign, were assembled in the shadow of the twin towers of the old Mission Concepcion. General Alexander Somervell, appointed by President Houston to the command, put himself at the head of this small army; the order to march ran down the line, and with a shout the men set their faces toward the west.

After several days’ march they camped at Laredo on the banks of the Rio Grande River. They expected to cross at once into Mexico and take the enemy by surprise. But at the moment when everything seemed to them favorable for this movement, General Somervell issued an order for his soldiers to return to Gonzales, where they would be disbanded.

The men were dumfounded. Three hundred flatly refused to obey the order. The others, after much wrangling, followed General Somervell to San Antonio.

Captain William S. Fisher was elected colonel in command of those who remained, and the expedition proceeded down the Rio Grande to a point opposite the Mexican town of Mier.

Mier was occupied by General Pedro Ampudia (Am-poo′dee-a) with two thousand troops. On Christmas morning, before daylight, Colonel Fisher led his men over the river. The Mexicans came out to meet them, but were forced to retreat before the hot fire of the Texans. By daylight the Texans had captured the enemy’s cannon and cut their way into the town. Here the fight went on, hand to hand, from street to street, from house to house.

But the superior numbers of the enemy enabled them to keep up the struggle, which lasted seventeen hours.

At the end of that time a flag of truce was sent by General Ampudia to Colonel Fisher. Fisher had been severely wounded early in the action; he was weakened by loss of blood and unnerved by pain; and he advised surrender, although up to this time his men had been victorious. He knew General Ampudia, he said, and he answered for his good faith.

After much discussion the majority of the men agreed to the surrender. The terms were most honorable.

No sooner were the articles signed and the Texan arms stacked, than the unfortunate prisoners began to suffer from the cruelty of their treacherous foes. They were put in irons and marched to Matamoras, thence to the interior. At the Hacienda of Salado, beyond Saltillo, they rose upon their guards, overpowered the soldiers, seized their weapons and horses, and escaped. But they found themselves in a strange country. They soon lost their way in the wild mountain passes, and after enduring great torture from hunger and thirst, they were finally recaptured and taken back to Salado.

On their arrival there they were met by an order from Santa Anna. Every tenth man of them was to be shot! One of their own number who understood Spanish was compelled to read this order to his companions. The rattle of handcuffs, indicating the surprise of the startled prisoners, was promptly silenced by the guards; and, amid a deadly stillness which succeeded the reading, an officer entered the shed where they were confined. He carried an earthen jar. The jar contained one hundred and seventy-five beans (the number of the prisoners). Seventeen of the beans were black, the others were white. The jar was placed on a bench and a handkerchief thrown over it. The roll was then called. Each prisoner stepped forward as his name was called, placed his hand in the jar, and drew out a bean.

The black beans in this fatal lottery meant death.

Some of the Mexican officers grew faint as they looked, and turned away their heads. But others bent forward eagerly, as if watching the throw of dice in an everyday game of chance.

It was Sunday afternoon, at the hour when the church bells were everywhere calling the people to vesper prayer, when this fearful drama began. Not one of the actors in it faltered or changed color at finding in his hand the black token of death. When the ordeal was ended, the shackles of the seventeen doomed men were knocked off. They were then hurried to a yard adjoining the shed and shot without further ceremony. Their comrades, crouched against the wall within, heard but too plainly the whispered prayers, the echoing shots, and the dying groans.

The survivors were carried to the Castle of Perote near the city of Mexico, where they found the prisoners taken by General Woll at San Antonio. They were immediately put to convict labor. “They were hitched to a wagon, twenty-five to a team, and compelled to haul rocks from the mountains to the Castle of Perote. The prisoners at no time, however, lost their buoyant spirits, nor did they ever lose an opportunity for fun. McFall, a powerful man, was put in the lead, and was always ready to get scared and run away with the wagon. This was often done, and the corners of the adobe houses always suffered in such cases. The Mexican officers would laugh, and the owners of the houses would swear in bad Spanish. The overseers were kept busy. They had the power of using the lash, but they did not do this very often, as the Texans made it their business, at the peril of their lives, to return such civilities with ample vengeance.”[31]

Several of the prisoners made their escape. Among these was Colonel Thomas Jefferson Green, who had been Fisher’s second in command. He was bitterly opposed to the surrender at Mier, and broke his sword across his knee rather than hand it to General Ampudia. Mr. John Twohig, of San Antonio, who had been carried into captivity by Woll, and several of his fellow-prisoners made a tunnel under the prison wall, through which they succeeded in getting out of the Castle and thence safe home again.

