Custer at the Alamo (34 page)

Crockett sat on his horse gazing at the battlefield. I heard a low whistle.

“Not a one of them is shootin,’” Crockett said.

“Surprised?” I asked.

“Damned surprised.”

“There’s always a hush before the curtain rises,” I said, my heart pounding. I had often ridden into battle with sabers flashing, but this was quite different.

“Command, take your positions!” I yelled. “Band, strike up the Gerry Owen! Forward march!”

And so the Seventh Cavalry marched down the Alameda in good order, rifles on their shoulders with heads held high. Hughes had picked his musicians well, performing a rousing version of the old Irish drinking ballad. And then, suddenly, the men started singing. I could not help but join in, knowing that the enemy, and our allies, must think us crazed.

As the trees along the Alameda receded, I took my boys straight ahead toward the old wooden bridge crossing the San Antonio River. With a nod, Crockett peeled off with the Texian volunteers, heading for the lunette guarding the south gate. They were not marching with military precision, but doing their best.

My skirmishers were watching the Mexican artillery on the left, for they were closest to our position. The faces of our enemies were bemused, if not awed, by my audacity. None made an effort to fire on us, perhaps because they had no orders to cover such an unusual occurrence.

The Alamo on our right grew near enough to recognize the defenders on the walls. They were equally startled. Though their rifles were ready should a fight break out, it did not look like they expected trouble. There was a wide, stone-paved plaza where the roads between the Alamo, the Alameda, and the bridge to San Antonio all intersected. Toward the Alamo eighty yards away, several burned-out hovels showed there had been a skirmish. Crockett had told me he helped burn the shacks to deny the Mexicans cover so close to their walls.

“Command, halt,” I ordered, forming the troops in two squares with the band in front. “Present, arms!”

The men stood in a steady line as if on parade. Though I pretended nonchalance, my Remington lay across my lap ready to shoot the first artillery officer who dared fire on us. Butler and Hughes were similarly disposed, but it soon became clear that Crockett had been right. Santa Anna wanted more victims
in
the Alamo. More fodder for his bloodbath. And even if he decided to open fire, giving the order would take more time than I would give him.

“Gentlemen,
Marching Though Georgia
, if you please,” I ordered.

The band struck up a favorite tune of General Sherman’s, and though I had not the honor to serve on that glorious campaign in 1864, I knew the song well. We stood at attention until the stirring ballad was finished. I sat erect on my mount, an old mare named Daisy, staring across the river as if I didn’t have a care in the world.

Crockett and his men reached the south gate, scrambling through a portal of the lunette into the fort, followed closely by the supply horses. I looked to my left where there was a Mexican battery hardly more than forty yards away. The lieutenant in charge was standing near his cannon but showing no sign of hostility. I even detected a hint of admiration in his eyes. The Mexicans were no slouches when it came to marching and drilling, and in this we shared a common bond.

“Right shoulder, arms!” I shouted. “Right wheel, march!”

Formed in column of twos, the battalion turned toward the Alamo, skirmishers at the rear, and made a steady drive toward the south gate. The burned-out adobes sheltered us on the left. The Mexicans on Powder House Hill were more than a thousand yards away. I lingered behind, being the last to leave, then drew my saber while waiting for the command to reach the fort. Across the river, among the trees lining the bank, I saw a dozen Mexican officers dressed in silver and gold trim. One of them, I supposed, was General Antonio López de Santa Anna. I saluted him and rode into the Alamo. Not a single shot had been fired.

Damn it felt good.

Among the People, it is not unusual for a warrior to give away their possessions when death in battle is certain. Custer had given me his horse, but I did not know if he expected to die. White men do not dwell among the spirits. Then I remembered the legend of a great warrior who saw many enemies coming, but rather than retreat, he pounded a stake into the ground and tied it to his ankle, promising never to run. The warrior was killed in that place, counting many coup, and winning great honor. I wondered if Custer now sought similar glory. I wondered if the Alamo was to be his stake in the ground from which he could not run.

“What the hell was that all about?” Crockett asked as I led my horse across a rough plank bridge into the lunette.

The Alamo was not a castle. It did not have high towers and a drawbridge to protect its gate. The long gatehouse, generally called the low barracks, did not even offer a crenellated wall, forcing the rifleman to expose themselves to enemy fire when standing on the roof. This is why the defenders had built the lunette before the south entrance, hoping to supply some flanking protection.

“I don’t know what you mean, Colonel?” I said, feigning innocence.

Ten of the Alamo defenders stood at their stations within the grimy lunette, their frayed clothes stained with splotches. They were tired, lean in both body and spirit. Santa Anna’s prolonged siege was having the desired effect. Through the gate, I saw that Hughes and Butler were keeping my men in line awaiting orders. My newfound mercenaries were formed up as well, seeking favor by appearing professional. To an extent, it was working.

“You know what I mean!” Crockett protested. “Is that what you learned at West Point? March under the enemy guns in broad daylight, playing at parade?”

“It was your idea.”

“The hell is was.”

“You said that sometimes we can get what we want without fighting, we just need to think about it. Well, I did think about it. And it worked.”

“You’re very proud of yourself, aren’t you?”

“Yes.”

