Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Hunter's Campfire After the Fall of the Alamo

Many thanks for the time effort to post this, Great reading.

Tks all, and I'll say it again, I never knew there was so much interesting history involved with the Goliad Campaign.

Holy Kshizzle! John Crittenden Duval

https://tshaonline.org/handbook/online/articles/fdu33

DUVAL, JOHN CRITTENDEN (1816–1897). John Crittenden (John C., Texas John) Duval, writer, son of Nancy (Hynes) and William Pope Duval, was born at Bardstown, Kentucky, on March 14, 1816, and grew up in Tallahassee after his father was appointed to a federal judgeship in what was then Florida Territory. Duval returned to Bardstown in 1831 with his mother to continue his education at St. Joseph College.

Going to St Joseph College saved his life; he learned Spanish there, and so being able to converse with his captors at Goliad, became someone somebody wanted to save. His older brother Burr was not so fortunate, Captain of their Kentucky Mustangs rifle company, he was shot with the rest.

Just to backtrack a couple of posts to where Spahn, in Duval's same rifle company, recounts their almost killing their own scouts early that morning.....

We were very near shooting at them. One of our guns snapped; and if it had gone off, we should certainly have killed nearly every man, for we all had our triggers sprung and our rifles cocked.

"Trigger sprung and rifles cocked"....... he was probably referring to double set triggers,as seen on my own replica 1810-30's era longrifle....





(The "hammer" that holds the flint was called the cock back then, from its resemblance to a chicken, this is where the term to "cock the gun" comes from. In the photo the gun is at half-cock, "going off half-cocked" was always very bad, still is. Sharpening a worn flint was called "skinning", being so cheap you wouldn't even buy new flints made you a "skinflint".)

Anyway, in action you cock the gun, but do not set the hair trigger in front until ready to shoot, setting the hair trigger is done by pulling the second trigger in back.

These locks were expensive and complicated in that age when everything was hand-made, and the sights of course were fixed. Longest hits ever recorded with rifles like these were made by Seminole Indians at the Battle of Ouithlacootchie at the beginning of the Seminole Wars (December of 1835). The Seminoles and Black Seminoles were scoring hits at 400 yards, the very capable General in command of the US force at the scene, one Edmund P. Gaines (worth a google of himself alone), found these extreme ranges so remarkable he included it in his report to the War Department.

Round balls have a rainbow trajectory. Now even with a 200 yard shot against a man in the open, not considered all that hard at the time, with fixed sights you were aiming way over his head and to his left or right depending on the wind ("holding into the wind").

The natural tendency is to think that since they were not actually aiming at what they were shooting at and just estimating anyway, what did it really matter where they aimed?

It mattered enough that they put expensive hair triggers on these rifles, the target triggers of their day, and just like today precision shooting was generally done prone or from a rest wherever possible, controlling one's breathing and carefully squeezing off shots just like it still is today.

More from Duval later, but here's more on his remarkable career after Goliad....

Not long afterwards he entered the University of Virginia to study engineering. He returned to Texas by 1840 and became a land surveyor. In 1845 he was, alongside William A. A. (Bigfoot) Wallace, a member of John C. (Jack) Hays's company of Texas Rangers.

By 1845 there were more than 100,000 Americans in Texas, almost nobody became a Texas Ranger if they didn't have to, especially not one of Jack Hays's Texas Rangers. If Jack Hays ever had 100 Texians on call (or 0.1% of the general population) that was alot. Most of Hays's rangers were exceptional men, a few were psychopaths, but they all faced an occupation where the annual mortality rate approached 50%, that, the company you kept and the cost of the equipment being why so few cared to do it. John Crittenden Duval did it.

War breaks out again when he was 47 years old.....

Duval did not favor secession, but he joined the Confederate Army as a private, declining a commission. He was a captain by the war's end.

All of that plus this....

He liked to be out in wilderness places, to loiter and to read, write, and recollect. His writings justify his being called the first Texas man of letters..... He died in Fort Worth on January 15, 1897.

Clearly, this is one guy we are all sorry we missed.

Birdwatcher

Thanks Mike.

Yer welcome....

Currently I'm searching on a guy named Chadwick, originally from New Hampshire, and like Fannin a West Point dropout. No flies on Chadwick, not from the accounts, somewhere it mentions him having been out West and already being a combat veteran, gotta find that again.

It was himself and the likewise admirable John Sowers-Brooks who commanded the artillery pieces at this Coleto Creek fight, and both sides agree that artillery was very well handled.

Anyhoo, looking for that reference I came across this, which I'll throw out here because it doesn't really fit anywhere else in stuff not posted yet...

Re: the Tejanos.....

