thanks, epic historical disclaimer, etc.
The author kindly requests that you read the disclaimer. Nothing is worse than misinformation, and while all of this story was fiction, some people and events were real. Please alleviate the crushing guilt of abusing history by scrolling through.
thanks:
pdragon76 was merciless to the story and very kind to me. This fic is the result. I'm looking into transporting frozen tofurkeys globally. Just FYI.
kimmer1227 looked this thing over from its second incarnation to this one. (the first one was so godawful it never left the desktop).
alchemise made the beautiful, wonderful, insightful art. I still can't believe how damn perfect it is.
patita_fea advised me on Creole. Whatever mistakes I made, NOT her fault.
tahirire had that early conversation with me that ended with both of us going "Oh, fuck it. Let's do this the hard way." How'd that work out for us again?
epic historical disclaimer:
My main sources for the history were:
Gone To Texas: A History of the Lone Star State by Randolph B. Campbell. A comprehensive overview of the full history of Texas, Pre-Columbus to 2001. A relatively easy read and full of fascinating/hysterical/shameful anecdotes about Texan History. For example, did you know that our first female governor (Ma Ferguson) was a sock puppet for her husband, a man so corrupt he was banned from holding public office? Good times.
The Alamo Reader: A Study in History edited by Todd Hansen. Far and away, the best one-stop Alamo book. No analysis or story-telling, just straight up primary sources. Front to back. That's where I got the most legit timeline for the battle, as well as personal statements from Susanna Dickinson and Juana Alsbury.
The Wells Family and Allied Families by George Stafford. The author married into the Wells family, so he's hardly an unbiased source. However, it was the only source I found that discussed the early Wells.
The Handbook of Texas Online by the Texas State Historical Association. This was required reading for my History of Texas class at UTD, along with Gone To Texas. Excellent source, even though the search function is a tad funky.
"Marrying the Hangman" by Margaret Atwood. This is the poem you should blame/thank for the structure of this fic. If you follow the link, there's a note at the bottom. The poem was based on a true story.
"Payday Someday" by Robert G. Lee: a bombastic, vitriolic speech from the old-school Southern Baptists about how the Jezebels of the world are dragging us all down. Awesome!
real people and things:
The Battle of the Alamo:
They say that history is written by the victors. But what happens when you lose a battle and then win the war? Crazy. Lots of crazy. Easily the most famous event in Texas' history, the truths of this particular fight will never be known. I recommend The Alamo. STFU, it's really accurate for a movie and was produced with help from the Smithsonian. It doesn't shy away from any of the ugly truths (slavery, war crimes, Jim Bowie). Also, the score is awesome.
Cecelia Wells:
As an orphan, Cecelia was taken in by her rich relatives. The Wells family were, at their peak, the largest landowners in the state of Louisiana. Not much is known about Cecelia: she was allegedly engaged to Jim Bowie, and she died of a fever in September 1829. There is NO EVIDENCE that she was ever 'compromised' or pregnant. I made that part up. Along with her personality. From THSA: "James became engaged to Cecelia Wells (b. 1805), who died on September 7, 1829, in Alexandria, two weeks before their wedding was to take place."
Samuel Levi Wells I:
The first of his name, he married a woman named, bless her, Dorcas Huie. "Their descendants are found today in nearly every part of the United States, but are particularly numerous in the states of Louisiana and Texas."
Samuel Levi Wells II:
'My' Levi's father was a very powerful man. He died in 1816 and his will contains the following: "4. It is my will to divide my negroes equally amongst my legitimate children...8. That all my land not disposed of after three years to be divided among my legitimate children." And, for accuracy's sake, he was the one who actually went by the name Levi. But that would totally ruin the name thing, so I ignored it.
Samuel Levi Wells III (SLW III):
'My' Levi lived March 13, 1976 to 1829. He was educated on the east coast and was apparently betrothed to Ellen Price at the time of his death. He died of yellow fever in 1829 in New Orleans where, as Sheriff of Rapides Parish, he was transporting prisoners. There is NO EVIDENCE that he faked his death to take up hunting the Supernatural, and then went on to mentor Mary's forefather.
