Anyone been to the Almo? I'd like to see it.

Bring your extra diapers and scented talc powder...
Gets hot their.
Give the other tourons around you a olfactory break..

Wabi:

I've been to the Alamo several times. The first time I visited, they offered a free video. If you could watch that video and not tear up, then your patriotism was severely inhibited. The last time I was there, I couldn't find the video. It's an impressive place to visit.

I think the newer movie with Billy Bob Thornton, is better than the John Wayne version.

I have been there several time. The first time in 1973. The last in 2005. It's a great place to see Texas history. I used to have traffic court in the old Post Office across the street. The Federal Courthouse was on the top 2 floors. I even had a traffic case in front of Maximum John once. Downtown SA is a great place to visit. Or, at least it was many years ago.

kwg

Wife and I were there a few yeas ago. I was kind of disappointed. The Alamo is right in the center of town on the river walk. I thought it would be out on the open range like in the Davy Crocket movie

Thanks all, The Old North Church is not so tall, and standing by it's self today either.

Currently at Washington On The Brazos State Historical site. Independence declared here March 2, 1836. Repro of Independence hall behind me. We are doingland surveying demos

The Alamo is something special. It should have a sobering effect on anyone who loves freedom. To us Texans, it is sacred ground.

Seen it, heck birdwatcher lives there....

When I was a yonker, the whole family made an annual pilgrimage to the Alamo, followed up by San Antonio Zoo, dinner at Casa Rio on the Riverwalk, Breckenridge Park, Chinese Sunken Gardens, over to Aquarena Springs and at the time the best part was swimming in a motel pool. Good times and great memories.

      
 

I’ve only been there once……definitely brought out some strong emotions! Similar, though not as great when at the Little Big Horn! memtb

Well the way things are going we’ll need your help deciding where the Next Alamo Should be Placed..

I’m just wondering Who’s going to be Inside ..

Get a Load of Texas Rep. Micheal McCaul head of the Intelligence Committee on Ukielund.

Transfer Our Wealth to Futility..

What’s another 200 Billion..

Remember the Alamo !!

It’s smaller than I thought it was.

So is Dealey Plaza.

I've seen him there more than once.

I was in San Antonio on business in 1985 so I visited the Alamo. Yes, it was right downtown now, across the street from a department store, buses going by on the street.

Someone had placed a yellow rose by the entrance.

I felt the Alamo was a Sacred and Holy place, like the cold granite wall in Washington.

This, I was expecting something bigger? for lack of a better description.
SA was nice and kind of made up for it.

Walk in the Alamo and think about 4000 Mexicans firing at you, shooting canons and rushing your position with ladders and sabers. You'd know you were going to die yet given the chance to cross a line in the sand, you stayed. Hero's all. Sobering. I remember reading a placard on one of the walls, that said: "Blood was ankle deep inside these walls."

...and you couldn't ask for a better guide/historian.

I was there in 1962 while in Air Force basic. It was pretty much in rumbles back then !

The reverence hits you deep.

It WAS bigger.

In 1836, there was a palisade/fortification
that made the area larger than just the Alamo
chapel itself, and other structures too

Borned and jerked up in Texas!
Didn't visit the Alamo until I was 40! 🤯
....and I had been to San Antonio many, many times!
I've been to the State Capital in Austin.
I've been to the Houston, Fort Worth, Dallas, Waco and San Antonio zoo's. All very nice!
I've even visited the Texas Ranger Hall of Fame and Museum in Waco on numerous occasions! THAT was a sight to see!

Since the Castro twins came to power, San 'tone has turned into just another liberal s#¡thole!

We just surveyed the lots off the corner of Main and Ferry street to the approx location of President Houstons Law Office. Just down main street from the Independence Hall. Kinda cool.

On February 24, 1836, with the garrison surrounded and the Texan Army at the Alamo outnumbered, one of the most famous letters in American history was written by William B. Travis. It was addressed, “To the People of Texas and All Americans in the World.” This letter was a passionate plea for aid for the Alamo garrison. He ended the letter “Victory or Death” – the only outcome this battle could have.

