Alamo Traces (43 page)
Authors: Thomas Ricks Lindley
Nevertheless, if one wants to accept the Ross document as authentic and assume that the typed statements actually refer to Moses Rose/Louis Rose, there are two problems one must do away with in order to make it work. First, the alleged Dickinson statement can be read to mean that Ross had not escaped the Alamo but had been killed in the attempt. Moreover, that interpretation is reinforced by Zuber's response to Steele's missive showing that Dickinson said Rose was killed. Therefore, Ross could not have been Moses Rose, if there ever was such a person.
Additionally, when Walter Lord assumed that the name Ross had to refer to Moses Rose because a man named Ross had never been identified as an Alamo defender, the famed writer made a serious mistake. There was an Alamo defender named “Ross.” He was Ross McClelland, a little Irishman from Mina. So, if the alleged Dickinson statement about Ross is authentic, she was most likely talking about McClelland. Still, this investigator believes the Ross document is a forgery.
27
1
Lord,
A Time
, 202-203.
2
Ibid.
3
Ibid.; “Testimony of Mrs. Hannig,” September 23, 1876.
4
“Alamo Strays” box, Archives Division, Texas State Library. Former archivist Michael A. Green was kind enough to inform this investigator of the box. The box of documents appears to be the same one that Walter Lord examined in his research on the Alamo.
5
Version number one of the alleged Hannig statement concerning Ross, “Alamo Strays” box, TSL.
6
Version number two of the alleged Hannig statement concerning Ross, “Alamo Strays” box, TSL.
7
Zuber, “An Escape,” 81; Dobie, Boatright, and Ransom, eds.,
In the Shadow of History
, 36; “Testimony of Mrs. Hannig,” September 23, 1876; F. H. K. Day, Number 106, M. B. Clark, Number 203, David Wilson, Number 427, Marcus Sewell, Number 579, “Proceedings of Land Commissioners,” John Blair, Number 259, “Rough Minutes.”
8
Susanna (Dickinson) Bellows affidavit, November 21, 1853, Harris County, Susanna Bellis affidavit, July 16, 1857, Caldwell County, James M. Rose file, C-7115, Court of Claims collection, GLO.
9
Lord,
A Time
, 202-203.
10
“Testimony of Mrs. Hannig,” September 23, 1876.
11
Alleged Hannig statement concerning Ross.
12
Almonte, “Private Journal,” 22-23.
13
“Testimony of Mrs. Hannig,” September 23, 1876; Annie E. Cardwell interview, “Attended first Texas Presbytery in 1849,”
Gonzales Inquirer
, June 7, 1911.
14
Ruiz, “Fall of the Alamo,” 80. See Chapter Nine, this book, for the evidence and analysis that explains why Ruiz was not at San Antonio on March 6, 1836.
15
Cardwell, “Attended,” June 7, 1911; Morphis,
History of Texas, from its Discovery and Settlement
, 177.
16
Alleged Hannig statement concerning Ross; “Testimony of Mrs. Hannig,” September 23, 1876.
17
Alleged Hannig statement concerning Ross; Zuber, “An Escape,” 83.
18
Zuber to Steele, September 14, 1877.
19
Ibid.
20
Alleged Hannig statement concerning Ross.
21
Zuber to Steele, September 14, 1877.
22
Susanna (Dickinson) Bellis affidavit, July 16, 1857.
23
Ibid.
24
Zuber to Steele, September 14, 1877; Alleged Hannig statement concerning Ross.
25
Webb, Carrol, and Branda, eds.,
Handbook
, I: 500-501.
26
This explanation is pure speculation, but as they say, between heaven and earth anything is possible.
27
Merrett and Saul statement, July 1838; Erath, “Memoirs of Major George Bernard Erath,” 230-231.
Mexican Casualties at the Alamo:
Big and Little
In fact, the plight of our wounded was quite grievous, and one could hardly enter the places erroneously called hospitals without trembling with horror. The wailing of the wounded and their just complaints penetrated the innermost recesses of the heart; there was no one to extract a bullet, no one to perform an amputation, and many unfortunates died whom medical science could have saved
.
Jose Enrique de la Pena
1
The exact number of Mexican soldiers killed and wounded during the siege and storming of the Alamo is one of the minor mysteries of the Alamo story. As almost always with the Alamo, there is little agreement on the issue. The numbers are high and low. Dr. John Sutherland, who said he was Travis's first courier to Gonzales, wrote that Santa Anna told him: “ âWe brought to San Antonio five thousand men and lost during the siege fifteen hundred and forty-four of the best of them. . . .' The question, however arises, did he mean that 1,544 men were lost to the service, some killed and some permanently wounded, or did he allude to the latter? Mr. [Francisco] Ruiz says âSanta Anna's loss was estimated at 1,600 men,' which would have left us in the dark, had he not indicated plainly from another remark that he meant the killed only. Speaking of one charge made by the Toluca battalion, he says: âThey commenced to scale the walls and suffered severely. Out of 800 men, 130 only were left alive.' By this remark the former is relieved of mystery, showing that he meant to say that 1,600 was about the number killed; for if 670 men fell out of one battalion in one assault, the number slain during the entire siege must have been fully as great in proportion.” Santa Anna, however,
on March 6, 1836, wrote that he had lost 70 dead and 300 wounded in the final assault of the Alamo. Other Mexican reports give numbers close to Santa Anna's figures.