The Sandbar Fight:
I mention it only in passing, but this is the fight that made Bowie and his knife famous. Apparently, one Dr. Maddox was caught out slandering Mary Wells, SLW III's sister. His brother General Montfort Wells shot at the good doctor, missed, and hit someone else in the knee. One of Montfort's sons later said: "You know, Pa never could shoot." SLW III stepped in for a duel and took Jim Bowie with him as one of his seconds. SLW III and Dr. Maddox both missed one another. Then, all hell broke loose. Bowie was shot through the lung and stabbed repeatedly with sword canes. He still managed to kill one of the stabbers with his soon-to-be famous knife.
James Bowie:
He was not, as they say, a stand-up guy. He speculated illegally on land. He converted to Catholicism for the sole purpose of getting Mexican citizenship, then went on to completely ignore every provision of the Constitution of 1824, namely the ban on slavery. He pursued the daughter of Govern de Veramendi, married her, and exploited that connection ruthlessly. He lied to the mayor and the bride on his wedding day. He did speak fluent Spanish. Obviously, he was pretty fucking handy with a knife. And though it ended bloody, he went down swinging. There is NO EVIDENCE that he fathered an illegitimate child who turned out to be Mary Campbell's forefather. Read more about him here.
The Bowie Knife:
I thought it was a fitting forerunner to Ruby's knife. According to the THSA, "The knife was both a hunting knife and a tool. With it, one could clear a path, hack a sapling, dig a hole, or butcher game. In the siege of Bexar in 1835, Texans used Bowie knives to dig through roofs and walls and engage in hand-to-hand combat with the Mexicans. The knife was not designed or balanced for throwing." If you'd like, you can read more here.
The San Saba/Los Almagres Mine:
Real! It never yielded much silver, although myths abounded. Jim Bowie did go on a quest, where he and his friends were pinned down by hostile Apache. Word got back to San Antonio that Bowie was dead, and Ursula went into formal mourning. False alarm! Also, there's no evidence that anyone's Grace ever fell in there and got lost.
Maria Ursula de Veramendi:
LWife of James Bowie. Although Bowie was rarely home, de Veramendi family tradition says they were a happy couple. It was probably not a purely love match, though. Her father, Juan Martín de Veramendi was an alcalde of Bexar and, later, governor of the province. He and Bowie partnered up to make money with cotton mills. He also sponsored Bowie's ostensible conversion to the Catholic faith. In 1833, a cholera epidemic swept through Tejas. Bowie, fearing for the lives of his family, sent them away from Bexar to the de Veramendi family home in Monclova. Ursula, her father, her mother, and her and Bowie's children, all died.
Juana (Navarro) Alsbury:
A relation of the de Veramendi family, after the death of her mother, she was raised with Ursula at the de Veramendi Palacio in Bexar. She married Dr. Horace Alsbury in 1836. Alsbury left the Alamo as one of the earliest messengers. Juana stayed inside with her 11 month old son Alejo, under the protection of her in-law, James Bowie. Like Susanna Dickinson, she was later called on to verify the identities of Alamo defenders and survivors.
Sam:
He may have been the property of the de Veramendi household, but he was eventually attached to Bowie, personally. He is believed to have survived the battle, but there is no record of him afterwards. As slaves, the Mexicans spared both Sam and Joe, since slavery was technically illegal in Mexico, and the fact that the two men could not have consented to the resistance.
Joe:
Joe, Lt. Col. Travis' slave, is better known. He survived and walked with Susanna Dickinson to Gonzales. He gave his account and turned over the surviving letters of Travis'. Shortly afterwards, he got the hell out of Texas. And Travis' estate, keeping it classy, put a $50 bounty on his head and advertised for his return.
Juan Seguín:
Juan Seguín
is my favorite Alamo hero. I only got to mention him once, but, believe me, I wanted to write SO MUCH MORE about him. He was a Tejano, fighter, and totally unsung hero of the Texas Revolution. A native of the area, he left the Alamo because Travis was afraid the other messengers had been captured. He was riding Bowie's horse. Seguín made it to Sam Houston, and begged the General to return to his friends in the Alamo. Houston denied his request. Seguín went on to be a hero at the battle of San Jacinto. Later, he was the one to return to the Alamo, attempt to collect the ashes of his friends, and inter them.