Commandancy of the The Alamo

Bejar, Feby. 24th. 1836

To the People of Texas & All Americans in the World-

Fellow Citizens & compatriots-

I am besieged, by a thousand or more of the Mexicans under Santa Anna - I have sustained a continual Bombardment & cannonade for 24 hours & have not lost a man - The enemy has demanded a surrender at discretion, otherwise, the garrison are to be put to the sword, if the fort is taken - I have answered the demand with a cannon shot, & our flag still waves proudly from the walls - I shall never surrender or retreat. Then, I call on you in the name of Liberty, of patriotism & everything dear to the American character, to come to our aid, with all dispatch - The enemy is receiving reinforcements daily & will no doubt increase to three or four thousand in four or five days. If this call is neglected, I am determined to sustain myself as long as possible & die like a soldier who never forgets what is due to his own honor & that of his country - Victory or Death.

William Barret Travis.

Lt. Col.comdt.

P. S. The Lord is on our side - When the enemy appeared in sight we had not three bushels of corn - We have since found in deserted houses 80 or 90 bushels and got into the walls 20 or 30 head of Beeves.

Travis




https://www.thealamo.org/remember/battle-and-revolution/travis-letter

ya!

GWB

I haven’t had the opportunity to see it, yet.
But youns that know me know that Bowie, Travis, Crockett, and the others are greatly admired by me.
There’s something about this story of heroism and sacrifice in the name of liberty that I know has taught me that there are some things much more important than life itself.
Remember The Alamo!
7mm

"That men where every they go, will remember the Alamo."

Before you visit (which is absolutely worth it), do two things: prepare yourself for the crush of tourists who move in slow motion for no apparent reason (the Alamo is just one of those places) and, more importantly, read Jim Crisp's Sleuthing the Alamo. He's the first historian to definitely figure out how the story ended for Crockett (i.e., that he gets hacked to death after the battle had ended while a POW). It doesn't devalue what Crockett did (though Texans went bananas and several sued Crisp when the book first came out) and really puts the fighting in better context.

One day soon.... A few Americans are going to be called upon to dispatch tyranny once again.

God Bless and God speed!

yes i have been to the Alamo was sad to see how these soldiers died in this small fort , but they were all hero`s . these soldiers of the past and many other soldiers who have died been crippled ,shot or seen the terror of wars. these soldiers would all hate what is going on today at the Whitehouse right now with the head clowns Biden / Harris and these dishonest liberals . we need the ghosts of these soldiers to clean house in Washington D.C. soon !

That’s another cool TX Historical Site that doesn’t get anywhere near the annual visitors as the Alamo.
I haven’t been there since I was attending TAMU in nearby College Station. Still looks pretty much the same from your photo. Have they added a museum or anything else to the Site ?

And of course, I’ve been to the Alamo many times.
One of my ancestors was there on March 1st, 1836 when it fell.

Nice museum and visitors center here now. About to dump a bunch more money into the place.

Good Deal !!!

Wife and I felt the same visiting the Alamo and Pearl Harbor. People spoke in whispers. We felt a great reverence for the Hero’s who died protecting our freedom. Hasbeen

Visited last fall

Been there twice. The chapel is a chilling spot to stand quietly in. Was there once for the morning re-enactment — very cool. Tons of history and emotion on both sides.

I was there just yesterday, my most-often Saturday afternoon destination, dressed all 1835.

IIRC Santa Anna brung 1,500 men with him, another 1,000 arrived a week later, giving him about 2,500 men on the scene. He committed 1,500 of these to the attack, most likely figuring it was gonna be a walkover, it wasn’t.

We still don’t know exactly how many defenders there were, somewhere between two and three hundred. The walls of the three acre Alamo Compound were just seven to twelve feet high. If you were one of the defenders you would be standing on a flat roof or platform shooting at an overwhelming crowd of attackers so close that, had you been so inclined, you coulda reached down and given ‘em a hand getting up.

The old joke about why SA only brought that many.....

He only had 3 station wagons.

ya!

GWB

He actually had five, but two got pulled over by CBP.

 
"Remember the Alamo! Remember Goliad!"

