BANCROFT LIBRARY
•o
THE LIBRARY
OF
THE UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA
REPLY
OF
GEN. THOMAS J. GREEN,
TO THE
SPEECH
OF
GENERAL SAM HOUSTON,
IN THE
SENATE OF THE UNITED STATES,
AUGUST 1, 1854.
F
WASHINGTON CITY, February 15#A, 1855.
To THE HONORABLE SENATE
OF THE UNITED STATES :
About the close of the last session of your honorable body, and whilst I was in Texas zealously advocating the building of the Southern Pacific railroad, Sam Houston, one of the Senators from that State, under his senatorial privilege, made an as- sault upon my character, so maliciously false, yea, without a shadow of foundation in truth, that it requires a present notice from me. He made a formal request of the Senate, which was granted, to meet at an earlier hour than usual the next day, to afford him the opportunity of calumniating a private citizen from his senatorial desk; and consequently to have that calumny propagated through the journals and printing patron- age of the Senate — thereby making the Senate the ostentatious endorser of the vilest tissue of falsehoods which ever found their way to public notice through such a channel. It is plain that with these meretricious advantages, and the further sena- torial privilege of having reporters to reduce his bombast to readable grammar, and that printed and franked throughout the country, a private citizen, with both truth and justice upon his side, must appear to disadvantage.
It is indeed painful to question the justice or policy of the Senate, in any particular ; but when your high body sits day after day as a shield to a mendacious colleague, to pour forth his slanders against myself and others, which, if uttered by him outside the Senate walls would not be credited by his vilest sychophant, is, I trust, a sufficient reason for my protest- ing against the use of a prerogative thus abused. This quarrel between Senator Houston and myself, which has been so offi- cially dignified, has nothing to do with his senatorial duties.
It was of foreign birth and growth, of many years' standing before the days of Texas annexation. What I then said of him was openly said, upon the stump, through the press, and from my place in the Congress, of the Republic. That every thing I said of him was believed by the intelligent and honest, is clear, or this new attempt to divert merited odium at this par- ticular time, would hardly have been made. If I have said any thing against his official conduct since annexation, it has been in common with the people of the South, and the general sentiment of Texas, to denounce his abolition treason to a sec- tion which delegated to him her security and political equality. This right belongs as much to Senator Houston's deceived and betrayed constituency, as does that of his new abolition allies, to reward and praise his treason. Had the Senator have asked for a committee to investigate the many charges, which, in most of the States of the Union, would secure him a life tenure in a penitentiary, I should have been saved the trouble of thus appearing before the public. With all his pen- chant for committees of investigation, this he dare not do ; and having no voice in your honorable body, I claim the glorious privilege of an American citizen, to vindicate before the pub- lic that which I hold far more dear than life — my honor.
The sequel will show, that there are reasons which lie far deeper than appears upon the surface, for the Senator's attack upon me at this time. He knows full well that I have the proofs of his many crimes — personal and political — with the honesty and boldness to make them known ; and he was in- formed that the proper occasion for this would be when his treasonable insolence to that section of the Union which gave him life and bread, would cause him to talk seriously of being the Presidential candidate of the abolitionists. To break the force of my testimony, by the most calumnious and stupid falsehoods, was his real, while his ostensible object was, that my history of the " Mier Expedition" was in the Congress library. President Polk requested the first copies of this work issued from the press, for the use of himself and Cabinet. It contained information of Texas and Mexico, then new, and for which I received the thanks of the President and other officers of the government. It has been in the Congress
library for the last nine years ; was generally read, and as .generally believed ; and which the concurrent testimony of all my comrades in that sanguinary campaign, will bear witness to its truth. I do here most solemnly avow, that I have not, in said work, made a solitary charge upon General Houston, either directly or by implication, which is not strictly true. This the Senator, as well as the most intelligent men of Texas, know, and which I will prove by the most incontestible evidence ; and while the extensive circulation of this work, together with its cost, is beyond the ability of him or his sycophants to sup- press, he resorts to this mode of destroying it. His efforts so far, have greatly increased the public desire to read it ; and for his pains, I promise that the next edition will contain a more full length portrait of himself. Should it not prove true to life, language wilLbe deficient in showing np those monstrous immoralities which constitute his life-time of iniquity ; of fraud and falsehood ; of impiety and hypocrisy ; of inebriety, bestiality, and villainy — all of which he attempts to palm upon the public as "eecenfoio&y, tact, coquetry" I own that this is severe language, and sincerely regret the necessity for its use — if it were less severe, it would be less true.
Gen. Houston's " eccentricity, tact, and coquetry," have re- cently caused him to pitch into Abolitionism, Know-Nothing- ism, and Baptism. As poor an opinion as I entertain of the first-named of these isms, I am slow to believe of that sect, that their political astuteness would readily receive into leading membership this Benedict Arnold, black with treason to that section which gave him birth, — in comparison to which the treason of Burr is exalted patriotism, — the betrayal T)y Judas •of the Son of Peace, an excusable weakness.
It would be a gross slander upon the intelligence of the great Know-Nothing party, to suppose that he could pack him- self upon them for any thing except one — untrue to every moral obligation, personal and political. But a short time since, the senator made a speech to some Irish regiments in the New- York Park, in which he " thanked 'God that every drop of Uood which circulated through his heart was Irish" Is this the blood of Know-Nothings ; or do his new peans to that party :suit the Irish regiments f Does Ms .common slander of the
6
American people for the last twenty years, and his praises of the faithless Indian, suit them better ? Even now, when his own state for hundreds of miles is bleeding from the scalping- knife of his red brethren, and that state at this time has taken from the plough six companies of her own citizens to assist the United States army in stopping the work of the tomahawk, the senator prates for days, in and out of the senate, of Indian honesty and humanity. For his leap into the Brasos, under the sanctity of Baptism, there are other reasons, of which we will speak hereafter. Such a leap would defile Jordan itself, without purifying his soul, or even imposing upon the true piety of the respected Church to which he has attached him- self; and in vain may he elongate his face to a Puritanical measure, and continue to drawl his words to a ghostly intona- tion, he will not be believed. (Aristotle, the wise preceptor of Alexander the Great, says, " Show me a man who drawls his words, and I will show you a scoundrel" I believe that in the whole of my large experience of mankind I never knew this saying falsified.) Yes, he may Gloster-like, with
"a book of prayer in hand, True ornaments to know a holy man,"
make pilgrimages the balance of his life between the Baptist of the Brasos, and the Abolitionist of the Canada shore, with- out convincing them that this treason and hypocrisy was for any other purpose than to gull their numerous voters. Such an attempt at this late day, when his head is frosted with three score years of crime, is an insult to our political intelligence, and the quintessence of a brutal impudence.
The first purpose of this communication is to prove to your honorable body, and the world, the utter falsity of every charge, and every inuendo, contained in the senator's magniloquent tirade ; and next, to give the true reasons for this attack upon me at this late day, interspersed with necessary remarks of himself.
Ex-President David G. Burnett, than whom a more truthful, talented, or purer patriot never labored for liberty, in his review of the life of Houston, page 6, says, that " Gen. Hous- ton has long and habitually acted on the Spanish proverb, that ' a lie that can gain belief for one hour is worth the tell-
ing? " If tlie reporter of the New Orleans Picayune, and others present, reported his speech truly, he seems to have screwed his courage up to promising the senate that he would give me per- sonal satisfaction. "Whether this promise, for even one hour, gulled a solitary senator of the half dozen who listened to him, is doubtful ; if so, it was more than he accomplished with any who knew him well, and certainly myself.
Acting, however, upon the opinion of friends who thought that it was due to the Senate, I wrote to my friend, the Hon. Branch T. Archer, to call upon him to redeem his promise. Before, however, my friend could see the senator, he had taken leave of all worldly promises by his hypocritical submersion in the Brasos, hoping, doubtless, thereby that he could also se- cure the vote of the Baptist.
The puerile whining in his pamphlet speech, about his- " two crushed limbs," would be laughable in a superannuated old woman. The two flesh-wound scratches he received, the one upon his arm and the other upon his leg, would not have made a man of ordinary nerve lay up an hour ; though the first was the pretext of his deserting the brave Jackson, in the Creek nation, who conducted the whole of that eventful cam- paign with his right arm broken and in a sling ; the other the pretext for his deserting the army in Texas and going off to New Orleans and Tennessee, exhibiting Santa Anna's gold- headed cane, spurs <md saddle, which he had taken from the captive's personal effects. After the battle of Cannae, in an age when writing was difficult, the illustrious conqueror sent a sack of rings taken from the fingers of the slain Roman Knights, to the Carthaginian Senate, not as a trophy of vic- tory, but to insure a vote for new supplies. The means was worthy of the object intended to be accomplished. What a contrast ! In this enlightened age for an American Com- mander in Chief to be hawking about the personal apparel of a captive Chief; and after satisfying his vainglory, which ought to have shamed an untatooed Indian, he sold the saddle to Colonel William Christie, of New Orleans, as I was informed by himself, for five hundred dollars. What the Senator did with the cane, spurs, and thousand dollar snuff-box, which he
8
subsequently swindled Santa Anna out of, and of which I have more to say hereafter, I do not know.
There are numerous anecdotes of the manner in which the Senator squalled when the arrow struck him upon his arm at the battle of the " Horse-Shoe." The gallant old Col. John C. Nail, who commanded a company in that action, certified that he "Heated like a cub" and that his commanding Colonel, John Williams, rode up at the time and damned at him for his cowardice, which is the secret of Houston's slandering the memory of that distinguished gentleman to this day. I refer to the Hon. Joseph L. Williams, of Washington city, for the truth of this incident. The Senator's cowardice and alarm, after receiving the scratch upon his ankle at San Jacinto, has been attested by nearly every officer, and most of the men. President Burnett, in his review of the life of Houston,rpages 11 and 12, says : — " About three o'clock in the afternoon, the Texian army was paraded. Col. Wharton arranged the order of battle, and they marched with alacrity to the onset. Gen. Houston, with a tolerable bearing (he chewed opium in those days), rode in front of the line, until within about four hundred yards, when he wheeled his horse half round and hollowed out,
* Present and fire.' By previous concert, the officers of the line had determined to reserve their fire until they could see
* the white of the enemies' eyes,' and when the hasty order was given, the word rushed along the line, < hold on ~boys — hold your fire — rush ahead.7 Houston advanced, and when within about two hundred yards he again, and in evident agitation,
bawled out, £ God Almighty d n you, ain't you going to
f-i-r-e ?' The same cheering words passed along the line ; the fire was reserved, and Houston moved off to the right wing of the army. Houston was soon afterwards wounded in the foot or ankle, but I believe rather slightly. He made then and afterwards a huge fuss about it. A calf will bellow at the prick of a bodkin. As soon as the ball struck him he screamed out, { Halt ! halt ! your General is wounded / Coss has come up • all is lost.7 But that army did not halt. Several of the officers called upon Gen. Rusk, the Secretary of War, who was then in the field, to take command and push ahead. Captain Turner, commanding the only company of regulars present,
was detailed to take charge of the wounded General, and the rest drove on the brief battle to a noble victory. Gen. Hous- ton never advanced one step after he was wounded ; but he manifested a goodly portion of trepidation as the tide of battle rolled from him." The evidence is ample, both from the late Adjutant-General John A. Wharton and other officers, that Gen. Busk, the Secretary of War, did give the onward order, and he himself was amongst the foremost in that glorious charge, which resulted in triumph. Whilst the bravery of Gen. Busk is more than equalled by his modesty, these facts belong to truthful history, and are the common property of the country. But, to Senator Houston's speech.
In his very commencement he overacts the Spanish pro- verb. With the evidence before his eyes, he commences his speech with a falsehood — by a willful misnomer of the title of my work. I never wrote such a work as a " History of Texas, Mexico, and the United States." His garbled quotations, from my work entitled the " Mier Expedition" to be fully under- stood, must carry with them both their antecedents and sequence, which in every instance completes the proof of all that I have asserted. If, however, such evidence appear any- wise unsatisfactory, I will supply additional proofs.
The Senator, in the second paragraph of his speech, says that in my work of four hundred and eighty-four pages, he finds his name recorded " one hundred and seventeen times" This may or may not be so. I have not taken the pains to ascertain its truth, nor is it important whether true or false. If it be true, this follows, that I had to use his name thus often to prove that which I charged upon him, which had immediate connection with the main object of the book ; but that his name has been used maliciously or untruly, is wholly false. Had I have been pleased to use it maliciously, or to have gone into a detail of the Senator's 'life and doings, seventeen thou- sand times the use of his name would not have recorded the enormities of his past career — his vulgar blackguardism — his vile debaucheries — his universal mendacity — his numerous perjuries — his personal swindles — his. official peculations — his annexations coquetry — his want of faith, and treason to politi- cal parties — his hypocrisy, impiety, and opium eating — his
10
desertion of western Texas, and leaving it open to the Mexican enemy — his dastardly cowardice — his dirty polygamy an.d de- sertion of his former wives, with his pagan brutality to some of them and their young.
The same paragraph also makes the lamented Gen. Stephen F. Austin the subject of eulogy. This eleventh hour tribute comes most ungraciously. This deceased patriot, who we de- fended, before his death, against the Senator's slanders, passed from earth more than eighteen years ago. He carried with him the regrets of every honest man in Texas, and has now a warm place in their memories. But, in the most eventful period of the Texas strife, during the summer of 1836, it is well known by hundreds in Texas, that Gen. Houston lay drunk for months, at the house of his land partner, Mr. Phil. Sublet, in eastern Texas, swearing that he would hang this same General Austin as a traitor. Gen. Austin, the Honorable Branch T. Archer, and the lamented William H. Wharton, had just returned from the United States as commissioners, and were urging on the defences against the common enemy. About that time, or soon after, Houston was elected President by a popular vote, and having heard of his slanders against Austin, I wrote him a letter, the copy of which I now hold, certified to by a gentleman, well known in Texas for his integ- rity, insisting upon Austin's appointment as Secretary of State. He was so appointed by Houston, in the fall of that very year in which he was so often threatened to be hanged by the Senator. Whether this appointment was the result of my letter, which Houston warmly complimented, or the fear of Austin's growing popularity, is immaterial. The Presidential election of 1856 approaches, and the manes of Austin must be appeased, as the attention of the people of Texas are turned to another of their citizens for that office, in the person of Sena- tor Rusk, who was the uniform friend of Austin, and whose claims to their confidence is a thousand-fold greater than that of this political empiric.
The third and fourth paragraphs of the senator's speech are not only notoriously false both in and out of Texas, but which I will show from his subjoined letters to me, written in his own hand, and now in my possession, subject to the inspection of
11
every senator and other gentlemen who may wish to see them. The sobriquet which he applies to me is the invention of his own chaste conception, and tittered under his senatorial pro- tection, around which he also throws the panoply of the Church. That any other Texian ever applied such an epithet to me, is what I never heard, or do I believe ; nor have I any fear of such ever being the case ; and if the Brasos river shall wash the foul lie from his throat, it will possess greater virtues than those who know the senator hope for. The only sobriquet of the kind I ever knew applied to a Texian, was this very one which the senator for years applied to himself. For years, during his drunken orgies, it was a common boast for him to say, that " I am the Hg dog of Texas — the * master cur of the tan-yard" I believe that this was the only political truth this political charlatan ever was guilty of.
The senator says in this paragraph, that " General Thomas J. Green is what he calls himself" My unconditional com- mission as Brigadier-General of the first brigade of the Texas army, signed by President David G. Burnett, and countersign- ed by Thomas J. Rusk, then secretary of war, on the 19th of March, 1836, was tendered me without solicitation on my part, by the unanimous vote of the cabinet. This commission I cherish as an honorable testimonial of my service in the cause of Texian liberty, for which I received repeatedly the thanks of the leading men in Texas, and among them the senator him- self, as his letters will show, every word of which is written in his own hand. I was elected to congress, not " once" as the senator falsely charges, " by the army," but three different times, by two of the largest and most intelligent counties of the republic. In 1836 I was unanimously returned a member from the county of Bexar. Some doubts were entertained whether I was constitutionally eligible to a seat, being at that time in command of the first brigade in the field. The army was in great need. It was much feared that their interest would be overlooked ; and, mainly at the urgent solicitations of my friends, Generals Thomas J. Rusk and Felix Huston, also in the field, did I consent to take my seat in congress, to sustain the army, as well as other public duty. The following was Senator Houston's opinion of my eligibility :
12
"EXECUTIVE OFFICE, " Columbia, Texas, 25th Oct., 1836. " Gen. THOMAS J. GREEN,
" Texian Army.