Mr. Wright of De Witt County was not so lucky. He was a very large man; after making his preparations for flight, he crawled into the tunnel, where he got along famously until he was about half way through. There he stuck fast, equally unable to go forward or to come back. Finally, with a despairing effort he slid back an inch or two, then a little further, until at last bruised, breathless, and torn, he got back into his dungeon, glad to settle down to prison life once more.

Among the captives was Samuel H. Walker, afterwards famous as a captain of cavalry in the Mexican war with the United States.

In September, 1844, these prisoners were finally released by Santa Anna, at the dying request, it is said, of his young and beautiful wife.

About the time the Mier expedition started from San Antonio, the capital was again removed from President Houston’s beloved town on Buffalo Bayou; this time to Washington on the Brazos.

VII. AUSTIN. (1842-1861.)

1. “THE REPUBLIC IS NO MORE.”

From 1842 to 1844 the Texan Congress held its meetings at Washington on the Brazos—the spot where, a few short years before, the declaration of independence had been adopted.

The nation born amid the gloom and uncertainty of that stormy time now stood forth proud in the consciousness of growing strength, free and full of hope for the coming years.

An armistice was signed with Mexico (1843) which left the Republic at peace. The Indians under the wise rule of the “Big White Chief,” Houston, made but few outbreaks. Year by year more fields were fenced in, more orchards and gardens were planted, more dooryards were set with vine and rose-tree.

Immigrants poured in. Many came from “the States”; but others crossed the wide seas to find homes in that fertile Texas whose story of struggle and triumph was in everybody’s mouth. Henry Castro, a French gentleman, who was consul-general for Texas at Paris, obtained in 1842 large grants of land from the Republic, and brought over five hundred families from France. These settled on the Medina River west of San Antonio. Another important colony came from Germany under the leadership of the Prince de Solms, and founded the thrifty town of New Braunfels on the Guadalupe.

The roads were white with westward-traveling wagons which stopped to pass the time of day, as it were, with all the little towns along the way. In those hospitable days small barrels of tar stood as a matter of course on the sidewalks. Long-handled dippers floated in the tar, so that the passing wagoner might help himself and ease his creaking wheels.

As for the wayside houses, their doors were always open to the wayworn mover and his family. The women and girls peering out from under the wagon cover, the boys trudging sturdily along by the driver’s side, the dog trotting in the shadow of the feed trough,—all these were to the free-handed pioneers as welcome as kinsmen.

The newcomers were often struck with amazement at the curious contrasts they saw on the frontier. “You are welcomed,” writes one traveler, “by a figure in a blue flannel shirt and pendant beard, quoting the Latin poets.... You will see fine pictures on log walls; you will drink coffee from tin cups on Dresden china saucers. Seated on a barrel, you will hear a Beethoven symphony played on a rosewood piano. The bookcase may be half full of books and half full of potatoes.”

But while the western border thus filling up with settlers was quiet and unmolested, there was serious trouble over on the eastern line. A band composed mostly of rough desperadoes from the old Neutral Ground roamed along the Sabine River, shooting and killing innocent citizens under the pretext of punishing theft, negro-stealing, and other offenses. They called themselves the Regulators. An opposition band, made up of men as reckless as themselves, undertook in turn to punish them, and to administer justice generally. These were known as the Moderators. Between the Moderators and Regulators, Shelby, Harrison, and the neighboring counties were kept in a state of terror. Honest men were afraid to venture out of their own homes; for no one could guess when or upon whom the so-called justice of these bands would fall. Bloody “courts” were held in the swamps, one day by the Regulators, the next, and perhaps on the same spot, by the Moderators, both equally cruel and lawless. Wild stories were told of certain leaders in either gang whose victims were always shot in the left eye; of others again whose weapon was not the rifle, but poison.

At one time more than a thousand men were engaged in this feud. In the summer of 1844 the Regulators and Moderators assembled under arms in fortified camps. An active campaign was carried on for some weeks, during which more than fifty persons were killed or wounded. Finally President Houston ordered out five hundred militia under General James Smith, and the two factions were disbanded. But it was a long time before the feud died out entirely.

In the fall of 1844 Anson Jones was elected President of the Republic. His Secretary of State was Doctor Ashbel Smith.

Dr. Smith, who was a learned and able man, came to Texas from Connecticut just after the Revolution, and was made surgeon-general of the army. During Houston’s administration, he represented the Republic at the courts of England and France. At this time all over Europe there was keen interest in Texan affairs.

