Alamo Defenders Knew They Were Doomed
Many believe that Alamo defenders knew from the beginning that they were doomed. Travis did not enter the fort to achieve a glorious death but to hold it until reinforcements arrived. He made that clear in his famous letter of February 24: “Then, I call on you in the name of Liberty, of patriotism & everything dear to the American character, to come to our aid, with all dispatch.” He was not, as many have asserted, delusional.
As the siege continued and none of the promised aid appeared, Travis became anxious, then angry. On March 3, he wrote to the delegates of the Independence Convention then assembled in the Town of Washington:
Col. Fannin is said to be on the march to this place with reinforcements. But I fear it is not true, as I have repeatedly sent to him for aid without receiving any. . . . I look to the colonies alone for aid; unless it arrives soon, I shall have to fight the enemy on his own terms. I will, however, do the best I can under the circumstances.
Later the same day, Travis revealed even more bitterness in a letter to his friend Jesse Grimes: “I am determined to perish in the defense of this place, and my bones shall reproach my country for her neglect.”
This prompts an obvious question: Why did Texian leaders ignore Travis’s repeated calls for assistance? Texans dislike admitting it, but the provisional government that should have—and could have—organized relief efforts had fallen apart because of its bickering, dissention, and discord. On March 1, when Texian delegates finally assembled in the Town of Washington to organize a new government, it was too late for the men besieged inside the Alamo. They were as much victims of political malfeasance as enemy bayonets. Having received “assurances that every possible effort is making to strengthen, supply and provision the Garrison,” Travis found it difficult to accept that his superiors had placed him and his men in harm’s way only to forsake them through sheer ineptness and indifference. Even so, it happened.
Travis was not, as some have insisted, a zealot with a death wish. The men of the Alamo were not part of an obsessive death cult; nor were they Japanese kamikazes bent on ritual suicide. Such fanaticism was no part of their cultural tradition. The defenders were citizen soldiers. They may have been willing to die for their country but that was never their aspiration. They fervently prayed that such a sacrifice would prove unnecessary.
It never occurred to them to join “in an immortal pact to give their lives.” That knowledge makes their sacrifice more, not less, heroic. When their political leaders neglected them, Travis and his garrison did as they promised. They fought the enemy on “his own terms” and did the best they could “under the circumstances.” What more could anyone possibly ask of them?