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Post by silverwolf on Sept 10, 2013 4:38:06 GMT -5
...among the dead with his peculiar cap by his side, this begs the question.
1. Who was the person alleging or alleged to have been David Crockett, Cwokett,? Cwocketty,? confronting Santa Anna and his staff?
2. Was David Crockett such a dandy that he couldn't fight without his good luck coonskin cap on his head? And if not, wouldn't it have long into the battle been the last thing he worried about having on his person to the degree it happened to be right next to him when he fell. Or was she looking at one of Davy retinue of Tenneseans who she may have mistaken for Crockett with all the grime and filth on the faces of the soldiers and who also may have been prone to wearing the coonskin cap, perhaps the national hat of Tennesee.
3. Did Santa Anna not ask to be shown the bodies of Travis, Bowie and Crockett? Obviously he knew nothing about executing Crockett and therefore may indeed have executed a fraud grasping at the chance that Crockett s notoriety would somehow soften Santa Anna to the point of where he would be expected to tell Santa Anna bedtime stories about his pet bear DeathGrip.
4. As an aside, did none of the defenders have time to don a Mexican uniform and BS his way out of the Alamo and possibly to a riderless horse and escaping before Santannas lancers could guess what was going on.(Yes a what if but still stranger things have happened. Like the Japanese Navy not sending the Third Wave Squadron to finish off Pearl and calling off the attack which might have gotten the precious fuel tanks, till then untouched).
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Post by mjbrathwaite on Sept 10, 2013 21:54:47 GMT -5
3. Did Santa Anna not ask to be shown the bodies of Travis, Bowie and Crockett? Obviously he knew nothing about executing Crockett and therefore may indeed have executed a fraud grasping at the chance that Crockett s notoriety would somehow soften Santa Anna to the point of where he would be expected to tell Santa Anna bedtime stories about his pet bear DeathGrip. We do not know at what point Santa Anna asked to be shown the bodies, and it could well have been after the executions. None of the accounts of the executions suggest Santa Anna knew one of the men was Crockett. The English translation of the de la Pena account suggests he did, but this is not supported by the Spanish original. The appearance of the man described by de la Pena doesn't sound much like Crockett to me, and I've often wondered if there really was a "naturalist" taking refuge at the Alamo, and that he was mistaken for Crockett by Almonte or someone else, but there is no evidence for that. We don't know how Almonte knew what Crockett looked like, although it's by no means impossible that he did, given the time he's spent in the United States. Still, as you say, the man could have been someone hoping to pass himself off as Crockett but didn't get the chance.
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Post by loucapitano on Sept 12, 2013 18:54:12 GMT -5
It nice to see we're back to the "where did Crockett die?" discussion. It's so hard to seperate emotion from testemony but each layer of the Alamo artichoke keeps leading to new questions and an array of plausible answers. Logic supports the understanding that Crockett's Tennessee boys were first assigned to the South wall stockade which was the obvious weak point the just arrived Mexican troops would notice. But Travis's later letter extolling Crockett for being at all places where help was needed leads one to believe he may have been someplace other than the South wall during the attack. So here's my speculation: Both Travis and Crockett were at the North Wall, which was clearly the focus of the main Mexican assault. Travis dies early as the wall is stormed. Minutes later Crockett, after seeing the North wall cannot hold and being the "high private" that everyone naturally follows, leads the retreat from the wall to the prepared defensive positions in the Plaza. That would be, the Long Barracks, the battery in the center guarding the Main Gate, and the the Battery at the center of the West Wall. If mayor Ruiz and his after battle report is to be believed, he identified Crockett's body near that west position. As far as Mrs. Dickenson's statement identifying his body in the stockade area, who knows? There are many understandable gaps in her recollections and she certainly meant well. There is one statemtn she made that I, and I think many other society members believe, that at the last day, Travis left it up to the men whether they would stay or try to escape. In other words, he asked them to "cross the line." We don't know exactly how he put the issue to the men, but based on his letters and flare for the dramatic, it might have been quite show.
