Texas, previously part of the Mexican state of Coahuila, declared its independence early in "1836 and the heroic resistance of the devoted band of patriots in the Mission Church at San Antonio gave the new state its war cry, “Remember the Alamo.” Six weeks later, April 21, General Sam Houston (1793- 1863), in command of the small Texan forces, won the battle of San Jacinto, not far from the present city of Houston. In this battle the Mexicans, with double the Texan forces, were completely routed and their general, Santa Anna, the Mexican president, was captured.
A state of war, sometimes active, sometimes passive, existed between Mexico and Texas practically from the date of the Texan proclamation of independence until its annexation by the United States in 1845. Houston was elected President in September, 1836, and the independence of the new republic was recognized by the United States in March, 1837, and later by other countries.
The prosperity of the new state being dependent on foreign trade, it was not long before it was decided that a navy was needed to prevent the blockade of its coast and interference with its trade by Mexico, which had not given up hope of subjugating and re-annexing the country. In 1838 a contract was made for building a sailing sloop of war, two brigs, and two schooners at Baltimore, to be delivered at Galveston. For immediate use in the protection of the coast, the steamship Charleston was purchased, fitted out in New York, and renamed Zavala.
Mexico was preparing to harass the Texan coast and to throttle foreign trade, when she became involved in a brief war with France. During October and November, 1838, a French squadron under Admiral Baudin blockaded the Mexican coast, bombarded and captured the Castle of San Juan de Ulua, and occupied Vera Cruz. The blockade of Mexican ports was not lifted until 1839, the French being determined to secure action on claims for damages to persons and property of French subjects in Mexico and to ensure their just treatment thereafter, by that turbulent state.
The Zavala was a conditional purchase for protection against Mexican cruisers, which in case French and Mexican difficulties should be composed and the blockade raised, would then be at liberty to harass the Texan coast before the vessels building in Baltimore could be ready for service.
The Secretary of State of Texas, referring to the Zavala in a letter to the Texan (then written “Texian”) Minister to France and England, remarked, “With this acquisition we can command the coast, the Gulf, annihilate the commerce of Mexico, prevent an invasion, and force the enemy to a reasonable peace.” These were great expectations and indicated an intention to use the Zavala for other than purely defensive purposes. The Secretary of State was the more confident because Mexico had then no steam-driven men-of- war, and both France and England, at that time, were interested in preventing the annexation of Texas by the United States and also in keeping Mexico from reconquering it.
Admiral Baudin, after lifting the blockade, paid a visit of courtesy to Galveston, the principal seaport of the new republic. Salutes were exchanged between the Zavala and the Neriède, 64, the French flagship. The Neriède had the misfortune to ground while attempting to enter the port and was pulled off by the Zavala, the latter evidently being more powerful than the French side-wheeler Phaeton, the Neriède’s tender.
Edwin W. Moore who had entered our Navy as a midshipman, January 1, 1825, and who became a lieutenant in March, 1835, resigned on July 16, 1839, to take command of the Texas Navy, with the rank of captain and the title—as was customary in our own service in those days— of commodore.
Commodore Moore’s force, in addition to the Zavala, consisted of the sloop Austin, flagship, 20, two 18-gun brigs, and two schooners, the San Antonio and the San Bernardo, carrying seven guns each. It appears that, for a time, besides the Zavala, he had another steamer, the Cayuga, carrying two light guns. The Zavala is listed as carrying eight guns and as cruising with other vessels under Moore’s command, to prevent the enforcement of a blockade of the ports of Texas, which, as was foreseen, had been declared by the Mexican government after the end of hostilities with France.
Moore was an active and enterprising officer. He carried the war to the enemy’s coast with his small squadron, making three cruises in Mexican waters, in the years 1839, 1840, and 1841.
Appropriations made by the Texas Congress were too meager to maintain the navy it had created, but Moore was able to keep the sea with funds obtained from sales of captured Mexican vessels and from contributions which he levied on Mexican towns.