"When Sam Houston's revolutionary soldiers won the Battle of San Jacinto and secured independence for Texas, their battle cry was "Remember the Alamo! Remember Goliad!" Everyone knows about the Alamo, but far fewer know about the stirring events at Goliad."
https://www.tshaonline.org/publications/remember-goliad


Goliad massacre
"The Goliad massacre was an event of the Texas Revolution that occurred on March 27, 1836, following the Battle of Refugio and the Battle of Coleto; 425–445 prisoners of war from the Texian Army of the Republic of Texas were executed by the Mexican Army in the town of Goliad, Texas.The men surrendered under the belief they would be set free within a few weeks, however this was not to be. Despite appeals for clemency by General José de Urrea, the massacre was carried out by Lt. Colonel José Nicolás de la Portilla, under orders from General and President of Mexico, Antonio Lopez de Santa Anna."
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Goliad_massacre


Fannin Memorial Monument

   

Sam Houston was in a difficult position, many of the men in the Texian Army despised him and no Texian commander could simply issue orders. Properly speaking their men weren’t soldiers, didn’t feel bound to follow orders they didn’t agree with or follow leaders they didn’t like.

In the six weeks since the fall of the Alamo Sam Houston had gone from around three hundred men at Gonzales, to a high of around fifteen hundred men two weeks later, almost half of whom had left his command by the time of San Jacinto, leaving him with around eight hundred.

Houston himself had wanted to retreat clear to Nacodoches, where his mentor Andrew Jackson had American troops posted. The Texian Army refused to retreat any more, at the famous Witchaway Tree fork in the road, Houston wanted to go left to head north to Nacodoches, the army turned itself right to head south towards approximately 4,000 Mexican troops, 1,200 of which would be present at San Jacinto.

Even fewer remember Jose de Urrea, with the intelligence and guidance provided by the Goliad-area Tejanos under Carlos de la Garza, Urrea beat us every time he fought us.

His first two victories were against the British Subject James Grant who had left the Alamo in January with two hundred American volunteers to occupy Matamoras on the Rio Grande. Santa Anna and Urrea did not like each other, and news of Urrea’s killing of the notorious Scot Grant on March 2nd may well have prompted Santa Anna to take the Alamo when he did.

Urrea’s subsequent capture of the Texian army in the open country east of Goliad was brilliantly executed, as was his proposal to send that army home to New Orleans unharmed. This war was not universally supported across the US and an unprecedented humanitarian act like that on Santa Anna’s part could have raised his political capital in the US enormously.

Even Sam Houston thought we lost when Urrea won, said later that was the worst day of his life.

No one could predict that Santa Anna would be dumb enough to kick a war back to life that Urrea had very nearly won by overriding Urrea and shooting all the prisoners.

As Urrea predicted, this massacre made it life or death for the 30,000 American settlers in Texas who were previously divided on the subject of independence. Most of them had not even picked up a gun yet.

Santa Anna’s problem was his Vice President in Mexico City had just died and if he didn’t get back right away he wasn’t gonna stay President for very long. Just then his rival Urrea wins this tremendous victory putting Santa Anna in a fix. If he left now Urrea would get credit for Texas.

So he takes Urrea out of command, has all the captured men shot, and unleashes his army on East Texas which was about like kicking a hornets nest. Santa Anna himself jets down the coast with his fastest 800 guys looking for someone to fight before they could get away.

This set the stage for San Jacinto.

Another unsung hero, the guy who rebuilt it 1849/50.

The Alamo story wasn’t put together until the 1870’s, forty years after the battle. Everyone on our side died, most were from out of state, and Texas was being settled by immigrants. By the 1870’s enough residents had actually been born here that there was a push by the state to construct an Alamo narrative.

This is how the Alamo looked in 1844, the oldest known image.m, a daguerreotype.



The church never had a roof, the limestone was too soft. In 1849 no one appreciated the significance of the old mission and US Army guys on the scene wanted to tear it down and build a warehouse.

Fortunately for posterity the War Department wouldn’t fund that, telling them to put a roof on it instead. To do that they had to finish the walls. They hired a local architect to design and supervise.

This is how he finished the back wall, a simple rounded design.



If he woulda done that on the front too, that would have been a public relations catastrophe.

Instead he topped the ornate front wall with the faux mission-themed facade that we have today. Did such a great job that the whole world recognizes that profile.

Dammit, I forgot that guy’s name.

I was thinking, if all of us are responsible for slavery , why are we letting are these beeners in our country? Remember the Alamo !!!!

Birdy, you be at Massacre weekend with us at Goliad end of March? I haven’t looked at the current sign up list. Dud and I will be ther Thursday and try to set up under the anaqua tree in front of Scott’s office.

