The Battle of San Jacinto and the San Jacinto CampaignKemp, Louis Wiltz
History
The Battle of San Jacinto and the San Jacinto Campaign
Kemp, Louis Wiltz
San Jacinto, Battle of, Tex., 1836; Texas -- History -- Revolution, 1835-1836
General Houston, suffering with pain, received him coldly. He sent for
young Moses Austin Bryan and Lorenzo de Zavala Jr. to act as
interpreters. Santa Anna cringed with fright as the excited Texas
soldiers pressed around him, fearing mob violence. He pleaded for the
treatment due a prisoner of war. “You can afford to be generous,” he
whined; “you have captured the Napoleon of the West.”
“What claim have you to mercy?” Houston retorted, “when you showed none
at the Alamo or at Goliad?”
They talked for nearly two hours, using Bryan, de Zavala and Almonte as
interpreters. In the end Santa Anna agreed to write an order commanding
all Mexican troops to evacuate Texas. Later, treaties were signed at
Velasco, looking to the adjustment of all differences and the
recognition of Texas independence.
Thus ended the revolution of 1836, with an eighteen-minute battle which
established Texas as a free republic and opened the way for the United
States to extend its boundaries to the Rio Grande on the southwest and
to the Pacific on the west. Few military engagements in history have
been more decisive or of more far-reaching ultimate influence than the
battle of San Jacinto.
[Illustration: Outline of Texas]
Opposing Commanders’ Reports
It is interesting to compare the accounts of the battle of San Jacinto
written by leaders of the opposing Texan and Mexican forces.
General Sam Houston, in his official report of the engagement to
President David G. Burnet, dated April 25, 1836, reviewed his movements
during the three days preceding the battle, and then said:
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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