2
General Santa Anna
Photo courtesy of Texas State Library and Archives Commission
Recently, new primary sources have come to hand that add new data to the story of the Mexican dead and wounded at the Alamo and to the medical services available to Santa Anna's troops. The new sources are: (1) a statement, dated August 1, 1836, from Colonel Nicolas Condelle, commander of the Morelos battalion at the siege and storming of Bexar, which reports the activities of Dr. Jose Faustino Moro, the Mexican army's senior doctor at Bexar in 1835 and 1836; (2) a letter, dated December 15, 1835, from General Martin Perfecto de Cos that contains data about the siege and storming of Bexar and his departure from the city; (3) a muster roll for the Morelos battalion, dated October 3, 1835, at Bexar; (4) a Jose F. Moro letter, dated August 5, 1836, which reports medical corp activities in 1835 and 1836; (5) a Martin Perfecto de Cos letter, dated December 3, 1835, which gives details about Mexican activities during the siege and storming of Bexar; (6) a list of the Mexican officers and units that passed through San Antonio in 1836; (7) a summary, dated August 1, 1836, prepared by the physician who treated most of the soldiers, which gives the number of Mexican dead and wounded from the Alamo.
Moreover, when the investigator integrates the new evidence with the old evidence, insights and conclusions arise that go beyond the issues of the number of Mexican dead and wounded at the Alamo and the nature of the Mexican medical services at Bexar in 1835 and 1836. In this case, the investigative process takes the reader in a different direction and reveals evidence about the authenticity of two influential Mexican accounts of the Texas Revolution and one Mexican-Texian account of the fall of the Alamo. Those narratives being
La Guerra de Tejas: Memorias de un Soldado by
Jose Juan Sanchez and
With Santa Anna in Texas: A Personal Narrative of the Revolution
, the Jose Enrique de la Pena narrative. The Sanchez narrative is supposed to be a contemporary diary that he kept during the fall and spring campaigns in Texas. Whereas, the Pena narrative, a manuscript of over four hundred pages, is alleged to be a memoir based on other sources and a second draft of Pena's contemporary campaign diary, a 109-page manuscript that has never been published. The Mexican-Texian chronicle is the much-used Francisco Ruiz report that appeared in the 1860
Texas Almanac
.
3
To determine the approximate number of Mexican casualties for the 1836 siege and storming of the Alamo, one must first determine General Martin Perfecto de Cos's number of dead and wounded in the fall campaign of 1835. Cos left a number of wounded men behind when he departed the city on December 12, 1835. Those men were later included in an August 1, 1836 hospital report of the Mexican dead (the men who died from their wounds while being treated) and wounded from the Alamo.
Mexican street scene
Photo courtesy of Joseph Musso collection
Let us start with the battle of Concepcion in late October 1835, and Lieutenant Colonel Jose Maria Mendoza, General Cos's secretary. Besides Mendoza's main job of taking dictation, he commanded fifty infantrymen from the Morelos battalion at the old mission on October 28. In addition to Mendoza's men, Colonel Domingo de Ugartechea commanded 200 cavalrymen and Lieutenant Francisco de Castaneda commanded two “guerrillas” of sixty horsemen each. The Mexican force had two field pieces, a long bronze six-pounder and a gun of unknown
caliber. General Vicente Filisola later observed: “There were more than two hundred of the enemy ambushed at that place, and they were able to fire point blank and with great accuracy. Thus in less than ten minutes almost all fifty brave men of the Morelos group were lying on the ground either dead or wounded, and the artillery piece [the six-pounder] was in the hands of those traitors.”
4
In regard to the Mexican dead and wounded, Rafael Muzquiz, the governor of Coahuila and Texas, reported on November 7, 1835, that after two engagements with the enemy, the Mexican force had suffered forty wounded and fourteen killed. Muzquiz, however, destroyed the credibility of his report by claiming that seventy-five Texians had been killed. When in fact, only one Texian, Richard Andrews, had been killed.
5
Samuel Maverick, who at the time was a prisoner in the city, reported: “Oct. 28th. Fifteen Mexican infantry out of the 42 wounded brought in are, this morning, dead; besides this havoc of the infantry, artillery-men, etc. there were some of the cavalry killed. It is probable that more than 42 were brought off wounded for they [Mexicans] reported 8 (only) left dead [on the field], whereas the Padre (who went with 10 men at the request of Austin to Gen'l Cos) reports 23 dead [on the field] and some dying in the American Camp. There must be at least 80 put past duty [dead and wounded]. The old Padre reports but one [Richard Andrews of Bastrop] man as being touched, and he only wounded in a tender part [grapeshot in the gut].” Then on October 29 Maverick reported there had been “Several [Mexican] deaths” in the city.
6
Using the Maverick numbers, it appears that as of October 29, the Mexican dead were 15, 23, and 2 for a total of 40 men. The wounded stood at twenty-five or more. Of course, that number would change over time. Men would die, other soldiers would recover, and additional men would be wounded.
The Concepcion wounded forced General Cos to do something about his failure to bring surgeons to San Antonio. To solve the problem, Cos appointed Alejandro Vidal, a local resident, to treat the men. Jose Faustino Moro, who became the first surgeon of the military hospital of Bexar, finally arrived in that city at 9:00 a.m. on December 9. Don Mariano Arroyo, the second surgeon, chief intern G. Guadalupe La Madrid, first interns Nazario Gil and Victor Samarroni, second intern Eduardo Banegas, and at least two unnamed interns (probably second
class interns Jose Maria Ylisariturri and Jose Cardenas) came with Moro. They found 54 wounded men in the city.
7
Moro and his team may have traveled a day or less behind Sanchez and the relief force. The fact that the medical personnel were with the reinforcement group is not included in Sanchez's journal. It is hard to understand why Sanchez, if he wrote the journal, would not have mentioned the much-needed medical personnel, who appear to have ridden to San Antonio with him. Otherwise the Sanchez account goes to great lengths to identify the units and individuals who are alleged to have reinforced General Cos in December 1835. Apparently, whoever wrote the Sanchez chronicle was not aware that the medical staff traveled to Bexar with Sanchez and entered the city a day later than Sanchez.
8