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Post by Paul Sylvain on Sept 12, 2013 20:17:18 GMT -5
Something crossed my mind as I was reading through the posts above, and that is I wonder how rough and haggard the defenders' appearance was after 13 days of siege behind the Alamo's walls? We think in terms of the guys being clean-shaven and so on, but I'm guessing these guys might have some face hair grown, and were probably looking and smelling a little rough. Crockett and the others might not have been as easily recognizable as we assume they were.
Considering Mrs. D's state of mind as she left, walking past the bloodied, mangled bodies of men she knew and may have spoken to just hours before, and knowing she was now a widow, I'm not surprised that she might have been confused. She must have felt like she was in a dream. She might have seen Crockett, but maybe not.
Paul
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Post by Rich Curilla on Sept 13, 2013 12:22:20 GMT -5
Crockett's residence while in Bexar was at the Musquiz House at the N.E. corner of Main Plaza. The Dickinsons were also boarding there and took in Crockett and Dr. Sutherland (who is the source for this detail). If so, then Susanna would have known Crockett well enough to recognize him, even in her moments of shock. I lean more toward her adding the Crockett detail years later since that's what everybody wanted to hear.
Regarding the de la Pena account, I hold that he added Crockett to the list of executed after he discovered that a national celebrity died in the Alamo (perhaps while captive at San Jacinto). His goal in publishing his diary was largely to trash Santa Anna, whom he dispised, and I would guess that he wasn't above adding a thing or two to make Santa Anna look even worse. The executions did take place. I have no doubt of that. De la Pena did know of them whether or not he witnessed them, so it would not be too much of a stretch to imagine him saying, "Hmmmmmmm. I can really make Americans hate Santa Anna if I throw Crockett into this group.
I would put most of my trust in Alcalde Ruiz' description that Crockett's body was found "in a small fort opposite the city." Modern vernacular would perhaps take "opposite the city" literally, but I see enough evidence in Alamo accounts to suggest that, in the 1836 Mexican idiom, it simply meant on the general side of the Alamo that the town was on. Hills to the east, village plaza to the south, river valley to the north, city to the west. One of my theories could be answered if we could see Francisco Ruiz' original Spanish document. This theory is that Ruiz' Spanish referring to Crockett's location was "en un fortin enfrente de la ciudad." "Fortin" literally translates as "small fort." When you consider that the Spanish word for the cannon emplacements in the Alamo was fortin (as in Fortin de Cos, Fortin de Condelle and Fortin de Teran), it becomes very possible for Ruiz comment to be referring to Fortin de Condelle, which was the cannon emplacement in the N.W. corner of the compound, due west of Fortin de Teran, where Travis died. Thus, when Ruiz says, after describing Travis' location, "To the west and in a small fort opposite the city..." he means quite literally this N.W. cannon emplacement.
I cannot believe that, during the twelve days after Travis assigned Crockett to the palisade, assignments wouldn't have changed as siege progressed and Travis saw where the threats really were. And I do not accept the palisade as being the "weakest part of the fort." The stockade (to use Jake Ivey's term) was eight feet high on the outside, loopholed, and with a cannon port in the middle. It was flanked by rifle fire from the top of the low barrack to the west and church to the N.E. and protected by a violent snarl of sharpened tree limbs (the abatis) in the front. It was formidable.
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Post by Paul Sylvain on Sept 14, 2013 20:38:52 GMT -5
Nice response, Rich. I don't think I ever considered that Crockett might have fallen in the fighting at the North Wall (or in that general area), but you make a very compelling argument for just that, and one that I can readily accept.
I also agree with you 100 percent about the palisade. It was formidable enough that the Mexicans pretty much avoided it during the final assault. Of course, the position still required defense, which means whether they engaged the Mexicans or not, it took Texian firepower away from where it was needed. I, too, believe the position was far was the weakest at the Alamo andwas, in fact, formidable.