Was just there Friday. Flying back home today.

Hit the Riverwalk Thursday night.

Visiting the Alamo, and standing in the old church building brought the same feelings I get when at Mt. Rushmore.

Had a relaxing trip down here and look forward to returning for yet another visit some day.

Was -14 last Thursday when we left the Black Hills. So the weather has been a welcome relief from our SD winter.

Dad and I were there in 2007. It was definitely sobering to see. Birdy, I'm trying to remember - didn't they have a dirt ramp built to roof level so they could use cannons?

While on that trip Dad and I also visited Mission Espada - That was really eye opening as well.

Was there about 12 years ago. Enjoyed walking through it and would go back if I ever get the chance.

Worked with a guy, Elvis Jennings, at the plant back in the '80's who retired to Jewitt TX. Visited him a couple times when we were passing through there and one time I went in and he had his feet propped up on a table in his sunroom drinking a Pearl. Looked out the window and his wife was running a rototiller in the garden. I knew he had passed away years earlier but got to thinking about him the other day and looked him up on Find a Grave. Was astounded to find his great grandfather, Gordon Jennings died at the Alamo and his GG/Uncle Charles Jennings died at Goliad. Elvis never said one word to me about his kin folks.

Thanks for the reminder, I just signed up, Texian infantry but I might join the Tejano Tories in the battle if they need people.

Might bring my Mexican soldier stuff too if I’m able to make it on Sunday for the massacre. Always looks odd when the victims outnumber the perps 🙂

Whatever side I’m on, I’m gonna die valiantly at 11am and again at 2:30pm if my flint gets dull or I run out of blank cartridges, whichever comes first 🙂

The top third of the back wall was knocked down to accommodate three cannons. Most of the Alamo defenses had been put in place by the Mexican Army when they occupied and reinforced it in 1835.

IIRC a six to one ratio was customary for building ramps to accommodate artillery. The inside of the church was too short to accommodate a long ramp, so the top of the back wall was accordingly lowered.

Mexican General de Cos’s engineers knocked down what remained of the church’s collapsed roof and used that rubble as a basis for the ramp. I believe the consensus is that ramp also consisted of earth and a supporting wooden framework.

Great. Once again I will be Johann the Prussian merchant/cotton buyer caught up again in this conflict. Wish scott would finish my “Preussichen Reisecarte"!

This, purportedly, is what the entire compound looked like. The building people currently refer to as the Alamo was just the church building.

There should have been a section (640 acres) declared for the Alamo site and Texans should be totally ashamed that THEY did not reconcile this issue! Instead, the city of San Antonio has built concrete and plaster damn nigh onto the doorstep of what should have been declared as 'hallowed ground'! I feel fully justified in thinking that there was also in play over the years an ethnic portion of the San Antonio population that did all they could do to desecrate the memory of those Americans that died at The Siege of the Alamo!!

I was stunned when I saw the Alamo in the center of San Antonio. I was expecting to see it as you described with acreage and open space.

Sky scrapers on 3 sides, buries the Alamo in a pretty sanitized setting, far from what you would expect…

The terrain is somewhat different than it was back when. I can see where it’d be a shock.

Further proof of don't bet historical data will get the best of the Almighty dollar!

Hard to believe but exactly what happened at the Alamo wasn’t worked out until 1874 (??) when the State convened a commission for the purpose. By that time commercial and residential development had already impinged on the original mission footprint. Widespread ignorance prevailed, as late as 1903 when one Adina de Zavala locked herself inside the Long Barracks for three days to prevent their demolition, the resulting publicity prompting the Governor to intervene.

As to that “ethnic portion of the population doing all they could”. Who? The Germans? Alsatians? Polish? Czechs?

If you mean Tejanos and Mexicans, they were politically powerless here well into the 1970’s at least, by which time everything present now was already in place.

I wish you coulda been here when the famous Travis first day letter was on display, lines so long a four-hour wait time to get in. You woulda been astounded at the number of Tejanos on that line, I know I was.

I found it very interesting how the mission, has morphed into fort, military barracks, and now historical place.

Some say the dollar encroached on the property, probably a huge factor.

But over centuries, pragmatism was also at play. My humble opinion.

