promptly turned into the south, on the right-hand trail. The music
struck up blithely. The general sat his horse, watching, with a little
smile on his haggard face.
And down the Harrisburg road briskly marched the column, to find Santa
Anna, now fifty miles in the lead.
XIX
FINDING SANTA ANNA
Harrisburg was only about twenty miles inland from Galveston Bay of
the coast. So Santa Anna had marched clear across Texas, with General
Houston at first before him, and now behind him. On the bay shore east
of Harrisburg was the town of New Washington; and a few miles north
of New Washington was Lynch’s Ferry and Lynchburg, of the San Jacinto
River――just above where the river, flowing southward, widens into San
Jacinto Bay in the upper part of Galveston Bay.
From the west, Buffalo Bayou (near whose mouth is to-day located
the city of Houston) joined the San Jacinto River at Lynch’s Ferry.
Somewhere to the south of the angle formed by the Bayou, and the San
Jacinto River and bay, were the Santa Anna army. They could not go much
further east, that was certain. They would go north, for East Texas.
Urrea was taking care of the south.
To-day’s march from McCurley’s ranch was a hard one. The prairie road
was soft with bogs and with mud from the rain, and everybody was
in a hurry. The “Twin Sisters,” as the Cincinnati cannon had been
christened, were dragged with long ropes――a score of volunteers lending
their hands. The cannon wheels and the wheels of the wagons sank deeply
into the mushy sod. The general frequently dismounted and helped push
and pull. There were so many sloughs and creeks, also, that it took
until dark to go twelve miles, and even then camp was made on wet
ground at the edge of a sluggish creek.
Buffalo Bayou, curving into the south as it reached back from the San
Jacinto, sent out many branches; and Jim and Ernest and all were well
fagged out when, before noon of April 18, the third day from McCurley’s
and the forking of the trails, the toiling army at last reached the
main channel of the bayou, almost opposite Harrisburg.
Not a Mexican soldier had been sighted; but now, slightly to the
southeast, across the bayou, lay Harrisburg. It had been burned, for
a veil of smoke from its smouldering rafters hung low over the bayou
timber, marking the site.
So there, between the bayou and the coast, a short stretch of
timber-dotted prairie and swamp country, was Santa Anna with his army.
However, the other army were almost too tired to talk. During the
forced march of fifty-five miles from McCurley’s, in two and a half
days of rain and mud, Jim and Ernest had scarcely seen Leo and Sion.
As soon as the camps had been located, and supper eaten, everybody had
gone to sleep. Now the word was passed that a half day’s rest would be
given, to freshen the army up for a battle.
Deaf Smith and Henry Karnes, the chief scouts, took two or three of the
Deaf Smith Spies, and swimming their horses, crossed the rapid bayou on
a raft, to reconnoitre. Otherwise it was a lazy afternoon. But about
dusk Deaf Smith returned, driving two prisoners before them. He made
them row the raft, and followed them in to camp, a pair of leather
saddle-bags in his hand, his rifle in the other. There was no use
yelling questions. But――――
“I know that one fellow, and so do you!” exclaimed Ernest, to Jim.
“That little fellow. Remember him? He’s a _paisano_ from Bejar. He was
in Captain Seguin’s Mexican company, too, before San Antonio.”
“Well, you never know which way those _paisanos_ are going to jump,”
quoth Jim.
The two prisoners were conducted to headquarters by Deaf Smith. The
“little fellow” proved to be a guide for Santa Anna; and the other
prisoner was a captain in the Mexican army, who had been carrying
dispatches from General Filisola the Italian to Santa Anna. Deaf Smith
had caught both of the men on the main road for Harrisburg.
The guide told General Houston that the Santa Anna army numbered 500
infantry and 100 cavalry. As for the dispatches in the leather bags――――
“Jiminy!” cried Sion, who with Leo sought out the other boys, after
having skirmished for the true news. “Deaf Smith says those dispatches
were so fresh that the ink on ’em was hardly dry yet. Those were
Travis’s deerhide saddle-bags――had his name on ’em. The dispatches
told us just what we want to know. Santa Anna’s ahead, all alone, with
only six hundred men. Urrea’s clear down at Matagorda. Gaona’s away
back up north, toward Bastrop. He got lost. Filisola and Sesma are at
the Brazos, near Fort Bend below San Felipe; and the only thing that’s
liable to interfere is Cos the parole-breaker. Filisola’s hurrying him
forward with five hundred men.”