Santa Anna:
Talk about your heavy biographies. As far as the Alamo goes, no one really knows why he decided it was so important. He could easily have walked around it and gone on to crush Sam Houston. Most likely, Santa Anna's ego got in the way. He knew that Davy Crockett and James Bowie were inside the fort, and he knew that defeating them would only increase his own reputation. Also, I think he must have been pretty pissed that a group of ragtag, ill-equipped, morally bankrupt white boys were camped out in a Spanish/Mexican mission, thumbing their nose at him. This disdain can perhaps be seen in his decision to delay Crockett's execution until morning, and his following decision to burn the bodies. "In the evening, the Mexicans brought wood from the neighboring forest and burned the bodies of all the Texans, but their own dead they buried in the city cemetery across the San Pedro." Santa Anna's disgust for the Anglo colonists culminated in the Goliad Massacre which was, by the standards of the day, both dirty pool and a war crime. It was a poor tactical move, too, because it incited the remaining ambivalent colonists to take up arms. Anyway, Santa Anna chased Sam Houston all the way across Texas in the aptly-named Runaway Scrape. He honestly thought the Texians could be crushed at his will. So, one afternoon, having left most of his heavy artillery behind, his army divided, Santa Anna's army sat down for a siesta. No lie. Sam Houston, never one to fight fair, seized the moment at San Jacinto. It took 18 minutes. Tops.
Samuel Colt:
...was definitely probably not in the country for the perihelion of Halley's comet. I tried to work around that. He was in England at the time, trying to get patents for his shiny new gun design. Later, he did partner with both Samuel Morse and Samuel Walker. The latter of whom went on to make Colt's gun famous as a Texas Ranger. And it's true that Sarah Winchester, who married into the famous rifle-making family, went a bit off her nut. She felt she was haunted by those killed by the rifle, a fear that culminated in the construction of the Winchester Mystery House.
Susanna Dickinson:
Another primary source for the siege. Her husband Almaron was an artillery captain at the Alamo, and is probably responsible for nursing the 18-pounder back to life. Susanna and her two-year-old daughter survived the siege. Susanna gave several accounts of the battle, but they're not exactly trustworthy. It's not known how much exposure to the military action she had. In addition, Susanna was illiterate. So, her story was told by newspaper men of the time who make "truthiness" seem like the gold standard of journalism. One of the more moving stories is the stories she often told of the musical duels between Crockett's fiddle and the bag pipes of one John McGregor. (Santa Anna played "Deguello" or "slit-throat" every evening before he commenced shelling).
The Wolf Family:
Little is known about the Alamo defender named Anthony Wolf. The speculation that he was Jewish immigrant was VERY tempting, but if I went there, I knew it was all over. So I stuck with the facts. The Wolf/Wolff family is mentioned only by Susanna Dickinson. In 1878, the San Antonio Express ran an interview with her: "She says that only one man, named Wolff [?], asked for quarter, but was instantly killed. That wretched man had two little boys, aged 11 and 12 years. The little fellows came to Mrs. Dickinson's room, where the Mexicans killed them, and a man named Walker, and carried the boys' bodies out on their bayonets."
The Rifle:
Also real-ish! The Kentucky long-rifle was the precursor to the Winchester rifle. I thought that was a nice parallel. There is also a famous rifle, the Dickert Rifle, on display now at the Alamo. The following are an excerpt from a manuscript by the donor, Col. Walter F. Siegmund:
"The identity of the patriot who used this Dickert rifle in the battle of the Alamo may never be known, but this long Dickert rifle will remain forever, a mute reminder for future generations of the great sacrifices and glorious deeds of our forefathers to gain life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness for all of us and to ever remind us to remain alert and prepared so that all we now enjoy will not be denied us."
