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Post by Jake on Jan 4, 2008 12:07:24 GMT -5
Hey, come on, guys, I said sure, the wall was higher than I claimed at first, so you won, so you don't have to keep trying to win some more.
OK, Craig, so that was a little deceitful ... thing is, and what I actually meant, was that from my viewpoint about the sequence of construction of the churches, there was nothing down there for the wall to connect to, and no way to know where the cemetery was -- and a 6-7 foot wall is way much to enclose a cemetery anyway; they wanted a delimiter, not a prison wall -- nobody was leaving. So cemeteries usually get 4 feet at best.
In 1727, the ground floor rooms of the convento had been finished, presumably carrying us above the level of the quoins. The temporary church in 1727 was a jacal structure, "very spacious, with a good door," but we don't know where it was. End result: yes, the change in structure of the corner tells us something, but we can't say what yet.
Certainly if there had been a wall here 7 feet high, built as part of the convento and then removed, what we're seeing is the repaired corner after that removal. But then it would have been built, most likely, as part of the original construction in 1724-27, and when removed? And what was it for, with that height and no more?
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crc
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Post by crc on Jan 4, 2008 17:18:11 GMT -5
"... and no way to know where the cemetery was -- and a 6-7 foot wall is way much to enclose a cemetery anyway; they wanted a delimiter, not a prison wall -- nobody was leaving. So cemeteries usually get 4 feet at best."
Agreed, and glad to hear you say we don't know where the cemetery was. I don't want to argue that it was a cemetery wall anyway - I used it as a hypothetical because somebody brought it up as a hypothetical.
"In 1727, the ground floor rooms of the convento had been finished, presumably carrying us above the level of the quoins ... yes, the change in structure of the corner tells us something, but we can't say what yet."
Agreed again...
"Certainly if there had been a wall here 7 feet high, built as part of the convento and then removed, what we're seeing is the repaired corner after that removal. But then it would have been built, most likely, as part of the original construction in 1724-27, and when removed? And what was it for, with that height and no more?"
The stub of wall attached to the convento is there through the early 1840s. As I said, being the most unclaimed source of stone must have marked it for death by scavengers. A very low remnant of it is seen (with a gentleman sitting upon it) in the ubiquitous early Alamo photo, variously dated between 1858 and 1860 with the cannon barrel lying in the foreground.
As to what it was used for, I don't know. That's what I hope you might suggest someday. We can't argue that something people saw and drew in the past couldn't have existed just because we can't yet divine it's purpose; things existed and it's up to us to make the best of them. (That must be the charm and challenge of archeology!) First we have to agree something did exist, then we have to agree on what it looked like and go on from there. Are we ready to move ahead?
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Post by Jake on Jan 4, 2008 21:52:17 GMT -5
Actually, what I was edging up to suggest is that if the original construction of the convento west wing included a 7-foot wall, it wasn't necessarily the same wall as the one visible in the 1830s and '40s. But as I type that, I'm thinking a) kind of too much of a coincidence, lacking that "ring of truth," and b) I can't think of anything that would suggest it went away sometime after construction in the 1720s and was rebuilt later, presumably for a different reason.
If we move ahead, where are we going?
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crc
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Post by crc on Jan 5, 2008 2:08:49 GMT -5
Jake,
Where are we going? We're going to keep our eyes and minds open to clues, hints, and possibilities about when and why a stone wall 4 to 7 feet high was constructed in front of the churches of Valero.
-C
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Post by stuart on Jan 5, 2008 4:24:37 GMT -5
This actually harks to an unanswered question of mine on the lunette thread - why Cos built the stockade linking the gate complex with the church.
The plaza we know was fully enclosed (fortified is too strong) at the end of the 18th century as a defence against Comanche raiders, so there had to be an adequately high wall linking the gate complex with either the convento or the unfinished church and given that the church was unfinished a 7 foot wall filling the gap between the convento and the gatehouse/low barracks would seem more sensible or at least a whole lot easier.
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crc
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Post by crc on Jan 5, 2008 13:07:55 GMT -5
Good point about the wall, Stuart.
I imagine the need for the palisade wall to enclose the "fort" would have been for "communication" reasons. The church held the powder magazine and it would have been necessary to get to all points from it as quickly as possible - and vice versa. The trip through the north courtyard, through the porteria in the long barrack to get to the lunette or sw corner emplacement would have been too complicated and time-consuming.
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Post by stuart on Jan 5, 2008 13:18:29 GMT -5
I agree entirely about why Cos needed to seal off the apparent gap between the gatehouse/low barracks.