“Yes,” put in Leo, “and Deaf Smith says Harrisburg was burned on
the fifteenth, and the Mexicans got to the bay just in time to see
President Burnet setting out in a skiff for Galveston Island. Only
three printers were left in the town. Then Santa Anna started on for
New Washington and Lynch’s Ferry, to cut us off if we retreated east.
But when he finds we’re here to fight him, and have cut _him_ off, in a
pocket, he’ll have to get out either over the bayou again, or else by
Lynch’s Ferry. He doesn’t know we’re here――he thinks we’re retreating
to the Trinity and Nacogdoches. That’s what all the settlers have told
him. And if we hurry we can beat him to the San Jacinto, and he’s _our
meat_!”
“He sure is!” exulted Jim. “This army can lick any six hundred Mexicans
that ever were born.”
“I reckon Sam Houston knew his business, after all,” admitted Sion.
That night the camp was impatient for the dawn. Deaf Smith estimated
that the Mexican army were less than a day’s march away. If they
weren’t overhauled before they crossed the juncture of Buffalo Bayou
and the San Jacinto River they’d have a clear lead again, and could go
on up to Nacogdoches, and summon the Indians of the northern prairies,
and perhaps unite with the Gaona column.
General Houston and Colonel Rusk, the secretary of war, had had a
conference.
“We don’t need to talk,” the general was reported to have said. “You
think we ought to fight, and so do I.”
There still were some men who feared that the general might wait.
Colonel Sherman promised his regiment that _if_ the general would _not_
fight, they could follow him and he’d soon give them enough. But an
aide summoned him and Colonel Burleson to headquarters and when Colonel
Sherman returned, everything was all right.
The general had asked him and Colonel Burleson if they had beef on hand
for three days.
“Yes, sir,” they replied.
“Very well,” had said General Houston. “You will see then that each
man is supplied with cooked rations for three days, and hold the camp
in readiness to march. We will see if we can find Santa Anna. Good
evening, gentlemen.”
The morning dawned for a day of energy. The army ate a hasty breakfast
of beef strips wound around green sticks and held in the blaze, and
orders were given to fall in. General Houston rode in front of the
lines, and from his horse made a speech. It was a short speech, but it
was enough.
“The army will cross, and we will meet the enemy,” he declared. “Some
of us may be killed, and must be killed. But, soldiers, remember the
Alamo, the Alamo, _the Alamo_!”
“By thunder, after that speech there’ll be mighty few prisoners taken;
I know that!” exclaimed Major Somervell.
Colonel Rusk began an address. He had proceeded only a few words, when
he stopped, amidst the cheering, and bowed, and said, simply: “I am
done.” He evidently saw that no more words were necessary.
First, the bayou was to be crossed. It was fifty yards wide, and
running swiftly. The old ferryboat――a scow――had been found, but it was
leaky, and the general fumed angrily when he saw that it had not been
repaired according to orders. There was no time to repair it now. If
Cos or Santa Anna should come while the army were crossing――whew!
The boat had no oars, even. General Houston flung off his black coat,
grabbed an ax, and began to hew an oar from a piece of fence rail.
He delivered orders right and left, while he hewed. A second oar
was needed. Men were set at work tying rawhide ropes and horsehair
_cabrestas_ or picket lines together. Only the saddle-horses, the “Twin
Sisters” teams, and one baggage wagon were to be taken. The rest of the
baggage and animals, and the sick men, were to be left here on the west
bank.
Thirty pioneers or trail-makers were sent over first, while four men
bailed. They carried an end of the rope, and made it fast to a tree;
and the rope, thus stretched from bank to bank, formed a guide for
the boat. When the boat was returned, rowed and paddled, the general
himself leaped aboard, afoot, with the next detachment. His horse
whinnied, and sprang into the water and swam after. Colonel Rusk stayed
on the west bank. Running between them, guided by the rope, the boat
made passage after passage. To help out, the raft which had served Deaf
Smith was called into service.
The infantry and cannon and wagon were transferred before the cavalry
moved. The boat soon was leaking much worse, and threatened to sink or
capsize. The four men bailing furiously could scarcely keep it afloat.
Noon passed, and still the cavalry waited, and still the infantry were
being ferried by scow and raft, urged from either bank by the shouts of
the general and Colonel Rusk.
Somebody in Ernest and Jim’s company had picked up, on the ground where
the general’s quarters had been located, a piece of paper which he had
thrown aside. It was the first part of a note, written in lead pencil
to Mr. Henry Raguet, of the Committee of Safety in Nacogdoches. The
fragment said:
CAMP AT HARRISBURG, April 19, 1836.
