Post by Herb on May 25, 2008 10:07:40 GMT -5
A little bit off topic, but I've spent some times the last couple of days relooking at the Mexican Artillery at the Alamo. In a lot of ways the popular view of what the Mexican Artillery did, seems like the mythical attack on the palisade, when you look at the first hand sources, the differences between our perception of what happened and reality are two very different things.
While most of you are not dismissive of the internal documents of the Mexican Army, I thought I 'd start with what Travis actually wrote about the bombardment and show how it ties in to what the Mexican sources say. It's almost amazing, the detail Travis gives us - and how badly it's been ignored.
In his letter of March 3rd to the President of the Convention (Hansen, page 35) Travis writes:
" From the 25th to the present date, the enemy has kept up a bombardment from two howitzers, (one a five and a half inch, and the other an eight inch,) and a heavy cannonade from two long nine pounders, mounted on a battery on the opposite side of the river, at a distance of four hundred yards from our walls, ...." he goes on to describe the Mexican fortified camps and other details then adds: "I have so fortified this place, that the walls are generally proof against cannon balls and I continue to intrench on the inside and strengthen the walls by throwing up the dirt. At least two hundred shells have fallen inside our works without having injured a single man ...." He then goes on to describe the Mexican reinforcements then arriving in town (and though he doesn't mention it the additional artillery that will form the North Battery).
From the Mexican Accounts we know that this first battery probably consisted of two eight pounders and a seven inch (possibly a five inch) and seven and one half inch howitzer. ( One note, the Spanish and English used a different weight measurement system at the time, a Spanish pound being slightly heavier than an English one. Thus an English Long Nine [eg the cannon currently at La Villita] and a Mexican eight pounder are the same cannon, this is also where the confusion of a 16 pounder vs 18 pounder probably comes from). So Travis's report is remarkably accurate.
From Almonte's diary, we know that for most of the siege the bombardment was only during the day with only an occasional grenade fired (howitzer shell) at night. For example the diary entry for Feb 25th "The firing from our batteries commenced early .... Our fire ceased in the afternoon."
In Travis's famous letter of Feb 24th, Travis mentioned a "continual" bombardment, Jack Edmondson, did a great job parsing the difference between continual and continuous in his book The Alamo Story, and his words are far better than mine, but to me, the difference, simply, is continual implies daily while continuous is just that.
There is even more info in Travis's March 3rd he specifies that 200 shells have landed inside the Alamo. Now a shell, the Mexicans called them grenades, is a howitzer round, an exploding shell versus a cannon ball (solid or round shot). The effect of a howitzer shell in 1836 is much like that of a modern fragmentary grenade - antipersonnel. Only on very rare and very lucky occasions is it going to do any substantial damage to structures. Note that General Ampudia's inventory of rounds fired (Hansen, page 377) lists 112 howitzer shells. Again, a remarkably accurate assessment by Travis, especially since he was on the receiving end. And since Travis specifically goes to the trouble to mention bombardment by howitzer and cannonade by cannon in his letter, these 200 shells are in all probability just that.
The distance of this first battery (located opposite the SW Corner of the Alamo) is also significant, at 400 yards light field pieces are not going to do much damage to earth reinforced walls, Rich's point, about the upper story of the Long Barracks is however significantly different (and indeed raises the question was Bowie in the Low Barracks because the hospital was moved after the first day of bombardment made the second story untenable?). The whole point of a siege was to open saps and parallels to get the cannon within close protected distance to the walls where they can then do significant damage to the walls.
Santa Anna did that the night of March 3rd when his chief of artillery who arrived that day, with the additional artillery, emplaced the northern battery using the acequia as his protected position. According to sources this was within musket shot ( how far a musket can fire - not how far it can fire accurately), map interpretation by Bruce Moses places it a little over 200 yards from the Alamo. The fire of this battery, for only two days, was indeed much more effective, we know from a letter from Goliad by Brooks written on March 10th (presumably based on info from the last courier Allen) that every shot went through the walls. Still Santa Anna did not wait for this battery to open a breech, but ordered an escalde attack for dawn March 6th (Almonte Diary, March 4th).
Looking at the info Travis provided us, how it substantiates the Mexican Army's accounts, the relatively low number of ammunition of all types fired, according to Ampudia, the fierce Mexican bombardment (until March 4th) appears to be largely myth. There simply weren't that many Mexican cannon, and they were emplaced too far away to have any great effect on the earth reinforced walls. After the additional cannon arrived on March 3rd and were emplaced in a close battery (200 yards) and opened fire on the North Wall on March 4th, it was a different story. Even then the firing commenced early each morning and ended at night (see Almonte's Journal entries for March 4th and 5th).
