The Texas Question 299land and something approaching local autonomy to
groups of settlers from the United States. By 1830
there were some 20,000 white Americans in Texas,
about 2,000 slaves, and only a few thousand Mexicans.
President John Quincy Adams had offered Mexico
$1 million for Texas, and Jackson was willing to pay
$5 million, but Mexico would not sell. Nevertheless, by
the late 1820s, the flood of American settlers was giving
the Mexican authorities second thoughts. The immi-
grants apparently felt no loyalty to Mexico. Most were
Protestants, though Mexican law required that all
immigrants be Catholics; few attempted to learn more
than a few words of Spanish. When Mexico outlawed
slavery in 1829, American settlers evaded the law by
“freeing” their slaves and then signing them to lifetime
contracts as indentured servants. In 1830 Mexico pro-
hibited further immigration of Americans into Texas,
though again the law proved impossible to enforce.
As soon as the Mexican government began to
restrict them, the Texans began to seek indepen-
dence. In 1835 a series of skirmishes escalated into a
full-scale rebellion. The Mexican president, Antonio
López de Santa Anna, marched north with over
5,000 soldiers to subdue the rebels. Late in February
1836 he reached San Antonio.
A force of 187 men under Colonel William B.
Travis held the city. They took refuge behind the stout
walls of a former mission called the Alamo. For nearly
two weeks they held off Santa Anna’s assaults, inflicting
terrible casualties on the attackers. Finally, on March 6,
the Mexicans breached and scaled the walls. Once
inside they killed everyone, even the wounded. Among
the dead were the legendary Davy Crockett and Jim
Bowie, inventor of the Bowie knife. (See Re-Viewing
the Past,The Alamo, pp. 316–317.)
After the Alamo and the slaughter of another gar-
rison at Goliad, southeast of San Antonio, peaceful
settlement of the dispute between Texas and Mexico
was impossible. Meanwhile, on March 2, 1836, Texas
had declared its independence. Sam Houston, a for-
mer congressman and governor of Tennessee and an
experienced Indian fighter, was placed in charge of the
rebel army. For a time Houston retreated before Santa
Anna’s troops, who greatly outnumbered his own. At
the San Jacinto River he took a stand. On April 21,
1836, shouting “Forward! Charge! Remember the
Alamo! Remember Goliad!” his troops routed the
Mexican army, which soon retreated across the Rio
Grande. In October, Houston was elected president of
the Republic of Texas, and a month later a plebiscite
revealed that an overwhelming majority favored
annexation by the United States.
President Jackson hesitated. To take Texas might
lead to war with Mexico. Assuredly it would stir up
the slavery controversy. On his last day in office he
recognized the republic, but he made no move to
accept it into the Union, nor did his successor, Van
Buren. Texas thereupon went its own way, which
involved developing friendly ties with Great Britain.
An independent Texas suited British tastes perfectly,
for it could provide an alternative supply of raw cotton
and a market for manufactures unfettered by tariffs.
These events caused alarm in the United States,
especially among Southerners, who dreaded the
possibility that a Texas dominated by Great Britain
might abolish slavery. As a Southerner, Tyler shared
these feelings; as a beleaguered politician, spurned
by the Whigs and held in contempt by most
Democrats, he saw in annexation a chance to revive
his fortunes. When Webster resigned as secretary of
state in 1843, Tyler replaced him with a fellow
Virginian, Abel P. Upshur, whom he ordered to
seek a treaty of annexation. The South was eager to
take Texas, and in the West and even the Northeast
the patriotic urge to add such a magnificent new
territory to the national domain was great.
Counting noses, Upshur convinced himself that the
Senate would approve annexation by the necessary
two-thirds majority. He negotiated a treaty inSam Houston—and his horse—earned this heroic tribute. At the
Battle of San Jacinto, a musket ball shattered Houston’s right ankle;
his horse, hit by five bullets, fell dead.
Source: San Jacinto Museum of History.