SIR: This morning we are in preparation to meet Santa Anna. It
is the only chance of saving Texas. From time to time I have
looked for reinforcements in vain. The convention adjourning to
Harrisburg struck _panic_ throughout the country. Texas could
have started at least four thousand men. We will only have
about seven hundred to march with, besides the camp guard. We
go to conquer. It is wisdom, growing out of necessity, to meet
the enemy now; every consideration enforces it. No previous
occasion would justify it....
“Sounds like business,” approved one of the men, as the note was
circulated.
Toward sunset only one boatload of the infantry remained to be ferried.
Sion and Leo had gone――they had waved to Jim and Ernest; and balancing,
Sion had grinned with glee at the adventure.
“Cavalry’s turn, now, gentlemen,” called Colonel Rusk. “Swim your
horses well below the ferry, and don’t crowd.”
“Come on, boys,” bade Colonel Sherman. “Tie up your bridles.”
The bridle lines were tied loosely about the horses’ necks, so that the
animals would not entangle their feet, and by companies the horses were
led to the water’s edge. Then the men fell back, forming a half circle,
to shout and wave their arms and hats, and crowd the horses forward. In
plunged the gallant Colonel Sherman, to head his own horse across, and
slipping from the saddle, to swim alongside, holding by the mane.
On the bank the front rank of horses were pressed forward by their
comrades behind, jostling and snorting to the shouting and waving of
the men. Presently in splashed one horse, and another, and another,
to launch in the wake of the Colonel Sherman horse. Some disappeared
entirely as they took the plunge into the deep water. In went Jim’s
horse; in went Duke――practically heels over head; and Ernest watched
anxiously for him to break the surface again, for it was well known
that if a horse got water in his ears, while swimming, he would drown.
But up bobbed Duke’s yellow head; he blew the water from his nostrils,
and bravely stuck out along with the procession.
Every horse of the sixty reached the opposite bank without mishap;
scrambling out, shook himself violently, and joined his fellows, herded
together by the first of the cavalrymen ferried across.
The baggage wagon and the Twin Sisters had been rafted over. Twilight
was gathering when the last boatload of men was landed. Colonel Rusk
accompanied it. He stepped ashore, and he and General Houston gripped
each other’s hands. The camp guard left at the other side cheered.
“Thank God,” uttered the general. And, to the colonels commanding:
“Form the ranks.”
Now across Buffalo Bayou, on the Harrisburg and Santa Anna side toiled
the little army, at best pace. In the darkness they clattered over a
bridge which crossed a branch bayou running north into Buffalo Bayou.
Vince’s Bayou, was this, by report along the column, and Vince’s Bridge
of the road from Harrisburg: the road taken by the Mexican army. But
presently the column left the main road and diverged to the left,
following closer the timber down Buffalo Bayou.
“Great Cæsar!” murmured Jim, dimly seen as he rode at Ernest’s right
hand. “If this keeps up all night we’ll reach the mouth at the San
Jacinto, and Lynch’s. Can’t go any further then without more ferrying.”
By midnight the infantry were staggering and stumbling, and even the
horses moved on leaden feet. But nobody complained. Seven hundred
fighting Texans were hot on the hunt for 600 hateful invading Mexicans,
and the two trails would meet somewhere close ahead.
At one o’clock by the stars (for the sky had cleared at last) the
order to rest for two hours was given. The infantry dropped in their
tracks, Ernest and Jim and the other horsemen simply tumbled from their
saddles. And here concealed in the fragrant evergreens the little army
panted and shivered and dozed.
“After this war’s over,” mused Jim, drowsily, huddling under his wet
blanket beside Ernest, “I’m going to change my clothes. A fellow likes
a clean shirt and dry socks _once_ in a while! Maybe to-morrow I’ll
capture an officer and take his. Those Mexican officers dress fine.”
“Guess Sion and Leo are getting all the action they want, this time,”
stammered Ernest, with teeth chattering. “But we’re lucky that none of
us had to stay with that camp guard, back at the bayou crossing.”
“Those fellows certainly did hate to stay,” agreed Jim. “They’re liable
to have to fight the whole Mexican army, though, if there’s a retreat.
Or Cos may attack ’em on his way in.”
Ernest dropped into an uneasy sleep. He dreamed that he was home and
that his mother was trying to tuck him in bed with covers which were
too short!
The easternmost stars were just paling when the camp was aroused
by orders to fall in again. Stiffly all obeyed. Ernest had faint
recollection of the usual three taps of the drum, from the general’s
quarters, as first signal――but he had found it very hard to obey them.