"SiR : — I have the honor to acknowledge the receipt of your favor, under date of the 19th inst, with its enclosures. In reply, I can only say that it was my opinion, that there was no constitution for Texas, until the final action of the people upon it, which was their vote in favor of its adoption.
" On my inauguration into office, I found you in possession of a seat in the House of Representatives, and, as each house is to judge of the competency of its members, I can not, and will not, question the rectitude of their 'course. As to the other subject contained in your letter, it will not be overlooked. " With high consideration,
" I am your obt. servt.,
" SAM HOUSTON,
"President."
I took my seat accordingly. The journals of that first Con- gress, and the book "of laws which followed, will show what that Congress did, and what participation I had in that result. The army was re-organized during that first session, and while I was a member. President Houston nominated me for the command of the army. My nomination was rejected by a ma- jority of one vote ; several of President Houston's friends vot- ing against it, because, as they said, that I was still a mem- ber of Congress, and therefore constitutionally ineligible. Sus- pecting Houston of conniving against me, I denounced him, to which he replied by the following letter ; and also sent the Attorney-General J. Pinckney Henderson to me, whose honor and veracity has never been questioned, with the offer of Ad- jutant-General of the army, which I refused, as I did his other proffers of office.
"COLUMBIA, TEXAS, December 27, 1836. "GEN. THOMAS J. GREEN:
" SIR : — Your favor of yesterday having been placed in my hands late this evening, I seize a moment to reply to it. In personal conversation I did really suppose I had satisfied you, that you had no reason to feel either mor- ] tification or disgrace ; but it seems that you labor under a feeling of both, i I truly regret that you should do either — nor does any cause exist why you should. I certainly apprised you from the first that I should nominate a senior and junior Brigadier-General, but would not nominate a Major-General, but that I should keep vacant. When this was in contemplation I intended, as I did, to nominate you as senior Brigadier. Subsequently I heard that
13
constitutional objections would be made to the confirmation of your appoint- ment. I frankly stated to you that such would be the case, as I had learned. I did not at first believe there was any constitutional objection ; but on exa- mination I was satisfied there was, and frankly stated the fact to you, but never did so express myself to any one where it could prejudice the confirma- tion of the nomination.
" You then alleged that the same objection would not obtain against you as Major-General, and you seem to have contemplated no other obstacle. Be it so. I am disposed to serve my friends as far as any man ought to do, either in public or private life ; but you will admit as a public functionary I have a trust to exercise, and in the use of it I must be limited, and must be gov- erned by some sort of principle. How then, from the situation of the country, was I bound to act — taking into view the state of the army and the country ? We had less than a brigade of men in the field ; nor do we expect, without a change, to have two brigades in the field before the spring, and less than that number cannot constitute a division. Through favoritism I might call the present force a ' Division,' but it would be mockery of everything military. The curse of the country has been an excess of officers, as you well know, for when I came into office, the force in the field was reported at six hundred and fifty, and the number of officers commissioned five hundred and ninety two, as well as I recollect.
"You state in your note that you, with others, sustained this administra- tion against attempts to embarrass or destroy it. That you did I am satis- fied, and I presume that you acted from principle, as I conceive I have done in relation to my nominations to the Senate. If you feel that the * appointing power ' has treated you wrong, I seriously regret that you are so impressed ; and I am well assured that when you reflect calmly upon the subject, that your impressions must, if from one fact only, and that fact is that I preferred no man to you, and in nowise attempted to pretermit your claims. Your mortification now, as you were rejected on constitutional grounds, must be imaginary; but had I nominated you for- Major-General, when the army and the country did not require it, you would have had grounds to have com- plained of a different character, or I was not correctly advised. As a man I was and am your friend. As an officer I have done you justice. Had I permitted your urgency to have induced me to nominate you as Major-Gene- ral, with the knowledge which I possessed of matters, you must justly have complained of me for want of candor and friendship. I wished to place you in the command of the army. I attempted it, and the wish failed.
" I appreciated fairly your zeal, your activity and your usefulness in the cause of Liberty in Texas. I have evinced my confidence in you as an officer ; and as a friend and a gentleman you shall never have reason to doubt my regard.
" I have the honor to be your obedient servant,
"SAM HOUSTON."
14:
I have copied the above letter entire, that it may speak for itself. Now, it will be recollected that I am the same General Green which he wished to place in command of the army — thus, says he : "I appreciated fairly your zeal, your activity, and your usefulness in the cause of liberty in Texas. I have evinced my confidence in you as an officer / and as a friend and as a gentleman you shall never have REASON to doubt my regard" But President Houston had taken a solemn oath to support the constitution of the Republic, and yet he thought me so well qualified to command the army, he violates his oath to place me in that command. Hear him in his letter. " I did not at first believe there was any constitutional objec- tion, but on examination, I was satisfied there was, and frankly stated the fact to you / but never did so express myself to any one where it could prejudice the confirmation of the nomina- tion" What he says about the number of men and officers in the field at the time he came into office, is one of his ad cap- tandum falsehoods, which he has all his life been ready off- hand to assert, and give them a seeming truth by the particu- larity of some odd number in figures, or some " eccentric " ex- pression. The Texas army had never been so strong — so much so that Generals Thomas J. Rusk, Felix Huston, and myself, had just previously held a council of war upon invading Matamo- ras. But suppose his assertion was true ; then it is plain that he did not do his duty in nominating myself and Felix Huston, as first and second Generals of Brigade, and afterwards Gen- eral A. Sydney Johnson.
I will here notice that portion of the Senator's speech, in which he speaks of my filibuster brigade of " 230 men, in 1836." As I have more to say upon this subject hereafter, I will only for the present give a sample of what shameless falsehoods pervade every line of this production. The Sen- ator, in one part of his speech, asks " why did he (I) not go to the proper office for information ?" I have done so in more than one instance, as he will have cause to regret, before I have done with him. The following is a sample of my official information : —
15
"ADJUTANT GENERAL'S OFFICE, AUSTIN, TEXAS, November 6th, 1854.
" I hereby certify that by the muster-rolls on file in this office, which said rolls were duly approved and certified to by the late John A. Wharton, Secretary of War, on the 25th day of September, 1836, and certified to by the proper officers belonging to the 1st brigade of the Texas army, under the command of Brigadier General Thomas J. Green, that there were nine hundred and six rank and file, including officers ; and that so far as it appears from said muster-rolls, there does not appear an over proportion of officers in said Brigade.
" JAMES S. GILLETT, Adjutant General.
On the 1st of January, 1837, when I -was about visiting the United States, President Houston again wrote me his "Dear General," imploring me to send " troops and supplies" as I had extensively done the Spring previous. On the 2nd of August, 1837, he again wrote me, repudiating Colonel Geo. "W. Hockley's draft of $500, in my favor, for money which I had advanced Colonel Hockley in Washington city, upon Houston's letter of credit. In this letter he acknowledges to have received through me, from Colonel "William Christie, five hundred dollars, which was for the aforesaid Santa Anna saddle. This letter I still hold for the inspection of those who may doubt. My answer to which, was uncompromising de- nunciation of his shameless meanness. He never ventured to write me again. He found that I was beyond the price of his official bribery, with the boldness to denounce his many cor- ruptions, which every day were becoming more apparent.
The most cool and barefaced set of the Senator's falsehoods, form the whole of the 5th paragraph of his speech, which I here insert verbatim.
" In 1836 the boundary of Texas was declared, by an act of the Legisla- ture of that Republic. The first constitutional President, then in the dis- charge of his duty, drew up a description of the boundary as it had been pointed out after the battle of San Jacinto, but had not yet become a law. He drew up the law, and gave it to the President of the Senate, by whom it was given for presentation to an accidental Senator, this identical Thomas Jeffer- son Green. He introduced it, and it became the law of Texas."
Short as this paragraph is, it contains not less than six stupid falsehoods ; it was not the duty of the President to draw
16
up the law — lie did not draw it up — lie did not give it to the President of the Senate ; the President of the Senate did not give it to an " accidental Senator, this identical Thomas Jeffer- son Green." Neither was I a member of the Senate, or was Houston the President of the Republic. So far from these as- sertions of the Senator being true, these are the facts which the Journals of the House of Representatives, of which I was a member, will show ; which not only every living member of that house will bear witness, but which is a matter of general notoriety, and have been published time and again for the last eighteen years, and never before denied or even questioned.
" Journal of the House of Representatives, of the Republic of Texas, Oc- tober llth, 1836, page 40. Mr. Green gave notice tluit he would on some future day ask leave to introduce a l)ill to define the western boundary of Texas" Mark the date — David G. Burnett was then President of the Republic. Again, page 116 :
" 'Mr. Green, introduced a bill to be entitled an act to define the bound- aries of the Republic of Texas.' Read first time and passed to a second read- ing without opposition. Again, page 259 :
" Mr. Green move'd to take up the bill entitled ' An Act to define the boundaries of Texas,' and the question being taken, was carried ; and the same being read the second time,
" Mr. Green moved to strike out the second and third sections of the bill ; and the question being taken, was carried.
" Mr. Branch moved to suspend the rule, and read the bill a third time forthwith ; and the question being taken, was carried. The Speaker asked shall the bill pass ? and the question being taken, was carried." This not all.
I not only introduced the measure before Houston was Pre- sident, but carried it through the committee of foreign rela- tions, under the strongest presentiment of its future conse- quence, did press it through Congress to a final passage, against the opinion of my warmest personal friends, " that it was un- necessary" When this was accomplished, I went in person to President Houston (he in the meantime had been inaugurated), on the last days of the session, and had much difficulty in get- ting him to sign it, as he said that " there was no necessity for such a law" In 1846, President Polk, in several messages, informed the Congress that, upon this law " he had ordered General Taylor to the Rio Grande, and that he would defend
17
that "boundary" The Santa Anna treaty with Texas, in 1836, had failed, and President Polk had little other legal or interna- tional right, to defend the Rio Grande. He complimented me for my " happy thought" in being the author of said law, and said without it he never would have moved up to that line.
General Houston was at that time a member of the United States Senate, and made speeches upon the war ; but never until this late day, when he supposed that proofs were difficult to be obtained, has he had the unblushing hardihood to claim the credit of the law. Such falsehoods as these, the Senator and a few of his servile minions call " tact." In 1848 he was at the democratic Baltimore convention intriguing to have himself taken up as the Compromise candidate for the presidency, and when his name was not even called in the convention, in con- nection with this office, he shrugged his shoulders, and said that he " was fixing the thing for '52." This both he and his friends called tact. In 1852 he had humbugged the demo, cratic party in Texas to believe that " that was the time for him" A majority of the Texas delegates controlled the four Texas votes, and with a half dozen abolitionists, voted for him. General Pierce was nominated. The Senator again shrugged his shoulders, and said, " I am working for '56." Another edition of " tact." Since which time, he has tacked into the Abolitionists, tacked into the Know Nothings, and tacked into the Baptists, with occasional interludes into temperance, and Indians, with parenthetical spasmodic slander of Pierce, Doug- lass, Cass, Buchanan, and every other gentleman who is talked of for the presidency. For sensible men to suppose that such " tact " will ever place him in the White House, is grossly calumnious of the American people. Tacking into the Aboli- tionists may not scatter them as a polecat would a hen-roost — they are fond of the fetid, and that is a matter of taste. But that the great Know Nothing party, or the meek and Christian Baptist, would admit him into their political confidence, any sooner than they would pestilence to their domestic hearths, is what I cannot believe ; and I predict that after '56 his next tack will be into his first love — that he will return to the whis- key bottle, as a " sow to the wallow."
I do here most positively declare, and I will stake my life
2
18
and honor upon its truth, that the Senator's pamphlet speech before me, independent of what I have already noticed, con- tains THEEE HUNDRED AND SEVENTY-SIX positive, and I believe wilful, malicious, premeditated falsehoods against myself, Commodore Moore, Colonel Fisher, ex-President Burnet, and others, besides his calumnious inuendoes and false deductions. To follow up and establish each of these falsehoods seriatim, which I have the proofs to do, would not only swell this com- munication to a tedious length, but would subject me to the oft repeated and stupid charge of egotism. But who, I may ask, is not an egotist, save the stupid dolt, who never made his mark in any walk of life. The greatest men who have figured in the world's history, from Alexander to Napoleon, are the greatest egotists, because it was necessary for them to speak in the personal pronoun oftener than other men. Even the Sena- tor himself, had he spoken truth for the last forty years, would have been a greater egotist than they. To speak, however, of him in the same century with such names, is slander upon true nobility and truth — it is the coupling of the Bengal tiger with the skunk — the " sublime with the ridiculous " — " hype- rion to a satyr."
If I must be an egotist, in the vulgar acceptation of the term, it will be because the most of these three hundred and seventy- six falsehoods are charged against myself. I will endeavor, however, to condense his tautology of falsehoods to a clear illus- tration und a readable length.
A long time the Senator has been noted for an inuendo system of attack upon personal character, male and female, when he could not, with any show of plausibility, make a direct charge. This system is the more infamous, because it seeks avoidance of responsibility, and leaves the party accused without means cf answering a tangible charge. Thus, when the Senator was oxce discarded by a lady of high character in South Carolina, he m^de a peace-offering to his unmanly coxcomb nature, by saying, in his peculiar manner, that "her coachman was a little too likely" What volumes of dirty slander were here meant ! Again, when the public opinion of Nashville, Tennessee, made him fly the State for his vile treatment of his chaste and amiable lady — when Thomas Crutcher, the octo-
19
genarian friend of Andrew Jackson, who had been forty years the Treasurer of the State, and was proverbial for his blunt honesty and purity, openly denounced him as a " wretch who ought to ~be hanged" — he pretended to say nothing of the causes of the separation, — this he could not do without making himself a villain — he for years would charge himself with a sufficient amount of Dutch courage to say, " that he did not believe there was a virtuous woman in the world " — that the Bible proved that the Virgin Mary herself was what neither language or morals will permit me to repeat. This is oue of the ten thousand sins which he pretends to have washed out by the Brasos.
So it is now, he speaks by inuendo of my JSTorth Carolina and Florida " antecedents," meaning thereby to convey the idea that they were not honorable. Whilst that I deny the insinuation, as it is maliciously villainous, and leave the thou- sands of my acquaintance in my native State and Florida, to answer this slander, I do fearlessly say that the antecedents of no man in either State are more honorable. The first time that I ever saw General Houston, was in the fall of 1824. I was just then out of school, and for my activity and usefulness in the cause of Jackson, was appointed, over many leading gen- tlemen of the State, bearer of the first votes for that distin- guished patriot which crossed the Roanoke to Washington city. It may be considered an honorable antecedent to know that I was the first individual east of the Alleghany, and per- haps in the Union, in April, 1820, then a student at Chapel Hill, the University of my native State, who made a speech in favor of Jackson for the Presidency. This fact is well recol- lected by my numerous college friends, among whom I may name General Lucius J. Polk, of Murray county, Tennessee, and the Right Rev. Bishop Otey, of the same State ; and, I am proud to say, that I enjoyed the friendship of that great man to the day of his death.
I will here relate an incident of the Senator himself, — it is this : — Just four weeks previous to the death of General Jack- son, I spent the day with him at the Hermitage. He was then greatly excited upon the subject of the annexation of Texas. It had safely carried his friend, Mr. Polk, into the Presidency.
20
while it had accomplished a darling desire with him : — the defeat of Mr. Clay. I was just from Texas. General Jackson asked " how was Houston about annexation ?" I replied that "the most intelligent men of Texas believed that he was oppos- ed to the measure ; that in his cooler moments he pretended a quasi friendship for it, but that just previously he had made a speech in Montgomery County, at Spring Creek, I had under- stood, with whiskey enough in him to make him tell the truth (in vino veritas\ and he there denounced the measure." The General replied that " he has written me letters lately in favor of it, but from what you tell me, and what I see in the papers, his course is very astonishing." I replied, " You do not sup- pose, General, that Houston is capable of writing you any thing but what he supposed would be pleasing." The old hero nod- ded assent, but I regret that he departed this life before Hous- ton's public acknowledgment of my charge. To excuse him- self from this charge, the Senator soon after came to New Or- leans, and in a public speech said that he was " coquetting " with the British Minister. Thus the President of a Kepublic of enlightened Anglo- American citizens, to acknowledge, that by falsehood and dissimulation he was dealing with a great nation, which had been among the first to recognize our nation- ality. This will long remain in American Diplomacy the cli- max of national perfidy.
