Alamo Traces (55 page)

Ordinarily, a full colonel would have commanded a regiment, not a small company like Bowie took to the Alamo. Because Bowie was not in the regular army and had been discharged from the volunteer force at Bexar on December 15, it appears his Alamo rank of full colonel was some kind of unofficial rank that was contingent on him raising a volunteer force to attack Matamoros.

Bowie, after his arrival at Bexar on January 18, appears to have commanded the troops that came with him, but otherwise he seems to have functioned as an advisor to Lt. Colonel Neill. Bowie, in Bowie to Smith, February 2, 1836, referred to Neill as the “Col. Comdt.” Thus, it appears that Bowie did not consider himself as in command of Bexar while Neill was in San Antonio. Therefore, Bowie could not have had any authority over Travis, who like Neill was a regular army officer.

38
J. J. Baugh to Henry Smith, February 13, 1836, Bexar, Jenkins, ed.,
Papers
, IV: 320-321; W. Barret Travis to Henry Smith, February 13, 1836, Bexar, Jenkins, ed.,
Papers
, IV: 328. Travis wrote Smith that two small companies had voted to serve under Bowie. One of the companies Bowie commanded was a detachment of Captain John Chenoweth's United States Invincibles that traveled to San Antonio with Bowie under the command of William C. M. Baker of Clinton, Mississippi. Bowie's second company was most likely William H. Patton's Columbia company, which as of February 12 had only five or six men.

39
J. C. Neill to Henry Smith, January 27, 1836, Bexar, Jenkins, ed.,
Papers
, IV: 160.

40
Entry for February 13, 1836, Audited Military Claims ledger, 77; Nancy Timmons Samuels and Barbara Roach Knox, compilers,
Old Northwest Texas: Historical – Statistical – Biographical
(Fort Worth: Fort Worth Genealogical Society, 1980), I-B: 547-548.

The AMC ledger shows that on February 13, 1836, Neill purchased $333 worth of military supplies from “Horton & Clements.” The identity of Horton is unknown, but the only “Clements” residing within a two-day ride of Bexar who sold supplies to the military was Joseph D. Clements at Gonzales. Also, Neill's action of obtaining the supplies and the amount of the purchase indicates that he was returning to his command.

Samuels and Knox reported that Neill's wife, Margaret Harriett, probably
died in February 1836, in Gonzales County. Their source for that data appears to have been obtained from a Mrs. C. L. Neill of Pharr, Texas. The two researchers also reported that Neill departed San Antonio on February 14, 1836, and rode to Gonzales. John Alexander Neill, a cousin to James C. Neill, lived in Gonzales. Thus, Neill's sick wife may have been staying with the John A. Neill family while she was ill. That way she would have been closer to her husband than she would have been in Bastrop, where they had a home.

41
J. C. Neill discharge affidavits, February 14, 1836, Bexar, John T. Ballard file, Robert White file, David Davis file, Thomas Hendrick file, Jesse B. Badgett file, Chester S. Corbit file, William A. Irwin file, AMC-TSL; J. C. Neill affidavit, February 20, 1838, I. L. K. Harrison file, M & P-TSL.

42
W. Barret Travis, Comd. of Cavalry, and James Bowie, Comd. of volunteers, to Henry Smith, February 14, 1836, Bexar, Jenkins, ed.,
Papers
, IV: 339. The Alamo's volunteer cavalry was most likely composed of Captain William B. Harrison's company and David Crockett's small spy unit. James L. Vaughan, one of Travis's recruiting officers, assisted Harrison's unit in obtaining provisions (see chapter two) at San Felipe and Mina.

43
J. C. Neill to Henry Smith, February 28, 1836, San Felipe, James C. Neill Papers, Daughters of the Republic of Texas Library, Alamo, San Antonio, Texas; Sam Houston affidavit, December 9, 1839, Austin, Samuel Williams file, AMC-TSL. Houston wrote: “I certify that Col. Jas C. Neill was commander of the Troops until I arrived at Gonzales.”

Walter Lord, in regard to the source material he used to write
A Time To Stand
(p. 227), wrote: “The Alamo has intrigued writers for more than 125 years, but the contradictions and gaps in the story remain as exasperating as ever. In the end, the only solution was to go back to the original sources and start all over again.”

Lord, by starting over, believed he had solved many of the Alamo's contradictions and filled some of the gaps. He did carry the Alamo story to a new level of knowledge. However, he also created a number of new problems with his uncritical acceptance of certain old sources and some of the new evidence he discovered. Lord's incorrect and negative depiction of Alamo commander James C. Neill in order to make William B. Travis, the Alamo's temporary commander, look more competent and heroic is especially galling. Neill was one hell of a fighting man, and Lord most likely knew it.

Still, what Lord said about the Alamo story being “exasperating” and full of contradictions and gaps is almost as true today as it was in 1961 when his book went on sale. Not only is that the case for the Alamo, but the most recent military and political histories of the Texas Revolution still have their contradictions and holes. The Alamo and the Revolution are areas ripe for a new look. Many explosive primary sources are still out there—some unknown to historians—others sources have been ignored because they did not dovetail with the historian or writer's bias.

Hopefully, this study has done away with some of the Alamo contradictions and bridged many of the gaps in the Alamo story. Moreover, I hope this work is a new beginning that other investigators and historians can build upon with new sources and valid interpretations. Perhaps historians will agree with my conclusions. Perhaps not. I make no claim that
Alamo Traces
is the best or the most correct study of the Texian Alamo
and its role in the Texas Revolution; it is only, as of its publication date, the new kid on the block.

Alleged execution of David Crockett

This section examines a number of new documents that speak to the Alamo and the Texas Revolution. Each document is presented with a short analysis of its importance to history.