I couldn't find a picture of THE rifle at the Alamo, but here's what a Kentucky rifle looks like:
Whew. If you have any other questions, or if you'd like to point out any inaccuracies, or spit in my eye for leaving out your favorite hero of the Texas Revolution, please do so in the comments.
thanks:
pdragon76 was merciless to the story and very kind to me. This fic is the result. I'm looking into transporting frozen tofurkeys globally. Just FYI.
kimmer1227 looked this thing over from its second incarnation to this one. (the first one was so godawful it never left the desktop).
alchemise made the beautiful, wonderful, insightful art. I still can't believe how damn perfect it is.
patita_fea advised me on Creole. Whatever mistakes I made, NOT her fault.
tahirire had that early conversation with me that ended with both of us going "Oh, fuck it. Let's do this the hard way." How'd that work out for us again?
epic historical disclaimer:
My main sources for the history were:
Gone To Texas: A History of the Lone Star State by Randolph B. Campbell. A comprehensive overview of the full history of Texas, Pre-Columbus to 2001. A relatively easy read and full of fascinating/hysterical/shameful anecdotes about Texan History. For example, did you know that our first female governor (Ma Ferguson) was a sock puppet for her husband, a man so corrupt he was banned from holding public office? Good times.
The Alamo Reader: A Study in History edited by Todd Hansen. Far and away, the best one-stop Alamo book. No analysis or story-telling, just straight up primary sources. Front to back. That's where I got the most legit timeline for the battle, as well as personal statements from Susanna Dickinson and Juana Alsbury.
The Wells Family and Allied Families by George Stafford. The author married into the Wells family, so he's hardly an unbiased source. However, it was the only source I found that discussed the early Wells.
The Handbook of Texas Online by the Texas State Historical Association. This was required reading for my History of Texas class at UTD, along with Gone To Texas. Excellent source, even though the search function is a tad funky.
"Marrying the Hangman" by Margaret Atwood. This is the poem you should blame/thank for the structure of this fic. If you follow the link, there's a note at the bottom. The poem was based on a true story.
"Payday Someday" by Robert G. Lee: a bombastic, vitriolic speech from the old-school Southern Baptists about how the Jezebels of the world are dragging us all down. Awesome!
real people and things:
The Battle of the Alamo:
They say that history is written by the victors. But what happens when you lose a battle and then win the war? Crazy. Lots of crazy. Easily the most famous event in Texas' history, the truths of this particular fight will never be known. I recommend The Alamo. STFU, it's really accurate for a movie and was produced with help from the Smithsonian. It doesn't shy away from any of the ugly truths (slavery, war crimes, Jim Bowie). Also, the score is awesome.
Cecelia Wells:
As an orphan, Cecelia was taken in by her rich relatives. The Wells family were, at their peak, the largest landowners in the state of Louisiana. Not much is known about Cecelia: she was allegedly engaged to Jim Bowie, and she died of a fever in September 1829. There is NO EVIDENCE that she was ever 'compromised' or pregnant. I made that part up. Along with her personality. From THSA: "James became engaged to Cecelia Wells (b. 1805), who died on September 7, 1829, in Alexandria, two weeks before their wedding was to take place."
Samuel Levi Wells I:
The first of his name, he married a woman named, bless her, Dorcas Huie. "Their descendants are found today in nearly every part of the United States, but are particularly numerous in the states of Louisiana and Texas."
Samuel Levi Wells II:
'My' Levi's father was a very powerful man. He died in 1816 and his will contains the following: "4. It is my will to divide my negroes equally amongst my legitimate children...8. That all my land not disposed of after three years to be divided among my legitimate children." And, for accuracy's sake, he was the one who actually went by the name Levi. But that would totally ruin the name thing, so I ignored it.
Samuel Levi Wells III (SLW III):
'My' Levi lived March 13, 1976 to 1829. He was educated on the east coast and was apparently betrothed to Ellen Price at the time of his death. He died of yellow fever in 1829 in New Orleans where, as Sheriff of Rapides Parish, he was transporting prisoners. There is NO EVIDENCE that he faked his death to take up hunting the Supernatural, and then went on to mentor Mary's forefather.
