Tango01 | 05 Feb 2022 4:45 p.m. PST |
"Each year before the pandemic over two and one-half million people visited the Alamo in San Antonio, Texas. Widely portrayed as a shrine to freedom, it is the site of an early battle of the Texas War of Independence where Mexican troops, led by President and General Antonio López de Santa Anna, defeated and killed some 189—the exact figure is in dispute—independence fighters, including frontier icons Davy Crockett, Jim Bowie, and William Travis. "Remember the Alamo" became the revenge slogan that presumably drove other independence fighters led by Sam Houston six weeks later to definitively defeat Santa Anna's troops at the Battle of San Jacinto and secure Texas independence. The Alamo is at the center of the Texas creation story, purportedly a symbol of courage in the willingness to fight to the end for a noble cause, to secure freedom from Mexican tyranny…" More here link Armand |
35thOVI | 05 Feb 2022 5:36 p.m. PST |
"Widely potrayed", "presumably drove", "purportedly"… I did not have to read the story to know where this was going. 😂 But I read half of it and was right. Evil Davy, Nasty Austin, Terrible Travis, Satan, beelzebub, Asmodeus, Mammon and our other horrible evil forefathers, beating kind gentle misunderstood Santa Anna and his peace loving Mexicans, who were only trying to end slavery and bring worldwide peace to all mankind. Thus furthering the darkness of the the American experience and Satan's plans for world domination. I think that pretty much sums this up. Now I must scurry to further the word of our Countries Satanic Lord and Master. 🤣😂 This book is probably required reading in every liberal College. |
pzivh43 | 05 Feb 2022 6:55 p.m. PST |
+1 35thOVI. I'm biased, as an expatriate Texan, but that article lacked any scholarship at all. Maybe there is some in the author's work, but I don't see any citations? Anyway, the Alamo defenders weren't saints, but they weren't the dark evil cabal plotting to keep Texas slavery they are depicted as, either. |
doc mcb | 05 Feb 2022 8:25 p.m. PST |
It IS important, and I believe is being done, that Texas history give appropriate emphasis to such as Lorenzo de Zavala and Juan Seguin. I visited the Alamo this past November and saw much that was new, including several exhibits highlighting the Tejano defenders. Modern Tejanos should take as much pride in the story as Anglos, and I know many of them do. Adina de Zavala and Clara Driscoll are credited with saving the Alamo, though they quarreled about how it should be preserved and presented. (They were both fluent in Spanish and Roman Catholics.) I didn't spot it last visit, but there used to be a garden outside the chapel on the way to the Long Barracks honoring both ladies with plaques, and a giant cactus between them. |
pzivh43 | 06 Feb 2022 5:30 a.m. PST |
No argument doc mcb. But it seems many can't celebrate one facet of history without tearing down and demonizing the another facet. |
35thOVI | 06 Feb 2022 6:09 a.m. PST |
Agree Doc, all who took part, should be recognized for their contributions. A book telling about the battles from the perspective of the Mexicans would be welcome. But this was another in a long line of hit pieces on our ancestors. Another attack on our heritage and forefathers, judging them from morals of a different generation. The tearing down of their statues and even the Alamo will follow. |
Frederick | 06 Feb 2022 7:09 a.m. PST |
One perspective that really seems to be missing is that the Texian revolt was not an isolated thing – there were two competing versions of Mexico's future, one with the states having considerable autonomy and one with power very centralized to the federal government in Mexico City. Needless to say, Santa Anna was a fan of the second version! In fact, after Santa Anna proclaimed the "Seven Laws" centralizing power in 1835 there were rebellions in a number of the states – Alta California, Nuevo México, Tabasco, Sonora, Coahuila y Tejas, San Luis Potosí, Querétaro, Durango, Guanajuato, Michoacán, Yucatán, Jalisco, Nuevo León, Tamaulipas, and Zacatecas with Zacetecas probably being the most serious threat to the central government |
Tortorella | 06 Feb 2022 8:32 a.m. PST |
