Change of Leadership Ends Badly

For two years Sam Houston's economy and moderation kept the republic alive.  Texans were growing impatient for annexation.  The constitution barred Houston from succeeding himself, so in 1838, Mirabeau Buonaparte Lamar became the new president.

Lamar was a violinist, a poet and a Houston foe who opposed annexation and dreamed of making Texas a powerful independent nation.  He opened  thousands of acres to settlers by driving Cherokee out of east Texas and crushing the Comanche in west Texas.  He moved the capital to Austin in 1839.

By 1840 Britain, France and the Netherlands all recognized the republic, thanks to Lamar, but his lavish spending exceeded his income by more than $4 million! The Texas "red back" dollar's value plunged, and credit collapsed. 

Then Lamar launched his greatest scheme - a secret invasion of New Mexico.  He hoped to corner Santa Fe trade and extend Texas borders all the way to the Pacific.  He believed that New Mexico, plagued by Indian revolts, would welcome Texas traders and would rally behind the Lone Star Flag.

In June 1841, 300 soldiers and traders, along with 24 wagons set out for Santa Fe. You might say the trip didn't go so well...first they got lost.  Then Indians picked off the stragglers.  Finally prairie fires destroyed the wagons.  After 1300 miles of desert, they were seized by Mexican troops and marched on bleeding feet another 2000 miles to Mexico City and prison.  No, didn't go well!

The fiasco didn't help relations between Texas and Mexico either.  Lamar's career was  obviously over.  Houston took back the presidency in 1841.  As one the people recorded, "Houston drunk in a ditch is worth a thousand of Lamar sober."  :)

Next time...Can you say oui, oui?
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Today in Pioneer History:  On October 24, 1901, a 63-year-old schoolteacher named Annie Edson Taylor becomes the first person to take the plunge over Niagara Falls in a barrel.

Meanwhile in Santa Fe Plaza

To get an idea of the community of Santa Fe in its infancy, let's visit the town square, or plaza which is the center of commerce and community.

The square is noisy - clanging caravan bells, hawking peddlers, arguing traders, and shouting wagon master arriving in town.  At 10 am everyone is eager to do business before the midday heat drives most inside to the coolness of thick-walled whitewashed rooms or the tree shaded courtyards around the private homes. 

In 1835, the 4,000 residents of Santa Fe welcome the caravans as a break in their isolation imposed by Spanish trade restrictions, lack of roads and navigable rivers.  The Santa Fe locals trade in pinon nuts (from mountain scrub pine), sheep, goats, and coarse wool.  They have a limited outlet for their products.  Their tools are primitive with no craftsmen or manufacturers. 

To the American traders, Santa Fe means safety after weeks of danger and with luck, good profits. One trader wrote "arrived at last in the strange place to which our wild love of novelty lead us - excitement tingled through our veins."

What makes up the town plaza?  As wagons enter the plaza's east side from the road to Pecos, they cross San Francisco Street.  It leads to the cathedral with its shady portales.   Beyond are the snow capped Sangre de Cristo Mountains.  They stop at the ornate customhouse to unload goods for inspection.  Adjoining the customhouse are the shops, in the rear is a placita (little court) which is shared by private homes.

The hotel welcomes wagon crews with clean beds, bathing facilities, meals of chili and lamb, costly liquor and free nightly dances.  The wagon master goes to the fashionable salon of Spanish gambling, La Tules.  Shrewd, wealthy and bejeweled, the owners is an aristocrat respected in New Mexican society. 

The trader's paymaster pays the crew - some in goods, others in gold coins.  The men, from seven countries speak diverse languages.  The trader's partner, a shopkeeper, checks goods brought to his shop on the plaza's south side.  His store, like the others, have interior wooden shutters and barred windows without panes. 

Next time...more inside the Santa Fe Plaza.
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Today in Pioneer History: "On August 4, 1873, while protecting a railroad survey party in Montana, Custer and his 7th Cavalry clash for the first time with the Sioux Indians, who will defeat them three years later at Little Big Horn.

Trading Caravan Style

The Spring of 1824 found all the Missouri traders bound for Santa Fe agreeing to travel in one well-defended caravan as protection against hostile Indian raiders.   The results were impressive - Indian raiders kept away, and goods worth $35,000 brought a return of $190,000 in gold, silver, and furs.  This caravan style of trade became the norm from then on except for a temporary halt during the Mexican war.  Even larger caravans made the annual trek, eventually expanding to include Taos and market in the state of Chihuahua.