I nodded to the small group of men around us, who were yet to utter a word, and walked with Crockett through the crude gate, the heavy oak doors left open. Twenty or so men were at their posts in the sprawling compound. About forty had rushed to greet us, including William Travis and Green Jameson. They looked thin. Unshaved, except for Travis. One would think that eighty reinforcements would lift their spirits, but this was hardly the case. Santa Anna’s army had pressed them hard since the Seventh Cavalry had ridden out nearly a week before.

“Davy, thank God,” Travis said, rushing to shake Crockett’s hand. “Where’s Houston? Will he be here this afternoon?”

“Houston?” Crockett said, surprised.

“You’re the advance guard, ain’t you?” a burly sergeant asked. “Got to have a thousand men behind you, a comin’ in brass balls like ya did.”

“I don’t know where Houston is. Still back on the Brazos, probably,” Crockett admitted.

“But the rest of the men? Our relief?” Jameson asked.

The Kentucky lawyer turned engineer was more haggard than the rest, exhausted by rebuilding the fortifications that Santa Anna’s artillery kept knocking down. His fine blue coat was tattered.

“General Custer here is the only relief I found. Custer and these volunteers up from Goliad,” Crockett explained.

Travis gazed at the men standing in the courtyard, frowning at the count.

“Fannin has four hundred men, I only see fifty,” Travis said.

“The rest were coming, sir, but they must’ve turned back,” Brister said. “Colonel Fannin believes Urrea is coming up from the south. Maybe he thought he couldn’t spare no more.”

“No one else is coming?” Jameson asked.

“Nothing from Houston. A handful from Fannin. Goddamn them! Goddamn Texas if this is all they’ll send,” Travis said, his fists clenched in frustration.

How the young attorney expected all of Texas to rally in the space of ten days was a mystery to me, for the territory was vast and the eastern colonies hundreds of miles away. I sensed the man’s idealism had gotten the better of him, only to be confronted by a grim reality.

“If that’s the way you feel about it, I reckon we can march back out,” Brister angrily said. “Can’t we, General? Can’t you march us right back out?”

All eyes turned towards me. I had not interjected myself in their conversation, gauging their reactions. The situation was not favorable, and nothing I could say would change that. But I was not without resources.

“Captain Brister, billet your men. Sergeant Hughes, find quarters for ours. Keep everyone to the south side of the fortress,” I calmly instructed. “Mr. Jameson, I’ll need to gut those workshops on the north side. Strip out all the timber and metals. Then . . .”

“Sir, what the hell do you think you’re doing?” Travis asked. “This is
my
command. I give the orders here.”

“Where is Colonel Bowie?” I asked, causing the young man’s face to turn red with resentment.

“Sick. Most likely dying,” Captain Baugh said, pointing to one of the small rooms in the low barracks.

“Mr. Travis, your commission is from the regular army of Texas, a government I don’t recognize,” I said. “The rest of these men are Bowie’s volunteers, my troopers, and the militia who came in with me. How many in this garrison are actually under your direct authority? Ten or twelve?”

“Eighteen,” Travis reluctantly admitted. “But Bowie and I agreed to share command when Colonel Neill left.”

“And what orders are you going to issue? How are you going to save these men’s lives?” I asked.

“Are you sure no one else is coming?” Travis said, turning to Crockett.

Crockett looked down at the ground. He knew I’d sent Tom and Seguin off to find more help, but nothing could be promised.

“Sorry, Bill. For now, we is all thar is,” Crockett answered.

Travis looked around the Alamo with a momentary flash of despair. He had two hundred and fifty men to defend three acres of broken down fort. A few good cannon, but short on powder and shot. Kentucky long rifles were generally accurate up to two hundred yards, but slow to reload and worthless in hand-to-hand fighting. Travis turned to a scrawny youngster holding a French horn.

“Jimmy, call the men together,” he ordered.

Private James Allen, barely twenty years old, blew a call on his trumpet that I didn’t recognize, more gibberish than a military summons, but the garrison responded just the same.

As the defenders of the Alamo began to gather, I noticed an unusually large number of corporals, sergeants, lieutenants and captains. Perhaps because communications were so poor, extra leaders were needed. Or maybe it was just a way to make the volunteers feel more important.

Most of my men had followed Sergeant Hughes towards the long two-story barracks looking for a place to sleep, but now they surged back into the courtyard. The famous Alamo church was behind them. Extending from the church to the low barracks was a log stockade guarded by two cannon overlooking the prairie we had crossed coming in. I stood with Crockett and Jameson, closer to the south gate. In the middle of the Alamo’s southern courtyard, a redoubt had been build for a 6-pounder, and it was near the foot of this low dirt mound that Travis took his position. All but a handful of men gathered around, a few left on the walls to watch for enemy treachery.

The day was growing late, not half an hour left before sunset. As the sun faded, the frosty cold returned, for it had been a gray day marked by stubborn clouds. The firing from Santa Anna’s cannon had paused, and in the distance, I heard a band playing Mexican music. Not the famous
El Degüello,
but just as annoying.

The men were mumbling, wondering what had caused Travis to call them together. James Bonham, the courageous twenty-nine-year-old dispatch rider born in South Carolina, came to Travis’s side with a leather pouch. Kellogg had told me of Bonham. Of all the messengers sent from the Alamo to find help, only Bonham and one other had returned. Like Travis, he was tall and lean with blue eyes and a clear complexion. A popular officer with a winning smile. His loyalty to Travis had brought him back to this place of certain death, just like Tom’s loyalty to me had led him to the Little Big Horn.