Post by Allen Wiener on Feb 15, 2010 15:43:49 GMT -5
Although this discussion began on the “Alamo Flag” thread, I have created a new thread devoted just to this subject. I will apologize for such a long post in advance, but there is much to consider in this material, which I believe has been badly misrepresented.
I have re-read Jim Crisp’s introduction to the expanded edition of With Santa Anna in Texas, his chapters on the de la Pena diary and Crockett’s death in his book Sleuthing the Alamo, and David Gracy’s analysis of the de la Pena documents themselves in the October, 2001, edition of Southwestern Historical Quarterly. Most of you are familiar with this material and the series of articles constituting a long debate between Crisp on one side and Bill Groneman, and Tom Lindley on the other.
Referring to anything as the “de la Pena diary” is misleading and inaccurate. The de la Pena papers consist of many items, none of which can be called his original field diary. Crisp describes them as a “disjointed collection” of military records and personal papers in three large packets and nearly two dozen file folders. Many are documents that de la Pena obtained from other officers involved in the Texas campaign long after the event.
There are two major documents in the collection. First, an early version of what looks like a “diary” and runs 109 pages. This is a first draft attempt by de la Pena to record the events he witnessed in the Texas campaign. It is a narrative written in diary form, but is not the original field diary kept by de la Pena, which has not been found. De la Pena began this document in Matamoros on July 21, 1836, writing “On this date I begin to put my diary in clean form,” meaning that it was on that date that he began drafting a clean copy of his diary, which he had actually begun keeping on October 8, 1835.
There is some confusion here in Crisp’s introduction to With Santa Anna in Texas, as he quotes de la Pena as writing “Matamoros, July 21, 1836. On this date I begin to put my diary in clean form,” but also writing in the next sentence “San Antonio de Bejar March 10, 1836 = Diary which starts on the 8th of October 1835, and begins to take form on this date.” Regardless of the apparent confusion regarding the date on which he began the first draft, it is clear that he was working from a rougher, original field diary and attempting to make a clean copy of it. The result was the 109-page first draft, which has never been published. Unless and until that original field diary is found, this early “clean” draft of it is as close as we are likely to get to it. Skipping ahead to the sexy centerfold moment, this early draft document does not mention executions at the Alamo or the name of David Crockett anywhere, but stay tuned.
The second document is a much longer draft written on 105 folded pieces of paper with 4 sides each, called “quartos,” which runs over 400 pages. It is this second version that is the basis of the commonly seen document that is usually referred to as de la Pena’s “diary,” although it is anything but. It was first published in Mexico City, in Spanish, in 1955 as La Rebelion de Texas, edited by Jesus Sanchez Garza. It was translated into English by Carmen Perry and published as With Santa Anna in Texas in 1975. There are discrepancies between de la Pena’s original manuscript and Sanchez Garza’s transcription of it. There are additional problems with Carmen Perry’s translation, which omitted Sanchez Garza’s preamble, which would have made clear the fact that the manuscript had never been published before and that, although de la Pena intended to publish it, he never got to do so. She also omitted the appendices, which included several de la Pena letters to newspapers in 1837, stating that he was still at work on the manuscript. That letter compliments another, long unknown de la Pena letter of November 6, 1839 to Mexican President Anastasio Bustamante, in which he referred to himself as “a victim of despotism,” which was published as a 16-page pamphlet called “Una Victima del Despotismo” (the only copy of which resides in the Sterling Memorial Library at Yale University). It, too, refers to the diary and de la Pena’s plans to publish it eventually. These latter-day documents dismiss seeming anachronisms in the manuscript that are dated after 1836, which suggested that someone doctored or forged the manuscript, despite its apparent “1836” publication date. But there was no 1836 publication and that impression was created by Sanchez Garza, who manufactured a “title page” with that date. Perry reproduced it in her translation as well, while leaving out Sanchez Garza’s preamble, which clearly stated that the manuscript had never been published before 1955. Perry also included some “creative” rewriting, like mentioning Crockett’s name twice on the “crucial page,” when de la Pena only mentioned it once, and only in this longer, second version of the manuscript. This version also incorporates information from other sources, including information that de la Pena obtained from other Mexican officers. One discrepancy between the two versions was of de la Pena’s own doing. He omitted all of his diary entries from October 8, 1835 (the day he began the diary) and February 13, 1836 in the longer manuscript, although they are in the earlier version. His reason, apparently, was that he considered them inconsequential.
There are some problems regarding the de la Pena documents. For example, there is no provenance for the original documents prior to Sanchez Garza coming across them. The writing in the longer version of the manuscript (the published version) is in several different hands. Some pages are inserted in the middle of manuscript sections, including the page referring to Crockett by name, which itself includes two different handwritings. In fact, the handwriting changes just as the Crockett story begins. Crisp discusses these issues in detail and has devoted more thought and research into this material than anyone else I know of. It is essential reading for a real understanding of what the de la Pena documents actually are and what they do or do not tell us.
While even Tom Lindley accepted the original document as authentic, he thought the second was a fake. However, Crisp cites a checklist of footnotes that de la Pena kept as he incorporated them from his first version into his longer, second manuscript. All but the last two items on that list are crossed off because de la Pena had already incorporated them into the larger document. He did not incorporate the last two, however, because he never had a chance to complete his rewriting of that section, showing a connection between the two documents.
Gracy’s article adds more weight to the authenticity of the documents. However, before drawing any conclusions about what de la Pena tells us, his reliability as a witness and journalist must be established, and that is an entirely separate question. By his own account, some of what he writes has come to him second hand. There are, however, other documents corroborating much of what he says (for example, see Crisp’s discussion of Gregg Dimmick’s book Sea of Mud and its verification of de la Pena), including other reports of executions, some of which name Crockett as one of the victims.
