Lee at the Alamo by Harry Turtledove

Author:Harry Turtledove
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Tom Doherty Associates
Published: 2000-07-08T16:00:00+00:00

The next few days were quiet. The Texans kept sniping at the U.S. soldiers, but mounted no great assaults. The bluecoats shot back. One of them picked off a militiaman at upwards of six hundred yards. His friends cheered and carried him through the walled courtyard on their shoulders, as if he’d won a prizefight.

Texas’ voters proved themselves in accord with the secession convention, ratifying the state’s withdrawal from the Union. The militiamen shouted the news to the besieged U.S. soldiers. Under flag of truce, they brought up papers so the bluecoats could see they weren’t making up the news.

“It does not matter,” Lee said. “They have no right to federal property without negotiating its transfer with duly constituted authority, and less than no right to seize it by force.” No doubt the Texans were seizing small forts and outposts up and down the long frontier. No doubt some local U.S. commanders would sympathize with secession and make the seizure easy. Lee did feel a certain sympathy for secession, but none whatever for illegality.

He made sure the men garrisoning the Alamo stayed alert through the night. Sooner or later, Ben McCulloch was bound to realize the cloak of darkness gave him the best hope of breaking into the fortress…wasn’t he?

McCulloch was. He set the attack for two nights after the Texas plebiscite. It proved foredoomed. A Texan who favored the Union sneaked through the militiamen’s line after darkness fell and warned the U.S. garrison. The bluecoats let down a rope when he softly called. The local was spry enough to climb it. The soldiers took him to Lee, who had been about to go to bed.

Lee didn’t need long to decide the man—his name was Andrew Crouch—was telling the truth. “They’ll come tonight for sure,” Crouch said. By the way he talked, he’d been born in the Midwest, and come to Texas to better his fortune. He sounded contemptuous as he continued, “They can’t keep a secret for hell, Colonel, and that’s a fact. The way they’re carrying on, I’m surprised you didn’t hear ’em in here.”

“They make a good deal of noise a good deal of the time,” Lee observed, not without scorn of his own. “They are not the best-disciplined troops I have ever encountered.”

“I believe that, by God,” Crouch said. “If you give me a musket, I’ll help you shoot the buggers.”

“I will give you a musket and a uniform and swear you into the Army for a term of one month. That way, if things go against us” —as Lee expected they would, though he did not say so— “they cannot treat you as a bushwhacker taken in arms against them.”

“And hang me, you mean?” Crouch asked. Lee nodded. So did the other man. “Fair enough, sir, and I thank you kindly for the thought.”

The attack came around ten o’clock: well before the moon rose to spoil the darkness. The Texans were noisy there, too. The bluecoats on the walls blazed away at the chattering, clattering bands of militiamen.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.