Submitted by triviafrenzy t3_11c65tb in todayilearned
Very succinct. The Alamo was lost against orders. Retreat to better redoubts was the subjectively better action at the time. Regardless, it was turned into a rallying cry to this day. Most people, including Texans, do not understand the nature of the sacrifice that was made.
Growing up, we talked about it a lot. But since it was Texas we just talked about the “rumor” of Houston abandoning the Alamo, because to say it as truth undermined Texan identity. It was a weird thing that even as 9 YOs we treated it like that.
Houston didn't reign in his troops at the final stages of San Jacinto because of all the Texian troops put to the sword at the Alamo & the lesser known Battle of Goliad.
Remember, the Texians & the Alamo defenders were fighting to preserve slavery in Texas.
I wouldn’t call that a “sacrifice”.
they really were. they wanted independence from mexico because the mexican 1824 Constitution prohibited slavery and of course all those southern US transplants didn't want to live anywhere without their good old chattel slavery system.
Care to explain why the first Texas revolution flag was the 1824 flag demanding a return to the constitution?
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:1824_Flag.svg
Santa Ana ignored the 1824 constitution (actually repealed it!) and turned Mexico into a military dictatorship.
Austin may have been pro slavery, but Houston wasn’t.
Mexico wasn't a military dictatorship, there was a huge public reaction against federalism and the elected Congress decided to change the constitution.
I'm not talking about Austin OR Houston- I'm talking about the vision for Texas.
Pre-Revolution you had 4 people arguing who was in command.
After the Revolution was rapidly changed by the people who moved there. Hell, poor Juan Seguin had to flee because of transplants moving to San Antonio being assholes (and Santa Ana’s men).
Pretending there was a singular motivation before, during and after I think is a bit much.
Also pretending Santa Ana was a good guy, is the weirdest Reddit retcon of history I’ve seen. Seriously, I’ll buy you a plane ticket to Chiapas to go around and tell people you think he was a good guy, and was someone everyone should have been willing to live under his rule!
For unrelated reasons can you fax over your dental records first.
Santa Ana put people to the sword who surrendered under a white flag. He was a war criminal and a despot.
Yeah, that was the law in Mexico, foreigners who raised weapons against the Mexican nation should be treated as pirates and summarily executed. They captured a newcomer group in Copano and since they surrendered and didn't fight they were spared.
The law was repealed before the battle of San Jacinto, where the Americans shot people who surrendered under a white flag.
Mind you, Santa Anna's army treated civilians better than the American army in the Mexican American war, there were plenty of atrocities against civilians back then, including the rape and pillage of Huamantla.
Calling it a law that Santa Anna demanded when he was a despot and had control of the government is a bit of a stretch. Hitler had all kinds of laws passed that didn’t make them fairly unethical war crimes.
Goliad was a massacre that even the Mexican commander didn’t want to commit and begged Santa Anna to back down on.
See, the problem here is that you already decided that Santa Anna was a despost in ,when any cursory knowledge of Mexican politics and history would tell you that back then Santa Anna wouldn't even exercise the authority he had as the elected president, preferring to spend his time between his Hacienda or in military campaigns. When the Tornell Decree was voted for Congress he was already in San Luis Potosi organizing the Texas campaign. The law was repealed a few days before the battle of San Jacinto.
Also treating filibusters as pirates was the standard back then. Wasn't worse than what happened in San Jacinto.
I love how varied the up/downvote ratios are below
It bought 13 days for the rest of the Army to go north and burn supplies behind them. Santa Ana divided his army as he went north and was having supply chain challenges. Probably true a retreat was a better idea but they were trying to control moral. Sam Houston was forced to fight or he was going to be removed as commander, and the scrape was at risk of becoming a poorly managed shambolic retreat to Louisiana.
Wasn't the retreat towards Louisiana an attempt to bait Santa Ana to follow the Texian army into the United States where Sam Houston and Andrew Jackson had arranged the U.S. military to be waiting?