My real question was whether there has ever been any indication of a wall (thinner and lower?) further out marking the southern boundary of the presumed campo santo; or whether Cos needed to have the stockade built because the wall in question here, linking the convento with the gatehouse/low barracks represented the existing defensive perimeter and the church lay outside it.
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Post by marklemon on Jan 5, 2008 13:50:20 GMT -5
Stuart's hypothesis about the higher "low" wall perhaps having something to do with Indian defense is intriguing, but I'm not sure how we can then reconcile the fact that the quoins at the SW corner of the Convento, stop where the wall most likely began. This indicates an integrated approach to the construction. In other words, the evidence points to the "low wall" and convento being built at about the same time. This would place us in the late 1720's, 40 years or so before the Comanche threat became acute to the point of walling in the compound. I like the idea of Indian security, but the timeframe's off quite a bit.
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Post by stuart on Jan 5, 2008 14:03:59 GMT -5
That had occurred to me, but it all depends how well the wall was built. The hardening of the complex against Comanche attack was evidently a major programme so they might well have gone to the trouble of properly keying in the wall.
Otherwise we come back to the question of why it was built?
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Post by stuart on Jan 6, 2008 11:41:51 GMT -5
Another point of course is that if the wall does predate the "hardening" of the compound there is then a conflict with Mark's theory that the original church was built there. If we accept the evidence of the quoins in the Convento wall then this one clearly cannot be a remnant of the church wall, however altered, yet even if as was suggested on the relevant thread, the church was set back by a few yards it is still going to be pretty effectively screened by a 7 foot high wall right in front of it - which would certainly not be in accordance with any form of Catholic church I've ever come across
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crc
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Post by crc on Jan 6, 2008 18:40:53 GMT -5
Stuart, I think we're not putting all are arguments in their proper time frames. The quoins issue is useful only as far as it can help determine the height of the wall as it last existed and was pictured. The absence of the quoins lower down might indicate construction of the wall contemporaneously with the west face of the convento, but does not confirm it, and as Jake cautions. there doesn't seem to be a reason for it being constructed at that time yet. "Keying" in a wall later constructed would be sound practice and not difficult to do, and as you said, might have been "well worth the trouble."
The point is, I don't see your conflict with Mark's first church theory and the low wall as the information now stands, and I offer one possible scenario: There was a 4-foot cemetery wall there at the time of the first church; and around the 1760 "hardening" time, the wall's height was increased to a defensive level. Since the second church was under construction well before then, and far removed from the low wall, there need be no concern of yours that it was not "in accordance with any form of Catholic church I've ever come across."
I'm not making a case for this, just saying there is no un-resolvable conflict apparent yet, given the circumstances.
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Post by marklemon on Jan 6, 2008 20:44:48 GMT -5
Craig, I was just studying my photos of the SW corner of the convento, and noticed that, not only do the quoins stop at the bottom at the height you mentioned, but after going up for 6 courses, they suddenly stop, and smaller stones are placed there above them instead of the large-sized quoins. Could, in your opinion, this be as a result of earlier damaged areas being repaired, or could this be intentional? Perhaps damage from the 1912 demolition of the Hugo& Scheltzer add-ons caused this, or....what? Your thoughts? Mark
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crc
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Post by crc on Jan 6, 2008 23:20:14 GMT -5
Mark, a quick review of old postcards with the remains of the second story of the convento standing and after the woodwork had been torn off indicates damage to the SW corner near the present top of the wall due to the notches and holes cut for the supporting beams, etc. of the wooden galleries of the Grenet store.
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Post by stuart on Jan 7, 2008 1:36:25 GMT -5
The point is, I don't see your conflict with Mark's first church theory and the low wall as the information now stands, and I offer one possible scenario: There was a 4-foot cemetery wall there at the time of the first church; and around the 1760 "hardening" time, the wall's height was increased to a defensive level. I'm not making a case for this, just saying there is no un-resolvable conflict apparent yet, given the circumstances. I agree that there's no "conflict" here, I've no problem at all with that scenario. I'm simply suggesting that ultimately the 7 foot wall does most likely represent that hardening of the plaza against the Comanche; whether that involved heightening an existing lower wall or building a completely new one.
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Post by marklemon on Jan 7, 2008 21:12:46 GMT -5
More and more, I'm of the opinion that as this particular area ( the projecting SW corner of the convento) was so prone to impact damage (from many periods of time, but especially as an Army depot) that it must have been bumped and smashed many times by wagons and such, which chipped away at the lower quoins, and eventually necessitated stone and mortar repairs. Over the last century and a half, these repairs have taken on a patina all their own, which matches that of the quoins. Craig has explained the damage to the upper ones, as a result of the Grenet wood-framed galleys being either placed there, or removed.
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