Exodus From the Alamo: The Anatomy of the Last Stand Myth (32 page)

Despite the stain on his record, Cós’ relative youth veiled the fact that, in the October 1835 words of George Fisher, “he is a man of experience” in the art of war. In leading Santa Anna’s assault columns in striking the west wall, General Cós now possessed the opportunity to prove his worth as a commander on the offensive, instead of bottled-up in the Alamo.
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Santa Anna’s burning desire to wipe out the garrison was also predicated on the fact that Travis had been pressured by his men, who naturally did not want to die for nothing, into either attempting an escape or making a desperate, last-minute offer to surrender all arms, artillery, and munitions “with the only condition of saving his life and that of all his comrades in arms,” wrote General Filisola. Ironically, these were the same terms that Cós and his men had received, and it seemed possible that such an honorable surrender might yet be granted to the defenders—or so they hoped.
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In total, Santa Anna planned to unleash around 1,400 of his best, most experienced soldiers in a general assault. Santa Anna’s finest soldiers had been trained in a set of military principles articulated by one of Napoleon’s finest generals, the hard-hitting Marshal Nicholas-Jean de Dieu Soult, who led his crack IV Corps in the emperor’s greatest “military masterpiece” at Austerlitz.
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Most important, however, was the plan to launch the attack under the cover of darkness. This tactic was a rarity in the annals of Napoleonic warfare. In military operations, then as today, nothing is more difficult than a night attack. Santa Anna displayed his strategic innovation by planning such an attack to overwhelm the Alamo as quickly as possible, before the garrison could rally or perhaps even awaken in time.

Santa Anna was not only familiar with night operations, but also excelled at this rare military art. A large part of his success in repulsing the Spanish from Mexican soil in summer 1829 was his relentless nighttime attacks around Tampico, near where the Spanish invasion force had landed in July. Santa Anna’s offensive operations in darkness helped to convince stunned Spanish commanders to capitulate that September, ending Spain’s ambitious invasion and reconquest attempt. Always unsuspected by his opponents, a well-honed secret weapon for Santa Anna and a key element of his tactical repertoire, the unexpected hardhitting nighttime attack bestowed the “brilliance of Santa Anna’s triumph [that] was so dazzling” to the Mexican nation.
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But Santa Anna had also learned a lesson in the steamy, coastal lowlands of Tampico when on Sepember 11, he hurled repeated attacks against a fortified position without his men even gaining the parapet. Demonstrating his trademark impatience, he committed nearly a dozen assaults before the Spanish decided it was best to capitulate rather than be overwhelmed. Having learned those lessons well, Santa Anna had now adjusted his tactics, developing a masterful battle plan that was calculated to reap a swift victory, with only a single overpowering assault from multiple directions in the predawn darkness of March 6.
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Relying on what worked best, the old Zacatecas plan that brought an overwhelming victory against a powerful opponent in terms of sheer numbers and artillery, was also about to be repeated. On May 11, 1835, he had launched his attack at 2:00 a.m., catching thousands of militiamen completely by surprise, reaping an astounding victory.
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Even more, the cagey Santa Anna planned to attack on a Sunday. He knew that this was normally a day of rest and worship for the trapped Protestants, who needed to get closer to their God and desired a respite now more than ever before. Garrison members would almost certainly be even more ill-prepared on Sunday, resulting in more feeble resistance.

Additionally, Santa Anna took lessons from Cós’ recent defeat at San Antonio, incorporating successful Texian tactics. Catching the Mexicans troops by surprise, Neill and his Texian artillerymen had moved into position under the cover of darkness to strike the first blow at 3:00 a.m., while Cós and his boys slept soundly. Neill had fired his first shot from a cannon at 5:00 a.m., when it was still dark, signaling two columns to launch their attack that had eventually forced Cós’ surrender, after he had retired all of his forces into the Alamo’s trap.