However, now the officers were urging――the general’s voice was echoing
through the grayness――somebody said that he had slept with the coil
of cannon rope for a pillow――and into the cold saddles on the hunched
horses must the cavalry climb.
“Hee-yaw!” yawned Jim. “We’re riding, anyhow. Only the cavalry and the
high-up officers have horses. That’s tough on some of the officers
who’ve been a-straddle all the way from the Colorado.”
“Wonder if we ever eat again,” responded Ernest, who had a woefully
hollow feeling.
“Sure thing,” asserted Jim. “The general, he’ll just take us in sight
of those Mexicans cooking breakfast――so we can smell the coffee, you
know; then he won’t have to give a single order, but you’ll see us
charge a-whooping, for the kettles!”
Camp had been made without supper. The march was made without
breakfast. Nobody could accuse the general, now, of dilly-dallying!
Away galloped the Deaf Smith Spy Company, commanded by Henry Karnes the
red-head, to scout in advance. The army could always depend upon the
Deaf Smith Spies. At slower pace the column followed, plodding wearily
and hungrily through the damp timber and the tall prairie grass,
cloaked in the chillness of early dawn.
After a march of seven miles, halt was ordered for breakfast at last,
in the sunrise. Rations had given out, but several cattle were sighted
near, and were driven in and killed. Speedily the soldiers, horse and
foot, were grouped about fires, toasting the fresh meat on sticks,
regular buccaneer fashion. The cannon horses were unfastened from the
traces, and they and the mounts of the cavalry and the field officers
industriously grazed. It was a wild and picturesque sight: 700 ragged,
bedraggled, whiskered men (not to speak of the boys) squatting around
fires, their guns in their laps, and all intently toasting bloody meat.
The sun, which had risen above the timber of the crooked Buffalo Bayou,
shone peacefully upon them, through the magnolias and live-oaks, and
upon the prairie beyond.
This process of breakfast-getting was very slow; and Ernest, with eyes
smarting and mouth watering, was manipulating his meat on his stick,
trying to hurry it, when an exclamation from Jim interrupted him.
“Aw, shucks! Here come those scouts, lickity-split, as if they had some
sort of a big tell! Why can’t they wait till a fellow’s eaten?”
Along the timber edge from the east a squad of the scouts, led by Deaf
Smith, were racing back to the army.
“What’s the matter now?” hailed voices, impatiently.
“Saw the enemy. They’re on ahead a short piece. You-all’ll have to
hurry.”
Up sprang the camp. The cannoneers leaped for their team, the cavalry
for their saddles. Having listened shortly to the report of Deaf Smith,
the general roared his orders――repeated briskly by Colonel Burleson and
Colonel Sherman, and by the company captains.
“Fall in, men! Fall in!”
“By gravy, I don’t leave my meat, you can bet,” scolded Jim, running,
with his laden, smoking stick, for his horse. Ernest followed his
example. Men were doing the same. The army “chawed” as they went.
The scouts reported that a few miles before they had encountered an
advance guard of the Mexican army――had been chased but had escaped.
Nobody killed. By all appearances the Mexican army were marching from
New Washington north to cross the San Jacinto and the mouth of the
bayou at Lynch’s Ferry. Washington had been burned.
Throughout the ranks, afoot and mounted, rifles began to crack. Jim
promptly shot into the air, and swiftly reloaded.
“Go ahead. Clean out your gun,” he bade, to Ernest; and Ernest likewise
pulled harmless trigger. His little rifle spoke smartly.
The general came riding furiously down the column.
“Stop that firing!” he fairly bellowed.
“No, we won’t, general,” replied somebody, good-naturedly. “Our guns
have been loaded over two weeks and we don’t intend to meet the enemy
with our powder wet.”
The general drew his sword.
“I’ll run the next man through who fires without orders,” he declared.
“Bang!”
“It won’t do for you to try that game, now, general,” warned the
shooter. The ranks laughed. General Houston glared around him for an
instant, and with a shrug of his great shoulders clapped his sword back
and rode to the front again.
The column lunged forward at best speed. Now indeed it was a race to
see which army would be the first to reach the crossing. Colonel John
A. Wharton, of the staff, took thirty of the cavalry and dashed away,
to reconnoitre the crossing and keep the enemy in play until the army
could arrive. Jim and Ernest regretfully watched the advance disappear
in the margin of the timber. Only men had been picked, mainly from one
company.
“I always knew I ought to have joined that company, in the first
place,” deplored Jim. “Now they’ll find Santa Anna and get all the best
clothes!”