Notwithstanding the glory of the young Republic, its people still wished to be annexed to the United States. They felt themselves too weak to contend against Mexico in case of another war, and too poor to keep up the army and navy, and provide for the expense of a separate government. But the United States again refused to receive them. Upon this, France and England offered through Minister Smith to compel Mexico to acknowledge the independence of Texas, provided Texas would agree not to unite with any other country.

This offer caused a sudden change of feeling in the United States. Her jealousy of foreign interference was aroused; and in the spring of 1845 the United States Congress passed resolutions admitting Texas into the Union.

President Jones then submitted the question to the people. A convention met at Austin in July, 1845, to frame a constitution for the State of Texas. In October the final vote was taken. It was almost unanimous for annexation.

In February, 1846, President Jones gave up his authority to J. Pinckney Henderson who had been elected governor of the new state. This impressive ceremony took place at Austin, where the capital had been finally established. President Jones in his farewell address said:

“The Lone Star of Texas, which ten years since arose amid clouds, over fields of carnage, and obscurely seen for a while, ... has passed on and become fixed in that glorious constellation which all freemen and lovers of freedom must reverence and adore,—the American Union. Blending its rays with its sister States, long may it continue to shine.... May the Union be perpetual; and may it be the means of conferring benefits and blessings upon all the people of the States, is my prayer. The first act in the great drama is performed. The Republic of Texas is no more.”[32]

Many eyes must have grown dim as the closing sentence of this address was pronounced. Memories must have crowded thick and fast upon those veterans who listened, hearing at the same time in a dream the call of bugles and the roll of drums, the ring of sabers, and the echo of those daring voices which called into being the Republic of Texas!

Sam Houston and Thomas J. Rusk were elected United States senators. Rusk, who was a native of South Carolina, was one of the signers of the Texan declaration of independence. He was Secretary of War under President Burnet, and fought gallantly in the ranks at the battle of San Jacinto. After General Houston’s resignation he was made commander-in-chief of the army. Rusk had taken an active part in the war against the Cherokee Indians. Later he had been chief justice of the Republic. He had devoted himself for many years with great unselfishness to the interests of the Republic. He continued to serve the State with the same fidelity.

He died by his own hand in 1857. Grief at the death of his wife was the cause of this fatal act.

2. ACROSS THE BORDER.

Mexico was indignant at seeing Texas, which she still claimed as one of her provinces, about to enter the Union. As soon as the Annexation Bill was passed by the United States Congress, Don Juan Almonte, formerly aide-de-camp to General Santa Anna, now the Mexican minister at Washington, D.C., was recalled, and preparations for war were begun on a grand scale in Mexico.

In the meantime, the United States government had sent General Zachary Taylor to Corpus Christi on the Texas coast, with four thousand troops. He was ordered to march westward and take up a position on the Rio Grande River, the boundary line between Texas and Mexico. He was further ordered to confine himself to Texas soil unless the Mexicans should attempt to cross the river.

In the spring of 1846 General Taylor began his march across the country, “which appeared like one vast garden wavy with flowers of the most gorgeous dyes.”[33] Then came a desert-like waste in which there was neither water nor any growing thing. “The sand was like hot ashes, and when you stepped upon it, you sank up to the ankles.”[33]

But the region beyond the desert was fertile and inviting. At the Sal Colorado, a stream thirty miles east of the Rio Grande, some Mexican soldiers appeared. They insisted that all the country west of the Colorado belonged to Mexico, and declared that if the Americans attempted to cross that stream they would fire upon them. General Taylor paid no attention whatever to their threats. He led his troops over the Sal Colorado without further trouble and continued his march toward the Rio Grande.

There the war began in real earnest. The first battle was fought at Fort Brown (now Brownsville), opposite Matamoras. The Americans were victorious. Two other successful engagements, Palo Alto and Resaca de la Palma, took place on Texas territory. Then General Taylor, having received large reinforcements, entered Mexico and marched upon Monterey, the great interior city of northern Mexico.

About this time Santa Anna, who had been in exile and disgrace, returned to Mexico, and was immediately made commander-in-chief of the Mexican army.

Texas furnished her share of men for the war upon her hereditary foe. Governor Henderson himself entered the campaign as a major-general of volunteers; ex-President Lamar and Edward Burleson served upon his staff. Albert Sidney Johnston commanded a regiment. “Jack” Hays and George T. Wood, afterward governor of Texas, were also in command of regiments. Ben McCulloch carried into the war a company of rangers.