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Post by Herb on Sept 15, 2013 15:38:21 GMT -5
I am convinced that there are only two places that meet the Ruiz description (1) the cannon position in the ruined room of the Southern Castenada House near the NW corner, and (2) the NW corner itself as described by Rich.
I have not been satisfied with the Morphis' account of Dickinson "the peculiar cap" for a long time. As has been pointed out Dickinson and Crockett stayed in the same house for about 10 days prior to the siege, she had to know what the famous man looked like, yet in her statement to the Texas Adjutant General she said she BELIEVED Crockett was killed - not that she saw his body. I honestly believe that Crockett and his peculiar cap was an embellismemt added by Morphis - placing Crockett near the only portion of the Alamo still standing.
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Post by Jim Boylston on Sept 15, 2013 18:21:59 GMT -5
I am convinced that there are only two places that meet the Ruiz description (1) the cannon position in the ruined room of the Southern Castenada House near the NW corner, and (2) the NW corner itself as described by Rich. I have not been satisfied with the Morphis' account of Dickinson "the peculiar cap" for a long time. As has been pointed out Dickinson and Crockett stayed in the same house for about 10 days prior to the siege, she had to know what the famous man looked like, yet in her statement to the Texas Adjutant General she said she BELIEVED Crockett was killed - not that she saw his body. I honestly believe that Crockett and his peculiar cap was an embellismemt added by Morphis - placing Crockett near the only portion of the Alamo still standing. I agree.
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Post by mjbrathwaite on Sept 15, 2013 18:28:46 GMT -5
The version we have of the statement to the Texas Adjutant is only a second-hand version from 40 years later, and the way it has been reported could be a distortion of what was said. She could have been asked if she thought Crockett was killed and just replied in the affirmative. From my own experience, I'm aware of the extent to which statements taken down by reporters or public officials can misquote one, especially when they have no particular knowledge of or interest in the subject. Morphis seems to me to have had more interest in establishing exactly what happened.
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Post by Herb on Sept 15, 2013 18:38:44 GMT -5
Ah, but the Morphis account is also only a second hand account 40 years after the fact.
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Post by Rich Curilla on Sept 16, 2013 12:28:43 GMT -5
The version we have of the statement to the Texas Adjutant is only a second-hand version from 40 years later, and the way it has been reported could be a distortion of what was said. She could have been asked if she thought Crockett was killed and just replied in the affirmative. From my own experience, I'm aware of the extent to which statements taken down by reporters or public officials can misquote one, especially when they have no particular knowledge of or interest in the subject. Morphis seems to me to have had more interest in establishing exactly what happened. I still stand solidly behind what I said above, but I would fully agree that we need to be careful in accepting these sworn statements as "truth and nothing but the truth." I have looked askance at this and other court interviews with survivors, not just due to willful alteration on the part of the interviewer but because, probably without meaning to, the interviewer is putting words in Susanna's mouth. The only possible way to clearly understand what she is saying (and not saying) is to see the questions as well as the answers.
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Post by Herb on Sept 16, 2013 13:01:25 GMT -5
Rich, agree with your statement, but that's true of all accounts to include first hand ones. The weighing of evidence is problematic no matter what the source or the era.
That said, I'm still more cautious of accepting an account written in the age of yellow journalism by somebody attempting to sell the story versus a report for the senior military official in Texas, and yes the Adjutant General in Texas was still primarily a military position in 1876.
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Post by Rich Curilla on Sept 16, 2013 15:07:55 GMT -5
...an account written in the age of yellow journalism by somebody attempting to sell the story... Oh, you mean today. LOL.
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Post by Herb on Sept 16, 2013 16:10:00 GMT -5
...an account written in the age of yellow journalism by somebody attempting to sell the story... Oh, you mean today. LOL. How's it go, "he that doesn't learn from history is doomed to repeat it" ?
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Post by Rich Curilla on Sept 16, 2013 20:30:38 GMT -5
How's it go, "he that doesn't learn from history is doomed to repeat it" ? That's it. And now-a-days, I don't even think the word "history" is in young people's cell phone vocabulary.
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