But no sounds of a battle were heard――ah, yes, there echoed a rifle
shot! And another. The shooting ceased. And when, breathless, dripping,
men and horses alike, with perspiration, the army rounded a shoulder of
timber, they saw, before, an expanse of flat, marshy ground, inhabited
by myriads of piping, screaming wild fowl; eastward still was flashing
San Jacinto Bay, with the juncture of the Buffalo Bayou and the San
Jacinto River above its upper end――the few scattered houses at Lynch’s
Ferry, and the waiting horsemen of Colonel Wharton’s command. Not a
Mexican soldier was in sight.
The Colonel Wharton detachment were found at the ferry landing in
possession of a fine new flatboat equipped with a sail and loaded with
foodstuffs. They said that Captain Hancock and Lieutenant Crain and
four others had arrived before the rest, and that a guard of twenty
Mexican soldiers had fled south without firing a shot. Had left the
flatboat, of course――for which, much obliged to them! Santa Anna had
shipped the boat up the bay from New Washington, to be ready for him.
Now he could come and get it.
“We won. Hurrah!” cheered Ernest, excitedly. “We beat Santa Anna to the
crossing.”
“Yes, sir; and we corralled a flatboat full of breakfast, too,”
reminded Jim. “Do you see that big house yonder, across the San
Jacinto? That’s Lorenzo de Zavala’s house. He lives here. He and
Colonel Lynch and the rest of the bay fellows are right at home.”
General Houston immediately ordered the boat taken up the bayou about
three-quarters of a mile, and the army to follow along the bank, out of
the flat to the timber.
Camp was made on high ground in the shade of great live-oaks, whose
branches were festooned with the drooping Spanish moss. It was a
beautiful spot. The bayou, wide, and sluggishly flowing in a curve
between green banks, was behind. On the left the San Jacinto River
rippled past the bayou’s mouth, and widened into San Jacinto Bay,
bordered by salty marshes. On the right, distant about six miles,
Vince’s Bayou extended down to Vince’s Bridge in the southwest, at the
Harrisburg road. Before, a rolling prairie stretched two miles to the
swamps of the inward curving bay. A timbered rise jutted out before the
camp; and several hundred yards out on the prairie, were two timber
“islands,” or motts; one in front of the camp, the other to the left.
The general lost no time in getting ready for Santa Anna, who could not
be more than a couple of miles distant. He planted the Twin Sisters in
the edge of the trees on the little rise. Colonel John Neill commanded
the battery. Two hundred infantry, including Leo’s company, armed
with muskets and commanded by Lieutenant-Colonel Millard of the Texas
Regulars, were stationed behind the cannon. Sion and the other riflemen
of the First Volunteers under Colonel Edward Burleson were placed on
the right wing, the Second Volunteers under Colonel Sidney Sherman
on the left wing. The cavalry were back of the Millard musketeers or
regulars. The gold and white flag, surmounted by the glove of Colonel
Sherman’s bride, floated over the centre.
Now it was noon.
“I reckon if nobody’s coming we might as well eat,” quoth Jim, while
for a brief space the army waited, and peered across the prairie beyond
the timber. “What do we call it, anyway? Last night’s supper? We’ve got
three meals due us. De Zavala ought to invite us all over to his house
for a snack.”
De Zavala the patriot did not quite do this; but, as the prairie
remained apparently peaceful, presently orders were issued for the men
to go ahead with their three meals in one. Fires were lighted, beef was
toasted once more――when on a sudden back through the high grass along
the timber came galloping once more the Deaf Smith Spies. They had
sighted the Mexican army advancing. The camp left its beef and seized
its arms.
“Seems as if we didn’t get time for anything any more,” complained
Ernest, as he and Jim ran for their saddles. “It’s just up and down, up
and down.”
“That’s right,” concurred Jim. “We’ve been wanting to fight, and now we
have to fight even to eat!”
XX
“WILL YOU COME TO THE BOWER?”
Almost an hour passed, with the Texan army waiting and ready, and the
gold-fringed flag lazily flapping in the sea breeze.
“There they come,” announced a man sitting his horse at Ernest’s left.
“If we don’t lick ’em Peggy McCormick will. She lives yonder on the bay
and owns a square league of this prairie. They’re treading down her
grass.”
It was two o’clock. The Mexican army were in sight at last, advancing
from the left, along the marsh of the bay. Their colors flew, bayonets
and scabbards occasionally glistened, the officers’ trappings sparkled.
Infantry and cavalry they were――yes, and artillery, for there was a
cannon drawn by mules.