Have never been a huge history buff, but San Antonio has me intrigued for some reason.

If anyone wants to get a better idea of what the area around the Alamo might have looked like without all the city encroaching on it, check out some of the other preserved mission sites in the San Antonio area (administered by the National Park Service)..

Not everyone that's come here to live has
thought of the Alamo as a sacred site.
It's been used as storage and everything
else you can think of.
Some of the people in charge over the
years thought of the site as an embarrassment.
Some politicians have suggested that
the Alamo was a symbol of the theft of
mexican lands that should be repatriated
to mexico. Lots of reconquistas around today
that people don't notice or ignore.
Many support the notion

I attended a conference last year in June in San Antonio. My Hotel, and the Conference center are within walking distance, so I arrived a day early so I could take in the Alam0. It was HOT that day and extremely humid.

However, I found the Alamo a very poignant visit with time. All you have to do is look around and see all the pock marks on the wall and you KNOW what made them.

I had just missed Birdy, as I had struck up a conversation with one of the Alamo Polic Officers. Nice friendly guy he was. Certainly lot's to look at if you are a people watcher as I am........

Definitely worth the trip!

Frog---OUT!

Agreed - see my mention of Mission Espada above.

Wasn’t the Germans! 🤣

One aspect I bring out in talking to visitors is just how scared that collection of Defenders must have been. There had been talk about defending the Alamo, but most men and resources were properly being directed to the true gateway to Texas, an actual defensible stone fort; Presidio La Bahia at Goliad. Also, no one proposing to defend the Alamo ahead of this was thinking the suicidal odds of less than 300 men in a crumbling mission vs. 2,500 soldiers.

Goliad marked the first available ford of the San Antonio River when traveling up from Mexico.

That first morning of February 23rd they were so surprised by the appearance of 200 uniformed Mexican cavalry from the west that Mexican accounts say they recovered 50 American rifles in the town. Our people, after the Bexarenos evacuated the town, had been escaping the cold in their empty houses and apparently the owners of those rifles weren’t able to retrieve them.

What they were able to get inside the mission on Day 1 was about 400lbs of dried corn and maybe thirty random cattle. Sounds like a lot but not so much between 200+ people for twelve days. No mention of firewood either. No preparations for a siege had been made, I doubt there was firewood stockpiled.

The ailing Bowie’s first response on Day 1 was to send a messenger with a letter asking “what are your terms?”, ie. how can I get us out of this predicament.

Travis’ first response was to send an eighteen pound cannonball bouncing through the arriving Mexican force. Not usually mentioned however is later that same day he too sent out a messenger stating when he fired that shot he was unaware that negotiations (ie. Bowie’s message) were underway and asking if they were still willing to negotiate.

Attempts to escape certain death at the Alamo by negotiating their way out would continue until the very last night. The best intelligence now too is that, if Santa Anna hadn’t attacked when he did, a breakout after dark would have been attempted within a day or two so that at least some might have a chance.

Rather than diminish their reputation I believe this enhances it. They could have put up their hands and surrendered any time and maybe some might have lived, but even in the face of certain death on the ends of those long triangular bayonets, they didn’t.

Brave men.

There are several places that in my opinion, every American should visit (in no particular order)
Alamo
Gettysburg
Pearl Harbor
Normandy (and the cemeteries)
Little Big Horn.

Feel free to add...

Saratoga, where the mighty British Redcoats and their Hessian allies were humbled by a bunch regular Americans who had guns and knew how to use them. We didn’t just beat them, we captured their entire force, including one of their most famous Generals. Surprised the heck out of the Brits.

I got to see it a few times, once long ago. Very moving then especially. More of a shrine back then. One of Crockett's rifles was there. I was amazed at how slender and light it seemed. It's very crowded and commercial today but a lot more people are able to see it. The other famous missions are more realistic and original. The Alamo was already an abandoned ruin for 50 years by 1836.It never looked anything at all like it does today. In related history, Three Roads to the Alamo is a great book on the major heroes. Helps flesh out who and why these characters were there. Texas Monthly had an article The Yellow Rose of Texas about ?somebody Rose, a Jewish guy, who skipped out before the battle, supposedly the source of so much mysterious information on the last days no one survived to tell.