Col. Fannin and other Texans underestimated the importance of these Mexicans of Goliad, and the resentment in their hearts due to having to leave their homes. . . .

These Badeños, as they were called, were descendants of the presidio soldiers stationed at La Bahía through the years. They were indolent and maybe none too honest, but they were expert horsemen---among the world's best---knew every acre of the Goliad region and for a hundred miles around; and, contrary to the prevalent belief of the Texans, were anything but cowardly---their leader, Carlos de la Garza, had dignity and force of character, and courage and intelligence as well.

The people had abandoned Goliad at his bidding, and it was to his ranchero on the San Antonio River that they had gone. He and his men were everywhere after General Urrea came.

Lest one think that was written by some "Liberal", turns out it came from the works of one Judge Harbert Davenport (1882-1957). Davenport hailed from East Texas (which means something to those who know Texas ) .

Otherwise Davenport is known as the guy who in 1944 won the case for the old Balli family claim to Padre Island, based on the original Spanish titles.

https://tshaonline.org/handbook/online/articles/fda21

Another guy I wouldn't mind sitting around and shooting the breeze with.

Birdwatcher

So, on March 19th, thirteen days after the fall of the Alamo, Fannin and approximately 250 men were heading east across slightly rolling terrain maybe eight miles east of the presido at Goliad. Today we would call it live oak savannah; tall grass with isolated mottes (stands or patches) of fire-resistant live oak, strips of woodland and dense underbrush along any watercourses.

The time was early afternoon, maybe one o'clock. They had left Goliad maybe five hours previously and had lost at least an hour, perhaps two, in hauling their nine field pieces and wagons across the San Antonio River just one mile below the presidio.

This puts them in the ballpark of maybe a two mile per-hour pace once on dry land which doesn't seem bad at all considering they were on unimproved dirt the whole time, presumably following some sort of track or wagon-path. How many carts or wagons they had is unknown except that it wasn't very many and that their load consisted of five to six hundred muskets and a considerable store of ammunition and powder. They had expected to be on this road to Victoria for three or four days.

The weak link was the oxen. Eight miles in half a day seems a pretty good distance to have pushed oxen pulling heavy loads even under the very best of circumstances (Ward's feat the previous week of moving several unladen ox carts the 25 miles from Goliad to Refugio in the space of just twelve hours seems phenomenal in context). Fannin's oxen for whatever reason were fractious and hard to handle and by the usual livestock management standards of the day plainly needed a break.

The road brought them to a patch of good grass out on a stretch of open prairie. They could see for at least two miles in every direction, four or five miles to their rear from whence any pursuit would most likely come. Fannin called a halt, over the objections of the more cautious of his men.

Working against them was a pervasive contempt of Mexicans and Tejanos in general. That and the fact that they were collectively loaded for bear; nine field pieces and six hundred extra muskets plus plenty of powder and ammunition.

Urrea's cavalry, eighty mounted men travelling in a column, were first sighted about four miles away, I'm guessing twenty to thirty minutes away if they had been following the same road. Urrea himself was most likely leading them. We know that they didn't approach by a direct path but took a circuitous route, all the while cutting off access to the closest timber. Easy to imagine that Urrea had received excellent intelligence from his Tejano and Indian allies as to the exact disposition of the Texians at their resting place.

Following hard on the heels of the cavalry, relatively speaking, was a force of 250 Mexican infantry. Must be I'm biased too; it seems counter-intuitive to state the words "Mexican Army" and "efficiency" in the same sentence, but it must be said that Urrea was able to get these men to accomplish prodigies.

They had been in the field for more than two months by that time during which they had marched several hundred miles. These particular soldiers were some of the same 500 soldados who on the night of the 17th had camped three miles above Goliad, having just hustled yet another hundred miles down from San Antonio.

Now it may be that the Mexican rank and file for whatever reason were especially good at travelling long distances on foot, but it doesn't seem that even the best trained and led European or American troops could have exceeded their accomplishments on the march. In battle too they weren't at all shabby, their three-to-one losses when storming the Alamo at point-blank range, against defenders equipped with extra loaded muskets close at hand, was pretty much exactly what conventional military wisdom would predict.

On this occasion the infantry deployed so swiftly around Fannin that they may have very well been double-timing the whole eight miles from Goliad, heavy Brown Bess muskets and gear notwithstanding. We get from Urrea that their morale was high and that they were anxious to close with the Texians at last. Almost certainly these were not the actual troops that had stormed the Alamo, so this would be their first combat in Texas and their first fight against Americans.

