A train of emigrants encamped outside the fort for the night on their long journey across the plains.
A crowd of broad-rimmed hats, thin visages, and staring eyes appeared suddenly at the gate. Tall, awkward men in brown homespun; women, with cadaverous faces and long lank figures, came thronging in together, and as if inspired by the very demon of curiosity ransacked every nook and corner of the fort. The emigrants prosecuted their investigations with untiring vigor. They penetrated the rooms, or, rather, dens, inhabited by the astonished squaws. Resolved to search every mystery to the bottom, they explored the apartments of the men, and even that of Marie and the bourgeois (the commandant of the fort). At last a numerous deputation appeared at our door but found no encouragement to remain.... Having at length satisfied their curiosity, they next proceeded to business.
On the 19th of August, 1854, a Mormon train was encamped about ten miles below the fort on the Platte River. The Indians having killed a cow or ox belonging to the train had been complained of by the Mormons to the commanding officer, who sent Lieutenant Grattan, of the Sixth United States Infantry, with thirty men of Company G and two howitzers, to recover the cow and bring the thieves to the garrison. They met a large number of Indians (Sioux) under the leadership of a chief named Mattoioway about eight miles from the fort and a conflict ensued in which Lieutenant Grattan’s command, with the exception of one man, was annihilated. The survivor was hidden in some bushes by a friendly Indian and brought to the fort that night where he died two days afterward. The bodies of the slain were buried in one grave where they fell and a pile of stones marks their resting place.
The Alamo, which is famous for its heroic defence against the Mexicans by Travis and his men, is situated in San Antonio, Texas, and is the point of pilgrimage annually for many hundreds of the visitors to the southwestern United States. On the outskirts of San Antonio is the modern great military plant, Fort Sam Houston, the Alamo’s lusty successor.
The Alamo, as late as 1870, was used for military purposes by the United States government, but of recent years it has been preserved purely as a monument to those brave men who lost their lives in it fighting bravely to the last a battle which they knew to be hopeless from the first. Upon the front of the building has been placed an inscription which reads, “Thermopylæ had its messenger of defeat. The Alamo had none.” The building, itself, is a low structure of the familiar Spanish mission type, and its main walls, though constructed in 1744, are almost as solid to-day as when new. The chapel of the Alamo bears the date 1757, but this was of later building than the rest of the place.