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168
TEXAN INDEPENDENCE.

strong fortress near San Antonio de Béjar, which had 14 guns in position, and was garrisoned by about 150 men under W. B. Travis. During 11 days' siege and bombardment, 32 more men forced their way into the fortress. Travis would neither surrender nor attempt to retreat. At last Santa Anna, on the 6th of March, ordered the assault; the stronghold was taken, and the whole garrison put to the sword. Among the slain were colonels Travis, Bowie, and David Crockett, and also twenty residents or traders of San Antonio de Béjar. Only a woman and her child and a negro servant were spared.[1]

The blood, both of Mexicans and Texans, shed at the Álamo was a useless sacrifice. The massacre, even if in accord with the barbarous usages of war, did not serve the cause of Mexico, but, on the contrary, impressed the Texans with the firm conviction that no settlement except by the sword was any longer possible. It was now with them a question of victory or subjugation accompanied with the direst consequences. The fact was that the siege and storming of the Álamo was a childish display of vanity, to

    provided with artillery and other supplies. Am. Cyclop., xv. 678. Santa Anna wanted Béjar for his centre of operations, it being the only place in Texas inhabited by Mexicans. This explains why he traversed such an enormous distance of desert country. Filisola, Mem. Hist. Guer. Tejas, ii. 228-30.

  1. The Texan or American accounts of this struggle place the Mexican casualties at 1,600. According to the account formed by the Mexican general Juan de Andrade, from the reports of the several organizations constituting the storming parties, the casualties were: officers, 8 killed and 18 wounded; rank and file, 52 killed, 233 wounded; total, 311. Santa Anna reported 70 killed and 300 wounded, and with his usual unscrupulous disregard of veracity, sets down the Texan loss at over 600, all foreigners, buried in the ditches and trenches, and 'en las inmediacioncs un crecido número que no se ha podido exaininar.' He claims also that the Texans used 21 pieces of artillery. According to Mexican accounts, the investing force, together with that hovering at short distances, exceeded 5,000 men. Santa Anna detailed four columns, each composed of one battalion and two companies, besides a reserve of one battalion and five columns, for the assault. Dic. Univ. Hist. Geog., i. ap. 135-8; Filisola, Mem. Hist. Guer. Tejas, i. 6-17, ii. 382-90; Houston, Life of, 93-4; Thrall, Hist. Texas, 238-46, giving a detailed account of the siege and capture of the fort, says that only two women and a negro servant escaped with life. Maillard, Tex., 101-3, says six men and one woman escaped out of a garrison of 450 men. The same authority and the Mexicans assert that Travis had offered to surrender, but the privilege was denied him. Bustamante, Hist. Invasion, MS., i. 6-7, says that Santa Anna at the taking of the Alamo lost 600 men, which may be exaggerated.