187 years since the Alamo fell on March 6th, 1836

And tomorrow will be 187 years since TX Declared Independence from Mexico.

Unfortunately due to Lying Hiden Biden’s Open Border and “Catch & Release” BULLSCHITT, it sure looks like Fuqking Mexico is winning again, with help from the Drug Cartel’s and the Traitorous DemoRat’s. 😡

Travis’ well-spoken slave Joe gave us our best immediate post-battle report when he accompanied Susanna Dickinson and her infant Angelina back to the Texian area after the Alamo. Joe, being part of Travis’ estate, was sent to the plantation of Travis’ probate Lawyer.

He escapes from there in company with a Mexican soldier, presumably to Mexico where escaped slaves could actually build a life such as it was.

Five months later he comes back. A short time after that he skips out again and goes EAST, 600 miles and shows up some time later at Travis’ brother’s plantation in Alabama. An impressive enough feat for a runaway slave, even more so as it is believed he himself had never been east of Memphis.

As far as is known Joe lived the rest of his life there. The last time he is reported was in 1877, in Austin, in company with Travis’ brother. Apparently no one thought to interview him.

I was wrong, Adina Emilia de Zavala saved the long barracks in 1908. To her we owe a debt of gratitude for her tireless efforts in the years leading up to her public stand; a crazy woman who made a difference.

For those who ain’t familiar, a major part of the action after the walls had been breached accrued to the long barracks, hand to hand fighting. I believe one account suggests Bowie had been moved during the siege to the hospital area on the second floor too.

Wealthy society dame Clara Driscoll also stepped up, but Adina could not prevent Driscoll, with the backing of the Govenor, from demolishing the second story of the long barracks to give the church a better look. Unless they have read into it, few visitors now realize the significance of them.

Scroll down to “Saving the Alamo” for a full account.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adina_Emilia_de_Zavala

For thirty years prior to that the long barracks had been used as the base of Hugo Shmeltzer’s big general store, still in place in this
1905 photo of the Rough Riders, once again illustrating how little was known about the battle at that time.

Forty years after the Alamo, 1870’s, when the State finally looked into there were two sources, Susanna Dickinson, who one gets the feeling told them what they wanted to hear (Crockett surrounded by a pile of dead bodies etc), and one William Zuber.

William Zuber was 16 years old at the time of the Alamo, lived 100 miles northeast in Grimes County and was detailed to guard the baggage train at San Jacinto.

From Zuber we get the story of Louis (AKA “Moses” at the Alamo due to his age) Rose. Moses Rose, a French veteran of the Napoleonic Wars, was apparently a real guy at the Alamo.

Today we have no clear idea exactly how many individuals entered or slipped out of the Alamo during the siege. We do know that the 32 men from Gonzales arrived a week into it, feeling honor-bound to face nearly certain death. We also know that Santa Anna at one point allowed the Tejanos to leave, some took him up on the offer, others elected to stay.

Zuber had it that after leaving the Alamo before the actual battle, Rose showed up at this parent’s place in very poor condition. From Zuber, allegedly from Rose, we get Travis’ line in the sand speech which Zuber allowed was his approximation of that speech.

Lines in the sand or other form of vote was apparently not an unusual method back then of getting a bunch of guys who weren’t subject to command to agree on a course of action, majority ruled. There quite likely was one or more such voted during the siege, if so, what exactly they were about is unknown

Around 1855



Around 1927



Current

It is impossible for me to stand in the chapel with dry eyes. The raw power in the walls is tangible.

As a kid Crockett and Bowie were my big heroes. Travis seemed more a dandy thanks to Walt Disney and John Wayne. He was perhaps the only loyal Texan of the three as the other two were adventurers or worse. The air is so cool in there, the echoes eerie. Not knowing the reality was an open ruin with nothing like a roof gives a false sense of the battle. The current chapel lends a religious inference to their heroic sacrifice. That seems appropriate, to finish the chapel as it supposedly was intended to look, making it a memorial shrine to their memory. People forget Spanish was the official language, Catholicism the state religion every immigrant had to covert to. Most defenders were Mexican citizens, not American. The crowds today and commercial attachments degrade the solemnity, unfortunately, but it's still powerful. And the river walk is nice! Girls fatter than 20 years ago....

