True tales of valor emerged from the Alamo

No event in San Antonio history overshadows the 1836 siege and battle at the Alamo in prominence, folklore and true tales of heroism.

The 13-day standoff and predawn battle on March 6, 1836, generated countless stories of valor on all sides of the conflict, a pivotal event of the 1835-36 revolution that helped established Texas as an independent republic before U.S. statehood began in 1845.

Notable groups among the 189 known defenders of the old mission compound were 32 Tennessee volunteers, including frontiersman and former congressman David Crockett, and “The Immortal 32” from Gonzales who reached the Alamo five days before the battle. All of the defenders, possibly more than 250, died in battle or were executed; about 300 to 500 Mexican troops were killed or wounded.

The relief force from Gonzales included the youngest known defender, William Philip King, who died less than five months after his 15th birthday. He is said to have manned a cannon at the Alamo.

In his book, “A Time to Stand,” Walter Lord described King as a tall, thin boy who “begged to go in place of his father.”

“The elder King was badly needed at home; after all, there were nine children to feed,” Lord wrote. “William was sure he could do just as well — he was the oldest, all of 15.”

The Alamo commander, Lt. Col. William Barret Travis, a 26-year-old lawyer from South Carolina, penned a famous letter that still exists as a testament to the passion and courage of the defenders, pleading for help for his outnumbered force, surrounded by at least 1,500 troops under the command of Mexican Gen. Antonio López de Santa Anna.

“If this call is neglected, I am determined to sustain myself as long as possible and die like a soldier who never forgets what is due to his own honor and that of his country — Victory or Death,” Travis wrote.

Travis was among the first to fall in the battle. His slave, a man named Joe who survived, later recounted that Travis fired at least one shot from the Alamo’s north wall before he was hit in the head by a musket ball.

Other key defenders included local Tejano natives Gregorio Esparza and José Toribio Losoya. Both participated in the December 1835 Siege of Bexar, which resulted in a Mexican surrender and withdrawal, setting the stage for the epic confrontation at the Alamo.

Losoya’s family had lived in a two-room stone house, a former mission Indian dwelling at the southwest corner of the Alamo compound. He served in the Mexican army but deserted by 1835, and enlisted in a company of Tejanos under Juan Seguín, who left the Alamo as a courier two days into the siege. Losoya, believed to have had his wife and three children keeping refuge at the Alamo, was found dead in the church after the battle.

During the siege, Esparza was given a choice to flee with his wife, Ana Esparza, and their four children. He chose to stay, according to accounts from his son, Enrique Esparza, who lived until 1917 and was considered the last living witness of the battle.

“No, I will stay and die fighting,” said the elder Esparza, who manned a cannon in the church, according to his son’s account, reported by the San Antonio Daily Express in 1907.

“My mother then said: 'I will stay by your side, and with our children, die too. They will soon kill us. We will not linger in pain,’” Enrique Esparza recounted 71 years after the battle.

Gregorio Esparza died fighting, but “struck down one of his foes as he fell in the heap of slain,” his son recalled.

Unlike the other defenders whose bodies were burned, Esparza was the only one given a burial. His brother, a Mexican soldier who did not fight in the battle, had Santa Anna’s permission to bury him in the Campo Santo, in the area of today’s Milam Park downtown.

Esparza’s family and other survivors of the battle — non-combatant women, children and slaves — appeared before Santa Anna and were spared, as proof that those who abided by his laws had nothing to fear. Santa Anna’s capture at San Jacinto 46 days later would end the war and secure independence for Texas.

Though many of their names are not known, combatants on the Mexican side also demonstrated courage and patriotism at the Alamo. Scholars who have studied the 90-minute battle have noted the deeds of Lt. José María Torres, who died changing the colors that flew there that morning.

Lord’s account described an enraged Torres eyeing the light blue silk banner of the New Orleans Grays on the roof of what now is the Long Barrack, and climbing to replace it with a Mexican tricolor, undeterred by the lifeless bodies of three sergeants who had fallen in similar attempts.

“As Texan bullets whined around him, he ran over and ripped it down; then planted the Mexican colors instead,” Lord wrote. “Lt. Damasco Martinez, who arrived to help, was killed beside him; and next instant Torres himself was shot to death. No one moved any longer on the barracks roof, but the flag that now flew in the morning breeze was red, white and green — with the angry eagle of Centralist Mexico.”

Perhaps equally courageous, and critical to the battle, were the actions of Mexican Brig. Gen. Juan Valentín Amador, who led the first troops over the north wall. In “Texian Iliad,” author Stephen L. Hardin wrote of Amador scaling a 12-foot section of the wall, challenging his men to follow. Once inside, they found a postern and “swung it open” for Mexican troops to stream through, forcing the defenders to fall back.

“From that moment, the outcome of the assault was never in doubt,” Hardin recounted.

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