The most perfidious part of this transaction, is not in his acknowledging the disgrace, by calling it " coquetry," but in his heartless attempt in trying to shift it oif upon his successor, President Anson Jones, who from the following correspon- dence shows that though he, Jones, was at that time, 1844, Secretary of State, under President Houston, yet that he sus- pected Houston's integrity so much that he preserved the evi- dences of his guilt, in his own handwriting.
"BARRINGTON, Washington co., Texas, October 19th, 1848.
To the Editor of the Western Texian:
" DEAR SIR : — Very many misrepresentations having been made in relation to the relative course of Gen. HOUSTON and myself, on the subject of the an- nexation of Texas to the United States, the whole matter will be placed in its
21
proper light before the public by the following order addressed to me, by that gentleman, in 1844, on the eve of his departure from the seat of govern- ment :
EXECUTIVE DEPARTMENT, ) Washington, Sept., 24th, 1844. $
HON. ANSON JONES,
Secretary of State, &c., <&c.
" SIR : — Let despatches be forthwith sent to Dr. Smith, to the care of Mr. Rate, (vide note «,) at London.
"Let instructions be given Mr. Rate, to forward said despatches, in the event of Dr. Smith's departure homeward, to Col. Daingerfield, at the Hague. Let full powers and letters of credence be also transmitted to Col. Dainger- field, to be used by him, in the event of Dr. Smith's leaving Europe, in conducting the necessary negotiations with the courts of England and France.
" Let our representatives (Dr. Smith or Col. Daingerfield) be instructed to complete the proposed arrangement (5) for the settlement of our Mexican diffi- culties as soon as possible — giving the necessary pledges as suggested in the late despatch of Dr. Smith on this subject, but adhering to the Rio Grande as a boundary, sine qua non.
"Also, let our representative be instructed to enter at once into the proper negotiations and arrangements for the admission of our products into the ports of England, (and France, if possibly,) upon the most favorable terms — suggesting to the European parties that now is the most favorable time for such an arrangement with this country, in consequence of the absence of the obstacles which a treaty with the United States might interpose.
" SAM HOUSTON."
NOTES.
" (a) Mr. Lacklin Macintosh Rate, a London merchant, and at the same time an agent for the government of Texas.
" (b) The 'proposed arrangement' was a 'Diplomatic Act,' which, in the language of Dr. Smith's despatch, ' would give to the European Governments, parties to it, a perfect right to forbid, for all time to come, the annexation of Texas to the United States : ' and the ' pledges ' spoken of were to the same purpose, or that Texas would never consent to the measure.
" This, you will perceive, was the " Vermilion Edict," and had I complied with it, annexation would have been as completely killed as a man would be by having his head cut off, or a European war superadded to the Mexican one : — so I incurred the responsibility of postponing the same, and afterwards consummated the measure of annexation hi direct opposition to the ' policy of Gen. Houston,' as developed in the above letter. I trust that without fur-
22
ther comment from me, this communication, made from a just regard to the establishment of truth, will be satisfactory to those who may have been led into error in relation to the respective agency of Gen. Houston and myself in connection with this great measure of American policy. Some delay has oc- curred in making it, from the hope that Gen. Houston would himself inform the public of the facts which it contains.
" Very respectfully,
" Your ob't serv't,
"ANSON JONES."
When Houston attempted to sacrifice his old secretary of state, to screen himself from an infamous treason to his own native land, that secretary had the boldness to place the trea- son on his old master's forehead, in characters that can never be effaced. What is the senator's course in reference to this charge ? Though it was made by President Jones, through the public press on the 19th of October, 1848, against him, Houston, while in the United States Senate, he makes no pub- lic vindication, because the proofs were in the hands of his accuser — he shrinks from the charge publicly, and contents himself by retailing in private the dirtiest calumnies of his old friend. Here was a charge of corruption and treason against him as senator — where then was his senatorial privi- lege ? From his subsequent practice it would not have been difficult for him to have obtained the protection of your hon- orable body. To turn from this digression upon coquetry.
I was honored with a seat in the legislature of my native state from the county of Nathaniel Macon, when a very young man. I have since been a member of the Legislatures of Flo- rida and California, and in the congress of the Republic of Texas from every county in those states wherever I have lived. I have been honored with other high offices from those states, which every one but Houston will acknowledge, and even he knows, that I have filled with strict integrity and success. Every where my numerous acquaintances will bear testimony that no man has lived more for his friends. That my purse and house in my native state, in Florida, in Texas, in Jamaica Plain, in California — and wherever I have lived — have ever been, to prodigality, open to my fellow-men. There is not a transaction of my life that will not bear honorable scrutiny,
23
I invite the most rigid now, and on all occasions. I was a citizen of Texas from early in 1836 to the spring of 184:5. During this time the country had been broken up by the das- tardly flight of Gen. Houston before an inferior force of Mex- icans. The people of Texas were at this time poor in money ; they owned lands, but could not eat lands. Money was so scarce, that even the most wealthy were frequently without sufficient to pay hotel bills and traveling expenses. All this time, whether I was in Congress, in the field, or in the dungeons of Mexico, my house was the refuge of my soldier comrades, and numerous other friends, some of whom, for humanity sake, I am sorry to say, though they enjoyed my open hospitality in those trying times, have since played the sycophant to the senator, for " filthy official lucre."
By the senator's own showing, his antecedents, whether for good or bad, had their origin in "himself" — had they have been good and honorable, a corresponding credit would have attached to him, as he admits that his forefathers did nothing for " themselves, himself, or their country." "Whatever my own may have been, it is with unspeakable pride that I look back upon my lineal ancestors — the Greens, Hawkins, Macons and Christmas', all patriots, and distinguished patriots of Seventy- Six ; and that not a drop of tory blood circulates in my veins. If pride can be greater, it is that when I look upon the tomb of Solomon Green, my own venerated father, and see that " HE
WAS A REVOLUTIONARY PATRIOT, AND ONE OF THE ADOPTERS OF THE
FEDERAL CONSTITUTION," and that he carried with him to the grave, the homage of a large community. To me there is something sublimely beautiful in that part of the Chinese ethics, which teaches one to do nothing to disgrace departed ancestors. The senator, whose disregard of the living is so flagrant, can feel but little indeed for the reputation of the departed.
What the senator speaks of in this connection of my run- ning away from Florida, for debt, is as infamously false as the "balance of his charges. I had been a successful planter, and the representative of the county in which the seat of govern- ment is situated. The fever of the country swept my family from me, with the exception of an only son, then four years of
24:
age. Him I carried to his uncle, in Tennessee, and myself plunged into the Texas revolution, with no selfish calculation of cost. Before doing so, I had my property sold by public notice, and every cent of my indebtedness paid, for which I was responsible either on my own individual account, or as security. Two years after this I returned from my duties in Texas, and received nearly ten thousand dollars as a balance due me, and have at this time patented lands unsold in the county. These facts are well-known to ex-Senator James D. Westcott ; Governors Call, Duval, Brown, and many other gentlemen of Tallahassee. I feel most sensibly a disgust natu~ ral to every man of honor, in being compelled to defend him- self against charges though false, and made by a noted falsi- fier, yet, so made under the sanctity of official position ; my purpose therefore, at present, is to deal with facts, rather than rhetoric.
The special pleading of the -.senator makes me charge him in 1850 as having said that the late John C. Calhoun, when Secretary of "War, dismissed him, Houston, from a /Sw5-agency of the Cherokee Indians for " defaulting." He thus places in my mouth a charge which I never made, because it was the only one he could defend. My recollection of this circum- stance is this : that General Wallace, a member of Congress from South Carolina, asked me if I knew of a long settled hos- tility of Gen. Houston to Mr. Calhoun. I answered in the affirmative, and said that since I first knew Houston, 1824, he had always been in the habit of abusing Mr. Calhoun, who had turned him out of a sub-agency of the Cherokee Indians. It would have been unnecessary for me to have informed a member of Congress that he was turned out as a " defaulter" of the government, for the department would have shown that fact — nor did I suppose that such was the case, that a sw£>-agent was entrusted with public funds. This responsibility I sup- posed belonged to the head-agency. But I did suppose, that his dismissal from office was owing to some petit larceny pecu- lations or on account of his having married one of the Chero- kee squaws. Does that senator deny that he was turned out of office, or made to vacate it ? — if so, let the correspondence of the department speak. It is well known to the Senate, that on
25
sundry occasions Senator Houston made nullification the osten- sible pretext of his opposition to the distinguished South Caro- linian, who never would condescend to reply to the "big dog of Texas" That great man would as soon have handled a dead dog under an August son. Does the senator deny that he has abused Mr. Calhoun for more than thirty years ? — this fact is known to hundreds ; yet, nullification is only half that age. A sycophant, as was Houston, to the great Jackson, might shield himself for the time under such a battery, so that he could vent more effectually his spleen against the great nulli- fier. So did he, for years, vilify and^ calumniate the lamented Henry Clay, because he supposed it pleasing to Gen. Jackson. For years it was a common slander of Houston to say that Mr. Clay's hostility to Jackson was on account of Gen. Jackson having run Mr. Clay out of a tavern in Kentucky. Yet, I have been told that when he, Houston, was sent on to Ashland as one of the Senate's Committee with the remains of that lamented patriot, that he, Houston, in the presence of the people of Kentucky, stooped and kissed the coffin of the illustrious dead, with a sanctimonious phiz which would have shamed any puritan face in the days of the roundheads. Was such unblushing hypocrisy ever before witnessed ? I have related this incident to illustrate in part the character of the senator, whose hardihood could speak, publish and circulate, in one pamphlet, under senatorial privilege, and with the pub- lic money, five hundred Hack-hearted lies. This is a hard word ; but no other so well befits a truthful reply and this oc- casion. I will not attempt here to follow this senatorial harle- quin through his political tactics, tergiversations, antics. I have more important facts for the public ; but on one occasion he said from his place in the Senate, when one of General Jack- son's old friends turned freesoiler, that " if the immortal hero of the hermitage were upon earth, there would not be an olea- ginous spot left of him" the freesoiler. This former friend of the deceased, however, had the boldness to " kick the dead lion," as soon as breath was out of his body. Not so with the senator. Ten years he attempted to act the jackall upon the reputation of the illustrious dead ; and, after trying by every surreptitious means to place the well-earned mantle of the de-
26
ceased upon his own beastly nature, which was nobly resisted by the faithful hard-shell democrats, he, too, turns freesoiler. Now, what kind of spot is left of the senator ? Every honest man will say a DIRTY SPOT.
The senator's <mfo'-southern fling at the Texas Pacific Rail- road has a double object. Whilst it is to please his abolition supporters in the North, it has a home purpose deeply mali- cious. The zeal and ability with which his colleague General Rusk advocates this great enterprise, is every way creditable to his foresight and patriotism. If the road shall be built (which fact I can inform Gen. Houston is beyond the reach of his malig- nity), it will add to his (Rusk's) deserved popularity, and to that extent it has a rancorous place in the heart of Houston.
Not an inconsiderable portion of the senator's pamphlet speech is an oft-repeated charge l>y him of corruption on the part of President Burnet, in entering into treaty stipulations with Gen. Santa Anna, after the battle of San Jacinto. It is not my purpose here to defend President Burnet. There lives not a man so well able to do it as himself, and which he has often done, to the entire satisfaction of every honest man who chooses to inform himself of facts. President Burnet's emi- nently patriotic service, and his uniform poverty for the last twenty years in Texas, is a sufficient vindication from the slan- ders of ten thousand such tongues as Houston's. And here we might with good reason ask, whence came all the senator's wealth ? This we will answer hereafter. But, says the sen- ator, " Santa Anna was told that the Commander-in-Chief had no power to enter into negotiations with him ; " but in the next breath he admits that he did enter into negotiations with him, by requiring Santa Anna to make Gen. Filisola, then in command, to evacuate the country, which was done. The sen- ator may well squirm upon this subject. Thousands of the most intelligent men of Texas believe that his trip to Or- leans was to receive the amount of the captive's promise, rather than the healing of the scratch upon his ankle. I will here ask the senator where is the letter upon this subject, which was written to President Lamar, and filed in the office of the Secretary of State in 1841. President Houston came into office the second term in 1842, and this letter, and many other proofs
27
of his villainy, have been stolen from that office. I have re- cently had occasion to examine said office with much care, not only for that letter, but for the one he so boastfully referred me to that office for — the one which caused the " decimation of the Mier prisoners : " neither is to be found. But Commodore E. M. Moore holds one in President Houston's own hand writing, written on that identical day, and signed in his well-known signature. I will here give it without the alteration of a comma. His partisan sycophants have denied that such a letter was in existence. I invite the whole Senate, the whole American Congress, to call and see for themselves. I invite all Texians, Abolitionists, Know-Nothings, Baptists — all honest men every where, and of every party, to call and satisfy them- selves of this most infamous of all stealing in the history of Kepublican America.
" WASHINGTON (Texas),
" Colonel Bryan, 24th January, 1843.
" Texian Consul,
"New Orleans.
" My Dear Sir, — When you arrive at Orleans, if you can, have the enclosed Bill filled, and as you pass by Galveston you will be authorised by Gail Bor- den, jun.,* Esq. to draw on him for the amount of the purchases, at sixty or ninety days. I desire that you should see that the carriage or double ba- rouch, will track the usual width of waggons for the road.
" You will be judge of the quality of the articles and their prices, regarding economy in their purchase.
"The Furniture-Calico you will select, but take care to select none such as will exhibit Turkey Gobblers, Peacocks, Bears, Elephants, Wild Boars, or Stud Horses ! ! ! Vines, Flowers, or any figures of taste, you can select.
" I hope you will send them by some careful, clever fellow ; and as I am so poor, if you can make a bargain for the freight, it might be well!
" Consign them to my friend Borden, and he will settle the freight!
"I will rely upon you in all things, as I have always done, and will only say this is a l Stationery ' Bill! ! !
" You will please present Mrs. Houston and myself to Col. and Madam Christy, also to Mr. Caruthers and family.
" Very truly, thy friend,
"SAM HOUSTON.'" * Collector of the Port.
28
" GENERAL HOUSTON'S MEMORANDUM.
" 2 setts Guitar Strings,
" 2 barrels excellent Flour,
"2 do • do Sugar,
"1 do do Soap,
" 2 sacks do Coffee (Java),
" 1 barrel do Herrings,
" i do do Mackerel (No. 1),
" 1 keg do Lard,
" 1 do do Goshen Butter,
" 1 barrel Apples,
" 1 do Buckwheat,
" 1 box Prime Tea (Young Hyson),
" 1 Barouch (excellent), 4 seats, with shafts, tongue, and double harness, with a whip and all complete,
" 1 Good Dearbourn Waggon and Harness,
" 1 sett neat white China, for Coffee,
" 2 Wash Pitchers and Bowls,
" 1 neat Wash Stand,
" 1 Bolt fine white grass Linnen,
" 3 or 4 Bolts white cotton Furniture Fringe,
" 1 Bolt fine Calico (handsome),
"1 do coarse do,
"1 do Furniture Calico,
"1 do do Dimity,
"1 do Linnen Diaper, for Towels,
" 1 Crimping Iron,
" 6 yards fine Cambric Linnen,
" 3 fine large Silk Pocket Handkerchiefs,
" 3 pair Silk and 3 pair Cotton Socks,
" 1 handsome Pocket Knife (pretty large),
" To be filled by Col. Wm. Bryan for his friend,
" SAM HOUSTON. " WASHINGTON, 26th January, 1843."
Let it be recollected that this " Stationery " Bill was filled and paid for, as directed by President Houston ; that when the articles arrived at Galveston from Orleans, they were car- ried up the Brasos Eiver to Washington, by Capt. John N. Reed, the present popular Sheriff of Galveston, then in com- mand of a steamer ; and before he could collect his freight bill, this identical Senator Houston made him make it out for express service, and it was so paid. Sugar and Soap, Butter and Buckwheat, Lard and Flour, Herrings and
Coffee, Dearborn "Wagon and Barouch, whip, shafts, and tongue complete, Dimity and Crimping Irons, China and Fringe, Lin- en and Stud-Horse Calico, — stationery, very ! But this small stealing, which was an every-day practice of President Hous- ton, is the least of the offence. On this very day, January 24th, 1843, while with one hand he was robbing the impoverished treasury of Texas, with the other he was signing the death- warrant of the brave men of "Mier."
The following publication made by myself in reference to this subject, will speak for itself, and which neither the Sena- tor or his friends have undertaken since to mystify, until the appearance of his senate pamphlet.
• « TO THE PEOPLE OF TEXAS.
" WASHINGTON CITY, Jan. 10th, 1846.
