Heritage, Volume 3, Number 4, Spring 1986 Page: 32
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over the United States within a few
weeks after the final assault. People
in England and Europe also received
the same information during the following
months. Word of the victory
also became known widely in Mexico.
Quite naturally, the Mexican accounts
differed greatly from the story
as told in Texas and the United
States.
Until recent years most Anglo as well
as Mexican versions of the Alamo
battle failed to emphasize that a
number of Mexicans also died fighting
on the Texan side of the Alamo.
Popular versions of the Alamo story
today still barely mention any black
participation in the battle even
though at least one black man remembered
simply as "John" died in
the final siege. Travis' slave Joe also
fought in the battle after his master's
death but lived through it and Santa
Anna allowed him to leave the Alamo
alive. Joe claimed in an interview
shortly after the battle that a
black woman also died in the melee
on March 6 and several other black
women in the Alamo survived the
last assault.
In the weeks after the Alamo fell the
Mexican army leveled much of the
old mission fortress to insure that another
group of insurgents would not
utilize the site. In the late 1840s the
United States Army repaired some of
the Alamo's ruins including the
chapel and long barracks for adaptive
use. The work included construction
of the familiar parapet on the Alamo's
facade which ironically has become a
symbol of the Alamo. The majority
of the rock and adobe ruins of the
Alamo disappeared during the 1850s
and 1860s as commercial development
began around Alamo Plaza. In
the early 1870s the City of San Antonio
purchased the original gateway
to the Alamo's quadrangle and tore it
down in order to join Alamo Plaza
with Plaza de Valero just south of it.
People in Texas and elsewhere did
not forget the Alamo battle but during
the next four decades newspapers,
periodicals, and books made
scarce mention of the incident in
comparison with initial coverage of it
in 1836. A group of Texans in early
1837 interred what remained of the
Alamo defenders' bones at the three
funeral pyre sites but by 1860 people
in San Antonio unfortunately had
forgotten the burial location.
In spite of the lack of publicity given
the Alamo after 1836 the Alamo
battle became an important component
of a peculiarly Texan variety of
what several scholars in recent years
have described as American civil re32ligion. (Simply put, these scholars
believe an American civil religion
developed in the United States in the
late 1700s and early 1800s in lieu of
an official state religion.) The romantic
intellectual atmosphere
which permeated the United States
by the 1830s undoubtedly provided
the basis for inclusion of the Alamo's
fall into Texas civil religion. In addition,
the writings and other activities
of New Jersey-born Reuben Marmaduke
Potter insured that the Alamo
would remain a part of the unofficial
Texas faith.
Employed in Matamoros when the
Alamo fell, Potter felt inspired to
write a poem entitled "Hymn of the
Alamo" which the Telegraph and
Texas Register published in October
1836. Potter moved to Texas in 1837
and in 1841 to San Antonio, where
he reputedly suggested construction
of and helped design the first Alamo
monument that same year. Later,
Potter became the chief disseminator
of the Alamo's story. His monograph
"The Fall of the Alamo," first published
in 1860 and last revised in
1878, remained the best standard
treatment of the subject from an
Anglo standpoint for nearly a century.
During the painful years of Reconstruction
in the South after the Civil
War, distraught and disillusioned
Southerners looked backward in an
effort to find solace in a glorious past.
In Texas during the same period
many people similarly probed the
state's history and hauled out the Alamo as an example of heroism and
valor with which to help prop up
their sagging egoes.
The vanquished Texan Southerner
did not revere the Alamo heroes
alone because the Alamo remained
a neutral incident in Texas history
without a Northern or Southern
bias. George Washington and the
American Revolution occupied a
similar position for the rest of the
country during the same period.
Also, foreigners in Texas including
especially the large German-born
population seem to have identified
equally with the popular version of
the Alamo story.
Other developments in the 1870s in
Texas also helped activate a renewed
interest in the Alamo. The Texas
Veterans Association organized in
1873 to lobby for pensions and other
benefits for the men who gained
Texas independence, many of whom
lived in indigent circumstances by
that time. The Association also
worked to preserve the memories of
early days in Texas and helped pressure
the legislature into making
March 2 and April 21 state holidays
in 1874. The Centennial of national
independence in 1876 awakened a
new interest in history all over the
country and also helped stimulate a
concern for preserving the past in
Texas.
Of more direct importance, two developments
in 1877 in San Antonio
emphasized the need to preserve
what remained of the Alamo as a historical landmark. The Army began
construction of a new headquarters
at San Antonio in 1876 and started
moving out of the Alamo in 1877,
causing many local people to question
seriously the future of the Alamo.
Interest increased dramatically
after a local mercantile store owner
leased the Alamo chapel and purchased
the buildings north of it from
the Catholic Church in late 1877,
and announced plans to move his
business there.
Early in 1877 the first railroad line to
San Antonio had attained completion,
making possible a tourist and
winter resort industry for the city.
The railroad needed passengers and
San Antonio's businessmen wanted
visitors, so the two entities worked
together to promote such local attractions
as the Alamo. Also, the
Alamo Monument Association organized
in San Antonio in 1879 cooperated
with the Texas Veterans Association
and the city in urging the
State to purchase the Alamo chapel
in 1883.
From 1883 until 1885 the fate of the
Alamo still remained uncertain
while state officials considered several
alternatives concerning who
would take custody of the Alamo
chapel and its future use. Finally, in
1885 over the objections of then
Governor John Ireland the legislature
placed the structure in the custody of
the City of San Antonio to preserve
as a historical museum. Operated as
a tourist attraction, the building fell
into extensive disrepair during the
1890s due to the city's lack of maintenance
as Governor Ireland had
feared in 1885.
In the meantime, the Daughters of
the Republic of Texas formed in 1891
and by 1900 became interested in
preserving the Alamo. Under the
leadership of Miss Adina de Zavala
and Miss Clara Driscoll, the descendants
of early Texans, arranged to
purchase the long barracks portion of
the Alamo and persuaded the legislature
in 1905 to provide funds to
complete the purchase. In appreciation
of the efforts of the Daughters,
the legislature placed the Alamo in
"the custody and care of the Daughters
of the Republic of Texas, to be
maintained by them in good order
and repair, without cost to the
State." This arrangement continues
to the present.
During the nineteenth and early
twentieth centuries books, art, naive
art, and Alamo souvenirs helped
shape and also reflect how people felt
about the Alamo battle. In the twentieth
century these have remained
SPRING 86 * HERITAGEI
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Texas Historical Foundation. Heritage, Volume 3, Number 4, Spring 1986, periodical, March 1, 1986; Austin, Texas. (https://texashistory.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metapth45441/m1/32/: accessed March 28, 2024), University of North Texas Libraries, The Portal to Texas History, https://texashistory.unt.edu; crediting Texas Historical Foundation.