Allen
I have re-read Jim Crisp’s introduction to the expanded edition of With Santa Anna in Texas, his chapters on the de la Pena diary and Crockett’s death in his book Sleuthing the Alamo, and David Gracy’s analysis of the de la Pena documents themselves in the October, 2001, edition of Southwestern Historical Quarterly. Most of you are familiar with this material and the series of articles constituting a long debate between Crisp on one side and Bill Groneman, and Tom Lindley on the other.
Referring to anything as the “de la Pena diary” is misleading and inaccurate. The de la Pena papers consist of many items, none of which can be called his original field diary. Crisp describes them as a “disjointed collection” of military records and personal papers in three large packets and nearly two dozen file folders. Many are documents that de la Pena obtained from other officers involved in the Texas campaign long after the event.
There are two major documents in the collection. First, an early version of what looks like a “diary” and runs 109 pages. This is a first draft attempt by de la Pena to record the events he witnessed in the Texas campaign. It is a narrative written in diary form, but is not the original field diary kept by de la Pena, which has not been found. De la Pena began this document in Matamoros on July 21, 1836, writing “On this date I begin to put my diary in clean form,” meaning that it was on that date that he began drafting a clean copy of his diary, which he had actually begun keeping on October 8, 1835.
There is some confusion here in Crisp’s introduction to With Santa Anna in Texas, as he quotes de la Pena as writing “Matamoros, July 21, 1836. On this date I begin to put my diary in clean form,” but also writing in the next sentence “San Antonio de Bejar March 10, 1836 = Diary which starts on the 8th of October 1835, and begins to take form on this date.” Regardless of the apparent confusion regarding the date on which he began the first draft, it is clear that he was working from a rougher, original field diary and attempting to make a clean copy of it. The result was the 109-page first draft, which has never been published. Unless and until that original field diary is found, this early “clean” draft of it is as close as we are likely to get to it. Skipping ahead to the sexy centerfold moment, this early draft document does not mention executions at the Alamo or the name of David Crockett anywhere, but stay tuned.
The second document is a much longer draft written on 105 folded pieces of paper with 4 sides each, called “quartos,” which runs over 400 pages. It is this second version that is the basis of the commonly seen document that is usually referred to as de la Pena’s “diary,” although it is anything but. It was first published in Mexico City, in Spanish, in 1955 as La Rebelion de Texas, edited by Jesus Sanchez Garza. It was translated into English by Carmen Perry and published as With Santa Anna in Texas in 1975. There are discrepancies between de la Pena’s original manuscript and Sanchez Garza’s transcription of it. There are additional problems with Carmen Perry’s translation, which omitted Sanchez Garza’s preamble, which would have made clear the fact that the manuscript had never been published before and that, although de la Pena intended to publish it, he never got to do so. She also omitted the appendices, which included several de la Pena letters to newspapers in 1837, stating that he was still at work on the manuscript. That letter compliments another, long unknown de la Pena letter of November 6, 1839 to Mexican President Anastasio Bustamante, in which he referred to himself as “a victim of despotism,” which was published as a 16-page pamphlet called “Una Victima del Despotismo” (the only copy of which resides in the Sterling Memorial Library at Yale University). It, too, refers to the diary and de la Pena’s plans to publish it eventually. These latter-day documents dismiss seeming anachronisms in the manuscript that are dated after 1836, which suggested that someone doctored or forged the manuscript, despite its apparent “1836” publication date. But there was no 1836 publication and that impression was created by Sanchez Garza, who manufactured a “title page” with that date. Perry reproduced it in her translation as well, while leaving out Sanchez Garza’s preamble, which clearly stated that the manuscript had never been published before 1955. Perry also included some “creative” rewriting, like mentioning Crockett’s name twice on the “crucial page,” when de la Pena only mentioned it once, and only in this longer, second version of the manuscript. This version also incorporates information from other sources, including information that de la Pena obtained from other Mexican officers. One discrepancy between the two versions was of de la Pena’s own doing. He omitted all of his diary entries from October 8, 1835 (the day he began the diary) and February 13, 1836 in the longer manuscript, although they are in the earlier version. His reason, apparently, was that he considered them inconsequential.
There are some problems regarding the de la Pena documents. For example, there is no provenance for the original documents prior to Sanchez Garza coming across them. The writing in the longer version of the manuscript (the published version) is in several different hands. Some pages are inserted in the middle of manuscript sections, including the page referring to Crockett by name, which itself includes two different handwritings. In fact, the handwriting changes just as the Crockett story begins. Crisp discusses these issues in detail and has devoted more thought and research into this material than anyone else I know of. It is essential reading for a real understanding of what the de la Pena documents actually are and what they do or do not tell us.
While even Tom Lindley accepted the original document as authentic, he thought the second was a fake. However, Crisp cites a checklist of footnotes that de la Pena kept as he incorporated them from his first version into his longer, second manuscript. All but the last two items on that list are crossed off because de la Pena had already incorporated them into the larger document. He did not incorporate the last two, however, because he never had a chance to complete his rewriting of that section, showing a connection between the two documents.
Gracy’s article adds more weight to the authenticity of the documents. However, before drawing any conclusions about what de la Pena tells us, his reliability as a witness and journalist must be established, and that is an entirely separate question. By his own account, some of what he writes has come to him second hand. There are, however, other documents corroborating much of what he says (for example, see Crisp’s discussion of Gregg Dimmick’s book Sea of Mud and its verification of de la Pena), including other reports of executions, some of which name Crockett as one of the victims.
Allen
