Alamo Traces (10 page)

Nevertheless, Williams did have one source that claimed Travis had shot himself. Speaking to the unsupported story she attributed to Bergara and Perez, Williams wrote: “These reports have been ignored or discredited by all writers of Texas history, but there is evidence that some of Travis's closest friends believed them in 1836. On March 28, 1836, Andrew Briscoe gave an account of the fall of the Alamo to the editor of the
New Orleans Post and Union
in which he said: ‘The brave and gallant Travis, to prevent his falling into the hands of the enemy, shot
himself.' This account was copied by the
Arkansas Gazette
, April 12, 1836.”
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Firstly, Briscoe's letter was written on March 16 and first appeared in the
Red River Herald
. The unsubstantiated story did not appear in the April 12, 1836 issue of the
Arkansas Gazette
as claimed by Williams. Secondly, Briscoe and Travis were well acquainted, but the one letter does not support Williams's conclusion that “some of Travis's closest friends” believed he committed suicide. For that claim she would have needed at least one more letter from a Travis friend that reported the same data as the Briscoe missive. As it is, the Briscoe document only shows that Briscoe may have believed a suicide rumor that was circulating about Travis. Briscoe's alleged reason (to not be captured) for the supposed suicide is different from the one (all hope of saving his men was gone) Williams attributed to Bergara and Perez. Also, Houston wrote a friend that it was rumored that Travis had stabbed himself to prevent capture, which contradicts Briscoe's claim of Travis shooting himself. The Houston version also suggests that someone may have seen a bayonet, knife, or sword wound on Travis's body.
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Another description of Travis's death is found in a report attributed to Joe, Travis's slave, who was sleeping near his master when the alarm was first sounded in the Alamo on the morning of March 6.

The Joe story is similar to a Susanna Dickinson report of Travis's death that was given at Gonzales and a few days later relayed to a Texas newspaper by John W. Smith, the Alamo storekeeper, and Andrew Ponton, the judge at Gonzales. Their description reads: “Col. Travis stood on the walls cheering his men, exclaiming, ‘Hurra, my boys!' till he received a
second shot
[italics added], and fell; it is stated that a Mexican general, (Mora) then rushed upon him and lifted his sword to destroy his victim, who, collecting all his last expiring energies, directed a thrust at the former, which changed their relative positions; for the victim became the victor, and the remains of both descended to eternal sleep; but not alike to everlasting fame.” It is highly unlikely that Dickinson witnessed Travis's death. Therefore, if her version is true or even partly true, she must have obtained the data from a Mexican officer. Also, it is important to understand that Joe did not witness Travis's death. Joe left him sitting upright on the sloping ground.
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Williams's claim of a “pistol shot through the forehead” comes from her transformation of a statement made by Francisco Ruiz. In 1860 Ruiz declared: “On the north battery of the fortress lay the lifeless body of Col. Travis on the gun carriage, shot only in the forehead.” The claim of a “pistol shot through the forehead,” which suggests entry and exit wounds is not supported by the Ruiz evidence. Thus, it appears that because Travis had already discharged his rifle, Williams assumed that the only way he could have shot himself in the head was with a pistol. Which makes sense, except that neither a pistol wound nor a caliber size of the ball is mentioned in the Ruiz account. Also, Joe reported that Travis was only armed with a rifle and sword. Moreover, there is valid evidence that indicates Ruiz was not in Bexar on March 6, 1836. Therefore, he did not identify Travis's body. If Travis had a wound someplace on his head, Ruiz obtained that information from somebody else who saw the body.
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Santa Anna's soldiers appear to have been firing “buck and ball” loads in their muskets. Thus, given Joe's statement, Travis's head wound, if he had one, may have been caused by a single buckshot pellet that did not cause immediate death. The Ruiz statement does not eliminate the possibility of a blade wound on Travis's body, which might not have been as obvious as the head wound.
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Furthermore, while there was no General Mora at the north wall, a “Colonel Esteban Mora” was one of the officers who “succeeded in
gaining a foothold on the north side where the strife was bitterest, which encouraged the soldiers in their advance and resulted in their capture of the enemy's artillery on that side.” Travis and Mora may have engaged in some kind of struggle. We just don't know. Mora, however, was not killed in the March 6 attack of the Alamo. He died at San Jacinto.
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Another Mexican report that throws new light on the older evidence is a letter that an unknown soldier wrote on March 7, 1836. The informant was a member of General Martin Perfecto de Cos's column that attacked the north wall. He claimed that what he had seen was “at close range.” He wrote about Travis: “Their leader, named Travis, died like a brave man with his rifle in his hand at the back of a cannon.” The soldier may have witnessed Travis's death, but that is not certain. He may have only seen Travis's body and assumed he “died like a brave man” because the body was located where the fighting was the most intense. Still, if the Mexican soldier saw Travis's body “with rifle in his hand,” that would seem to eliminate the suicide stories and the death struggle with Mora. If Travis had killed himself with a pistol or knife, he would have had one of those weapons in hand. If he had died in a death struggle with Mora, he would have had a sword in his hand.
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In total, the evidence about Travis's death only supports a couple of conclusions. First, Travis did not shoot himself in the head or stab himself in the heart. Second, Travis was killed on one of the Alamo walls, next to a cannon. Remember, the
T & T Register
story claimed that Travis had been hit twice. The nature of the first wound is unknown, except that it did not appear to have killed Travis. The second wound knocked him down to a seated position on the sloping wall inside the fort but failed to kill him. Perhaps both wounds came from buckshot pellets. Had Travis been hit in the head with a musket or rifle ball, it is doubtful he would have remained seated on the slope. At that point Joe departed the scene. Travis must have moved from the sloping wall to a nearby cannon platform and received a third, fatal shot to his body. Or the killing wound may have come from a blade weapon of some kind.

