By Steve Bennett
San Antonio Express-News
http://www.mysanantonio.com/
May 20, 2012
Do we really need another book on the Alamo?
Of course. Aside from the heroism displayed on both sides of the little fort's walls, the mystery — we will never truly know everything that happened — is what continues to make the Alamo so captivating.
Dallas author James Donovan's “The Blood of Heroes” is not without controversy — yes, William Barret Travis drew a line in the sand; no, Davy Crockett didn't survive the battle to be executed afterward — but its most exciting attribute is it's one of the best one-stop overviews of the entire campaign, from the 1835 siege of Bexar by the Texans to Sam Houston's victory at San Jacinto.
“I took this project on with a few goals in mind,” says Donovan, who took on another famous last stand in his previous book “A Terrible Glory: Custer and the Little Bighorn.” “One, I hoped I might be able to scrape away some of the myth and legend that have encrusted the Alamo story over the years. Two, I thought the Mexican side of the story had not been told properly, and believed I might be able to do that more extensively, as I did the Indian side in ‘A Terrible Glory.' Three, I hoped that I might uncover some new material. I truly believe that you can always find something new if you dig enough. Too many writers of history don't research thoroughly — they rely too much on secondary sources, such as books on the subject, and don't spend the hundreds of hours in archives and collections necessary to do it right. Fortunately, I love that part of the job.”
Donovan, who will be in San Antonio on Tuesday to discuss and sign “The Blood of Heroes,” recently spoke with the Express-News.
Q. What ignited your interest in the Alamo?
A. I've lived in Texas for 36 years, so I've been aware of the dramatic power of the Alamo story for a long time. My previous book, ‘A Terrible Glory,' was about the Battle of the Little Bighorn. When that was published in 2008, I suggested the Titanic as the topic for my next book. My editor declined, and suggested something Western-oriented as a more logical foll-owup. The Alamo battle jumped out of my mouth almost without thinking — I had always wondered about all the myths and legends that had grown up around it, and thought I might be able to get to the root of some of them as I had with the Battle of the Little Bighorn. In retrospect it was the perfect subject.
Q. You come down on the traditional side on the line in the sand and Crockett's death in battle. Are you confident that you're right about these incidents?
A. I discovered some new sources that support the line in the sand, and incorporated them into a 24-page afterword that examines and analyzes all the evidence concerning the line. Yes, I think there is now enough reliable evidence to write it as acceptable, factual history. As far as Crockett's death in battle, the several Mexican accounts (five or six officers and one sergeant) that are used to support his execution are, upon close inspection, highly suspect for many reasons — second- and third-hand hearsay accounts that just don't hold water, and none of the high-ranking officers who were there, including Santa Anna himself, ever mention it. Some Alamo defenders were executed after the battle, but it's highly doubtful that Crockett was one of them. My discussion of the execution theory is the longest endnote in my book, and I invite anyone interested in the controversy to read that, and the sources I cite, and make up their own minds.
Q. What was the most challenging thing about researching and writing the book?
A. When you're researching a fight-to-the-death battle like the Alamo, there's a serious shortage of primary sources on one side of the struggle, since they all die. And in this case, the only accounts we have on the defenders side is from noncombatants like Susanna Dickinson, who was hiding in the church during the entire battle, and from Joe, Travis's slave, who saw Travis die on the north wall very early and then retreated into a room for the remainder of the struggle. The Mexican accounts are complicated by the fact that there are few of them extant — a few officers' terse after-action reports, and plenty of other accounts over the next 70 years that vary wildly in reliability. And don't forget that it was dark for most of the battle, and none of the participating Mexican soldiers or officers knew any of their opponents by sight, so we have little knowledge of who did what on the defenders' side. That makes it tougher to write a narrative, since there isn't an abundance of personal details that bring a story alive.
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