A couple of other notes, proper siege cannon were 18, 24, or 36 pounders by 1836. The somewhat famous Mexican 12 pounders due to arrive on the 7th, by this time were regarded as large field guns. The modern exploding round fired by cannon was not invented for another 15(?) years. It's first major use in America was the Union siege of Fort Pulaski, at Savannah in 1862.
Also worth looking at is what Almonte said by day of the Mexican Artillery fire:
February 23: "... in the afternoon four grenades were fired at them them. The firing was suspended in order to receive a messenger...." by the time negotiations concluded "...night came on and there was no more firing."
February 24: The river battery was erected. "It was finished in the afternoon, and a brisk fire was kept up until the 18 pounder and another piece was dismounted." "At evening the music struck up and went to entertain the enemy with it and some grenades."
February 25: "The firing from our batteries commenced early." "Our fire ceased in the afternoon."
February 26: "During the day the firing from our cannon was continued. The enemy did not reply, except now and then"
February 27: "There was little firing from either side ...."
February 28: "The cannonading was continued"
February 29: No mention.
March 1: Mentions two 12 pound shots fired at Santa Anna's HQs from the Alamo.
March 2: No mention.
March 3: The North battery was erected.
March 4: "Commenced firing very early, which the enemy didn't return." The North battery was advanced down the acequia toward the Alamo.
March 5: "A brisk fire was commenced from our North battery against the enemy which was not answered , except now and then."
Note, that except for mention of artillery firing the evening of February 24th, there is absolutely no mention of any firing at night - any night. Instead it is an almost constant refrain that firing commenced early each morning.
Instead of Santa Anna wearing down the defenders as popularly believed by a 24 hour bombardment, it appears he lulled them into a routine, bombardment by day, work parties until around midnight repairing the damage, then sleep, until the bombardment began again. I've long argued that a halt in the nightly bombardment on March 5th should have alerted Travis that something was up, but relooking at it, what happened the night of March 5th was exactly what had happened every night but one - according to Almonte.
One final note, one of the howitzers, that Travis identified in the river battery on March 3rd, according to various other accounts, apparently moved around during the siege, and fired from, at least a bit of time prior to March 3rd, from the fortified camp in La Villita.
While most of you are not dismissive of the internal documents of the Mexican Army, I thought I 'd start with what Travis actually wrote about the bombardment and show how it ties in to what the Mexican sources say. It's almost amazing, the detail Travis gives us - and how badly it's been ignored.
In his letter of March 3rd to the President of the Convention (Hansen, page 35) Travis writes:
" From the 25th to the present date, the enemy has kept up a bombardment from two howitzers, (one a five and a half inch, and the other an eight inch,) and a heavy cannonade from two long nine pounders, mounted on a battery on the opposite side of the river, at a distance of four hundred yards from our walls, ...." he goes on to describe the Mexican fortified camps and other details then adds: "I have so fortified this place, that the walls are generally proof against cannon balls and I continue to intrench on the inside and strengthen the walls by throwing up the dirt. At least two hundred shells have fallen inside our works without having injured a single man ...." He then goes on to describe the Mexican reinforcements then arriving in town (and though he doesn't mention it the additional artillery that will form the North Battery).
From the Mexican Accounts we know that this first battery probably consisted of two eight pounders and a seven inch (possibly a five inch) and seven and one half inch howitzer. ( One note, the Spanish and English used a different weight measurement system at the time, a Spanish pound being slightly heavier than an English one. Thus an English Long Nine [eg the cannon currently at La Villita] and a Mexican eight pounder are the same cannon, this is also where the confusion of a 16 pounder vs 18 pounder probably comes from). So Travis's report is remarkably accurate.
From Almonte's diary, we know that for most of the siege the bombardment was only during the day with only an occasional grenade fired (howitzer shell) at night. For example the diary entry for Feb 25th "The firing from our batteries commenced early .... Our fire ceased in the afternoon."
In Travis's famous letter of Feb 24th, Travis mentioned a "continual" bombardment, Jack Edmondson, did a great job parsing the difference between continual and continuous in his book The Alamo Story, and his words are far better than mine, but to me, the difference, simply, is continual implies daily while continuous is just that.