The Texans were in the van in every battle. At the storming of Monterey they especially distinguished themselves by their daring and high courage. A participator in the siege of the city says: “In order to dislodge the skirmishers from the housetops, the Texans rushed from door to door, breaking through buildings and inside walls; and, mounting to a level with the enemy, picked them off with their rifles. Meanwhile those in the streets charged from square to square amid sweeping showers of grape, cheered on by Lamar, Henderson, and Jefferson Davis of the Mississippi regiment.” The next day “the artillery on both sides raked the streets, the balls striking the houses with a terrible crash, while amid the roar of cannon was heard the battering instruments of the Texans. Doors were forced open, walls were battered down, entrances were made through stone and brick, and the enemy were driven from point to point, followed by the sharp crack of the Texan rifles.”

General Ampudia, who had so basely betrayed the trust of the Texans after their surrender at Mier in 1843, was in command of the Mexican forces. After three days of desperate fighting he surrendered the city of Monterey to General Taylor.

The officers commissioned by Taylor to draw up the articles of capitulation on the American side were Generals Worth and Henderson (governor of Texas) and Colonel Jefferson Davis.

Texas furnished above eight thousand soldiers for this war, and the “murderous ring of the Texan rifle” was heard on almost every field.

In New Mexico, where there was considerable fighting, the cannon taken from General McLeod in the fatal Sante Fé expedition in 1841 was discovered by the American soldiers, where it had been hidden in the mountains. “It is,” says the record, “a six-pounder, bearing the ‘Lone Star’ of Texas and the name of her ex-President, Mirabeau B. Lamar.” The Americans adopted it as a favorite, and used it in firing their morning and evening signals. The Lone Star, they declared, brought them good luck.

The war ended in the storming and capture of the city of Mexico by General Winfield Scott, commander-in-chief of the United States army. Santa Anna, once more defeated and humbled, hid himself with the remains of his army in the mountain passes of Mexico.

In one of the last battles of the war Colonel Samuel H. Walker was killed. This dashing young Texan, had been again and again selected by General Taylor for dangerous service, and his gallantry was a by-word in the army. He had been one of the unfortunate Mier prisoners, and was among those who overpowered the guard at Salado and escaped, only to be recaptured. In the death-lottery he had drawn a white bean, and had afterward endured the miseries of the Castle of Perote. In the neighborhood of that prison he fell mortally wounded, but flushed with victory, and soon afterward expired. “Few men were more lamented. When the cry ‘Walker is dead’ rang through the company, the hardy soldiers burst into tears.”[34]

Mexico signed at Guadalupe, Hidalgo, a treaty with the United States (February 2, 1848), and abandoned forever all claim to Texas.

The governors who succeeded Henderson in Texas from 1847 to 1859 were Governors George T. Wood, Hansborough P. Bell, Elisha M. Pease, and Hardin R. Runnels.

Early in Governor Wood’s administration a disagreement arose between Texas and the United States over Sante Fé and the surrounding country. This had been a part of Texas, but was ceded in 1848 by Mexico to the United States with New Mexico. When the United States took possession of it Texas protested, and much ill-feeling followed. For a time it seemed as if the state which had just got into the Union would march out again.

But the question was settled during Governor Bell’s term of office. The disputed territory was bought by the United States from Texas for the sum of ten million dollars.

During these years Texas grew in prosperity; all boundary questions were settled, and the public debt was paid. Settlements sprung up to the very border. This, however, caused fresh trouble among the Indians, who from time to time fell upon isolated settlements, burning the houses and killing the settlers or carrying them into captivity. As late as 1847 two hundred Lipans on the war-path swept the western frontier. In 1848 the Indians in Texas killed one hundred and seventy persons, carried twenty-five into captivity, and stole six thousand horses.

The Texan rangers were ordered out by Governor Wood to protect the frontier. The Comanches, the fiercest of the western tribes, were finally defeated by the rangers under Colonel John S. Ford. Their chief, Iron Jacket, was killed in a desperate hand-to-hand combat with Captain S. P. Ross. The chief’s tall form was found, after death, to be encased in a fine coat of scale armor, supposed to have belonged to some Spaniard in the days of the conquest of Mexico. Hence his name, Iron Jacket, and the belief that he could not be killed by the bullet of the white man. Iron Jacket’s little son Noh-po was carried to Waco, where he was raised by the Ross family. During the administration of Governor Pease, the legislature gave the Indians twelve leagues of land and built for them several new trading-posts along the frontier. Later they were all removed to the Indian Territory.

Two million dollars were set aside by the state for a permanent school fund; and a quantity of land was voted for the support of the deaf and dumb, the blind, the orphan, and the insane.

A new state capitol, a Land Office, and other public buildings were erected at Austin.