" A friend has just placed in my hands a * Galveston Civilian' of the 13th ult., containing a letter from Gen. Sam Houston, purporting to be a vindica- tion of his conduct in reference to the decimation of our countrymen in Mexi- co. Gen. Houston, in his letter, failing to adduce any evidence of his inno- cence of this enormous crime, has endeavored to divert public attention from his guilt, by the grossest, false, and vindictive — I had almost said unparal- leled slander of myself. In this I would have erred, for it has many parallels from Gen. Houston himself. His publication of the gallant Commodore Moore to the world, as an outlaw and pirate, at the identical time that his cannon were thundering against more than ten times his force, that of our common enemy — his reiterated slanders against the brave Generals Burleson, Sherman and Wharton, and almost every other distinguished man in Texas — his oft repeated ridiculous charges against ex-President Burnet, one of the purest men in any country — his vile denunciation of Gen. Stephen F. Austin, the father of his country — his perfidious slander of the spotless wife of his own bosom — yea, in his general character as an universal calumniator, count- less parallels might be adduced. Though his charges against myself must meet that contempt from every honest man which has followed the habitual falsehoods of his whole life, yet the circumstances in which Gen. Houston and myself are now placed before the people of Texas, make it proper that I should appear before the public through the same medium. And I will ask what other redress is left me ? It is well known that Gen. Houston holds himself perfectly irresponsible. If personal chastisement be inflicted upon him, as was done by the Hon. Branch T. Archer and Col. Jordon, he either pleads sickness or old age. If falsehood is proved upon him, as was done by Mr. Wingfield, and many others, he pleads drunkenness. II is due to myself
30
then, that I should in this case prove his falsehood, and ' out of his own mouth will I convict him.'
" Fellow citizens, it has been three long years and over, since the hard- fought and sanguinary battle of Mier : a few days more will make three years since that gallant little band of your countrymen was made to draw hi a black-bean lottery, and each tenth man shot. Such a cold blooded murder astonished the whole civilized world, and put to the test the wisest politicians of the most civilized nations, to know what sufficient cause could be assigned therefor. Could it be that they had fought, under the requirements of their own government, considering the disparity of forces and the circumstances of the case, the hardest fought battle in the annals of war ? Could it be, that when captives, they had, while emaciated and worn down by the fatigues of a long and wearisome march, risen upon triple their number of armed guards, over- powered and dispersed them uninjured, and then peaceably pursued their way homewards ? No ! these actions met the praises, not only of all civilized nations, but even the highest encomiums of semi-barbarian Mexico. For what, then, could such a shocking murder have been perpetrated ? Alone, upon the most authoritative evidence, that they were without the pale of those laws which govern civilized nations in war. Did that evidence exist ? If so, who furnished it, and how came it to the knowledge of that government ?
" In this letter, fellow citizens, I must necessarily confine myself to a brief statement of this matter, and refer every man who wishes to know the whole history of it, to appendix No. 2, page 450, and appendix No. 6, page 477, of my work upon Texas and Mexico, in which will be seen stated all the evi- dence in the case, and such evidence as no man, so far as I have heard, of the thousands and tens of thousands in this country, who have read it, pre- tended to doubt. That evidence is — that Sam Houston, the President of Texas, early in the year 1843, and soon after the battle of Mier, wrote a letter to Capt. Elliot, Her Britannic Majesty's Charge d' Affairs, residing in Galves- ton, which he, Houston, requested him, Elliot, to forward to Mexico, and which he, Elliot, did as he was requested ; in which Houston said, * that though the Mier prisoners had entered Mexico contrary to law and authority, yet Tie, Houston, legged mercy for them, &c? It is in evidence, that upon the re- ceipt of this letter of Presd't Houston, that Santa Anna, the President of Mexico, ordered the decimation, showing that the President of Texas was the highest, and sufficient authority for this horrible deed : because, that evi- dence had proclaimed them brigands and robbers.
" Fellow citizens, these facts came to the knowledge of myself and com- panions, through the American and English ministers, while we were in the dungeons of Mexico, very soon after this sad tragedy in March, 1843. After my escape from the castle of Perote, and in October of the same year, I pub- lished them in the ' Galveston News,' and notwithstanding President Hous- ton's then control of the Mails and Post Offices of Texas and the limited cir- culation of that journal, he, Houston, knowing the truth of these charges, and feeling a murderer's guilt, commenced his vindication by denying, with up- lifted eyes, that he ever wrote, or caused to be written, the letter charged to
31
him. (See Lieut. S. H. Walker's statement, page 453.) This was President Houston's FIRST defence of himself; but upon my receipt and publication of Gen. Waddy Thompson's and the British Minister's letters from Mexico, proving the falsity of his denial, he fled to the Presbyterian Church in the town of Houston, in November of the same year, and made a speech, which was published in all his newspapers of that day, and in which he said, * it was not my friend's, Capt. Elliott's letter, that produced the mischief,'1 thereby implying, that Elliott had written the letter. In said speech, however, he goes on to charge all the consequences of that murder to a letter which Gen. M. Hunt had written to, and which was published in the * Houston Telegraph ' of the 18th of Jan. previously. This is Gen. Houston's SECOND defence, and thus, up to this hour, so far as I am informed, Gen. Hunt and the Telegraph stand charged by Gen. Houston with the horrid butchery. On the 12th of December, which was about one month after his speech was published in his annual message to Congress, he again changes his ground, and said, that ' it was a retaliation on account of those under Gen. Somermlle who robbed Laredo? charging this murder to those who returned from that place with Col. Bennett. Thus, you see, for the THIRD time, in the short space of a few months, when pursued by the ghosts of these murdered heroes, he changes his ground of defence. Now, fellow citizens, after a lapse of nearly three years, when his control over the public intelligence of Texas is about to give way to an honest administration of the mails, — when my work upon Texas and Mexico has gone the length and breadth of this great nation, and carried conviction to the mind of every man who has read it, that Sam Houston is the wilful and malicious murderer of his countrymen of Mier, and just on the eve of the Congressional elections and in my absence from Texas, he comes out in the ' Civilian' of the 13th of last month, and charges this crime upon myself, as having been the ' first to incite the men ' to the plun- der of Laredo. Thus, for the FOURTH time, Gen. Houston, has changed his defence. But, fellow citizens, falsehood and crime will always convict itself, be- cause it rarely ever tells one steady tale. Gen. Houston, after changing his de- fence, as you have seen FOUR different times, comes out in his latest publica- tion, and for the FIRST time admits that " he wrote the letter to Capt. Elliott." It cannot be forgotten, in Texas, how often, for the last three years, both Gen. Houston and his partisans have denied this fact, and it would have been better for him always to have denied it ; for then many of his blinded friends would either have believed, or professed to believe, that he never had writ- ten it.
" Fellow citizens, the vind'ictiveness of Gen. Houston's last defence can only be equalled by his stupidity. If the plunder of Laredo had been a suf- ficient cause for the decimation of your countrymen, and I had been the 'first to incite the men to that plunder,' why did not Santa Anna have me shot ? His personal hostility to myself for the last ten years was well known, and the slightest pretext would have been sufficient for him to have practised his bloody vengeance upon my person. If Gen. Houston's charge be correct, I ask, in the name of common sense, why it was that innocent, unoffending
32
men, were made to pay the penalty of my crime? Why it was that Majors Cocke and Dunham, Captains Cameron and Eastland, Este, Hams, Jones and Mahan, Ogden, Roberts, Rowan and Shepard, Thompson, Torry, Trum- bull, Wing, and the * iron nerved ' Whaling, were made to pay the penalty of my wrong-doing ? This charge, like a badly counterfeited dollar, carries its own condemnation upon its face, and I should not have deemed it worthy of notice but to show the recklessness of one who scruples at no falsehood to serve his ambition and hatred.
" Fellow citizens, what Gen. Houston asserts in his letter, about promptly furnishing the Mier prisoners in Mexico with the supplies which Congress had voted them, is as untrue as the balance of his letter, and I will take the jour- nals of Congress and his own letter to prove it. The facts are these : — Early in December, 1843, and soon after the meeting of Congress, the destitution of our countrymen in Mexico was pressed upon the attention of Congress by myself, the Hon. Wm. E. Jones, S. H. Maverick, and others, who had tasted some of the sweets of a Mexican prison. To the honor of that Congress, be it known, no time was lost in voting $15,000 for their relief, under the re- quirement that it should be forthwith furnished them. It was then deemed best by the Congress, for the good of our countrymen in prison, that this law should not be made public at the time. About two months after, and at nearly the close of the session, the Secretary of the Treasury was called upon by myself and others, to know what had been done in carrying out this law. To our surprise and mortification we were informed that not a dollar had been sent them, and no measures taken to send them one. We saw then, full well, that President Houston would cloak his vindictive dereliction of duty under a law then not designed to be made public; and just before the close of the Congress another law was passed, in open session, appropriating an additional $15,000. This law was passed without the repeal of the former, and thus the Congress, under full consideration for the eminent services of these men, voted $30,000 to their relief. We come now to the question, how much of this money was sent these men, and when it was sent to them ? Gen. Houston tells you in his letter, that on the 19th of October, 1844, one draft was drawn for $3,740. Mark the time — this is ten months and a half from the passage of the law. But he says that he sent Mr. Potter as a spe- cial agent (Mr. Hargous refusing to act as such), with $2,500. Now I ask the question of every Mier man, did they ever receive one dollar of this ap- propriation while in prison? No ! On the 16th of September, the survivors were turned loose at the gates of Perote, like so many cattle, with the excep- tion that the * magnanimous Mexican nation ' gave each man one silver dollar to bear his expenses to Texas. With that silver dollar they started home, and at Jalapa, for the first time, they were furnished, through Mr. Hargous, $2,000. These are the historical facts of the case, proved by the acts of Congress, now upon your statute book, the assertion of every Texian then in Perote, and the confessions of Gen. Houston's own letter. Was there any possible excuse for this cruel delay, even had Mr. Hargous refused to act as our agent ? Was Mr. Hargous the only man in Mexico through whom money
33
could be transmitted? Or was it at all necessary that we should have an agent? I say not! and Gen. Houston knew full well, that in one week from the passage of that act, he could have placed the money in some responsible house or bank in New Orleans, and, with a certificate of deposit and author- ity sent to Gen. Fisher, or Quarter-Master Fenton M. Gibson, or any other officer in the Castle of Perote, to draw for the same, could have been cashed in one hour at that place, at a premium of six per cent. Thus, with this small paper, which could have been sent to them in twenty days from the passage of the act, every $100 on deposit in New Orleans would have been worth to them, in their cheerless and destitute prison, $106!
" But, fellow-citizens, in these long ten months of withholding the bread of your dying countrymen, did President Houston hear no complaints'from them ? Yes ! not a sail that crossed the Gulf which did not bring from the miserable cells of Perote the lamentations of the sick and dying ; and the bones of eighty-odd noble souls, now scattered from the bottom of the great ditch of Perote, to nearly every prison-yard in Mexico, are evidence of 'Presi- dent Houston's friendship for the Mier men.'1 Did President Houston hear no other complaints from the Mier men ? Yes, indeed, be it told to their eternal honor ! though it has been well said that starvation for the want of food is the greatest subduer of the physical man, yet, when these noble countrymen of ours heard that President Houston had his commissioners across the Rio Grande, signing their country away as the ' DEPARTMENT OP TEXAS,' though they were at that time living skeletons, and daily depositing some of their comrades in that horrible ditch, they nobly wrote home, which should be written in letters of gold and engraven upon every patriot's heart, * Let no consideration of us forfeit your country's honor: let us rot in these dungeons ere you concede one inch to these colored barbarians.''
" All this is only equaled by one thing in the conclusion of Gen. Houston's letter, which I must think caps the climax of every assertion and assumption of his whole life, to wit : — that ' 1 lie day will come when it will le shown that he obtained the release of the Mier prisoners.1 This beats * Coquetting ' about Annexation so far that I cannot well conceive how his most devoted followers can read it with becoming gravity. * The day will come.' Was there ever so propitious a day for Gen. Houston to prove that thing as now, when the separate nationality of Texas is merged in this great confederacy, and when he is staking every thing for a seat in that dignified branch of the Congress of this Union, which, should he succeed, it cannot fail to experience the dis- grace of that success.
" Fellow-citizens, so much for Gen. Houston and the Mier men ; and, in conclusion, I must crave your further attention to that part of his letter per- sonal to myself. Gen. Houston says, that in the sacking of Laredo, I was 'the first man who broke open a house and incited the men to outrage.' I know not what milder epithet to give to this charge, than to say it is maliciously, infamously false. It is known by the whole army, that on the day of the sacking of Laredo, I did not leave the camp, which was three miles below the town, and that when those that had participated in the sack-
3
34
ing, returned to the camp, I was among the most active in getting them to return the articles to Gen. Somerville's quarters, to be re-delivered to the alcalde, and the well known fact that every Mier man, with many others, did so return them, relieves them from Gen. Houston^ charge of crime, if crime it was. That some who returned from Laredo with Col. Bennett did not return the articles taken from the town is also well known. These men are known to be Gen. Houston's warmest friends, and they must settle with him this high charge of robbery which he brings against them. I will, however, de- fend these friends of Gen. Houston against his wholesale denunciations.
" On the 8th of December, 1842, General Somerville's forces arrived at the town of Laredo, after seventeen days' march from their camp upon the Me- dina ; having exhausted the whole of more than three hundred beeves which they started with from the San Antonio, General Somerville made a requisition for eight or ten beeves, which was barely rations for one day, and then took the backward track for home. The men had been promised supplies upon the Rio Grande, and now found that promise neglected. They had, by every law of war and nature, a right to be fed ; and if the General did not do it, through his commissariat, they were reduced to the alternative of doing so of their own accord, though with becoming patience they awaited a whole day for the General to comply with his promise, and did not attempt to sup- ply themselves until he had made a retrograde march of three miles home- wards. That these men took articles useless and unbecoming soldiers, was more the fault of their General, in not telling them what was lawful to take, than in their not knowing what was so lawful by the usages of war. Now, I will ask, did President Houston inform these men what was proper by the laws of war to take, when in his address to the people of Texas, in July, 1842, he called upon them to * to pursue the enemy into his own country, and chastise him for his insolence and wrongs? No ! These are his identical instructions, published in all the newspapers of the day. ' The Government (says Presi- dent Houston) will promise nothing hut authority to march, and such supplies of ammunition as may ~be needful for the campaign. They must look to the valley of the Rio Grande for remuneration — 2 he Government mil claim no portion of the spoils ; they will ~be divided among the victors. The flag of Texas will accompany the expedition.1 Thus much for President Houston's calumny of the sacking of Laredo ; and while the Texian army has been in the invariable habit, during our revolution, of quartering upon our own citizens while in the field, he would have them starve while in an enemy's country, though called there by his own proclamation.
" Fellow citizens, the manner in which General Houston has lugged Mr. Hargous into his letter, shows a vindicative hatred of that gentleman, which he (Houston) has manifested in several of his veto messages on those laws of your Congress which provided to pay him the money he furnished our countrymen of the Santa Fe Expedition, while in Mexico. "Wherefore, I ask, has General Houston thus formally brought Mr. Hargous before his govern- ment ? — There can be but one answer. — It is the same manifestation of his murderous intent which caused him to write to Santa Anna, that the " Mier
35
men had gone into Mexico without authority of lew ;" and while I trust that the fatal consequences of his Mier letter may not befall this excellent gentleman, it is due, both to him and myself, to state the particulars of a transaction for which President Houston, in January, 1844, received the unanimous rebuke of the House of Representatives of Texas.
