Breaking Away

This is the first in a series of excerpts from Sheer Will: the Story of the Port of Houston and the Houston Ship Channel, highlighting the role of Buffalo Bayou in the birth of the Texas Republic.

The Texas Revolution “busted” wide open in the fall of 1835. Within the first three months, Texian rebels achieved six victories to their credit. However, the brazen freedom fighters might have taken a lesson from a quote by the great Carthaginian general, Hannibal. He said, “Fortune is the most fickle thing in the world, and inclines with decisive favour now to one side and now to the other on the slightest pretext, treating mankind like young children.”

In other words, things change quickly—and they did. Antonio López de Santa Anna, Mexico’s president and commander-in-chief, implemented a severe and brutal campaign winning all five major engagements between February and April of 1836. The provisional Texas government was scattered and on the run. Pushing eastward ahead of Santa Anna, General Sam Houston, along with his makeshift militia, tried to buy time to ready his troops and maybe find a place to fight—or flee Texas altogether until he could muster a real fighting force.

Things looked bleak for Texas.

While it seemed as if Texians were up a creek without a paddle, victory actually lay along the slow-moving currents of the Buffalo Bayou. It began with the heads of Texas’ provisional government, President David G. Burnet and Vice President Lorenzo de Zavala. Their faith in the Buffalo led the provisional government to take refuge on its banks. In their view, Buffalo Bayou provided an easy escape to the sea and on to New Orleans, if needed. It also afforded a reliable line of communication with the outside world. Conventional wisdom was that the road north to Nacogdoches was the better choice, but a small Mexican force could easily have severed that route. Hordes of refugees must have agreed since they poured over the Brazos heading for Harrisburg so they might catch a steamer, a barge, or even a canoe that headed anywhere but where Santa Anna was going.

The Cayuga depicted as it chugs up Buffalo Bayou.

Moreover, the provisional government decided that if necessary, Galveston Island would be the last stand for a fight with Santa Anna. His army would have to make a beach landing on the island, leaving his forces vulnerable to rebel defenses. Any Mexican ships trying to invade the bay had to pass within spitball distance of Galveston and, thus, were susceptible to its artillery fire. If for some reason things completely fell apart, the island made a perfect jumping off point for an exodus east to New Orleans. Consequently, a small fleet of vessels spent the better parts of March and April making their way up and down Buffalo Bayou. Led by the Cayuga, the cavalcade included two other paddle wheelers, the Laura and the Yellow Stone, as well as the schooners Flash, Kosciusko, and Shenandoah. But it was the paddle wheelers that bore the oxen task of ferrying men, timber, and supplies in order to fortify Galveston. Indeed, later roles played by these paddle wheelers grew ever more important as the early Port of Houston story unfolded. But at the moment, they were the liberty ships of the Texas Revolution.

"Fortune is the most fickle thing in the world..."

Texians were an optimistic bunch despite the dire reality of their situation. Santa Anna’s force of thousands had just levied slaughter at the Alamo and Goliad, and he was sacking every town he came to while chasing Sam Houston. The Mexican dictator was on a bloodthirsty drive to catch Houston so that he could fight the deciding battle that would be his final solution to the rebel problem. Ahead of the Mexican army was a surge of refugees gobbling up the diminishing stores in and around Harrisburg while overloading the ever-dwindling number of transports out of harm’s way. And yet again, fortune was fickle.