There is even more info in Travis's March 3rd he specifies that 200 shells have landed inside the Alamo. Now a shell, the Mexicans called them grenades, is a howitzer round, an exploding shell versus a cannon ball (solid or round shot). The effect of a howitzer shell in 1836 is much like that of a modern fragmentary grenade - antipersonnel. Only on very rare and very lucky occasions is it going to do any substantial damage to structures. Note that General Ampudia's inventory of rounds fired (Hansen, page 377) lists 112 howitzer shells. Again, a remarkably accurate assessment by Travis, especially since he was on the receiving end. And since Travis specifically goes to the trouble to mention bombardment by howitzer and cannonade by cannon in his letter, these 200 shells are in all probability just that.
The distance of this first battery (located opposite the SW Corner of the Alamo) is also significant, at 400 yards light field pieces are not going to do much damage to earth reinforced walls, Rich's point, about the upper story of the Long Barracks is however significantly different (and indeed raises the question was Bowie in the Low Barracks because the hospital was moved after the first day of bombardment made the second story untenable?). The whole point of a siege was to open saps and parallels to get the cannon within close protected distance to the walls where they can then do significant damage to the walls.
Santa Anna did that the night of March 3rd when his chief of artillery who arrived that day, with the additional artillery, emplaced the northern battery using the acequia as his protected position. According to sources this was within musket shot ( how far a musket can fire - not how far it can fire accurately), map interpretation by Bruce Moses places it a little over 200 yards from the Alamo. The fire of this battery, for only two days, was indeed much more effective, we know from a letter from Goliad by Brooks written on March 10th (presumably based on info from the last courier Allen) that every shot went through the walls. Still Santa Anna did not wait for this battery to open a breech, but ordered an escalde attack for dawn March 6th (Almonte Diary, March 4th).
Looking at the info Travis provided us, how it substantiates the Mexican Army's accounts, the relatively low number of ammunition of all types fired, according to Ampudia, the fierce Mexican bombardment (until March 4th) appears to be largely myth. There simply weren't that many Mexican cannon, and they were emplaced too far away to have any great effect on the earth reinforced walls. After the additional cannon arrived on March 3rd and were emplaced in a close battery (200 yards) and opened fire on the North Wall on March 4th, it was a different story. Even then the firing commenced early each morning and ended at night (see Almonte's Journal entries for March 4th and 5th).
A couple of other notes, proper siege cannon were 18, 24, or 36 pounders by 1836. The somewhat famous Mexican 12 pounders due to arrive on the 7th, by this time were regarded as large field guns. The modern exploding round fired by cannon was not invented for another 15(?) years. It's first major use in America was the Union siege of Fort Pulaski, at Savannah in 1862.
Also worth looking at is what Almonte said by day of the Mexican Artillery fire:
February 23: "... in the afternoon four grenades were fired at them them. The firing was suspended in order to receive a messenger...." by the time negotiations concluded "...night came on and there was no more firing."
February 24: The river battery was erected. "It was finished in the afternoon, and a brisk fire was kept up until the 18 pounder and another piece was dismounted." "At evening the music struck up and went to entertain the enemy with it and some grenades."
February 25: "The firing from our batteries commenced early." "Our fire ceased in the afternoon."
February 26: "During the day the firing from our cannon was continued. The enemy did not reply, except now and then"
February 27: "There was little firing from either side ...."
February 28: "The cannonading was continued"
February 29: No mention.
March 1: Mentions two 12 pound shots fired at Santa Anna's HQs from the Alamo.
March 2: No mention.
March 3: The North battery was erected.
March 4: "Commenced firing very early, which the enemy didn't return." The North battery was advanced down the acequia toward the Alamo.
March 5: "A brisk fire was commenced from our North battery against the enemy which was not answered , except now and then."
Note, that except for mention of artillery firing the evening of February 24th, there is absolutely no mention of any firing at night - any night. Instead it is an almost constant refrain that firing commenced early each morning.
Instead of Santa Anna wearing down the defenders as popularly believed by a 24 hour bombardment, it appears he lulled them into a routine, bombardment by day, work parties until around midnight repairing the damage, then sleep, until the bombardment began again. I've long argued that a halt in the nightly bombardment on March 5th should have alerted Travis that something was up, but relooking at it, what happened the night of March 5th was exactly what had happened every night but one - according to Almonte.
One final note, one of the howitzers, that Travis identified in the river battery on March 3rd, according to various other accounts, apparently moved around during the siege, and fired from, at least a bit of time prior to March 3rd, from the fortified camp in La Villita.