" The facts are these, fellow citizens : — In June, 1843, while in the castle of Perote, I received, as was known to all my companions, several letters from my brother, Colonel C. P. Green, of N. C., saying, that in July he would come to Mexico, to see how he could best serve me. On the 2nd of that month, not content to await the arrival of my brother, I escaped from prison, with fifteen of my countrymen. After weeks of suffering in the mountains, myself, Captain C. K. Reese, and Interpreter Dan Drake Henrie, of Brazoria county, Rd. Barclay, and R. Cornegay, of Fayette county, and John For- rester, of the town of Houston, met in disguise in the city of Vera Cruz* Captain Reese had been provided with some means through his father's fac- tor in New Orleans, and Mr. Hargous furnished me with $130, and I became responsible for the balance of the passages of my comrades on board the steamer Petrita, to New Orleans, which, in all, amounted to $280. I dis- tinctly told Mr. Hargous that it was more than probable I would meet my brother in New Orleans, and in expectation of which, I would draw for the $280 upon him ; but at the same time, I would draw a duplicate draft upon the Government of Texas, that for a like purpose General McLeod and Col- onel Cooke had drawn the year previously in his favor, for the Santa Fe pris- oners, for several thousand dollars ; that I was satisfied that General Houston would neither pay the one or the other, for he never was known to pay his own debts voluntarily, and rarely under any circumstances, but that the Texas Congress would. When we sailed on the Petrita, John Forester pre- ferred to work his passage as fireman, thereby reducing my indebtedness to Mr. Hargous to $255. On my arrival at New Orleans, I had sufficient money to pay for the use of a bed, and a drink of grog each. The next day, through the kindness of my friends, Col. W. M. Beal and Charles Duroche, I was enabled to furnish some of them still farther. In a few days after, we sailed for Texas, I becoming individually responsible for passages of four to Captain Ferguson. Upon my arrival in New Orleans, instead of meeting my brother, as I expected, I received the melancholy intelligence that he was upon his death-bed, and from which he never arose. This fact was known to the supercargo of Mr. Hargous, in Orleans, and at my request he sent the duplicate draft to the Government of Texas, which he accompanied with some stupid complaints of my brother not meeting him in Orleans. At this time I was a member of Congress, and had exposed Houston's murder of our decimated Mier men, and all other of his mal-practices coming under my knowl- edge, with that unreserve well known to you all. Upon the receipt of this draft for $280, expended upon our suffering countrymen, President Houston laid it before the House of Representatives, in a special message, with reflections against myself. Upon the presentation of which, the House unanimously .refused to receive his message, and ordered the Clerk forthwith to return it
36
to him : thus rebuking him in a manner never known before or since in the history of the Texian Congress. Did the Congress stop here ? No ! the draft for the $280 was incorporated in Mr. Hargous' Santa Fe outlay, without one dissenting vote ; and if that gentleman has not yet received his whole dues, it has been on account of the constant hostility of Presidents Houston and Jones, which their veto messages will prove. — For these facts I refer to the journals of Congress and the Hon. Wm. E. Jones, who was chairman on the Commit- tee, as well as to every member of the House of Representatives, and chal- lenge their denial.
THOMAS J. GREEN.
Thus it will be seen that the senator has for the first time admitted that he wrote the fatal letter ; but in this he again attempts to charge the consequence of that murderous " black bean lottery," first, to the sacking of Laredo by his own friends and neighbors ; next, to Gen. Hunt's letter of the 18th of January, 1843 ; and, last, to the rising of our prisoners upon their guards. For a more full understanding of the truthful- ness of his assertions, I herewith append the certificate of Capt. Samuel G. Norvell, than whom a braver soldier or better patriot was never in the Texas army. Before doing so, let me call attention to this military pretender's idea of an " armistice." He says, " They had violated the armistice granted to them, and for that, and nothing else, they were punished." Now there never was an armistice granted them / and if there had been, it would necessarily have expired upon the signing of the articles of capitulation. That men loaded with irons, driven and herded like cattle, could violate a parole, by strik- ing for their liberty against three times their number of armed guards, is something new in the science of war ; and I should like to know in what book this " COMMANDEE-IN- CHIEF " found such law. The only parole ever granted to a " Mier prisoner," was to Gen. Fisher and myself, by Col. Savriego, on our march from Matamoras to Monterey. This parole we could have easily broken, and gained our liberty thereby ; but I am sure that either of us would have preferred death. I knew that I was being carried to an implacable enemy, Santa Anna, and my friends believed that my life would be the forfeit. But to- Capt. Norvell's certificate.
37 -
"AUSTIN, TEXAS,
"Oct. 29th, 1854. •"To Gen'l Thomas J. Green,
"Dear Sir:—
" Having read Senator Sam Houston's late attack upon you in the United States Senate, in which he denounces as untrue your . work upon the ' Mier Expedition,' and endeavors to exculpate himself by charging Gen. Memucan Hunt as the cause of the decimation of the 'Mier Prisoners,' and the murder of the brave Capt. Ewin Cameron ; and having carefully examined all the evidences in this matter, from page 450 to 461, in your work, all of which I know to be true, I feel it due to yourself and the public to make this further unsolicited statement, to which at any time I am ready to testify.
"I, as one of the sixty-seven 'Bexar prisoners of war,' who surrendered to Gen. Adrian Woll, of the Mexican army, in September, 1842, at the city of San Antonio, was marched, with my comrades, through Mexico as far as the city of Queretero, where I was left sick. Through the intercession of friends, upon my recovery I was released, and proceeded to the city of Mexico, where, for the first time, I heard of the capture of the * Mier Prisoners,' their decimation, and the shooting of Capt. Cameron. I went immediately to Gen. Waddy Thompson, the American Minister, to know more of this mel- ancholy news. He told me that it was too true, and that President Sam Houston's letter, written through the British legation, at Galveston, to Mexico, was the cause of it. I replied that it was impossible that the President of Texas could have written such a letter. He answered, go to the British min- ister and see for yourself. I went immediately to see Mr. Packenham, the British Minister, and upon my announcing myself as one of the released Texian prisoners, he inquired, Did you know Captain Cameron, and was he the bloody robber he is represented to be ? I answered that I knew Captain Cameron well ; had served in the army with him, and that a purer gentleman and better patriot and soldier never fought for his country. Upon this the tears trickled down the cheeks of that gentleman, and he said, I fear the worst has not come for your unfortunate countrymen. This letter, by the authority of your President, has done all the mischief, and President Santa Anna claims the full privilege, under it, of shooting the whole of your men. I read particularly this letter, which you refer to in your book, and which your correspondence with the American and British ministers show that it was on file at that time. As for General Hunt's having written a letter to a Texas newspaper, I can say that neither myself or any one with whom I conversed with in Mexico ever heard of it. I will add, that both Gen. Thompson and Mr. Packenham promised to use their best endeavors to pre- vent the farther slaughter of our men, and the sequel shows with what good success. That they deserve the lasting gratitude of all true-hearted Texians, no honest man will doubt.
" Very respectfully, your ob't serv't,
"S. G. NORVELL."
.. 38
The following resolution, offered by myself, in Congress,. Dec. 22d, 1843, page 66, Journal House of Representatives, will show that they were not forgotten, as it passed unan- imously :
" Mr. Green, from the Select Committee to whom was referred sundry papers concerning our own prisoners of war, in Mexico, offered the following resolution, to wit : —
" Resolved, That the gratitude of this nation is due to the Hon. Waddy Thompson, United States Minister in Mexico, and her Majesty's Charge d* Affairs, the Hon. Percy TV. Doyle, and also her Britannic Majesty's late Minis- ter, Mr. Packenham, for their active interference in behalf of our fellow- countrymen, while prisoners of war in Mexico ; and that the thanks of this House be unanimously tendered them therefor, and that they be furnished with copies of this resolution."
The Senator has devoted a large portion of his pamphlet speech to disprove what I have charged upon him, to wit : that he was the malicious cause of the murder of the "decimated Mier men." In his speech, he says,
" I could appeal to an honorable gentleman from Texas, now present in this chamber (General Memucan Hunt). The capture took place on the 26th of December. On the 18th of January following, General Hunt, who had been out in the campaign, who had marched as a private soldier under Gene- ral Somerville, who had won the admiration of the whole army by his soldier- like, manly, and chivalrous conduct, wrote an account as to the scenes at Mier, in which he bore testimony to all that I have said. He came to Hous- ton, in Texas, and published to the world the facts connected with the Mier expedition ; he showed that it had gone unauthorizedly ; he did not condemn it, but merely gave the historical facts. That was on the 18th of January, so that by the end of the month the news would be in the pdsses'si6n of Santa Anna ; and yet he suspended all vengeance until March afterwards, and until the rising of the prisoners upon the guard. What, then, was the use of the President of Texas saying it was against law? Was it not known by General Hunt's letter (in which he detailed the facts), that Colonel Fisher, Green, and others, had deserted from the command of Gen. Somerville, when ordered to the interior of Texas, had united to maraud upon Mexico, had crossed the Rio Grande without authority of law, and in open violation of or- ders, had taken possession of Mier, and that a battle ensued."
I will prove by the letters of Capt. Norvell, Col. Fisher, and the American and British ministers, that Gen. Hunt's letter to a Texas newspaper had nothing to do with this most hellish murder. Col. Fisher and his brother officers, writing from the
39
Castle of Perot e, on the 26th day of July, 1844, one year and a half after the date of Gen. Hunt's letter, says, — " I have re- ceived the paper containing Gen. Hunt's letter ', and I can see in it nothing to give the slightest foundation for the charge of Sam Houston."
The Senator here makes General Hunt accuse the " Mier men" of uniting to " maraud upon Mexico, and that they had crossed the Rio Grande without authority of law" Gen. Hunt having permitted this speech to go forth to the world and widely circulated, I am to presume that it has his sanction, or he would have corrected it months ago. On two previous occasions, both in 1844 and '46, I defended Gen. Hunt before the public, from this charge, which Houston had made against him, of being the cause of the " decimation of the Mier Men" Gen. Hunt himself denounced Houston in severe, though just terms, for this charge. The facts are these : that so far from crossing the Rio Grande in violation of law and orders, Presi- dent Houston, on the 27th of January, 1844 — page 376 of the Journals of the House of Representatives — forgetting his fre- quent denials upon this subject, in a veto message says, "In an address to the people of Texas, dated July, 1842, and pub- lished in the newspapers of the day, the Executive remarked, in reference to the contemplated expedition, that < the Govern- ment will promise nothing but authority to march, and such supplies of ammunition as may be useful for the campaign .They must look to the valley -of the Rio Grande for remuneration. The Government will claim no portion of the spoils — they will be divided among the victors. The flag of Texas will accom- pany the expedition." Again, in the same message, he reiterates, " he plainly told them they must look' for remuner- ation to the valley of the Rio Grande? " It will be recollected that these proclamations from President Houston were numerous, and under which we assembled to defend western Texas. Gen. Hunt knew these facts. ' He also knew that, by the law of 1840, volunteers had the right to elect their own commanders. My work upon this expedition shows that General Somerville had marched a competent force to Laredo (not as the Senator falsely says in his speech), " MANY miles on the east side of the Rio Grande" but immediately upon the east bank of said river,
40
is the town of Laredo. General Somerville here got sight of the enemy, and commenced a homeward retreat. In this re- treat he was arrested by the unanimous voice of the army, after he had proceeded several miles. He then said that the army could elect a commander ; that he would be among those who would "*lleach his bones upon the plains of Mexico." The army then re-elected him under this pledge. He moved down the east bank of the river, until he reached a point opposite Guerrero, and crossed. Here he again got a view of the enemy, and then falsified his word by a precipitate retreat homewards. This is a fact well recollected, that when he recrossed the river homewards, there was no man more loud against this cowardly movement than Gen. Hunt ; — and on that very night the army was stimulated to elect a new commander by Gen. Hunt, which they had a right lawfully to do, and which they did do. Gen. Hunt was a candidate for the command, and made as many promises of " bone bleaching " as any of us ; but he was not elected. Next morning the General was among the first to saddle his horse for home ; he then found out it was necessary to obey the defunct Gen. Somerville's orders. Instead of Gen. Hunt being where the Senator places him, in the situation of giving a " correct account of the scenes of Mier" he was fol- lowing his home-sick leader through bog and chapparal, within hearing of our cannons' thunder. His friend and messmate, Capt. Bartlett Sims, informed me, that such was their destitu- tion, they had to stew up raw hides, of which their packs were made, to subsist upon. Under these circumstances, let every sensible and impartial reader say, who were the deserters ! Was it General Somerville and his two hundred followers who ran home from the sight of the enemy ; or was it the three hundred and twenty -four men who agreed to stand their ground and fight ? In my knowledge and reading of war, the " Mier men" are the first to desert from a run-away general, by standing their ground andjfighting an overwhelming enemy.
It is passing strange that General Hunt should have per- mitted himself to be thus abused by the Senator. A few weeks after the delivery of this speech, while on my return from Texas, I met Gen. Hunt upon a railroad in North Carolina, and he, for the first time, told me that, " the damned old
41
villain, Sam Houston, had the audacity to allude to him. in his speech against you. You know that I have not spoken to him for six years, and that I have denounced him as severely as ever you did. Demolish him ; I~know you have the evidence to do it" This was Gen. Hunt's opinion of the Senator in August last, soon after his speech was delivered against myself.
The following extract from General Memucan Hunt's letter to General Sam Houston, dated October 30th, 1849, and pub- lished in the " Texas State Gazette," of November 10th, page 91, will show what General Hunt's opinion of the Senator was at that date : —
" Your overbounding ambition, added to your jealousy and selfishness , has so uniformly prompted you in this propensity, that you are notorious in Texas as having reviled, traduced, and calumniated, or threatened, as in your judgment you thought most politic, the character of almost every man who has obtained any favorable reputation for himself and his country, either in connection with its revolt, the acquisition of its independence from Mexico, or subsequent annexation as a state of the United States. To prevent the least misapprehension of the justness of my assertions, I will, with your leave, make the following applications and references, namely : Have you not hushed your insidious attacks, either of ridicule, slander, or threats, or all of them, by making assertions to those who were your menials, and whom you knew would repeat the same after you (and make it more public and effective for your purpose than if published in newspapers), or by messages in a similar manner, as you recently sent openly and publicly to me by Major Neighbours, traducing them for the purpose of destroying their usefulness and in- fluence, as you have done of Col. Austin, the father of Texas; Governor Smith, Provisional Governor in 1835 ; Ex-President Burnet, and Lorenzo de Zavalla, Vice President, ad interim, of Texas; Ex-President Lamar; Ex- President Jones ; the late venerable Richard Ellis, President of the Conven- tion which formed the Constitution of the late republic of Texas ; the late William and John Wharton ; the late gallant Travis, and Fannin, and Crock- et, and Brenham, and Walker, Genl. Burleson, Col. Frank Johnson, Col. Sherman, Dr. Branch T. Archer, Gen. A. Sydney Johnson, late Sterling C. Robertson, Judge Megison, Leonard Groce, Col. Henry Jones, Col. Morgan, late Bailey Wardaman, Gov. Wood, Col. Bell, Governor elect ; Ex-Lieutenant Governor Horton, Dr. Levi Jones, late Gen. Wm. S. Fisher, late J. T. Van Zanett, late S. Rhodes Fisher, Gen. Tom Green of Fayette, Judge Webb, Ex- Governor Henderson, George W. Smyth, Commissioner of the General Land Office; Col. Caldwell, Judge Richard Scurry, Col. Barnard E. Bee, Gen. James Hamilton, A. T. Burney, late Richard Morris, Gen. Cazineau, Gen. Chambers, Gen. Thomas Jeff Green, Col. Latimer, Judge Franklin, Gen. Por- tis, late Dr. Tom Anderson, Commodore Moore, late Judge Jack Todd Robin-
42
son, Judge Ochiltree, Judge W. E. Jones, late Col. Wm. G.- Cpoke, late Col. James R. Cooke, Col. Samuel M. Williams, Judge W. Munifer, late Richard Dunlap, late Richard Bullock, Gen. Felix Huston, late Major Ben. Fort Smith, late Josiah Bell, Judge John B. Jones, Gen. McLeod, Dr. Gideon Williams, Col. Ira R. Lewis, Col. Robert Williams, Robert Mills, Major Mont- gomery, Judge Mills, Judge Robert Williamson, Ex-Governor Runnels, Col. Oli- ver Jones, Dr. Francis Moore, jun. Indeed, General, who is there that you have spared? Do not, however, understand me as being the defender of all the acts of all these gentlemen ; but I will venture the assertion that there is not one of them whose character in private or public life, or either, or both, as the case may be, would not bear a fair and advantageous comparison, now, if living, and, at their death, if they are no more, with your own. There is no one, indeed, in public life, who has dared to oppose your mandates, or even express a difference of opinion to yours ; nor is there any in private life, pos- sessing influence, who opposed your will and wishes, but have been, more or less, your victims, in the manner above referred to. It is, sir, proverbial in Texas, that the lowest compliment that can be bestowed on an old public offi- cer, or an influential gentleman in private life, in Texas, is, that General Sam Houston has never denounced him in a manner before named."
If I recollect rightly, this was not only Gen. Hunt's opinion of the Senator in 1849, but with every change of season since the commencement of the Texas Revolution to the present time, his denunciation has been as strong, or his friendship oppositely warm. I do not envy the amiability of General Hunt, and confess that my nature is of sterner stuff. My friendship was far beyond the reach of President Houston's official bribery. I have uniformly, and on all occasions, op- posed his corruptions and denounced his villanies.