You don't often see citations in a book review but this one does have one with its demographic chart. I grew up with the cardboard Crockett, a great hero on tv, in the time of Crockett hats for all. Later I came to see him as a flawed character, but still a compelling part of our history. Same for the Alamo. Give us the whole picture, slavery, flaws, etc., but let us each be the judge of what it means. Good history has some balance. Just as I don't like the hero worship kind, I don't want the story to be consumed by some other added agenda. |
The Virtual Armchair General | 06 Feb 2022 12:18 p.m. PST |
Another "+1," 35thOVI! TVAG |
Regicide1649 | 06 Feb 2022 12:57 p.m. PST |
Nevertheless, Mexico freed its slaves voluntarilly and Texas joined the Union as a slave state. This isn't really a debating point between liberal and conservative colleges. All voices should be heard. |
35thOVI | 06 Feb 2022 2:09 p.m. PST |
And the Mexicans kept their peons in abject servitude and poverty. Point? Yes some Texans owned slaves. Yes they were not all good men. My God, they had vices and sinned. How awful! Crockett and his men were from Tennessee. Did all men who fought for Texas Independence own slaves? No? Did the English treat my Irish ancestors like dogs? Yes. Do I berate the English every day about how they treated the Irish, Scots, Indians, etc.? No. So why this current, "let's whip the US about slavery and their treatment of the American Indian". Almost everyone dealt in slavery at some time. Almost everyone from the past, if judged by todays standards would be found wanting. I am not a member of the flagellants, nor do a feel the necessity to do daily penance for the past. |
doc mcb | 06 Feb 2022 2:20 p.m. PST |
35th, yes. To the extent that our attitudes, about race or other topics, MAY be more enlightened than those of our ancestors, isn't that a function of our benefitting from THEIR experiences, including the mistakes? Anyone who believes that moderns are naturally more just or compassionate or tolerant than earlier generations is just a thoughtless fool ignorant of both history and human nature. If we see further or more clearly than our great grandparents, it is because we are standing on their shoulders. |
35thOVI | 06 Feb 2022 2:42 p.m. PST |
True. But I don't feel the necessity to tear them or their statues down. I understand that they were human and products of their time. Just as we are now. How will we be judged in 200 years? If anyone is still alive in 200. It is funny that I have learned nothing I did not already know from these new historians. All they write has appeared in readings I have done in the past. It was told without the necessity to pass judgments on the individuals and foster an agenda, unlike the new. I think that is what puts a burr in my saddle. |
Tango01 | 06 Feb 2022 3:12 p.m. PST |
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35thOVI | 06 Feb 2022 3:27 p.m. PST |
Let me try and make a point with an example. So we know that babies born at 7, 8 and less then 9 months, I.e. premature, survive regularly. I read the youngest to survive was born at 21 weeks. If I went in and killed one of those born prematurely, I would be held on murder charges. If you knife a pregnant woman and kill her and her baby, you would be charged with 2 murders. Yet, we allow abortions of infants up to birth and that is viewed as acceptable by many of this current generation. Not murder, acceptable practice. After all, they are only fetuses. How would those who do this, or have it done to them, be viewed by those past generations we judge? How will it be judged in 100 or 200 years. Acceptable practices now, may be judged more harshly in the future. Just like slavery, there are those who oppose it and those who accept it currently. |
doc mcb | 06 Feb 2022 4:32 p.m. PST |
35th, yes, we gain on racism, maybe, but lose on concern for the unborn, and probably for the old as well. |
35thOVI | 06 Feb 2022 4:48 p.m. PST |
So…. Are we truly better than those we choose to judge? |
doc mcb | 07 Feb 2022 7:23 a.m. PST |
Overall, probably not. Depends on whether you think moral progress is possible. I took a semester course, way back in 1968, on 'The Idea of Progress in History." Rice University. Let us say the jury is still out. |
35thOVI | 07 Feb 2022 7:34 a.m. PST |
Too many today are ready to cast stones, not realizing that they are not without sin themselves. "First cast out the beam out of thine own eye". |
Regicide1649 | 07 Feb 2022 9:25 a.m. PST |