What of the death struggle story—where did it come from? It may have been a piece of contrived fiction to refute the stories that Travis had killed himself and to turn his death into a moral victory. Look at the report's core element once again: “. . . it is stated that a Mexican general, (Mora) then rushed upon him, and lifted his sword to destroy his victim, who, collecting all his last expiring energies, directed a thrust at the
former, which changed their relative positions; for the victim became the victor. . . .” The tale seems to be one of those archetypal Alamo stories that, using Travis and Mora as symbols, proclaim that even though the event was a Mexican victory, the Mexican loss was so great that in the end it was as much a defeat as victory.

A second example of Williams changing the evidence to fit her interpretation of the events is found in her section on David Crockett's alleged “Tennessee Mounted Volunteers.” She claimed: “Among the Comptroller Military Service Records, there are seven documents, all requisitions on the Provisional Government of Texas, signed by David Crockett and others of his band for board for a company of “Tennessee Mounted Volunteers” while they were resting at Washington and while they were on the way from that town to Bexar. These documents show that there were eighteen or more men in the company, including Colonel Crockett and Captain William B. Harrison, and that they went by the way of Gonzales to San Antonio.”
²⁶

Williams used five documents to unite the Crockett and Harrison units into a single company at Washington-on-the-Brazos. One of the documents is a claim written by Dr. William P. Smith on April 24, 1836. Williams's published version of the Smith document reads:

The actual Smith claim differs in two ways from what Williams reported. Smith wrote:

Because Williams's papers contain a correct transcription of the Smith affidavit in what appears to be Williams's handwriting, it seems that she must have intentionally changed the wording of the document. First, she changed the date from
“about the 15th of last January” to “about January 20, last.” She probably changed the date because Crockett was in Nacogdoches on January 15, 1836. Thus Harrison and Crockett could not have ridden together to San Antonio if Harrison had left Washington-on-the-Brazos while Crockett was still in Nacogdoches.
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Williams's second alteration expanded Smith's statement of “Said A. L. Harrison was . . .” to “He fell sick and was . . .” Thus suggesting that Harrison became ill at Washington on or about January 20, 1836. This change appears to have been made to effect the understanding of a second A. L. Harrison document. According to Williams, Comptroller Military Service record 644 was a Colonel Sidney Sherman affidavit that reported that Harrison had lost a horse and gun in the service of Texas. Sherman wrote that the property had been appraised by “Captain W. B. Harrison, Col. Crockett, and Lieutenant Robert Campbell.” Sherman, however, did not state when and where the evaluation had taken place. Williams, by changing the Smith affidavit to show that A. L. Harrison was sick and did not go to the Alamo, eliminated the possibility that the horse and gun were appraised at San Antonio. Thus, with Williams's versions of the documents, a reasonable interpretation would be that the evaluation most likely occurred sometime before Harrison's unit arrived at Washington-on-the-Brazos and supported Williams's claim that Captain W. B. Harrison and his men were members of Crockett's command.
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A military claim that Williams failed to find indicates that Harrison's “Nashville Volunteers,” not the “Tennessee Mounted Volunteers,” appear to have arrived at Washington-on-the-Brazos on January 23, 1836, and were still at that location on January 26. Whereas, Crockett and all but one of his men departed Washington on the morning of January 23, 1836. It would appear that the two companies probably missed each other by only hours.
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Moreover, Williams claimed that the Harrison and Crockett groups traveled to San Antonio by way of Gonzales. She, however, failed to cite any evidence for that belief. On the other hand, two military claims show that the Harrison company stopped in San Felipe. Harrison obtained forage and provisions from William Kerr and John Echols at San Felipe on January 28, 1836. Two additional claims for provisions reveal that Harrison's company trekked to Bexar by way of Mina (Bastrop). Harrison purchased provisions from James Gotier on January 30, 1836. The next day Harrison obtained supplies from John Eblin. Gotier lived southeast
of Mina near the Gotier Trace that ran between Mina and San Felipe. John Eblin lived two miles below Mina and just across and upriver from present-day Smithville.
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Crockett commanded a small “Mounted Spy Company” that was organized on or about January 8, 1836, in Nacogdoches. Two claims show that on January 23 and 24, 1836, at Washington-on-the-Brazos, Crockett's unit comprised himself and five other men. At that time, Crockett and his scouts appear to have been riding for Goliad, rather than San Antonio. On January 9, 1836, while in San Augustine, about forty miles east of Nacogdoches, Crockett wrote his daughter. Of his travel plans, he wrote: “I have taken the oath of government and have enrolled my name as a volunteer and will set out for the Rio Grand[e] in a few days with volunteers from the United States.” Houston was, at that time, sending all incoming troops from the United States to Goliad, which was serving as the staging area for his planned March invasion of Matamoros on the Rio Grande.
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The last documented location of Crockett before his arrival at Bexar sometime between February 5 and 11, 1836, was Gay Hill, the home of James Gibson Swisher, on the Goliad road, west of Washington-on-the-Brazos. The time frame for this location was most likely sometime between January 23 and 25. The other four men in Crockett's unit seem to have been riding ahead of Crockett at that point. Benjamin Archibald Martin Thomas appears to have joined Crockett on January 24. Crockett and Thomas's departure date from the Swisher home is unknown.
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