I recollect last winter, when General Hunt was a Member of the Legislature from Galveston, he had with him the orphan son of the late gallant Colonel "William R. Cook, who he pub- licly and repeatedly charged President Houston of having had assassinated. In this belief, however, General Huut is far from being alone. .
The Senator's charge of my " having filched a good deal of money out of benevolent individuals, while a prisoner of war in Mexico," is as unmitigated a slander as could have been invented by his black heart. I had money frequently offered me in Mexico, but never accepted a dollar, except from three individuals, to wit — J. P. Schatzell, of Matamoras ; S. L. Har- gous ; and Governor F. M. Dimond, (now of Rhode Island,)
43
-but then United States Consul at Vera Cruz. The circum- stances of my receiving aid from these excellent gentlemen, are •these : After the capitulation of Mier, we were marched via Matamoras to the city of Mexico and Perote* Upon reaching Matamoras, Mr. J. P. Schatzell. a wealthy and benevolent merchant, and an old friend of the Hon. J. J. Crittenden, with the permission of General Ampudia, furnished Lieutenant, now Major George Crittenden of the Kifles, with means. Mr. Schatzell also insisted that I should take from him a sufficient amount to carry myself and rother officers through our long tirid tedious journey. I accepted only four hundred dollars, for which I receipted, he insisting upon my taking a much larger sum, and was perfectly willing to await the result of Texas success for his pay. Before, however, leaving Matamoras, he placed in my hands an unlimited letter of credit, to draw upon him if we required a further amount; Upon reaching Monterey, 'I called upon his correspondent, and received three hundred .dollars, making in the aggregate seven hundred dollars, every •cent of which was expended in common for myself and com- rades on our long march of more than two thousand miles to the Castle of Perote. The Congress of Texas, in 1844, not only recognized this debt of Mr. Schatzell, but on the last day of the session — page 470 of the Journal of the House of Representa- tives— upon my motion, the House unanimously passed the following resolution : —
" Mr. Green^ ly leave, introduced the following resolution : " Be it resolved, ~by the House of Representatives of the Republic of Texas in 'Congress assembled, That the thanks of this house be tendered to J. P. Schat- zell, Esq., of Matamoras, for the uniform kindness and liberality extended by "him to our unfortunate fellow citizens, while prisoners in Mexico."
.-. The next money I " borrowed " in Mexico was from our avhole-souled American citizen Mr. L. S. Hargous, then of Yera .Cruz, whose heart' is as large as his purse. It was under these circumstances : I was a prisoner heavily ironed in the Castle of Perote, and nearly starved, as were my comrades, through the neglect and baseness of President Houston. Mr. Hargous I had never seen, and he sent me one hundred dollars ; my journal will show how this sum was nsed. After my escape
4:4:
from the Castle, I reached Yera Cruz with five of my com- rades who had escaped the pursuit of Santa Anna's guards. Mr. Hargous gave me thirty dollars more, and an order for myself and companions to go to the United States on board of his steamer Petrita — so that amount of money and passages made the sum of $280, which I drew upon Texas for, in favor of Mr. Hargous, which amount was promptly acknowledged by the Texas Congress and incorporated with the amount of $8,000, which this gentleman had the year previous advanced to Generals McCleod and Cook for the Santa Fe prisoners. — My publication of the 10th January, 1846, above copied, fully explains this transaction, and page 399 of the Journals of the House of Representatives shows the truth of my statement — that though it was an administration Congress I denounced President Houston from my place in the house, .as a " Hack- Jiearted murderer and villain /" yet that house unani- mously sustained me by having the papers forthwith returned to the President. I subsequently visited the city of Mexico, in 1849, and enjoyed the open hospitality of Mr. Hargous, who thanked me in the warmest manner for my active services in the Texas Congress in procuring the law for his payment. In this connection I will relate an incident which that excellent gentleman told me at that time. It is this. Upon the arrival of the steamer of Mr. Hargous in Orleans, some imprudent one of my comrades let it be known to the papers that we had escaped out of Mexico on board said steamer. The conse- quence was, that upon the return of the steamer to Yera Cruz, she was seized by order of President Santa Anna, and Mr. Hargous went in person to the President to procure her resto- ration. The President put Mr. H. upon his honor as a gentle- man, to say whether he knew of my being on board of his steamer when she left port. Mr. H. answered promptly in the affirmative, and asked the President if their positions were reversed, would he have done likewise for his countrymen. Santa Anna said he would, and forthwith ordered the release of the steamer. This transaction, so honorable in Mr. Hargous as a true American, is not less noble in the President of Mexico.
I come now to the third and last person who I " filched,"
money of, in the language of the senator, while in Mexico. It was Governor F. M. Dimond, of Rhode Island, then the United States Consul at Yera Cruz — a better man or truer American never held office under his government. The following cor- respondence between Governor Dimond and myself will ex- plain this transaction.
" NEW YOKK, "January 24th, 1855.
" DEAR SIR — At the last session of Congress I was charged by a speech in the United States Senate, of borrowing money by false representations, while a prisoner of war in Mexico. The only three persons I ever borrowed money of while a prisoner, were J. P. Schatzell, of Matamoras, yourself, and L. S, Hargous, of Vera Cruz.
" I request you to state the circumstances of our transaction. " Very respectfully,
" Your obedient servant,
" THOS. J. GREEN. " To Governor F. M. DIMOND,
" Bristol, Rhode Island."
" BRISTOL, R. I., " January 29, 1855.
" DEAR GENERAL — I received yours of the 24th instant, requesting me to state to you the circumstances under which you borrowed money from me. I cheerfully comply with your request by stating the facts as I recollect them.
" I was U. S. Consul at Vera Cruz, in 1843. In the month of July, I think, of that year, I heard of your miraculous escape, with fifteen others of your comrades, from the strong (and by Mexicans considered impregnable), castle of Perote. Some weeks after, yourself, Capt. Dan Drake Henrie, Capt. C. K. Reese, and several others of your escaped comrades, notified me of your whereabout* in Vera Cruz ; after night-fall I visited your gloomy and horrid abode ; to have done so in open day, would have been destruction to you and certain ruin to myself. I knew you only from character and that you were my countryman in danger and distress, and when you visited my office under the cover of night, I offered you all the aid in my power ; you availed your- self of my offer, (I thought too modestly for your necessities), observing that you all could go to New Orleans in the steamer of a friend, on credit. I fur- ther state, and do so with great pleasure, that you paid it back to me the first opportunity, after your return to the United States, and that you were the wry first of the numerous Texan prisoners to whom I loaned money, who paid back the demand.
" With great respect,
" I am your friend,
"F. M. DIMOND. " General THOM. J. GREEN,
" New York.
46
True, it would have been destruction to myself ; for there was a price upon my head. I had committed the heinous offence, when my parole was refused, in violation of the usages of civilized warfare, of throwing off my irons, and, with a por- tion of my comrades, performing an escape (in the opinion of the greatest military captain of this age, Gen. Winfield Scott) " more difficult than that of Baron Trenck." It is the opinion of such men in military matters as Generals Scott and Worth, that a soldier estimates above price ; and while this military buffoon, this '''''bleating cub" Gen. Houston, has the low mean- ness to disparage the battle of Mier, these great leaders pro- nounce it one of the most extraordinary in the annals of war. Gen. Scott said that " I recollect of no such battle ; that, Con- sidering all things, the advantage of the enemy in position, his superior force of 3,000 to 260, the nineteen consecutive hours during which the battle raged, the execution done upon each side (their official reported loss 730, and known to be greater), to 11 killed and 23 wounded, astonishes me, and does immor- tal honor to your Spartan band."
But to return to Governor Dimond. How can I sufficient- ly express the gratitude of Texas, or my own admiration of his noble conduct. Upon my arrival in Yera Cruz, incog., he came every night to see me with the consolations of his repub- lican countenance, and the full freedom of his purse. Such officers do honor to their country, and deserve the gratitude of every lover of liberty. Nor was Texas forgetful of his many kindnesses to her suffering countrymen while prisoners. Her resolutions of thanks, and the compliment of a league and labor of land, show how his services were estimated.
"What the senator says of my vote for Congress in 1846 is new to me. If I received forty-three votes for Congress, they were forty-three more than I desired to receive. My name was before the people of Texas for a time ; but, finding that I could not return to the State, it had been withdrawn by niy- self long before the election. I find in page 31, Journals of the House of Representatives, 1st Congress, that the scattering vote for President in 1836 was, for T. J. Green, 42 ; T. J. Rusk, 1 ; and B. T. Archer, 4. These votes were cast for me with- out my knowledge or desire, and is what the senator may al- lude to.
4:7
The senator refers in complimentary terms to the late General Fisher. The following extract from a letter to my- self, written from the Castle of Perote, will show Gen. F.s' opinion of the senator. He entertained this opinion, from the battle of San Jacinto until his death.
" CASTLE OF PEROTE,
" July 26th, 1844.
"DEAR GENERAL — Your very estimable favor of the 15th day of June last, was received yesterday, for which receive my thanks ; it is the second, I be- lieve, that I have received from you since your escape. For your indefatiga ble exertions in our cause, every man of us feels properly grateful. Although unsuccessful in procuring us the benefits of the appropriation of Congress, it has been occasioned by no neglect of yours, and we know whom to hold re- sponsible. Our condition is bad enough, * God knows,' but still we have manly pride sufficient to bear it, and not to trouble the ungrate^il * govern- ment and people of Texas ' with our sufferings and repinings, caused by too much loyalty and fidelity to her honor and true interests. Sam Houston and his administration cannot bear all the sins of Texas, deeply died as Tie may 1e in villainy ; for I consider him less base than that portion of the population who passively tolerate his outrageous acts, and still better than those who approve
his course Capt. Ryan sends his respects and requests
you to write him. All hands join me in respects. " I remain your friend and
u Obedient servant,
WILLIAM S. FISHER.
General Fisher is now no more ; but before his death he stated, in an address to the public, that " every fact set forth in my work, the ' Mier Expedition? WAS TKUE.". He objected only to some deductions bearing upon his advocacy of the sur- render of Mier. Whilst I believe that I did General Fisher justice in that work, it is with pleasure I defend his memory now against the slanders of the Senator. General Fisher was the first captain at San Jacinto to charge the enemy's works. Here he witnessed the dastardly cowardice of this squalling peacock, General-in-Chief Sam Houston, which he then de- nounced, while he praised the gallantry of Rusk, Wharton, Lamar, Sherman, Burlison, and others ; since which time he has been one of the few with honesty and boldness enough to denounce Houston's many crimes and filthy vices. Such virtue in Fisher he (Houston) could no more forgive, than he could change his own corrupt nature. He therefore charges upon
48
Fisher and myself that the " Mier expedition was organized to maraud ivpon and plunder Mexico" He, however, in the next breath, falsifies his accusation, by showing that we did take and hold undisputed possession of Mier, the richest town upon the Hio Grande, two clays previous to the battle, and not a copper's worth of private property was taken by any one of our com- mand. "What the Senator says of my participation in the sacking of Laredo, he knew to be a dirty lie when he gave utterance to it. It was shown, that when he made this charge in 1845, it was one of those slanders which the meanest of his partizans did not credit. It was shown that I was not in Laredo during that day, but was at the camp of General Somerville, several miles east of the town, and that mainly it was through the influence and energy of Fisher and myself that most of the articles were returned to General Somerville's head-quarters, to be returned to the owners. If any articles were carried into Texas, it was by those friends and neighbors of President Houston who returned with Colonel Bennett from that camp. That any one of the Mier men ever did take a pin's worth of private property, either at Laredo or elswhere, is positively, maliciously, infamously false, and its author is Sam Houston, the murderer of the slandered. I understand, however, that he pretends to give as his authority an individual by the name of H. Clay Davis, who came to Texas some years since, repre- senting himself as the nephew of Henry Clay, and took up with a Mexican woman. Page 142 of my work shows that he was the only American citizen who ever deserted our standard. That page thus speaks of him : —
" We have alluded to this circumstance as the first and last instance in our whole ^Revolution, where an American, born and raised in the United States, ever deserted our standard to join that of cur Mexican enemy, and it should be a warning to others against a too intimate Mexican association."
The best refutation of the Senator's slander of my receiving $24,154 04 by a resolution of the congress, for what he, Hous- ton, insinuates was a false charge, is contained in the proceed- ings of the first Congress, Journals House of Representatives, pages 164-5 and 272. The following law, which was passed in accordance with these proceedings, approved and executed
49
"by the Senator, then President of Texas, will show what he thought of its justice at that time :
"Be it resolved, &c., — That the President be and is hereby authorized to pay to Thomas J. Green, or order, out of the first means in the Treasury or any agency of Texas, the sum of $24,154 04, together with the damages and cost of protest, for or on account of this Government, provided the said Thomas J. Green shall file with the Executive the account of the same, report- ed to this Congress, receipted in full.
" IRA INGRAM, " Speaker of House of Representatives.
"RICHARD ELLIS, "Pres. Pro tern, of Senate. "Approved, Dec. 17th, 1836.
"SAM HOUSTON."
I was paid this amount by the President's order upon David White, the Texas agent at Mobile, not in good money, which was due me, but in Land Scrip, which I sold at ten cents per acre, and in other depreciated stuff, almost valueless : — so the amount proved nearly an entire loss, and up to this day I have never been a supplicant to Congress for relief.
The Senator's attempt at wit, for the purpose of diverting serious attention from what I have said of his two fugitive slaves, Tom and Esau, pages 122-3, is pointless and stupid. What I have related of them is literally true. I might have said, with equal truth, that Esau said that "he. did not so much dislike the blasphemous swearing of Old Sam, but that he had to sleep with him of nights, and scratch his back ; — this was more than this nigger could stand ; — I just as leave sleep with a dead horse." This was the language of Esau, the " Hack boy" as the Senator calls him. Boy, indeed ! he weighed two hundred pounds, was as black as the ten of spades, as greasy, and nearly as filthy as his old master.
I have learned, but for the truth of which I cannot vouch that the senator, in some northern abolition address, said he had manumitted his slaves. Up to the period above referred to, Tom and Esau, with the exception of his woman and chil- dren, were the only slaves President Houston claimed to own. We have seen how Tom and Esau manumitted themselves by leg bail ; and I understand that it is a fact well known, that he sold Martha Houston and children, as she called herself,
4
50
and put the money in his pocket, or rather in his belly. in my knowledge of physiology, the senator is the only animal that feeds upon its young, with the exception of the alligator. Providence seems to have supplied the latter with instinct to- eat only a portion of its young, to prevent an increase too great to be subsisted. Nature has not been so bountiful with the senator. In the absence of instinct and morals, human nature is the worst of brutes. Thus a gormand avarice makes him sell and eat the African litter and the mother who bare them, while we have seen him fly from his Cherokee wife and papooses, because he could not sell, and was too mean to feed them.
I said in the above paragraph, that these were the only slaves at that period which the senator claimed to own. Whe- ther he owned these lawfully or honestly is more than doubtful^ The boy Tom was a kidnapped slave of Colonel Augustus Als- ton, of Tallahassee, Florida, and had been run into Texas. Esau, I am informed, was purchased by a government agent with government securities, which were never accounted for. The Journals of the House of Representatives, Ylllth Congress, pages 87, 98, and 104, will show that the House believed he had a " Cherokee wife and children."
" Mr. Lott, by leave, offered the following resolution, to wit : —
" Resolved, ~by the House of Representatives, That the President be, and is hereby, requested to furnish this House, immediately and without delay, a copy of the letter of the King of the Netherlands, in relation to the marriage of his daughter ; his answer thereto ; also, his correspondence with the for" eign powers now in treaty with this Republic, on the birth of his son, Sam. — Laid upon the table one day.
" The resolution calling upon the President for information in relation to a correspondence with the King of the Netherlands, in relation to the mar- riage of his daughter ; also, to the birth of his son, Sam. — Read second time.
" Mr. Lott moved its reference to the Committee on Foreign Relations. — Lost. — Mr. Cazneau offered the following amendment — after the word * Sam,' insert — lalso, his wife and children in tfle Cherokee Nation.1 Mr. Rowett moved its postponement until next day. Mr. Kendrick moved its postpone- ment until the 1st of June. The Ayes and Noes being called thereon, stood 34 ayes and 1 No. — Next day — Mr. Rabb moved to strike from the journals the resolution calling upon the President for correspondence with the King of the Netherlands in relation to the marriage of his daughter ; also, in relation, to the birth of his son Sam, with the amendment of Mr. Cazneau. — LOST."
51
With all the senator's influence, he could not expunge these proceedings.