Morale was likewise reported to have been high on the Texian side. Ehrenberg states that news of the Mexican cavalry was greeted with hurrahs. It was obvious to everyone that it would be far better to have the cover of timber plus a proximity to water. Doubtless time was lost getting the difficult oxen back in harness, but at that point no sense of urgency seems to have permeated most of the command. In the event, they were all surprised at how fast the Mexican army deployed.

Coleto Creek itself was at least two miles away, half that distance some way off of the road, lay a smaller patch of timber, as the Mexican army closed in this became the Texian's objective.

The Americans had formed themselves into a mobile square or oblong as they moved, ready to repulse cavalry, the speed of their movement limited by their oxen. At that fateful moment in time, not too far from cover, the wagon or cart hauling the ammunition broke down.

It is a reflection of his command situation that Fannin could not merely order ammunition to be unloaded and hustled onward on the backs of his 250 men, but rather paused to call a council to decide what to do. It was decided that the best course was to unload what they could and take it with them.

Under most circumstances they probably would have made it despite everything, but as we have already seen Urrea was no ordinary opponent.

Birdwatcher

Why the artillery was handled so very well at Coleto Creek: Four Polish Nationals, veterans of combat against the Russians....

http://www.texancultures.com/assets/1/15/Texans_One_and_All%20%20-%20The%20PolishTexans.pdf

After the unsuccessful uprising against Russia in 1830, many Poles left for anywhere. Some of these found the Texas Revolution timely and sufficiently dangerous. Michael Debricki, a major in Poland, was an engineer at Goliad.

Also with Fannin's artillery were the brothers Francis and Adolph Petrussewicz and John Kornicky. The artillery commander killed at Coleto was Francis Petrussewicz. All others were executed with Fannin.

Birdwatcher

Mexican history is not an easy read, bewildering in fact. Indeed one of the main complaints of the Texians at the start of hostilities in '35 was the frequent change of Mexican governments even when the Constitution of 1824 was still officially in effect.

When Santa Anna came to power he at first had substantial support among the Texians because of his promises, but things quickly went downhill when Santa Anna and those around him abolished the constitution, sparking widespread revolution across the Mexican States, that of Texas being only one of these.

Among these Mexican States, Texas alone was victorious,this due to the influx of American manpower and the financial support of the war by mercantile interests in the United States.

Where Jose Cosme de Urrea (1797-1849) fits in all of this is more than just an easy google away. Most of the Mexican Generals of that era had been born in the last decade of the Eighteenth Century and, like Santa Anna, had first seen military service under the Spanish Empire. The Urreas were of Basque origin, Urrea himself having been born in Tuscon in present-day Arizona.

(The role of the Basques in Spanish Arizona I'll leave to the Arizona crowd if they care to.)

Urrea was a military cadet at just eleven years of age and by nineteen was an officer. He was twenty-four when Mexico achieved independence.

https://tshaonline.org/handbook/online/articles/fur02

Much of Urrea's subsequent career was spent in the wide open, sparsely populated areas of Northern Mexico. Prior to his involvement under Santa Anna in suppressing the Federalist Revolt in Zazatecas in 1835, he had been sent to oppose Comanche raids in Durango. Given that background, it is no wonder that he worked so well with Tejano vaqueros and practiced such a mobile form of warfare here in Texas.

Against the backdrop of his whole career, so far as I can determine, his role in Zazatecas was an anomaly based upon a misguided loyalty to Santa Anna, an allegiance that would be repudiated in the years immediately following.

Not claiming here to be by any means a student of Mexican history, as far as I can gather the theme of it throughout most of the Nineteenth Century was an ongoing struggle between more egalitarian rights in the form of Federalism versus the ruling oligarchy of a Centralist government. Santa Anna himself expressed the sentiment that the people simply were not educated enough for a Federal Republic, and that the country functioned better under a benevolent Dictator (meaning himself of course).

Not every Centralist was necessarily a bad guy, Col. Juan Almonte acquitted himself well under Santa Anna in Texas and is generally favorably viewed in Texas history, notably for refusing to fire upon a rowboat that interim Texas President Burnett was escaping on because Burnett's family was in the boat. Almonte was so pro-Centralist that in the 1860's he would actually serve under the French and their short-lived Mexican monarch Maximilian, this in the interest of National order.

Smothering all of this however was the ongoing culture of corruption and inequality of wealth that renders Mexican politics opaque to outsiders like ourselves to this very day.

Where exactly Urrea fit in all of this and what his exact motives were I dunno, if his role in fighting our Second Texas Revolution wasn't actually his finest hour as a military commander, it is certainly his most easily-accessed one on the internet.

There is mention of a 1985 book The Life and Times of Jose Cosme Urrea by a local Tuscon Historian but it appears to be out of print, I cannot find it for sale else I would buy it.