They started moving North AFTER they heard of the Alamo falling.
yeah a sacrifice was made in the name of slavery fuck all those dudes
Yep.
Sherman’s only mistake was not turning west after Savannah.
Prove it.
Prove what? Mexico had already abolished slavery and the Texas white colonists had slaves. Texas also joined the Confederacy 30 years later. The Texas Revolution was in large part a fight to preserve slavery.
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Nah.
Another important point is that the Texas Revolution came at a time when many other parts of the Mexican empire were also trying to revolt and break away.
Santa Ana was not the best leader.
Though for pretty different reasons!
What are you talking about?
Santa Anna suspended the Mexican constitution and became a dictator. This lead to multiple revolutions. The Texas revolution was the only successful one.
The other revolutions weren’t to preserve slavery? I’m just saying they happened at the same time but there’s different forces and motivations involved
I only know the Alamo for two things: 1) Ozzy pissing on it 2) PeeWee Herman traveling to Texas to recover his missing bike from the Alamo’s basement
That’s all you need to know.
The rest of it is pretty miserable.
As a proud Texan who lives in San Antonio. I would like to respectfully state. REMEMBER THE ALAMO!
Come and take it.
That's Gonzales.
Yes.
The Battle of Gonzales centered on American colonists in that town who were refusing to give back a cannon (the one on the flag) back to Mexican soldiers that they had received in 1831 to fend off Natives in the area. They wanted it now to defend themselves from Mexican General Antonio López de Santa Anna's increasingly aggressive actions against the colonists.
Those pesky Natives, acting like they were fighting for their ancestral lands.
Tsk tsk.
Santa Anna’s aggressive…enforcement of the abolition of slavery in Mexico.
The what now?
It’s famous for having bike storage in its basement
THE ALAMO MUTHA FUCKA!!!!!
Huh, never heard of it.
The war was about introducing slavery to Texas, which Mexican law forbade. However, Steve F Austin was hell bent on bringing slaves to Texas so that’s in short why the Alamo was ever a thing in the first place.
To be more specific, it was about preserving slavery which had been a de facto practice since euro-american settlers were induced to the area in the early 1820s. Technically it was already illegal, but many of the settlers simply wrote up “contracts” for all the slaves that they were bringing from the states (and importing from Cuba and Africa for several decades after importing slaves was banned in the US) of 99 years, so that legally they were free (but indentured) workers. In practice it was literally just slavery with extra steps.
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Texians were Anglo-American residents of Mexican Texas and, later, the Republic of Texas. Today, the term is used to identify early settlers of Texas, especially those who supported the Texas Revolution. Mexican settlers of that era are referred to as Tejanos, and residents of modern Texas are known as Texans.
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The huge memorial they built in commemoration outside Houston ist quite impressive. Although the mirror pond is being reclaimed by nature
Used to take field trips there as a little kid
“Remember the Alamo” hit different back in the day
You see, Bobby, your daddy's gene'ation's givin' away everything we fought for! Pannyma Canal. Mexican legs.
I thought we kept the leg
It's a reference to a delightful episode of King of the Hill. Then again, most episodes with Cotton make me laugh out loud.
Thank god they won and defended slavery
and it was all in the name of enslaving other people
I read that Houston only attacked after he learned that Santa Anna had split his forces, and that he moved rapidly to attack the weaker part once he learned that. Also, that he waited until Santa Anna had advanced so far his supply lines were stretched.
Disgusting that all the comments condemning the Texans' pro-slavery stance are downvoted. You people are really showing your true, ugly colors there.
Racism and slavery are ugly and hateful. Commenting that the fight for Texas' independence was a fight to preserve slavery, three decades before the Civil War, is asinine.
Pretty much everyone wanted slavery back then. How else would they make money if they had to pay people to do work?
Fiesta San Antonio!
Remember the Alamo!
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I live 30 minutes from there.
So why the fuck don't
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George Santos had a plan for Sam Houston and beat the mexicans almost singlehandedly!
Guess the Texans were pissed.
