The Southwestern Historical Quarterly, Volume 63, July 1959 - April, 1960 Page: 100
684 p. : ill., maps, ports. ; 23 cm.View a full description of this periodical.
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oo Southwestern Historical Quarterly
agreeably-work [at carpentering] all day and spent the night at
some publick discourse or lecture." He sent home Volume I,
No. i, of the Austin City Gazette, Austin's first newspaper, and
write enthusiastic prophecies of the city's prospects, but some-
time before Christmas of 1839, he moved to Austin County and
then to Fayette County, and by July of 1840 was located at Ruters-
ville reporting to his father that "teachers were much in quest"
and could "generally obtain a fair price for their labours."
Scarcity of money, high prices, Indians "cutting up the turf" on
the frontier, made him consider briefly a return to Tennessee, but
a teaching job paid him $40 per month and he wanted to improve
his financial condition a bit before he faced his creditors back
home. The longer he remained in Texas, the better seemed his
prospects, even if his work was broken by periodic Indian alarms.
In 1841 he became a tutor at Rutersville College, where he
planned also to complete his own education until he could "obtain
at least a respectable standing in the literary world."
Late in 1841 young Bell sought advice from his father as to
which church he should join and whether or not he should pick
a particular young lady with whom "to spend the remnant of
my days." Early in 1842 his mind was on more militant matters
as he joined "every student in the college that was 15 years of
age" in an expedition to repel the Mexican invaders under Rafael
Vdsquez, who had captured San Antonio. The marauders had re-
treated to the Rio Grande by the time the Texas expeditionary
force reached San Antonio, and Bell got a three-week trip, a
view of the dilapidated missions, and a determination to join in
repulsing any further Mexican incursions. His opportunity came
in the following September, when he joined the Texas forces
which gathered to avenge Adrian Woll's seizure of San Antonio.
As a member of the Mier Expedition, Bell drew a white bean in
the lottery at Salado, worked on the roads at Tacubaya, and wrote
letters home from the Castle of Perote.
As did other Mier captives, Bell resented the apparent indif-
ference of Texas to the sufferings of imprisoned Texas soldiers,
and when he was finally released in September of 1844, he has-
tened, not to Texas, but to his family in Tennessee. There he
resumed his teaching profession and, like Thomas Jefferson
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Texas State Historical Association. The Southwestern Historical Quarterly, Volume 63, July 1959 - April, 1960, periodical, 1960; Austin, Texas. (https://texashistory.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metapth101186/m1/130/: accessed March 29, 2024), University of North Texas Libraries, The Portal to Texas History, https://texashistory.unt.edu; crediting Texas State Historical Association.