We do know that he was generally pro-Federalist throughout his career, to the extent of fighting and losing two significant battles against superior Centralist forces in the decades following his Texas campaign and enduring a spell of imprisonment in the notorious Perote prison. He may well have been an honest idealist and a genuine hero.

The US invasion during the Mexican War was a unifying event across Mexico and we are told in the link that Urrea led a unit of Sonoran cavalry. What successes he may have had in that role I cannot tell.

Cholera killed him in 1849, but in 1836 he was easily Mexico's best military commander in Texas, probably the best commander on either side.

Birdwatcher

At half past one in the afternoon, I overtook the enemy and succeeded in cutting off their retreat with our cavalry, just as they were going to enter a heavy woods from where it would have been difficult, if not impossible, to dislodge them. Gen. Jose de Urrea

The Battle of Coleto Creek oughtta be better remembered than it is today.

We were abundantly supplied with provisions, and arms and ammunition, and almost every man had his rifle and brace of pistols, and besides there were a number of good English muskets captured from the Mexicans, and we had five or six pieces of artillery. The men, for the most part, were altogether superior to the ordinary material of an army in intelligence and education. They were far from being a class of mercenaries, but were men of character and standing, and some of them of wealth, who had left their homes from sympathy for a people who had taken up arms for their liberty. Dr. Joseph Barnard.


We don't have many fights on our soil where a Mexican Army was deployed with dash and elan, but more than anything else I am not aware of a fight anywhere where a compact square of 250 men, standing three deep, was equipped with two and three muskets per man plus no less than nine field pieces.

Doesn't hurt either that those men were a sort of self-selected elite in that they were all young, fit and aggressive enough to voluntarily engage in this distant Texas war and because most all of them came from a culture where proficiency with firearms was a given.

The volume of fire they could project from that square, just twenty yards on a side, must have been horrendous. Collectively about the closest one could hope to get to the firepower of modern weaponry there at the very end of the flintlock era.

A volume of fire that wrought carnage upon their attackers and in that black powder era would soon obscure the battlefield in a dense fog of powder smoke.


...a large force of cavalry were seen emerging from the timber, about two miles distant, and to the West of us. About one half of this force (350 men) were detached and thrown in front of our right flank, with the intention of cutting us off from a skirt of timber, about one mile and a half in front.

Our artillery was ordered to open upon them and cover our rear. Several cannon were fired at them, but without effect. About this time, we discovered a large force of infantry emerging from the same skirt of woodland, at which their cavalry had first been seen.

Our guns were then ordered to be limbered; and we had purposed to reach the timber in front, but the enemy approached so rapidly, that Col. Fannin determined to make an immediate disposition for battle. Dr. Jack Shackelford



...about seven miles from Goliad we entered a prairie perhaps from three to five miles across and by the time that we got about one mile into the prairie the whole Western border of the prairie was lined with Mexicans, and by the time that we got half a mile further they broke in a cloud as it were ahead of us to the East. Abel Morgan


Seeing themselves forced to fight, they decided to make the best of it and awaited our advance with firmness, arranging their force in battle formation with the artillery in the center. Gen. Jose de Urrea

The bloodletting was about to begin.

Birdwatcher

It might not have been obvious at that moment, but Fannin's battle was lost the moment they lost mobility; their oxen ran off, or were shot while in harness...

There was immediately a square formed, and as they took the oxen from the cannon instead of securing them they were turned loose and got away; for they went right off to the Mexicans. Abel Morgan

Those that remained to the enemy were killed by sharpshooters detailed for the purpose. Gen. Jose de Urrea


Urrea had a cavalry leader's mindset, the sort that we think would fit a fighter pilot today. First thing he does is attack, and under ordinary circumstances might well have overwhelmed the Texians in the first rush....

My troops, though fatigued by the rapidity of the march, were filled with enthusiasm at seeing the enemy, for they thought that to overtake them and defeat them was all one. Although our force was inferior and we had no artillery, the determination of our troops made up the disparity. Expecting the artillery and our munitions to reach us soon, agreeable to instructions given, I decided to engage the enemy at once. Gen. Jose de Urrea

The Red Rovers and New Orleans' Greys formed the front line of the square; the Red Rovers being on the extreme right. Colonel Fannin took a commanding position, directly in rear of the right flank. Our orders were, not to fire until the enemy approached in point blank shot.

About this time, Colonel Fannin had the cock of his rifle shot away by a ball, and another buried in the breech. He was still standing erect, a conspicuous mark, giving orders, "not to fire yet," in a calm and decided manner. Dr Jack Shackleford


The Mexicans sped up at a distance of from 500 to 600 yards gave us a volley from their carbines, to which, however, we paid no attention as the balls flew in respectable distance over our heads. Only occasionally one would whiz up entirely exhausted as if it were breathing its last breath and strike the ground in front of us without even knocking up any dust....