Even though four Mexican assault columns planned to strike the Alamo at different points along the perimeter, most of Santa Anna’s strength would be directed at the battered north wall, despite largely ineffective attempts to batter it with artillery fire. For instance, a sizeable strategic reserve of 400 elite soldados was likewise poised before the north wall, behind the frontline troops of Colonel Dúque’s column. Ironically, this weakness did not extend only along the commonly believed 40–60 foot section of the north wall, but in fact along its entire length. The entire perimeter had to be strengthened by an “elaborate wood outer-work cribbing,” built up with earth and wood to support the crumbling north wall by reinforcing its front, thanks to the damage inflicted largely by the 1835 cannonade from some of the very artillerymen—Captain Carey’s gunners of the New Orleans Greys—who had hammered the north wall during San Antonio’s siege. Likewise this outer work, yet incomplete, stood along the entire north wall’s length, unlike along the other three perimeters. And as opposed to elsewhere along the compound’s perimeter, no buildings bolstered the length of the north wall, leaving it relatively weak and vulnerable.
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But while artillery had played a key role in reaping victory at the Alamo in December 1835, Santa Anna would not order his cannon to open fire to soften up the Alamo before unleashing his general assault. Indicating a well-conceived battle plan, this was not only a wise tactical decision, but also a calculated one, to play upon the garrison’s greatest vulnerabilities: its overall exhausted state, inexperienced leadership, and the lack of training and discipline.

Seeming to have an intimate knowledge of Travis’ weaknesses, Santa Anna also gambled that when his artillery stopped firing in the afternoon, leaving all quiet on the night of March 5, this unprecedented artillery pause would not signal Travis to heighten extra vigilance among the garrison. In this regard, Santa Anna had calculated correctly, revealing just how well he knew his opponent. Instead of questioning if the silence was a wily ploy to literally lull the garrison into a sense of false security, Travis would allow his boys to sleep during the early hours of March 6. After all, they had been worn down, not only by strengthening the north wall at night, but also by Santa Anna’s waging of psychological warfare—continuous bombardment, Mexican bands playing music, and having his troops raise cheers—for nearly the past two weeks, which was effective in fraying the defenders’ nerves. But throughout the siege, Santa Anna’s most clever deception was to order cheering and musketry almost hourly during each nighttime bombardment, making the defenders believe that he was launching a night attack. The overall goal had been “to keep every American in position ready to repel the attack, thus through loss of sleep and increasing anxiety unfitting him for the final struggle.”