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Yay. I guess.
This victory preserved slavery for another several decades so not really
This is a massacre
A reverse Alamo.
Yay, the Texans got to keep their slaves.
you should not be down voted for this
I knew i would though. It was a main reason for the texans revolting.
yep. In Texas history we're taught that Texians revolted because Santa Ana violated the constitution of 1824. What they don't teach is that the part he violated was the part that allowed for slavery. Also left out the part where American slave owners/slavery supporters were moved into the state just to help tip the scale.
Slavery played a part, but the Texan Revolution was a part of a larger, general set of insurrections within Mexico at the time (the Mexican Federalist War) against Santa Anna.
Slavery was absolutely a cause, but the general trigger was the increasing centralization of the Mexican government. It wasn't that they violated the constitution, but that they replaced it with a centralist one in 1835.
in Texas it was slavery. It was an entire imperialist production by American slave owners
The vast majority of the soldiers who fought in the battle of San Jacinto didn't even live in Texas before the revolt
Very clear people are not aware Texas broke away from Mexico at least partially to keep slaver legal. There were other issues they had with Mexico's government, but a very clear effect of the Texans winning was slavery continuing in the area until the U.S. civil war ended.
They are aware at some level. They just don't remember.
They don't want to.
Don't Remember why they were fighting at The Alamo!
Only to join the United States, which would also outlaw slavery. Such bad luck!
Screw houston
DJ Screw, Houston!
R.I.P. SCREW
No you!
And yet today Texan's favour men who run away and abandon them at the first sign of trouble.
Texas the coward state!
We hate Ted Cruz too, the state is just too gerrymandered for anything else to really happen.
Why is this being downvoted?
It’s absolutely true.
It's cool that you just learned about it.
They were able to inflict such lopsided losses by attacking the camp in the middle of the night while everyone was asleep, which was against the generally accepted rules of war at the time.
Not exactly. They attacked in the middle of the afternoon while the Mexicans were taking a siesta.
If anything this is really a condemnation of naptime.
You can take my naps from my cold dead pillows.
You know what's also against the rules of war? Massacring POWs, which Santa Anna did twice at the Alamo and Goliad. Santa Anna was fighting a dirty war and it's on him that he posted no guards when going down for siesta.
Now do John Brown.
> You know what's also against the rules of war
The tear gas cops use on demonstrators exercising their constitutional rights.
I fail to see the relevance.
Also, this is a pet peeve of mine. Chemical irritants are banned in war because, before they were, people would make incredibly powerful irritants that would put people in the hospital for days (sulfur mustard). Tear gas is painful and nothing else, and would honestly probably be fine in war if it weren't for the risk of escalation. We've actually seen it recently in Ukraine being dropped from drones, first by Russia and now by Ukraine, and nobody's raising too much of a fuss about it.
In terms of crowd control, it has its uses. Just like every other tool the police have, it's not about the fact that they use it, it's the fact that they use it when they shouldn't. I say this as somebody who has been gassed while protesting.
Your "generally accepted rules of war" are just delusional fantasy. In any case, the Texans attacked at 4:30 in the afternoon. The reasons for the lopsided losses were the mistakes that Santa Anna made.
Pretty sure executing all the POW’s was against accepted rules of war at the time too. Mexican army fucked around and found out.
DoomGoober t1_ja21r1u wrote
It's also worth knowing that Sam Houston ordered the Alamo abandoned as it was not worth defending and had little strategic value.
Texians didn't have enough pack animals to remove the cannon, so they left them there. Then a bunch of men decided to defy Houston's orders and defend the Alamo anyway.
The Mexicans outnumbered the Texians and defeated the Texians. The Mexican command decided to execute all of the Alamo defenders, even though most of the Mexicans preferred to take them captive.
Houston used the murder of the Alamo defenders as a rallying cry for support and he was able to raise a larger army, leading to the eventual defeat of the Mexicans.
So, while the Alamo was meant to be abandoned, it ended up playing an outsized role in the war.