We remained completely passive and let the enemy approach who fired volley after volley at us as he came nearer our artillery officers mainly Poles and fine, tall men, patiently waited for the time when they could reply to the unholy greetings to advantage. The moment arrived, our ranks opened, and the artillery hurled death and destruction among the enemy. Herman Ehrenberg




Our fire was immediately returned by their rifles and cannons. I ordered the brave Col. Morales to charge the left with the rifle companies; the grenadiers and the first regiment of San Luis, under my immediate command, to charge the right; the remainder of the battalion of Jiménez, under the command of Col. Salas, to form itself into a column and charge the front; while the cavalry, commanded by Col. Gabriel Núñez, was to surprise the enemy's rear.

These instructions having been issued, the orders were immediately carried out and a determined charge was made on the right and left flanks. In order to obtain a quick victory, I ordered my troops to charge with their bayonets, at the same time that Col. Morales did likewise on the opposite flank; and, according to previous instructions, the central column advanced in battle formation, sustaining a steady fire in order to detract the attention of the enemy while we surprised the flanks.

Though our soldiers showed resolution, the enemy was likewise unflinching. Thus, without being intimidated by our impetuous charge, it maneuvered in order to meet it; and, assuming a hammer formation on the right, they quickly placed three pieces of artillery on this side, pouring a deadly shower of shot upon my reduced column. A similar movement was executed on the left, while our front attack was met with the same courage and coolness.Gen. Jose de Urrea

What Urrea did not anticipate going in was that the Texians were so heavily armed. The 600 extra muskets Fannin had were .69 caliber, and hence were probably US Springfields, originally government issue, and so were most likely superior to the used British Brown Bess muskets so common in Texas at the time.

I walked into the square. I knew we had some new muskets in the ammunition wagon. I selected me one of them and catched up two packs of cartridges and walked out to my wagon again where the balls were whizzing about like bees swarming. Abel Morgan

...in addition to our rifles, each man in the front rank was furnished with a musket and bayonet to repel the charge of cavalry. Besides my rifle and musket I had slung across my shoulders an "escopeta," a short light "blunderbuss" used by the Mexican cavalry, which I had carried all day in expectation of a fight, and which was heavily charged with forty "blue whistlers" and powder in proportion. It was my intention only to fire it when in a very "tight place," for I was well aware it was nearly as dangerous behind it as before. John D. Duval


The effect of our fire was frightful. Herds of horses were running without rider, while others were wallowing in blood and kicking furiously. Herman Ehrenberg


At this moment we opened our fire on them, rifles, muskets, and artillery. Colonel Fannin, at the same time, received a severe wound in the fleshy part of the thigh, the ball passing obliquely over the bone, carrying with it a part of his pocket-handkerchief. At this crisis, the enemy's infantry, from about ten to twelve hundred strong advanced on our left and rear. Dr jack Shackleford


, the withering fire of the enemy, who kept up a most lively fire, for each one of their soldiers had three and even four loaded guns which they could use at the most critical moment. The fire of the nine cannons, itself lively and well directed, was imposing enough; but our soldiers were brave to rashness and seemed to court death. The enemy put into play all its activity and all the means at its command to repel the charge. Gen. Jose de Urrea

When at a convenient distance, they gave us a volley and charged bayonet. So soon as the smoke cleared away, they were received by a piece of artillery, Duval's riflemen, and some other troops, which mowed them down with tremendous slaughter.... Shackleford

When within three or four hundred yards of our lines our artillery opened upon them with grape and cannister shot, with deadly effect--but still their advance was unchecked, until their foremost ranks were in actual contact in some places with the bayonets of our men. John D. Duval


The engagement now became general; and a body of cavalry, from two to three hundred strong, made a demonstration on our rear. They came up in full tilt, with gleaming lances, shouting like Indians. When about sixty yards distant, the whole of the rear division of our little command, together with a piece or two of artillery, loaded with double canister filled with musket-balls, opened a tremendous fire upon them, which brought them to a full halt and swept them down by scores. Shackleford


In the charge made by the Mexican cavalry they nearly succeeded in breaking our lines at several places, and certainly they would have done so had we not taken the precaution of arming all in the front rank with the bayonet and musket. At one time it was almost a hand to hand fight between the cavalry and our front rank, but two files in the rear poured such a continuous fire upon the advancing columns, that as I have said, they were finally driven back in disorder. Duval

Birdwatcher

One can only wish the action at the Alamo had been as well-reported as this battle, but still, it was a prolonged fight, maybe five hours...