A Mend of the senator onca applied to few for a letter of recommendation for office. The letter was at once written^ warm and strong ; but no sooner was the applicant's back turned than the senator wrote to the party telling him to dis- regard the former letter, that the applicant was unworthy, etc. The applicant got hold of the last written letter, put it in his pocket, and asked the senator if he had ever so written. With uplifted eyes and hands, he protested before high heaven he never had. Whereupon the letter was produced. The senator looked at it with a ghastly grin, and replied : "Drunk, ~by God ! this hand may have written, l)ut this heart never dictated that letter, my dear friend" So it is now with the senator. He doubtless forgets that in' 1836, while he was abusing President Burnet, for the Santa Anna treaty, he wrote me a letter of eight pages, approving in his highest terms of eulogy my con- duct at Yelasco, in relation to Santa Anna, which he now so vehemently abuses. He said — " you deserve the lasting grati" tude of the country for your conduct in relation to the pris- oner" It is the opinion and approval of better men that I value. Gen. Thomas J. Rusk writes me thus from his " Head Quarters, Victoria, June ~L5th, 1836 :
" DEAR GEN'L. — ... I would have liked much to have seen you, to have tendered to you in person the expressions of my gratitude on the part of the people of Texas^ for your zeal in our cause, as well as to have commu- nicated with you freely upon the present position of our affairs. The gene- ral opinion prevailing that our difficulties with Mexico have terminated is ill-founded. We now as much underrate as when I saw you before, we over- rated the enemy — and we have but a short period to organize upon the frontiers a sufficient force to meet the enemy in another campaign — when, beyond doubt, he will come upon us with redoubled numbers. I have re- ceived information entitled to credit, that the government of Mexico have directed Gen. Filisola to disregard any treaties entered into with Santa Anna.
" I have the honor to be, with great respect,
" Your obedient servant,
" THOMAS J. RUSK.." To Brig'r Gen'l. T. J. GREEN."
This was the general sentiment of the country at that time. I had been to the United States, mortgaged my property, raised
52
money, recruited men, brought into the field munitions of war, and provision to sustain those men. A portion of my brigade and my supplies had already reached the vicinity of General Husk's Headquarters. My quarter-masters were directed 1y me to make no difference in the issuing of provisions between Gen. Eusk's brigade and my own. These were things which an honest man and a patriot thanked me for, because these supplies found him destitute, and the government wholly un- able to help him. His letter shows that his forces were at that time reduced to less than four hundred men, without ammuni- tion or provisions, (except green beef,) and not good horses enough to send expresses through the country. At this time I had been ordered by President Burnet to proceed against the Indians on the upper Brazos with that portion of my brigade which had landed at Yelasco. I promptly proceeded to exe- cute said order, and had advanced into the country as far as Coles' settlement, some hundred and twenty miles, through a rainy season and boggy roads, when Gen. Eusk's despatch reached me, with the following information, which I give en- tire, as the best refutation ,of the senator's slander about my getting near the Indians and then turning my course. Gen. Eusk, in sending these despatches, informed me, that he had sent Col. Smith and Captain Billingsly, with two hundred mounted men in the direction of the Indians ; and requested me, in the strongest terms, to re-inforce him with all possible despatch. I would have been recreant, to every duty of patri- otism not to have complied. The President approved and applauded my course for so doing.
"MATAMOKAS, STATE OF TAMAULIPAS,
June 9th, 1836. "Gen. THOMAS J. RUSK.
" Dear Sir:— The messenger who carries this is strongly recommended by all the friends in this place. The news he carries is of the greatest importance to Texas. In God's name ~be governed ~by it. I expected to have carried this news to Texas myself; but to have been made prisoner is not what I ex- pected. I was to have left this evening by the assistance of the friends of
our cause. At 12 o'clock this day, I have been called up by Gen. ,
and obliged to give security that I would appear at any time I was called upon, or that I would not leave the city, or else be imprisoned in the quartet Captains Teal and Karnes are prisoners also. I hope, if the bad faith at the
53
Mission, Goliad, and elsewhere, will not fully open your eyes to the perfi- diousness of these unprincipled wretches, in the detention of our Commis- sioners in this place, as well as myself, and four of my men — all with pass- ports from Gen. Filisola — you will hereafter act on principle of retaliation, regardless of consequences to us. If you had shot the officers already taken, I have no doubt this second attack would not have been made. The infor- mation is so full in the other documents or letters, that it is not necessary for me to go into detail. The advice given in them, pay all attention to ; and, for heaven's sake, pay strict attention, and profit thereby. To Galveston and Matagorda, and your prisons, look well. Our situation is bad enough, but death can cure our troubles.
" I am your enemy's prisoner,
"MAJOR W. P. MILLER,
Legion Cavalry."
"MATAMORAS, June 9th, 1836.
" My Dear Friend: — I am sorry to inform you of our unfortunate situa- tion. We are detained for nothing but to keep you ignorant of the enemy's intentions. They will soon be down on you in great numbers. Four thou- sand will leave here in four or eight days, for La Baliia, — it is supposed via Nueces or San Patricio, — and as many more in fifteen or twenty days, by water, from Vera Cruz, to land at Conano or Brazos — not yet ascertained at •which place. They make war of extermination, and show no quarter. Now, my dear friend, you see what treating with a prisoner is. But you must make the best of it. You can fall back to the Colorado, and call all the men to the field ; for if you do not, Texas is gone. They have heard that the President is at Velasco with a very weak guard, and say they will have him in less than two weeks. I think you ought to send all the prisoners there to San Augustine, for safe-keeping. You will have from 7,000 to 10,000 troops to contend with, many of them cavalry, to be well mounted to murder women and children. No, soldiers ! You must not spare any pains for the sake of saving us. We are willing to be lost to save Texas. Our soldiers, march to the field, and there defend your rights. They say that you are rebels ; but you must show them that you are soldiers, and know how to defend your rights. Send all the prisoners to the east. We are not in jail yet, but to-morrow demand our passports ; as soon as that is done we shall have quarters in the calaboose. We have good friends, which, at present, prudence forbids me to name, for fear of detection. Urea is Commander-in-chief of the Mexican army, and says he will not stop short of the Sabine river. Be not discour- aged— poison every pool of water in the road. You must now work hard — work as well as fighting. Blow up Goliad and Bexar ; you must have a sufficient force in the field at once, and we will whip them again. Be united ; but do not let the people of the United States know what kind of a war they make of it, and they will certainly come to our assistance. I do not consider our lives in danger, if in close quarters. Do not let my father and sister know
54:
that we are prisoners ; if they do, say that I am treated well. Remember me to Col. Millard, and my Lieutenant, and all friends — tell them I will be with them soon. To give you as much information as possible, my letter is in this small hand, and bid you adieu in haste. — Ourjcaute for ever !
"Your friend,
"HENRY TEAL."
" I concur with all that has been stated above and foregoing. — Your obe- dient servant,
" H. W. KARNES, Captain."
" A true copy of the original, signed by Captains Teal and Karnes. " HEAD-QUARRTERS, VICTORIA, June Vlih, 1836.
" THOMAS J. RUSK."
Tliis correspondence, so creditable to Major Miller and Cap- tains Teal and Karnes, our commissioners, who had been sent by General Rusk to see the retreating Mexican army evacuate Texas, was of a most alarming character. They knew that Gen- eral Kusk's force was reduced to a few hundred men, and des- titute of supplies, and believed that their President, Santa Anna, had sailed for Mexico ;' and hence this determination to countermarch upon Texas. Dates will show that this deter- mination on the part of the enemy was not abandoned until after they heard of the retention of Santa Anna, at Yelasco, and the arrival of my brigade with abundant supplies for the campaign. Where was the Senator during these exciting times ? Either hawking Santa Anna's saddle and spurs about the United States, or drunk at his partner's in Eastern Texas.
The Senator again invents this senseless falsehood — " He even had the meanness to steal women's saddles" The follow- ing order from President Burnet to myself, will show by what authority I acted in supplying the army with " beef, horses^ wagons, <&c. ;"
" EXECUTIVE DEPARTMENT,
" Velasco, 7th June, 1836. " To Brigadier-General
" THOS. J. GREEN.
" SIR — You will take the forces [assigned to you at this place, and proceed with all practical expedition to the northern frontier of our settlements, where several small tribes of Indians are said to have concentrated for the purposes of depredation Should circumstances and the public good
55
Tender it necessary, you will press horses, provisions, and whatever private property may be required. But I want to enjoin upon you great circumspec- tion in the exercise of this harsh power, for it is beyond dispute that many shameful abuses have been practised under it. Be very cautious, therefore, to whom you depute an authority so invidious and so susceptible of perversion. "Wishing you and your companions in arms a successful and glorious cam- paign, I am,
"Your obedient servant,
" DAVID G. BURNET."
The following letter will show with what promptness I obeyed the above order of the President :
"BRAZORIA, June 12th, 1836. " To His Excellency,
" DAVID G. BURNET,
" President of the Republic of Texas.
" SIR — I arrived here two days since, and found not a horse or wagon of any description with which to transport our provisions. After much difficulty in sending around the country, I have succeeded in procuring teams to trans- port about half of my provisions, and have taken up our line of march via Columbia and San Filipe, to the seat of war. My present force at this place is about two hundred rank and file, besides the 100 mounted men under Bre- vet-Brigadier Felix Huston, now in advance. Further news arrived here, stating that the Indians are in much larger numbers than was reported in your despatches. If so, it will be prudent for the troops at Coxe's Point, be- longing to my brigade, to be ordered to advance and join me, as I understand it is probable that the present state of Gen. Rusk's command may place it out of his power to comply with your requisition for the 100 mounted men. I would further suggest whether it would not be best for your Excellency to take some early orders upon reinforcing my command by such companies as may come in from the United States via Red River. With sentiments of high consideration,
" I am, your obt. servt,
"THOS. J. GREEN, " Brig. Gen. Texas Army."
Upon the receipt of Gen. Husk's letter with his despatches from Matamoras, I again wrote to President Burnet, thus :
" COLES' SETTLEMENT,
" June 28th, 1836. '" His Excellency,
"DAVID G. BURNET,
" Pres. of the Republic of Texas.
" SIR — Enclosed you will find a letter from Gen. Rusk to me, of the 17th mst. This news, is unexpected and extraordinary, and under any circum-
56
stances leaves me but one course, and that to meet the call promptly and without hesitation. It is proper for me, however, here to remark, that the spies which Gen. Felix Huston sent out, bring intelligence that the Indian information you received was not only highly colored, but much magnified, and that the Indians had disappeared far north soon after their depredations, and that they had not been in large numbers. On yesterday I despatched Brevet-Brigadier Gen. F. Huston, in person, to Gen. Rusk's head quarters, and to-day I have ordered on the cavalry under his command ; and to-mor- row shall follow with the remaining forces under my command. I think that from the turnout hereabouts, and those troops just now arriving from the States, we will have from 1,500 to 2,000 men in the field in fifteen days. I have advised Gen. Rusk, to drive back all the cattle to the east of the Cola- rado, and make that our strongest line of defence. We ought to fight the enemy there, and if we do, I have every confidence he will not cross.
" I have had much difficulty in procuring beef, as most of the citizens upon the road hide out their cattle, and some have several times stolen my teams. But now, since this news, they begin to get very kind, and say that they will feed us upon the Colorado, for their horses are so low in flesh many cannot again run.
" Your obedient servant,
THOS. J. GREEN, Brig.-Gen. Texas Army."
In the execution of President Burnet's orders, it became my unavoidable duty not only to feed my men, but to procure transportation. Many on the line of my march believed that our Mexican difficulties were at an end ; and they were un- willing to furnish beef or horses for government credit. Those who were believed to be the best friends of the Mexicans were the first to refuse our troops supplies. Had there been more such patriotic citizens as Dr. Hoxie, Col. Coles, Capt. Swisher, Josiah Bell, Mrs. Ebberly and Miss Rebecca Cummings, and others, I would not have been compelled to have pressed a beef or a horse into the service. As it was, it became my duty to take for the service some eight or ten horses. For this ser- vice I detailed Lieutenant, now Major James Scott, the United States Post-office agent for the State of Texas. He was charged in his duty according to President Burnet's instructions to me. If he ever took a " woman's saddle," it was in violation of his orders, (which I do not believe,) and for which, had he com- mitted such an outrage, I would have been the first to punish him therefor. Major Scott is the warm personal friend of the
57
senator, and enjoys at present a lucrative office through his re- commendation. The senator has long known that he was the officer who pressed these horses into the service ; and, if a woman's saddle was taken, it was the work of his friend. I believe it a most unwitty and stupid lie. I do say that every beef, and horse, or other property that was taken, was re- ceipted for at the highest valuation, and Texas has paid or acknowledged the debt. I was particular to offer receipts at the time. Some few refused ; but whenever they have applied since, I have most cheerfully furnished them.
I must take leave for the present of the numerous other minor falsehoods contained in the senator's speech. They have already been abundantly refuted, not only in my work, but by ex-Presidents Burnet, Lamar, and Jones, Gen. S. H. Foote's history of Texas, Commodore Moore, Gen. Hunt, and numer- ous other writers ; whilst I notice his two most prominent, to wit, that concerning the " Texas Bank charter" and the one about the broken " West Florida Bcmk."
To say that these are base falsehoods, is to use language which poorly expresses the blind malignity and infamous pur- pose of the author. They are HELLISH LIES, wholly destitute of the shadow of truth ; and hundreds of the most intelligent men of Texas will bear testimony to this assertion. To the first of these calumnies the senator has devoted a large portion of his speech. He evidently feels here that the ground is soft be- neath him, and " hereby hangs a tale"
The senator has been charged by many gentlemen of Texas, with having been bribed, while President of that Republic, to sign this law. "We will see with what truth. On the 12th of December, 1836, see journals, House of Representatives -, page 261-2, an act of incorporation styled the " Texas Railroad, Navigation and Banking Company" was passed, granting to " Branch T. Archer, James €ollingsworth, and their present and future associates, successors, and assigns," the rights and privileges therein set forth. The i\±v& present associates of the petitioners, Archer and Collingsworth, were Stephen F. Austin (the father of Texas), Ex-Governor J. Pinckney Henderson, and Thomas F. M'Kinney. They organized after the adjourn- ment of the Legislature, and, for the purpose of carrying out
58
in good faith the objects of the charter, invited other gentle- men of influence, both in and out of Texas, to the number of sixteen, to an equal participation of its benefits. Among those out of Texas, were Judge James H. Gholson and Col. 0. P. Green, of Virginia ; Col. "William Christie, of New Orleans ; and, subsequently, Gen. James Hamilton, of South Carolina. My- self, amongst other prominent gentlemen of Texas, were of the future associates ; and, amongst the Texas associates, the per- sonal and bosom friend of President Houston, John K. Allen, applied for and obtained two shares, of a sixteenth each, one in his own name, and the other in Uank. It will be recollect- ed that President Houston was at this time " an anti-bank, mint drop " democrat ; and the presumption consequently was, that he would refuse to sign any bank charter. He did, how- ever, sign this charter, with its large banking privileges. This was at the time a matter of general surprise ; but the sequel will explain. By the terms of the charter, $25,000 dollars were to be paid as a bonus to the State, in gold or silver, within eighteen months from the passage thereof, or, in case of fail- ure, the charter was to be forfeited. Before the expiration of the eighteen months, a new Legislature having convened, enacted a law requiring the paper issue of the Republic (usu- ally called star money) " to be received for all debts, dues, and demands of any kind whatsoever, owing or coming to the Re- public." Before the expiration of the eighteen months, the Hon. Branch T. Archer, President of said Banking Company, presented the Secretary of the Treasury (the Hon. Henry Smith) the bonus of $25,000 in the star money of the Repub- lic. The Secretary of the Treasury acknowledged, by a certi- ficate now in my possession, that this tender was duly and lawfully made, but that President Houston had ordered him not to receive any thing but gold or silver. This was a few days previous to the expiration of the eighteen months, with- in which time, according to the terms of the charter, the bonus was to have been paid. The day before this tender was made, this identical President Houston offered to sell to the said Branch T. Archer ', President of the said Banking Company r, the identical share of one sixteenth, which the said John K. Allen had obtained in Hank from the original grantees. The
59
Hon. Mr. Archer, as pure a man as ever lived, suspecting cor- ruption on the part of President Houston, indignantly refused to purchase, even at the low price of $4,000, when said shares had been a short time previous sold at from $12,000 to $20,000 each. President Houston had retained his share a little too long ; and, failing to get even $4,000 therefor, Ms anti-lank, " mint drop" principles turned up so strongly, that he ordered the Secretary of the Treasury to receive nothing as a bonus but gold or silver. He had as little right to make this order as his brother-in-law Bowles, the Chief of the Cherokees. The law governed the case. The co-operators complied with the law ; and no lawyer in Texas, or out of it, who is honest, will hesitate to say the tender was legal, and therefore all the rights under the charter were vested in the Company. The Congress of the Eepublic of Texas, subsequent to the tender, in relation to this matter, determined that they could not interfere with vested rights, and that to determine these rights was the pro- vince of the Judiciary. The constitution of the (present) State of Texas reiterates this principle in its broadest sense, and guarantees fully all the rights vested by the Eepublic.
