Submitted by triviafrenzy t3_11c65tb in todayilearned
Reply to comment by quaffi0 in TIL of the Battle of San Jacinto. Just six weeks after the Texans terrible loss at The Alamo in 1836. The Texans regrouped under Sam Houston, and surprised the Mexican forces and overwhelming defeated the Mexicans. The Texans had 11 soldiers killed and the Mexicans lost 650. by triviafrenzy
Remember, the Texians & the Alamo defenders were fighting to preserve slavery in Texas.
I wouldn’t call that a “sacrifice”.
they really were. they wanted independence from mexico because the mexican 1824 Constitution prohibited slavery and of course all those southern US transplants didn't want to live anywhere without their good old chattel slavery system.
Care to explain why the first Texas revolution flag was the 1824 flag demanding a return to the constitution?
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:1824_Flag.svg
Santa Ana ignored the 1824 constitution (actually repealed it!) and turned Mexico into a military dictatorship.
Austin may have been pro slavery, but Houston wasn’t.
Mexico wasn't a military dictatorship, there was a huge public reaction against federalism and the elected Congress decided to change the constitution.
I'm not talking about Austin OR Houston- I'm talking about the vision for Texas.
Pre-Revolution you had 4 people arguing who was in command.
After the Revolution was rapidly changed by the people who moved there. Hell, poor Juan Seguin had to flee because of transplants moving to San Antonio being assholes (and Santa Ana’s men).
Pretending there was a singular motivation before, during and after I think is a bit much.
Also pretending Santa Ana was a good guy, is the weirdest Reddit retcon of history I’ve seen. Seriously, I’ll buy you a plane ticket to Chiapas to go around and tell people you think he was a good guy, and was someone everyone should have been willing to live under his rule!
For unrelated reasons can you fax over your dental records first.
Santa Ana put people to the sword who surrendered under a white flag. He was a war criminal and a despot.
Yeah, that was the law in Mexico, foreigners who raised weapons against the Mexican nation should be treated as pirates and summarily executed. They captured a newcomer group in Copano and since they surrendered and didn't fight they were spared.
The law was repealed before the battle of San Jacinto, where the Americans shot people who surrendered under a white flag.
Mind you, Santa Anna's army treated civilians better than the American army in the Mexican American war, there were plenty of atrocities against civilians back then, including the rape and pillage of Huamantla.
Calling it a law that Santa Anna demanded when he was a despot and had control of the government is a bit of a stretch. Hitler had all kinds of laws passed that didn’t make them fairly unethical war crimes.
Goliad was a massacre that even the Mexican commander didn’t want to commit and begged Santa Anna to back down on.
See, the problem here is that you already decided that Santa Anna was a despost in ,when any cursory knowledge of Mexican politics and history would tell you that back then Santa Anna wouldn't even exercise the authority he had as the elected president, preferring to spend his time between his Hacienda or in military campaigns. When the Tornell Decree was voted for Congress he was already in San Luis Potosi organizing the Texas campaign. The law was repealed a few days before the battle of San Jacinto.
Also treating filibusters as pirates was the standard back then. Wasn't worse than what happened in San Jacinto.
I love how varied the up/downvote ratios are below
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