The action commenced about one o'clock, and continued, without intermission, until after sunset. Shackelford

We don't have a minute-by-minute account of these events. I'm just grateful we have what we have, in the age of pens and inkwells it was no small thing to write the lengthy accounts like the survivors did.

From Urrea's account we know he assaulted the square in frontal attacks at least twice (Wiki says three times), putting himself in the line of fire the second time around.

The Texian square came so close to collapsing during the first attack that there seems little doubt they would have gone under had they been conventionally armed with one longarm to a man instead of with an extraordinary 600 extra muskets and ammunition on hand.

From this distance it seems like there's no way going in that Urrea could have anticipated that massive volume of defensive fire.

His second assault occurred just before dark, at a time when the completely exposed Texian formation had been enduring constant sporadic fire for hours and by which time the Polish guys and others originally manning the cannon had been taken out. Clearly, on this second occasion Urrea thought they might crack.

Here's a "fog of battle" (literally) episode from Herman Ehrenbach, late of Prussia (over the next forty years after the fight Ehrenberg would go on to cross the continent with a fur brigade, join the California Gold Rush, sail the South Pacific, map out Honolulu for the US, become the main guy surveying the Gasden Purchase, and like Jack Hays before him serve a stint as agent to the Mohaves in Arizona).....

We were soon enveloped in such dense smoke that we were occasionally obliged to cease firing and to advance slightly on the enemy in order to see our sights. The whole prairie as far as one could see was covered with powder smoke, and thousands of lightening flashes quivered through the dark masses accompanied with the incessant thunder of the artillery and the clear crack of our rifles.

Among them sounded the scattered bugle calls of the Mexicans, encouraging the men to battle. From time to time our grape shot hailed death into the ranks of the enemy under the majestic roll of thunder. I do not believe that a coward was to be seen on the battlefield at this moment. Who has time and disposition then to think of himself and his life in such tumult?...

All his senses are dulled. One sees nothing, one hears nothing except his enemy, and only partially does one hear the commands of the officers. That is the way it was with us. As the dense smoke only occasionally permitted us to see the advancing enemy, we stepped forward to meet them. Foolhardily several of us stood in his midst and fired....

I myself had gotten so far ahead in the general tumult and fired so incessantly that I did not notice how I stood right among the Mexicans. Everything was confusion and it seemed as if we were shooting each other down for pleasure. When I discovered my error, I hastily went back to my position as my ignition tube was stopped up besides.

One constant question among reenactors is how many caplock guns (ie. using percussion instead of flint) were in service in Texas in '35/'36. Ehrenberg plainly stated above he was using a caplock, and at that time he was a member of the New Orleans Greys yet.

On my return to my comrades I stopped at each fallen enemy and fired the often loaded musket at the living ones. But how did it look in our camp? Many of our people were either severely wounded or killed. All of our artillerymen with the exception of one Pole had fallen and built a wall around silent cannon, whose power was now passed as the range was now too close to do effective service.

..and on the effect of weather on black powder; notwithstanding all those extra muskets on hand, here's Ehrenberg scrambling around his own line looking for something that would shoot...

The whole battle ground was covered with dead men, horses, guns and all kinds of objects. I did not spend much time looking at the battlefield, but ran about to try out the guns of the fallen ones as quite a while would probably have been necessary to put mine in order again. I searched a long time before I found a usable one, as the damp, almost wet air, had made practically all unfit for use.

I do agree that even today a 'stopped up tube' in a percussion weapon is a real PITA to clear in the field. If ya ain't got a feather quill handy or some other flexible object to clear those hidden right angles your only recourse is water to flush it out.

On a flinter either the pan won't flash in which case its usually the flint or powder, or if the pan flashes and it doesn't fire, its usually the vent to the main charge that's the problem. Either way its a quick fix.

Birdwatcher

The Texian formation was stranded out in the open, 250 men with no cover, in an area no more than 20 or 30 yards across. Fortunately for them, in his haste to catch them Urrea had outrun his artillery, which did not arrive until after nightfall.

I ain't seen it mentioned, but the losses on the field to the exposed Texians could have been worse the 30% casualties they suffered. Urea was low on ammunition.

Though I had given instructions for the infantry to be provided with four rounds to the man, this order had been neglected in part under frivolous pretext of lightening their load. They had counted on the early arrival of what was coming up on our rear, when we left the camp at Manahuilla our ammunition was being loaded. The party conducting it, however, lost its way and did not arrive until the following day. Urrea

OK, I was wrong earlier, it appears there WERE three assaults made by the Mexicans against the square; the first one, the one at the end of the day, and this second one....

I decided to make a new and simultaneous charge on all fronts to see if I could disconcert the enemy before the sad moment arrived when we would entirely without munitions.....