Do any of you guys break keyboards occasionally pounding away with your 'cold, dead hands'? This is the third time this book has come up on TMP and still no-one seems to have read it. Dismiss it, of course as is your right. I won't be rushing out to buy it myself. The review suggests that it gives undue prominence to one aspect of the Texas story – that a number of settlers in the eastern area snuck in slaves from elsewhere in the South. This we all knew, surely? And nobody could regard Santa Anna as anything but a bloodthirsty wretch. But the jibe at 'liberal colleges' was unworthy, the comparison with Ireland was bizarre; and if a rant about abortion doesn't get the 'doghouse' then the 'doghouse' ain't worth having. However, I agree entirely with '35thOVI's 'burr in the saddle' post. See? We can be friends after all. I just wonder if we should actually read the dang thing before we debate it? Maybe we should nominate one contributor to this thread and Tango01 to do some recon and report back? |
pzivh43 | 07 Feb 2022 9:35 a.m. PST |
Life's too short to read crap history! Yeah, I may be missing a gem now and then, but at my age, I've rooted around in enough manure piles. |
35thOVI | 07 Feb 2022 10:02 a.m. PST |
The abortion analogy, was just that. To show how the views on the morals of one generation, can be judged by another. We are judging a generation on slavery. How would they view abortion? I am sure as the killing of live infants. They would see those who perform them and those who have them, as morally bankrupt. They would see them as, as evil as those view them as evil. Disagree? I mentioned colleges, because we have seen so much of these views espoused by their students. Forced name changes, defacing of statues and buildings and the destruction of statues very recently. I think, very fair. Santa Anne, he is what he is. No different then any other who wanted complete power. I am sure there were those who liked him and those who did not. By all means, read the book. But it seems to be another in a long line of the same thing. |
35thOVI | 07 Feb 2022 10:09 a.m. PST |
The Irish. Ahhh that was to say to those overseas.. stop throwing stones, until you look at your own pasts and come to terms with your own issues. I do not judge England on their past. I only said that because it seemed like a jab at us. I am equal parts Irish and English with some Scots, Swiss, Scandanavian, French and Bavaria thrown in. So my own people persecuted my own people. That was their problems not mine. Just as slavery was the problem of all our ancestors. |
Regicide1649 | 07 Feb 2022 10:48 a.m. PST |
I entirely get the point about judging ancestors from the pov of today. This book probably doesn't deserve the description of 'history' because it seems to do so – but I have only read a revue. I am overseas but I have thrown no stones. My first post was factual but not the whole truth. How could it be? But I stand by the statement that all voices should be heard. Having heard them, they can be engaged with or rejected. Sometimes these forums become an echo-chamber. Hispanic Texians are now recognised as heroes of the Alamo also. 50 years ago they weren't. This recognition has only come about by Texas as a community engaging with activists who were once considered whacky or left wing. I don't think that listening is ever a bad thing. Sure, if it's BS, then forget it. |
Kuznetsov | 07 Feb 2022 12:59 p.m. PST |
@35thOVI Thanks for standing up. You are not alone. |
35thOVI | 07 Feb 2022 1:53 p.m. PST |
Kuznetsov thanks, I know I am not. Regicide, yes all sides should be heard, but they should be all sides. Anyone who wants to read this book, by all means do so. I am pretty sure what I believe you will find in reading it, you will find. There have just been so many of these "US past is evil and US was bad", it becomes not history any longer, but an agenda driven sledgehammer. We are getting so much of the same from a very vocal and sometimes violent minority of our agenda driven students in our colleges. Buildings names must be changed, mascots must be changed, statues must come down, statues defaced, statues toppled. All to appease such a small group. I could not believe that people shouting for racial equality, defaced the statue of the 54th Massachusetts. How can you take these people seriously? |
Grattan54 | 07 Feb 2022 7:59 p.m. PST |