By 1831 the caravan contained 100 wagons and 200 men.  Congress authorized payments to the Osage and Kansa Indians to ensure safe passages.  Occasionally military escorts were dispatched to help fend off the Comanche who would attack the wagons and run off with precious livestock.

Nature was an even greater danger.  Rockslides often made the mountain route a nightmare.  The shorter Cimarron Cutoff had it own horrors -intense heat, mirages, and clouds of choking alkali dust.  Overnight spring rains turned  streams into mile wide torrents and transformed dusty flatland in hip deep oceans of mud.

The New Mexican welcome wore thin as well.  The governor of Santa Fe and his poorly paid subordinates were empowered to charge traders whatever custom duties the traffic would bear.  Traders never knew until they left Santa Fe how much profit they would be allowed to take with them.  Bribing and smuggling were very common.  The Americans, for the most part, were determined to give up as little as possible for what one bitter skinner called "the sole use and benefit of his obesity, the Governor".

Next time - Things get rowdy in Santa Fe
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Today in Pioneer History: On June 28, 1868, the 14th Amendment, guaranteeing to African Americans citizenship and all its privileges, is officially adopted into the U.S. Constitution.

Santa Fe - Quaint, Trading Town

Santa Fe was a quiet town of flat-roofed adobe houses of 3000 in 1821.  It was the commercial center of the Rio Grande Valley for 40,000 ranchers and estate owners.  Prior to 1821 the Spanish had always dealt harshly with those few Americans who tried to do business in Santa Fe - even jailing or fining them heavily as well as confiscating their goods.

An accidental meeting in 1821 re-opened commerce in Santa Fe and also signaled the beginning of the end of the Spanish speaking Southwest.  On September 1st William Becknell left Franklin, Missouri with a party of 20 frontiersmen intending to visit the Plains Indians and swap manufactured goods for Indians pelts and horses.  In the Raton Pass,  the Americans assumed that jail and confiscation would follow when they were confronted by a party of Spanish speaking soldiers.  However, the soldiers were extremely cordial, explaining that Mexico had just overtaken the Spanish rule and they were eager for friendly contact with the US.  The American traders would be more than welcome in Santa Fe.

Becknell and his men wee delighted by their good fortune and hurried off to Santa Fe, receiving a warm welcome from its citizens.  The Becknell party returned to Missouri in 1822 carrying saddlebags of Mexican silver dollars.

Becknell set forth again the following spring with three heavily loaded wagons.  This time due to his heavy wagons he chose to go south of the former route to blaze the rather flat Cimarron Cutoff.  It was a dangerous decision which almost cost his entire party their lives.  While crossing the 50 mile Cimarron Desert his party ran out of water and it was only by drinking the liquids from a freshly killed buffalo that they survived at all. 

Raiding Indians also plagued the party of their journey.  The path Becknell took became known as the Santa Fe Trail, stretching some 800 miles from the border of Missouri to New Mexico.

Next time...the Wagon Caravans of Santa Fe

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On this Day in Pioneer History: "On July 25, 1832, the first recorded railroad accident in U.S. history occurs when four people are thrown off a vacant car on the Granite Railway near Quincy, Massachusetts. The victims had been invited to view the process of transporting large and weighty loads of stone when a cable on a vacant car snapped on the return trip, throwing them off the train and over a 34-foot cliff. One man was killed and the others were seriously injured.

Three for the Money!

The third Santa Fe Expedition of which Walker took part was led by William Becknell, a ferryboat operator and manager of the salt lick in Boonslick Country, Missouri.  The party left in September and reached Santa Fe in November, just when the Mexicans were celebrating their independence from the Spanish.

The Mexicans invited Beckwell to trade with them and they did so well that when they returned to Missouri in February 1822 (after a winter of blizzards and high winds) they untied their saddles, throwing them down and letting 10,000 Mexican silver dollars roll around on the main street of Franklin, Missouri.  One woman who had invested $60  in their venture, got a return of $900...not too shabby!

It is suspected that the lost journals of Walker's recorded this journey but there is no proof.  The following year is unknown in Walker's life but in 1823 he made his personal entrance into recorded history - and what a doosie it was!

Next time - the economy takes a dive