...fortune refused to favor us. The enemy redoubled its resistance with new vigor. They placed their artillery on the corners, flanking, in this way, our weakened columns. The fire from the cannons, as well as from the rifles, was very lively, making itself all the more noticeable in proportion as ours died out for lack of ammunition.

For much of that afternoon a sort of armed standoff devolved, both sides going prone and taking aimed potshots.

In order to protect our soldiers as far as possible, we ordered them to throw themselves on the ground while loading raising up only to fire. Urrea

Fannin himself, attempting to stay on his feet as officers were expected to do back then, had already been hit three times. Three of the four Polish veterans manning the cannon had likewise been hit.

At this time four of our cannon were idle, because the regulars were wounded or killed, and Capt. Westover said that the volunteers did not like to undertake to man them, and allowed that they could do as much good with their rifles. Morgan

The Texians had brought with them some Mexican prisoners, and their actions during the fight are indicative of just how exposed the Texian square was....

We had some five or six Mexican prisoners (the couriers of the old padre, captured at Carlos Ranch). These we had placed within the square, when the fight began, for safe keeping, and in an incredibly short time, with picks and shovels, they dug a trench deep enough to "hole" themselves, where they lay "perdue" and completely protected from bullets.

I for one, however, didn't blame them, as they were non-combatants, and besides to tell the truth when the bullets were singing like mad hornets around me, and men were struck down near me, I had a great inclination to "hole up" myself and draw it in after me. Duval

Precision shooting however, was an American specialty.

...they contented themselves with falling down in the grass and occasionally raising up to fire; but whenever they showed their heads, they were taken down by the riflemen. Shackleford



About that time after I had fired eight or ten times of myself there came out four more men, and we formed a platoon of five, an Irishman by the name of Cash was at the head of the platoon. I was next. A Dutchman by the name of Baker next. A young fellow from Georgia next. A man by the name of Hews next. The last had a rifle...

Hews took advantage of the wagon to rest his rifle on. There was a low tree, from 140 to 170 yards distant where the Mexicans would creep up and shoot at us. Hews killed two and wounded a third at that tree....

...for every man killed or wounded on our side, I am confident that two or three Mexicans fell before the deadly fire from our rifles. Duval

Birdwatcher

Not usually mentioned is the large numbers of Indians on the scene, fighting on the Mexican side.

John C. Duval, a member of his older brother's Kentucky rifle company, comes across as a firearms enthusiast, in as much as he takes the time to give us a description of the guns, range and shooting ability of their Indian opponents.

...there were with the Mexicans probably a hundred or so Carise Indians, who were much more daring and withal better marksmen. They boldly advanced to the front, and taking advantage of every little inequality of the ground and every bunch of grass that could afford them particular cover, they would crawl up closely and fire upon us,

In the age of smokeless powder these guys might have done more execution than they did (which execution was apparently significant at least), but of course every time they fired they advertised their position.

...and a description of their guns, such details always gratifying to modern-day reenactors who agonize over such things...

and now and then the discharge of their long single barrel shot guns was followed by the fall of some one in our ranks.

"Long single barrel shot guns" (as opposed to, one supposes the doubles already favored by mounted Americans) sounds like the classic form of an Indian trade gun. I dunno who Morgan's "Carises" were for sure, but another account tells us the Indians [resent were a mix of Lipan Apaches and Karankawas. Prob'ly not all that important, intermarriage between tribes and between Indians and Tejanos likely blurred tribal distinctions.

Here's two Berlandier portraits of flintlock-armed Texas Indians from just ten years earlier. While allowing for the effects of an increased inflow of Euro/American style clothing and trade cloth during the decade since, the Indians at the fight prob'ly still looked a lot like this...





"within eighty yards"... Seventy five?

A pity he ain't more specific. Replica trade gun shooters today can tell you that 100 yard hits on man-sized targets are a slam-dunk with a carefully loaded smoothie. OTOH Duval's report may be the longest distance on record of precision shooting with the same back then, presumably aimed at guys likewise laying down behind some amount of cover.

Four of them had crawled up behind some bunches of tall grass within eighty yards of us, from whence they delivered their fire with telling effect.

It is entirely in character for Indians to be skilled marksmen, when you look close enough you can find mention of the proficiency of Indians with their firearms all through our Frontier history.

On this occasion they do however have appeared to be outmatched by an American with a rifle (Abel Duval's older brother; one Burr H. Duval).

Capt. D-, who was using a heavy Kentucky rifle, and was known to be one of the best marksmen in his company, was requested to silence these Indians. He took a position near a gun carriage, and whenever one of the Indians showed his head above the tall grass it was perforated with an ounce rifle ball and after four shots they were seen no more....