More incredible than being there is to handle the actual Bowie knife that Davey Crockett owned. You can't imagine touching history like that and to think of the connection with Crockett, Bowie and the Alamo...

Where did you do that? Because it isn’t there.

No, it certainly isn't. A good friend has one of the most eclectic collections of Western Historical items, this is just one of many...

We are going in April to the Texas Rangers Museum in Waco, and then to the Alamo.

Don't forget these landmarks...

Birdwatcher;
Good afternoon to you Texas time, I hope the first day of March is progressing acceptably for you.

Thanks once again for adding some of the details which aren't as easily found elsewhere, I always appreciate you and kaywoodie - and the others of course - who do so.

We were there about this time in 2018, I want to say about 3 or perhaps 4 days before the Alamo was overrun.

Our in-laws who used to winter down in Weslaco met us at the airport in San Antonio and had booked us each a room in a hotel close to downtown, which turned out to be the Gibbs Hotel - built on Samuel Maverick's ranch site so we found out later and just across the street from the Alamo.

Later on we read the Gibbs is one of the more well known "haunted" hotels in San Antonio, but we didn't experience anything extraordinary there.

I will say however that even though I'm emphatically not "that guy" who "feels" things, when we went into the church especially, there was definitely something about it which both my wife and I "felt" for lack of a better way to articulate it.

We were both taken aback that other men kept their hats and caps on inside and kept chattering away about nothing connected to the site. We just couldn't do either.

Anyways Birdwatcher, I've been to a couple other battle sights in my life and would have to say that so far the Alamo has been the one that affected me the most personally.

It was a bucket list item for me and I'm glad we were able to see it.

All the best and thanks again to all who've contributed.

Dwayne

Sacred ground. Very humbling to be there.

Never been there but, would love to go.

The Viet Nam Memorial in 'Washington, D.C.

You were most likely misled. Nobody is certain what the original looked like. I did have a photo of one Bowie supposedly gave to an admired actor. Looks nothing like it should! Just a big butcher knife, like his brother described it.

[quote=Birdwatcher]

Great stuff as per usual Mike !

Happy Texas Independence Day!!!

Travis’ personal failings are well recorded for anyone who cares to look. There’s a great line in the Billy Bob Thornton movie where Travis self-deprecatingly observes something to the effect that while he did countenance abandoning his wife and son and was a serial adulterer he drew the line at drinking. But his cousin and close firiend James Butler Bonham thought enough of him and the cause that he felt compelled to return to the Alamo and the near-certainty of death if only to bring the message that no help from the 500 man Texian Army at Goliad would be coming.

Bowie was a high roller who made and lost fortunes, legally or otherwise. Him and his brother Rezin were the guys who defrauded at least seventeen individuals out of significant sums of money by selling them fraudulent land titles in Arkansas, no record of those they swindled ever getting their money back. Jim and Rezin then made a fortune in the nasty business of smuggling African-born slaves into Louisiana via Cuba and Texas.

He was a natural leader of men tho and what speaks well of him is the high regard he was held in by decent folk around him and also because he was notably unlucky in love (ya gotta love first before you can be unlucky at it). His first fiancé in Louisiana died of a fever within a month of their wedding.

Here in San Antonio Bowie did court and marry 17yo Ursula Veramundi. By all accounts the Union was a happy one, possibly resulting in two children in as many years. Jim was away in New Orleans when cholera struck, killing Ursula, their children, her brother and her parents in the space of a week. Subsequently accounts have it that Jim became a heavy drinker, careless of his appearance, this is the Bowie we get in the Thornton movie (except the Musso bowie he carried was prob’ly WAY bogus). He obviously could still lead men and fight, until possibly typhoid fever struck him down during the siege.

David Crockett might be the nearest thing we have to an Alamo Saint. Whatever the intricacies of his political career in Washington he had been one of the few who dared to cross his former mentor Andrew Jackson ”I was a Jackson man when Jackson was Jackson”. Crockett was one of the few who voted against Indian removal on principle even though he knew to do so was political suicide ”I would rather be honestly and politically damned than be hypocritically immortalized.”

In particular, Crockett was one of the few men of his era that would tell the tale of having been so hungry during the Creek War that he and his companions ate potatoes from the basement of a home inside which they had just previously burned alive a crowd of Indian men, women and children. The potatoes were cooked in the fire and basted in human fat.