I have read a lot about the Alamo and Texas Revolution. I don't recall there ever being the issue of slaver discussed. Thus, if there were some in Texas that wanted a revolution to protect slavery, I think this book could add to our knowledge of the conflict. I do have trouble if the authors are claiming that slavery was the only reason for the rebellion. That would not be fair or accurate. |
35thOVI | 08 Feb 2022 7:09 a.m. PST |
Here is an article that I think puts this in more perspective. No one denies that slavery played a part. But the reasons, just like the later US Civil War, we're many and sundry. How many of those killed in the Alamo were slave owners? How many not? How many believed they were fighting to preserve slavery? How much was the Spanish and later Mexican stupidity in believing any country can import a large group of people, with a different culture, heritage, language into one area and expect them to assimilate into the culture and language of the parent country? (Initially the Spanish brought them in as a buffer against the Comanche). How well did doing this work anywhere else in the world. What happened in Texas was inevitable. But please, if you want to read that book, do so and give us all a book report. 🙂 "The Alamo: Slave to myth, legend, and differing viewpoints | kens5.com" link |
El Chintete | 08 Feb 2022 10:58 a.m. PST |
¡Ya alborotaste el gallinero Raúl! Va a estar difícil que estos güeros cambien de parecer sobre este tema. |
35thOVI | 08 Feb 2022 11:54 a.m. PST |
Si Muy dificil. hurrah para mis antepasados! |
Regicide1649 | 08 Feb 2022 1:13 p.m. PST |
Kind suggestion '35thOVI' but you wouldn't listen to any report I gave, I think. It would just be the opinion of a stone-thrower from overseas. I can't access your link, btw, as I would read it, because that's how we learn. Thanks for the thought. Adios! |
35thOVI | 08 Feb 2022 2:39 p.m. PST |
Actually I would listen. As I stated, I have no illusions about our ancestors. Everyone has their reasons for doing what they did. They were products of their times. They were both good and bad or in most cases some of each. But if it is a broad brush painting of the reason for the conflict, to one of slavery. Then I would ignore the book as nothing more then present times agenda driven crucifixion of past American History. If I read a history of Edward I written by a Welshman or Scotsman, that portrayed Edward as purely evil and his only motives for his wars with Scotland and Wales was to exterminate and in slave their populations. I would take it with a grain of salt. Just like I would if that same history of Edward was written by an Englishman and it portrayed Edward as a saint. He was some of everything, both good and bad, but nothing he did was for one reason. Everything was multifaceted. Sorry you could not read that. It expressed it from all sides. |
Tango01 | 08 Feb 2022 2:53 p.m. PST |
La historia la cuentan los que ganan… Armand
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35thOVI | 08 Feb 2022 2:59 p.m. PST |
Not always Tango. Just 2 though as examples that go against that theory for instance:Waterloo and Gettysburg. But yes, how many books do we have from the French perspective of the battle of la puebla? |
Tango01 | 09 Feb 2022 3:26 p.m. PST |
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35thOVI | 09 Feb 2022 5:11 p.m. PST |
Por Moi! En Inglise Por Favor. En Anglais sil vois plait My Spanish is poor. I used to be able to order my meals in it and read enough words to know where I was. My French is horrible. I can understand military words in stories. That is about as good as it gets. Other than that, I can say hello and goodbye. I think "The Guy" said something in his first sentence about letting the chickens out of the coop., which i assume is sort of like "releasing a can of worms". But merci beaucoup 🙂 |
Tango01 | 10 Feb 2022 3:59 p.m. PST |
Google tranlate is your best friend… (smile) Armand
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35thOVI | 10 Feb 2022 5:20 p.m. PST |
Well I hope their translate is less bias then their search engine. 🙂 |
Tango01 | 11 Feb 2022 3:57 p.m. PST |
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corzin | 24 May 2022 5:39 a.m. PST |
the reason i would forget the alamo, is that it is a good story and all, but in the end I don't think it mattered that much at all larry |