When the Mexicans quit the field, we examined the locality where these Indians had secreted themselves, and found the four lying closely together, each one with a bullet hole through his head....

During this exchange, it seems Capt Duval very nearly fell victim to a head shot himself...

At the moment he fired the last shot Capt. D- had one of the fingers of his right hand taken off by a musket ball.

Birdwatcher

A one ounce rifle ball. That would be 16 gauge. IIRC that rifle would be about .65 caliber.

Good catch Sir , I overlooked that detail. A pity we don't get a better description of the whole event. Capt. Duval was making snap shots with fixed sights at what amounts to brief pop-up targets maybe 70 yards away, using a heavy rifle rested upon a wagon. One wonders if he had a spotter or spotters.

He lost a finger off of his right hand to a ball in the act of hitting his final target. At that point his right hand would have been wrapped around the wrist of the stock, index finger on the trigger. Possibly both shooters fired at the same moment.

We get from Shackelford's account that grapeshot fired into the grass finally scattered these Indian sharpshooters.

One detail not yet touched upon here is the fate of Albert Horton and his approximately thirty Mobile Greys, a cavalry company which had been sent ahead to verify the route was clear, in this case to Coleto Creek, no more than two to five miles in advance of Fannin's main force.

It is hard to know how much to censure Horton's company for failing to detect the hundreds of vaqueros and Indians that must have been in the general area at that point. After all even Fannin, travelling with 250 men and a slow-moving train of ox carts, had left a fort that morning which was presumably under constant surveillance and yet was able to amass as much as a five mile or two hour lead over Urrea and his much faster force, not being caught and surrounded until early afternoon.

In later life Horton suffered much censure from the simple-minded for not having perished along with the rest of Fannin's command. In his own defense, Horton reportedly claimed that Fannin had already surrendered by the time he returned from the scouting mission which sounds a tad spurious. For that to happen he would have had to have been essentially absent overnight, far enough away in advance not to have heard the Fannin's artillery and heavy barrage of small arms fire.

Urrea too reported contact with a small number of Texian cavalry at the outset, most of which fled the area. This might well have been Horton. Another possibility is these mounted men were "free scouts" of the likes of a John Glanton of whose movements during this campaign we know little about.

The short version of all this is that Horton and his company left the scene, for whatever reason, and ultimately ended up in Victoria, fifteen miles down the road. From a military standpoint, this made perfect sense.

One constant in this Second Texas Revolution was that the belief that large numbers of American reinforcements were on their way. Plus there was the expectation that those 30,000 Americans already residing in Texas when the war broke out in the fall of '35 would at some point rise to their own defense.

Both assumptions were true to some extent. Almost all of Fannin's original 500 man army originally collected at Goliad were volunteers who had just arrived from the US proper to fight. Even at the Alamo, the majority of the defenders who died there met that description. Resident Texians would turn out in greater numbers once the Mexican Army started advancing east towards where the great majority of Texians actually resided but of course this happened too late to save either Travis or Fannin.

From accounts, the expectation of many in Fannin's command at the time of the battle had been that there would be as many as 500 volunteers in Victoria available to come to their rescue.

Of course Horton found no such force waiting in Victoria. The nearest concentration of volunteers in the field at that point was the 300 men waiting for Fannin to join them at Gonzales, 50 miles to the North.

So, Horton and most of his men survived Goliad to fight again at San Jacinto. The controversy surrounding that survival, such as it was, would not ruin Albert Horton. He was a wealthy man and just thirty nine at the time. Six years later he would take to the field again during the Mexican invasion of '42.

Through his plantation holdings Horton became one of the wealthiest men in Texas, living just long enough to experience financial ruin at the close of the War of Secession. To me it is significant too that, notwithstanding his considerable means, only two of his six children survived that childhood. Historians don't often talk much about such things but back then infectious diseases very often made no distinction between the rich and the poor, catastrophe could visit anyone at any time. This seems important to me in trying to understand the mindset and motivations of these people.

Anyways, not every Texian on a horse made their escape from Goliad. According to Urrea more than a few, including possibly some from Horton's command, returned to join Fannin's embattled force. I dunno that this was solely due to heroism in every case as Urrea suggests. At the start of the fight, with the prairie already swarming with Mexicans, Tejanos and Indians, Fannin's heavily-armed formation may have looked like the safest place to be.

http://www.tamu.edu/faculty/ccbn/dewitt/goliadurrea.htm

The enemy's cavalry, which was small in number, had escaped the moment we overtook them, thanks to their good horses. There were some who, choosing the fate of their brave companions, dismounted and abandoned their horses. I took advantage of this to replace the worst mounts of our dragoons.

Birdwatcher