While the defenders were fast asleep on the night of March 5, Mexican troops were preparing for battle. The chosen soldiers of the attack columns had received orders to “turn in after the night’s prayer’s as they will form their columns at midnight” for the assault. By this time, the worn Alamo garrison was in no shape or condition to adequately defend the old mission—especially the weak north wall. As Travis’ slave, Joe, later recalled after the bombardment that had steadily pounded the Alamo: “The Garrison was much exhausted by hard labor [in strengthening the works] and incessant watching and fighting for thirteen days.”
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While the Alamo garrison remained unvigilant in the early morning hours of March 6, Santa Anna was up early. He was busy, just like Napoleon in his prime, especially the night before Austerlitz when the French emperor had walked among the troops to inspire his soldiery. And like Napoleon, who wore a green tunic covered by a grey overcoat in Russia, he very likely now wore his trademark campaign coat—a green frock coat—to ward off the cold. Confidently, as if knowing the defenders could be swiftly overwhelmed on this chilly morning, Santa Anna had already boasted that he would “take his breakfast” in a fallen Alamo, once Mexican regimental and battalion battle flags and the national tricolor were flying proudly from its walls, after every man inside the compound had been put to death.
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Thanks to a well-conceived battle plan, meeting this tactical objective would be relatively easy, even if the garrison were not caught by surprise by the sudden attack out of the early morning blackness. Not only was the Alamo manned by far too few soldiers, but they lacked training, discipline, and munitions for a solid defense, even if everyone was ready, waiting, and in position for the attack. Because the Texas government had focused on buying tons of supplies, such as weaponry and munitions, for the future Regular Army of Texas, the Alamo volunteers—the revolution’s stepchildren—continued to go without almost everything. While warm uniforms, shoes, and blankets were stockpiled, and new muskets were stacked in neat rows to fill storehouses for future regular troops, the Alamo’s volunteers continued to lack proper clothing and went hungry, while wondering why both the Texas government and Texas people had abandoned them like sacrificial lambs.
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Finally, like a chess player, Santa Anna made his first move. Four columns of well-prepared Mexican troops moved stealthily forward over the bare landscape around 1:00 a.m. toward their assigned positions on the prairie, as designated by the commander-in-chief. With as little noise as possible, grim-faced soldados pushed quietly forward into the night, easing ever closer to the eerily silent walls of the Alamo now shrouded in darkness. An anonymous Mexican soldier of General Cós’ column that had slipped unnoticed across the flat ground and toward the west wall, wrote how: “After a roundabout approach we stopped at 3:00 A.M. on the [west] side, about 300 paces” from the Alamo.
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Incredibly, in the cold blackness of the open prairie, 1,400 Mexican troops now lay down in attack positions on the open ground within easy striking distance of the Alamo—after some minor obstacles had been quietly removed—without detection. Here, they awaited the inevitable signal to charge forward. Especially out in the open, this winter night was cold and windy. Rolling, dark clouds hid the moonlight, but provided sufficient light for soldados to make necessary final preparations for the attack. The younger men, especially those with relatively little battle experience, tried to stay awake in the cold and remained more nervous than the hardened veterans in the ranks. Gusting prairie winds gently rustled the nearby clumps of grass in the pale moonlight. A Godsend, the winds had masked the relatively little noise rising from the advancing columns.
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Santa Anna had developed a plan to minimize his losses because he knew that his late winter Texas campaign had only barely begun. Envisioning a vigorous spring campaign, he was now planning to drive the Anglo-Celts and their heretical civilization all the way to the Sabine River and out of Texas before the spring rains descended upon the land. Like a good student of Napoleonic history, Santa Anna had learned of Napoleon’s abundant mistakes in 1812 in marching across the steppes of Russia on the road to Moscow. Despite the summer season, Russian rains had played a role in slowing the advance, spreading sickness, and wearing out both men and horses. Santa Anna therefore demonstrated considerable wisdom in deciding not to invade Texas too late in the year, so as not to be slowed by spring rains. This decision also ensured that if the war against Texas developed into a lengthy conflict, or even a war of attrition, the Mexican troops would not face the worst winter weather in late 1836. Delaying too long in a foreign land, hundreds of miles from support systems, was a classic error that had led to Napoleon’s defeat. In fact, some Anglo-Celtic soldiers in Texas now believed that the key to victory lay in utilizing the Russians’ 1812 strategy, luring Santa Anna deeper into Texas.

While the Alamo’s defenders rested blissfully in their first undisturbed sleep since the siege’s beginning, dark masses of carefully chosen Mexican troops made final preparations to attack. In the cold darkness only “a short distance from the first trenches,” the Mexican’s dark blue uniforms helped them blend into the winter blackness that covered the silent prairie like a shroud. Demonstrating excellent discipline, hundreds of Mexican soldiers remained absolutely quiet amid the biting cold and breezes that cut to the bone in the damp air, while patiently awaiting the attack signal.

On the open prairie, no shelter existed for Santa Anna’s troops from the harsh winter winds sweeping down the open river valley. Not a warming fire or even a pipe could be lit. The soldados suffered and shivered in disciplined silence, while embracing a grim fatalism that was a distinctive characteristic of the Mexican peasant—both Indian and Mestizo—who had been exploited for so long by autocratic military, church, and political leaders. Ensuring that they would be ready for the signal to attack, these foremost troops now possessed no blankets to ward off the biting cold, more frigid than anything they had felt in Mexico. The thin wool uniforms—made for summer campaigns in Mexico’s heat and humidity—offered only meager protection from winter’s harsh breath on this near-freezing night, though Santa Anna had taken the wise precaution to ensure that all assault troops now wore “shoes or sandals.” Along with their Catholic God, ancient Mayan Gods, or Lady of Guadalupe, these young men from all parts of Mexico had placed their trust in their aristocratic commander and his tactical wisdom: a faith that would not be betrayed on March 6. But more important, Santa Anna had his young soldados highly motivated and ready for action. They now tightly gripped their heavy Brown Bess muskets—known as the
morena licha
—as Santa Anna had ordered, “All armaments [to be] in good shape—especially the bayonets.”
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