Lysander Wells, the guy who instigated the duel, was actually a 28 year old Yankee from Connecticut. This is the same Texas Cavalry guy who's Colt Patterson binded on him during the Council House Fight...
http://www.tshaonline.org/handbook/online/articles/fwe24The other fatality, 30 year-old William Davis Redd, was a lawyer from Georgia.
http://www.tshaonline.org/handbook/online/articles/fre11I dunno what the prior history was between these two, but it would appear Wells willfully left Redd with no other recource BUT to fight a duel (as per Moore)..
During the early part of May, Colonel Edward Burleson made a tour of the detachments of the First Regiment of Infantry which were stationed at Mission San Jose in San Antonio. During his visit, two of his leading officers had a quarrel about the Council House Fight.
Major Lysander Wells of the cavalry was bitter towards Captain William Redd for not fighting Chief Isomania's Comanches on March 28...
In an insulting letter, Major Wells apparently called Captain Redd a "dastardly coward" among other things. Wells also complained that Redd was under the influence of a "petticoat government," making insinuations about a certain woman from Georgia who was living with him out of wedlock. Lysander Wells had his letter signed by others from San Antonio before presenting it to Redd.
Captain Redd was furious, and challenged Wells to a duel the following morning. At 6:00 am on May 10, 1840, two of the Texas Army leaders met where the Ursuline Convent now stands near the Alamo.
Two other Texas Army leaders, Albert Sidney Johnson and Felix Huston, had duelled in 1837. They both had old horse pistols. Three years later, the weapons were much better. In fact Major Wells' cavalry is known to have been armed with the new Colt Patent Arms repeating pistol as of 1840.
"I aim for your heart" announced Redd.
"And I for your brains" countered Wells.
Bexar citizen Mary Maverick later recorded the deadly results of the army leaders' duel...
They fired. Redd sprang high into the air and fell dead with a bullet in his brain. Wells was shot near the heart, but lived two weeks, in great torture, begging everyone near to dispatch him, or furnish him a pistol that he might kill himself and end his agony....
In Captain Redd's pocked was found a marriage license and a certificate showing that he was wedded to the girl - also letters to members of his own and her families, speaking of her in the tenderest manner, and asking them to protect and to provide for her.First a noted Comanche War leader rides into town and stands outside a saloon in the town square screaming for the Americans to come out and fight, and then this.
History better than fiction.
Birdwatcher