The Sandbar Fight:
I mention it only in passing, but this is the fight that made Bowie and his knife famous. Apparently, one Dr. Maddox was caught out slandering Mary Wells, SLW III's sister. His brother General Montfort Wells shot at the good doctor, missed, and hit someone else in the knee. One of Montfort's sons later said: "You know, Pa never could shoot." SLW III stepped in for a duel and took Jim Bowie with him as one of his seconds. SLW III and Dr. Maddox both missed one another. Then, all hell broke loose. Bowie was shot through the lung and stabbed repeatedly with sword canes. He still managed to kill one of the stabbers with his soon-to-be famous knife.
James Bowie:
He was not, as they say, a stand-up guy. He speculated illegally on land. He converted to Catholicism for the sole purpose of getting Mexican citizenship, then went on to completely ignore every provision of the Constitution of 1824, namely the ban on slavery. He pursued the daughter of Govern de Veramendi, married her, and exploited that connection ruthlessly. He lied to the mayor and the bride on his wedding day. He did speak fluent Spanish. Obviously, he was pretty fucking handy with a knife. And though it ended bloody, he went down swinging. There is NO EVIDENCE that he fathered an illegitimate child who turned out to be Mary Campbell's forefather. Read more about him here.
The Bowie Knife:
I thought it was a fitting forerunner to Ruby's knife. According to the THSA, "The knife was both a hunting knife and a tool. With it, one could clear a path, hack a sapling, dig a hole, or butcher game. In the siege of Bexar in 1835, Texans used Bowie knives to dig through roofs and walls and engage in hand-to-hand combat with the Mexicans. The knife was not designed or balanced for throwing." If you'd like, you can read more here.
The San Saba/Los Almagres Mine:
Real! It never yielded much silver, although myths abounded. Jim Bowie did go on a quest, where he and his friends were pinned down by hostile Apache. Word got back to San Antonio that Bowie was dead, and Ursula went into formal mourning. False alarm! Also, there's no evidence that anyone's Grace ever fell in there and got lost.
Maria Ursula de Veramendi:
LWife of James Bowie. Although Bowie was rarely home, de Veramendi family tradition says they were a happy couple. It was probably not a purely love match, though. Her father, Juan Martín de Veramendi was an alcalde of Bexar and, later, governor of the province. He and Bowie partnered up to make money with cotton mills. He also sponsored Bowie's ostensible conversion to the Catholic faith. In 1833, a cholera epidemic swept through Tejas. Bowie, fearing for the lives of his family, sent them away from Bexar to the de Veramendi family home in Monclova. Ursula, her father, her mother, and her and Bowie's children, all died.
Juana (Navarro) Alsbury:
A relation of the de Veramendi family, after the death of her mother, she was raised with Ursula at the de Veramendi Palacio in Bexar. She married Dr. Horace Alsbury in 1836. Alsbury left the Alamo as one of the earliest messengers. Juana stayed inside with her 11 month old son Alejo, under the protection of her in-law, James Bowie. Like Susanna Dickinson, she was later called on to verify the identities of Alamo defenders and survivors.
Sam:
He may have been the property of the de Veramendi household, but he was eventually attached to Bowie, personally. He is believed to have survived the battle, but there is no record of him afterwards. As slaves, the Mexicans spared both Sam and Joe, since slavery was technically illegal in Mexico, and the fact that the two men could not have consented to the resistance.
Joe:
Joe, Lt. Col. Travis' slave, is better known. He survived and walked with Susanna Dickinson to Gonzales. He gave his account and turned over the surviving letters of Travis'. Shortly afterwards, he got the hell out of Texas. And Travis' estate, keeping it classy, put a $50 bounty on his head and advertised for his return.
Juan Seguín:
Juan Seguín
is my favorite Alamo hero. I only got to mention him once, but, believe me, I wanted to write SO MUCH MORE about him. He was a Tejano, fighter, and totally unsung hero of the Texas Revolution. A native of the area, he left the Alamo because Travis was afraid the other messengers had been captured. He was riding Bowie's horse. Seguín made it to Sam Houston, and begged the General to return to his friends in the Alamo. Houston denied his request. Seguín went on to be a hero at the battle of San Jacinto. Later, he was the one to return to the Alamo, attempt to collect the ashes of his friends, and inter them.