All of that and he also left us with this: ”You may all go to Hell and I will go to Texas.” 😎

There is a lot that you don't know and this is one of those things. It is documented and probably cost more than your house...

Three Roads to the Alamo showed all three men as they were. That reality raised them in my estimation from cardboard heroes to imperfectly complex men taking on a lawless, hostile environment with all they had. Bowie was a first rate scoundrel and convincing con man. If he died on the sand bar, that's how he would be remembered if at all. As I recall Travis left his wife and bad debts in Alabama after she took up with the lawyer he was reading under. He surely loved his prostitutes in Beaumont, if that's adultery. Debatable point maybe. I don't think he remarried. He was more important to founding independent Texas than his celebrated peers due to his legal intellect. Three giants for sure, but all of those men were unbelievably selfless. It's a bit disheartening that where they gave their lives has become such a "cool place to see." I would drive the money changers off the scene and across the street for starters. That's a sacred place.

Thanks, Daughter lives in Allen Tx. So I have seen those.

Well, that's a bold bet! You are right, at least, in that there is a lot I do not know. But since you're so touchy, I'll apologize - if you share with us the documentation. I'm only casually familiar with the subject myself. That's why I couched my opinion in such conciliatory and respectful terms. All the renowned experts will be at least as honored as anyone here. So dig it out and display! The photo of you holding it would be memorable indeed.

There is a pretty decent chance that the original James Bowie knife was found at a river crossing the Mexican Army used as it headed east. It’s call the “Sea of Mud Knife”.

https://blademag.com/knife-history/the-sea-of-mud-knife-james-bowies-knife-found-pt-1/amp

I can't show you any documents, especially when this belongs to an individual that doesn't want his identity splashed all over the Internet. Bold is stating no one knows what one looks like. I do know the provenance of this knife and it does indeed, exist. People like this have more access to things you and I have never heard of and because you don't know, it is true, you just don't know...

If I’m following right, Shrapnel is talking about Crockett’s knife or one of them, not a knife owned by Jim Bowie.

Some great history in that link, and more in the links provided in the link.

I do wonder if Bowie ever saw much less used a knife that we would recognize as a bowie. The presentation models Rezin Bowie had made resembled in shape fancy, silver-clad examples of regular butcher knives.

I wonder too how much of the popular names arose from the marketing by the Sheffield UK companies that made many of the bowies used in the US. I believe it was in Russels classic Firearms Traps and Tools of the Mountain Men there’s a picture of a knife that was sold as a “Buffalo Knife” in Canada, “Bowie Knife” in the US and “Gaucho Knife” in South America. Same blade, different handles.

JMHO- I've always thought the Edwin Forrest
knife would be "the " knife from reading the
letters Rezin had written to the newspapers of
the day, and the accounts of the sandbar and
silver expedition fights.
I think we'd like to glamour up a good many things
because of Alan Ladd and John Wayne and
Fess Parker and all them. One of my ancestors
came here to be a mountain man and trapper
( like the jerimiah johnson movie, except really
in the 1800's) but he ended up fighting in the
mexican war, and going to CA for the gold rush,
and fighting in the war between the states, and
all that mess, and that side of the family just
had tools for utility, and not prestige.
As far as I know, my daddy's generation was the
first to have a purpose built " hunting " knife and
deer hunting specific firearms

It’s pretty well established that what we consider the classic Bowie knife today with the clipped point and the big guard probably didn’t appear until the second half of the 19th century. The real original Bowie knives were like big butcher knives.

Black’s knives were distinguished by their coffin handles and their exceptional heat treating.

Black was set up in a good place to meet up with the Bowies and make them some knives. Rezin had plantations in eastern Arkansas and liked to take months long hunting trips to the mountains of Arkansas and Indian territory and the plains and prairies of north Texas. Washington was set up on the road west and a crossroads where you went north, southwest, or due west.

As an aside we own land where we believe a section of the Fort Towson road was.

For someone that knows less than I do, which is basic fact, you are incredibly arrogant to back up your gullible ignorance which such a stupid boast, attacking people only interested in history, and maybe truth.You have indeed been misled, more obviously now and pathetically so. And it wasn't a feat of magic.

From the front, you have no idea it is surrounded by skyscrapers. How did the river get where it is in front of the Alamo?