The Senator's charge that I sold $28,000 of this stock, is utterly false ; so far from this, I have never sold or offered to sell one dollar's worth to living man, whilst others of the asso- ciation, amongst whom Lieut. Gov. Albert C. Horton, Chief Justice James Collingsworth, Thomas F. McKinney, Samuel M. Williams, "Wm. H. Wharton, James Knight, C. P. Green, and others, did sell all or portions of theirs, at prices ranging from $20,000, down ; I, on the contrary, became the purchaser of a large portion of this stock, for which I paid more than $40,000, as my receipts and certificates will show. This heavy loss I have borne for eighteen years, without complaint ; and whilst I and my associates have secured to us the only banking privilege in the state of Texas, we have made no effort to avail ourselves of these chartered rights, in opposition to what might possibly be the public sentiment of the state ; and, whilst I be- lieve that a system of banking in all of her sister southern states makes it necessary for Texas to adopt and foster a simi- lar institution, I have not attempted to thrust it upon her in advance of public opinion. Whatever the rights of myself and
60
associates may be, we hold them lawfully and constitutionally ^ and we will thus exercise them, or not at all. Thus it is that the Senator, knowing that I had the proofs of his corruption in my possession, has devoted so large a portion of his senatorial vindication to this subject. I have said elsewhere that this peculation and stealing was an every day business of President Houston. Does he deny that he advocated the removal of the seat of government to a place called for himself, and for a large number of town lots in said place ? If he does, I refer to the books of the town proprietors, and to their agent, Major J. S. Holman, who, I learn, did, by order of said proprietors, make out his gratuitous deeds, Tor which he, Houston, never paid a dollar. The Senator, in his " /Stationery Stud-Horse" letter to his friend William Bryan, says, " I will rely upon you in all things, as I have always done, and will only say, this is a < Stationery ' Bill ! ! ! "
What does the Senator mean by these exclamations ? What does he mean by " all things f " Have they any reference to a duplicate of the Land Office seal, found among his friend's papers, amongst which was this honest " STATIONERY " Bill ; or is this seal, by which Texas lands can be created, a part of the " STATIONERY ? " Where is the Seal ?
The other of the Senator's assertions, that I purchased a plantation with " twenty thousand dollars of the circulation of a broken West Florida Bank," is notoriously false as any one of his numerous other slanders. I can appeal for the truth of this assertion to the present Governor of Texas, and Judge Robert J. Townes, Hon. John W. Harris, Hon. James C. Wil- son, Dr. Branch T. Archer, and every other gentleman of my very extensive acquaintance in Texas. So far from which, I never did own, directly or indirectly, one single dollar of said paper, neither did I ever circulate one dollar thereof. It is true, as was the custom then and now in Texas, that I endors- ed some few of these bills, — the circumstances of my so doing are these : Captain Eed, of the regular army of Texas, was in- troduced to me by our mutual friend President Lamar, as his warm friend, who informed me he had some West Florida money, which was perfectly good, but that he could make no use of it without the name of some gentleman well known in
61
Texas ; that he had immediate use for a few hundred dollars, and desired me as a matter of personal favor to endorse said bills, which I did for him, as I should have done for any other gentleman whom I looked upon as an honorable man. With- in a day or two subsequently, Mr. Thomas F. M'Kinney, of Galveston, informed me that he had good reason to suspect the solvency of said bank, from a letter which had accidental- ly came into his possession. I went immediately to Capt. Red, and made him cancel my endorsement. Capt. Red informed me, however, that he had lost at a faro bank some five or six hundred dollar bills, and promised to redeem them, so that no one was ever the loser in any lonafide transaction in receiving
said bills." Bancroft Libra-
The senator has told one truth, and only one, I believe, in his whole speech — it is this : — That I did instigate and stimu- late the Mier prisoners to rise upon their guards and obtain their liberty and return to Texas. At the battle of Mier, Gen. Ampudia promised that our men should be kept upon the Rio Grande until an exchange could be effected. No sooner, how- ever, than the Texians were cajoled into a surrender of their arms, they were informed that they were to be marched some two thousand miles to the interior, either to the city of Mexico or the Castle of Perote. This was the violation of promise, so horrible to the feelings of our men, that they naturally spoke of resistance to its execution whenever an opportunity offered. The senator's two bed-fellowTs, Tom and Esau, were in the habit of mixing with our prisoners, and soon communicated these threats to Gen. Ampudia, who sent for Gen. Fisher and my- self, and informed us that we should be held as hostages for the good conduct of our men — that he should keep us under a separate guard of forty men one day in advance of the main body of the prisoners, and if they made any attempt to over- power their guards, our lives should be the forfeit ; and he directed that Col. Savreigo and guards, who had us in charge, should take us by the prison where our men were confined, so that we might inform them in person of the consequences in which such an attempt would involve us.
Believing, as I did, that this long march of two thousand miles, and "Mexican humanity" would cause a loss, by the
62 ,
most horrid suffering, of a large portion of our men, I did not hesitate to make them promise me, before I left the prison, to lose no opportunity of effecting their escape, regardless of any consequences that might befall my person. This they did with tears in their eyes, and hearts bursting with anguish. From my then imperfect knowledge of the country, I supposed that the crossing of the Eio Juan, or at the Kinconada, would be the most favorable points for such an attempt. Unforeseen cir- cumstances however prevented the consummation of this ad- vice at these places, and it was not until the main body of our men overtook us at Salado, that the plan of an attack was consummated. That plan, as is known to Dr. William M. Sheppard, late Secretary of the Texian Navy, and other officers present, was my own. The whole world, with the exception of their calumniator, senator Houston, awards lasting honor to these brave men, who thus struck for their liberty against three times their numbers of armed guards. Had the whole of my plan have been adhered to, of never leaving the main road, four days would have taken them into Texas, without the loss of a man, after their victory was gained at Salado. Chance prevented myself and other officers from being with them, or the whole of that plan would have been carried out.
The Senator in his speech says that I am a " coward." This, I presume, is of the smallest moment to the United States Senate. It is what, however, those who know me as well as does the Senator, will not believe. Those who were with me at Guerrero, at the Alcantro, Mier, Salado, Perote, at Bear River, and other places of danger, know it to be false.
Even the Senator himself seems to have changed his opinion upon this subject. The last two interviews I had with him were in the spring, 1844:, at a public meeting in the city of Galveston, Texas. I denounced him then as " villain and traitor" and made him leave the stand, fly frbm the meeting, and seek pro- tection under a lady's roof. The next interview I had with the Senator, was in Barnum's Hotel, Baltimore, at the Democratic Convention in 1848, in the presence of the Hon. Isaac E. Holmes, and General Daniel M. Baringer, our late minister to Spain. There he " took the door," with the haste of one who wished to escape the explosion of a powder magazine. Since
63
which time, to quiet his nerves, he has taken to the cold water cure ; and I have my doubts whether the hydropathy of the Brazos, Colorado, or the Jordan itself, will keep them still. Speaking of the Colorado, reminds me of an incident illustrative of the Senator's benevolence. In 1841 the Senator was upset in a stage and thrown into the Colorado river, at the town of Bastrop, and not knowing how to swim, under the unerring law of gravity (whiskey being lighter than water), he floated down the river some distance, in a nearly drowned condition, when an old negro man, by the name of Sam Banks, plunged in and rescued him. The Senator was taken to the house of Mr. Noessel, where he remained some weeks ; but before leav- ing, he requited the kindness of his host, by swindling him not only of his bill, but also of a certain " Hooded filly " belonging to Mrs. Noessel. His benevolence was more manifest when he came to reward the heroic old negro, who had risked his own life to save that of the Senator. How do you suppose this was done ? By procuring the freedom of the old man and provid- ing him a competent pension the remainder of his days ? This was the natural reward which any gentleman would have applied to such service. Not so with the Senator. I am told, upon good authority, that he put his hand in his pocket, and abso- lutely gave his rescuer " ONE DIME IN SILVEK !" Last summer he passed through this same town of Bastrop, where this poor old negro called upon him for charity, when the Senator's heart, after fourteen years' expansion, did give the old negro a silver half dollar, which he threw under his feet with contempt, and died within a few weeks thereafter, saying up to the day of his death, " If God would forgive him, he never would do the lilce again ; that he thought it was a gentleman, and not OLD SAM, he was pulling out of the river"
These facts, disgraceful as they appear, are nevertheless true. They have been published time and again, and can be attested by many of the most respectable citizens of that county.
The Senator had many causes of complaint against me ; among others, one well known to many of the first gentlemen of Texas now living, to wit — of his swindling me out of my cloak, and General Santa Anna out of his gold snuff-box. The circumstances of this transaction are these : 1836, during the
64:
session of the first congress of the republic, then sitting at Columbia on the Brazos, President Houston begged me to give him a valuable cloak, which I had just received from New Orleans, stating that he was greatly in need of one, which I cheerfully did. The following day he visited the prisoner, General Santa Anna, then confined twelve miles distant at Orizimbo. Spying in the hands of the prisoner a luxurious gold snuff-box, valued at more than a thousand dollars, he placed upon the prisoner's shoulders the cloak of which he (Houston) had that day begged of me for his own use. This favor done to the prisoner, with the copious admiraton on the part of Houston of said snuff-box, the prisoner, in gen- tleman courtesy, could not do less than to offer it to him in return. Thus he received this, among other bribes, of the President of Mexico, in violation of his oath and the constitu- tion of the Republic. I ask now of the Senator, Where is the snuff-box ? Has he sold it, as he did the prisoner's saddle ; or has he got it secreted from public view, because to receive and hold it thus, was in violation of his oath and the constitution. The further facts are these : No sooner had President Houston been inaugurated, and even before, than he visited the prisoner, got a glimpse of the snuff-box, and returned to Columbia and begged of me my cloak, as a gentlemanly pretext by which he could get the prisoner's snuff-box. At this time he also com- menced a negotiation with the prisoner for his release — (see pages 111, 116, and 134 to 145, inclusive, of the Journals of the House of Representatives). It was determined, by a vote 21 to 5, inexpedient to release the prisoner ; yet, in violation of this expression of the Congress, President Houston had con- summated a plan, and at that time was carrying it into effect, by which he did so smuggle the prisoner out of the country. Few will believe that Houston was so stupendous an ass, as to sup- pose that Santa Anna's promises would hold beyond the bounds of Texas. Houston's motives, then, in acting in violation to the vote of the Congress, and the public sentiment of the country, must have been strongly mercenary, as have been repeatedly charged upon him.
Another reason for the Senator's dislike to me has been my uncompromising hostility to the demoralizing American system
65
of divorce. From earliest manhood, in every legislature in which I have served, I have opposed this system of prostitu- tion, as destructive of morals and good society. I have had occasion to refer to the Senator himself for repudiating his former wives with as much indifference as he did his honest debts, or as little compunction as Henry the Eighth. I crave pardon for speaking of Henry and the Senator in the same paragraph — the hyena and the mink resemble as well.
The Senator says, that of the "sixty-seven gallant brave men" who fell in the Mier Expedition, only the seventeen decimated claim my special sympathy. " How does he account for the loss of the other fifty f" I refer the Senator to the following extract from my work, which he says he " has read so particularly." ^QQ pages 369 to 72, inclusive: —
" Let us now turn to inquire after the main body of our countrymen — prisoners ; and we do so with feelings of mournful sorrow, with a heart over- whelmed with sadness. We go back to the prisons of San Luis Potosi, and find them covered with rags and filth, loaded with vermin, and worn down with hunger and all the multiplied cruelties of their captors. We trace their bloody path south three hundred miles, through the scorching plains of Mexico, by the unburied bones of many noble souls who sunk under a task more than human. We see the brave and dauntless Cameron taken out upon this path and murdered for no other cause than his bravery. We see the remainder herded together like beasts of burden, and driven forth into the streets with sticks and bayonets by brutal overseers, as scavengers of filth too horrible to contemplate. We see their manly frames worn down by an insufficient allowance of the offal of a rotten population. As the opposite plate will show, which was drawn from life by our indefatigable fellow pris- oner, Charles M'Laughlin, we see them heavily ironed, working upon a pavement in front of the archbishop's palace at Tacubaya ; and what was still more grating to their feelings, was to be gazed upon from their coaches, by the yellow, pepper-eating, demi-savages, as if they had been so many hye- nas. We trace most of the survivors, naked and emaciated, two hundred miles east, to the dark, cold dungeons of Perote ; the balance to San Juan de Ulloa, to be offered up as a certain sacrifice to the vomito, that universal ma- laria of death-. We follow around the massive castle walls of Perote upon the north, and in the bottom of the great ditch find newly-stirred earth. Here, underneath the loose sand, without a plank to cover their bones, or a stone to mark the place — without the last sad rights of burial, in a spot not only un- consecrated, but cursed by a fanatical priesthood, lie the remains of the best spirits of our country. Here, in a foreign land, in a priest-ridden nation, and in full view of the eternal snows of Orazaba, repose the bones of fathers,
5
66
brothers, husbands, and sons of Texians — here we helped to deposite Booker and Jackson, Trapnal and Crews, Saunders, Gray, Trimble, and a long list of others. Peace to their ashes, and a nation's gratitude to their memories ! But, oh ! how the heart sickens at perfidy the most unparalleled, when we trace those bloody murders, starvation, and deaths to the President of our own country! I would to Gor! that a due regard to truth, as well as justice to the memories of these brave men, would allow me to throw the mantle of eternal darkness over the sequel ; if so, I would bury this horrible conclusion in lasting oblivion for my country's credit. It is, however, my task to regis- ter this bloody tale, and I have no option but in truth ; and when President Houston has been charged as the cause of the sufferings and murder of our countrymen, for our country's honor it has been too clearly proven. (See Appendix, Nos. 2 and 6.)
" We still look after the surviving half of the brave band of Mier, and find them in the cheerless cells of Perote, living skeletons, without clothing enough to hide their nakedness ; and what language do we hear from them ? Though they feel mortified and indignant at their President's denunciation of them, and his Heartless usurpation of the laws of their Congress, in withholding their supplies, yet there is but one sentiment, one language among them, and that is * the honor and liberty of their country? At all times, all occasions, and under all circumstances, when hunger has pressed them most, when death made no sham visits to their gloomy abodes, boldly did they publish this sen- timent. Time after time did they write home to their countrymen, 'Let no consideration of us forfeit your country's honor. Let us rot in these dungeons ere you concede" one inch to these colored barbarians.' "
The Senator, while known to be a physical coward, is said to be a man of moral courage. To some extent this is true. Moral courage to change his politics without reason. Moral courage to commit, in the daily practices of life, the vilest in- decencies. Moral courage, under senate protection, to fulmi- nate numerous falsehoods against the best men in the country. Moral courage to commit perjury in open court, as is known to Governor J. Pinckney Henderson, and other gentlemen in Texas. Moral courage to play saint and sinner, thief and liar, without the change of countenance, or the quickening of a pulsation. Moral courage to break a seal or steal a dollar. Yet, Senator,* President, Preacher, Big Drunk, General Sam Houston, is an extraordinary man. It is impossible, in the limits of this reply, that I can do him full justice ; and having much material still on hand, it is due to the public that I should give a faithful account of his life cmd doings, in which I shall take him, without fear or favor from his " BIG DKTHSTK "
67
administration of his Cherokee wigwam, to his senatorial charlatanry.
I come now to the most pleasant part of this defence — it is to ask pardon, both of the Senate and the public, for the use of language, while in every instance true, yet mortifying, deeply mortifying, to myself for its necessity. I have been driven to its use by a tissue of falsehoods, malicious, vindictive, fiend- ish, which has no other foundation in truth than the ipse dixit of a Senator, the most mendacious who ever disgraced your high body. I am willing that the Senate and public shall judge whether there has been a necessity for language on my part, thus harsh, though true. To apply the ordinary lash to the hide of the rhinoceros, would be as futile as "darting straws against the wind." I have been compelled to use the rasp.
I am, very respectfully,
THOMAS J. GKEEK