Santa Anna:
Talk about your heavy biographies. As far as the Alamo goes, no one really knows why he decided it was so important. He could easily have walked around it and gone on to crush Sam Houston. Most likely, Santa Anna's ego got in the way. He knew that Davy Crockett and James Bowie were inside the fort, and he knew that defeating them would only increase his own reputation. Also, I think he must have been pretty pissed that a group of ragtag, ill-equipped, morally bankrupt white boys were camped out in a Spanish/Mexican mission, thumbing their nose at him. This disdain can perhaps be seen in his decision to delay Crockett's execution until morning, and his following decision to burn the bodies. "In the evening, the Mexicans brought wood from the neighboring forest and burned the bodies of all the Texans, but their own dead they buried in the city cemetery across the San Pedro." Santa Anna's disgust for the Anglo colonists culminated in the Goliad Massacre which was, by the standards of the day, both dirty pool and a war crime. It was a poor tactical move, too, because it incited the remaining ambivalent colonists to take up arms. Anyway, Santa Anna chased Sam Houston all the way across Texas in the aptly-named Runaway Scrape. He honestly thought the Texians could be crushed at his will. So, one afternoon, having left most of his heavy artillery behind, his army divided, Santa Anna's army sat down for a siesta. No lie. Sam Houston, never one to fight fair, seized the moment at San Jacinto. It took 18 minutes. Tops.
Samuel Colt:
...was definitely probably not in the country for the perihelion of Halley's comet. I tried to work around that. He was in England at the time, trying to get patents for his shiny new gun design. Later, he did partner with both Samuel Morse and Samuel Walker. The latter of whom went on to make Colt's gun famous as a Texas Ranger. And it's true that Sarah Winchester, who married into the famous rifle-making family, went a bit off her nut. She felt she was haunted by those killed by the rifle, a fear that culminated in the construction of the Winchester Mystery House.
Susanna Dickinson:
Another primary source for the siege. Her husband Almaron was an artillery captain at the Alamo, and is probably responsible for nursing the 18-pounder back to life. Susanna and her two-year-old daughter survived the siege. Susanna gave several accounts of the battle, but they're not exactly trustworthy. It's not known how much exposure to the military action she had. In addition, Susanna was illiterate. So, her story was told by newspaper men of the time who make "truthiness" seem like the gold standard of journalism. One of the more moving stories is the stories she often told of the musical duels between Crockett's fiddle and the bag pipes of one John McGregor. (Santa Anna played "Deguello" or "slit-throat" every evening before he commenced shelling).
The Wolf Family:
Little is known about the Alamo defender named Anthony Wolf. The speculation that he was Jewish immigrant was VERY tempting, but if I went there, I knew it was all over. So I stuck with the facts. The Wolf/Wolff family is mentioned only by Susanna Dickinson. In 1878, the San Antonio Express ran an interview with her: "She says that only one man, named Wolff [?], asked for quarter, but was instantly killed. That wretched man had two little boys, aged 11 and 12 years. The little fellows came to Mrs. Dickinson's room, where the Mexicans killed them, and a man named Walker, and carried the boys' bodies out on their bayonets."
The Rifle:
Also real-ish! The Kentucky long-rifle was the precursor to the Winchester rifle. I thought that was a nice parallel. There is also a famous rifle, the Dickert Rifle, on display now at the Alamo. The following are an excerpt from a manuscript by the donor, Col. Walter F. Siegmund:
"The identity of the patriot who used this Dickert rifle in the battle of the Alamo may never be known, but this long Dickert rifle will remain forever, a mute reminder for future generations of the great sacrifices and glorious deeds of our forefathers to gain life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness for all of us and to ever remind us to remain alert and prepared so that all we now enjoy will not be denied us."
I couldn't find a picture of THE rifle at the Alamo, but here's what a Kentucky rifle looks like:
Whew. If you have any other questions, or if you'd like to point out any inaccuracies, or spit in my eye for leaving out your favorite hero of the Texas Revolution, please do so in the comments.