During the summer of 1841 he surveyed and charted the Texan coast and in the fall of that year he was sent by President Lamar to cruise on the coasts of Yucatan and Campeche, in order to assist those two states which were then in rebellion against the central Mexican government.
After this cruise, he refitted part of his force in Mobile and sent it in 1842 to blockade Mexican ports under a proclamation issued by President Houston, then serving his second term. The Austin and one brig remained at New Orleans, unable to complete their refit or to take on stores for lack of funds.
The Mexican naval force, at that time, appears to have been employed wholly on the coasts of Yucatan and Campeche, to subdue the rebellion in those two states. It consisted of two steamers—built in England—two brigs, and two schooners. One of the steamers was an iron frigate, recently built at Birkenhead. It was first offered to the British Admiralty, which refused to buy, and was then sold to the Mexican government and christened Guadeloupe.
The Guadeloupe measured 175 feet in length by 30 feet beam and was somewhat larger than the Michigan of our Navy which was built about the same time. With the possible exception of the Michigan, she was the first iron warship. The dimensions of Mexico’s other steamer, the Montezuma, are not given, but accounts state that she was about 1,000 tons displacement and that she and the Guadeloupe were more powerful than any steam war vessels in the British navy. This would indicate that they were larger than either the Michigan or Princeton of our Navy.
Both the Guadeloupe and Montezuma were procured in England through Mexico’s representatives there and allowed to sail, partly armed and officered, over the protest of the Texan Chargé, Mr. Ashbel Smith. The British government, however, did issue orders that the naval officers who had sailed in them must leave the Mexican service and return to England, on pain of being dismissed from the British navy.
This Mexican force, if unopposed at sea, was powerful enough to subdue Yucatan and Campeche through landing troops, blockading ports, and capturing the small armed vessels which belonged to the two rebellious states. Besieged by land and sea, and learning that part of the Texas navy was inactive through lack of funds, the government of Yucatan, in 1843, offered financial assistance to Commodore Moore, by which means he was enabled to refit the ship and brig at New Orleans, take on stores sufficient for a 3-month cruise, and give battle to the common enemy off the Yucatan coast.
Moore’s actions were highly creditable and successful and of the utmost value to the Texan government, because through the defeat of the Mexican sea force he made a blockade of the Texan coast and the destruction of Galveston an impossibility. But the purpose of the campaign was misconstrued by his own government, he was proclaimed an outlaw, and on his return from his victorious cruise was brought to trial by court-martial. One of the charges against him was the violation of a secret act of the Texas Congress which provided for the abolishment of the navy!
This act had created a commission of three persons to whom Commodore Moore was directed to report for the purpose of carrying out its provisions. The orders to the commissioners were also secret. They had come on board the Austin at New Orleans and had directed Commodore Moore to proceed with his ships to Galveston. Moore, however, having made his arrangements with the Yucatan government, persuaded James Morgan, one of the commissioners who was living with him in the Austin, to accompany him on the cruise; the sinews of war being $8,000 a month, furnished by Yucatan.
His ships Austin and Wharton—named in honor of two well-known Texan patriots—were assisted to a slight degree by some small, armed, Yucatan vessels. With this force, Moore successfully engaged, on two occasions, the Mexican squadron of two steamers, two brigs, and two schooners; first, on April 30, 1843, and again on June 26, of the same year. He also prevented the dispatch of transports to supply and re-enforce the troops employed in subjugating the two rebellious states. After the last engagement in June, the Mexicans abandoned the coast.
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Courtesy “National Republic”
SAM HOUSTON
As he appeared when elected to the United States Senate
Moore’s companion on this cruise, Commissioner Morgan, conceived a great admiration for the Commodore’s skill and resource. Morgan’s account of the expedition has been preserved and is quoted in part:
We . . . proceeded along the Yucatan and Campeche coasts until within some ten or twelve miles of Lerma, where we anchored on Saturday night, the 29th of April and on Sunday morning at four o’clock, got under way.
At daylight we discovered two large steamers, two armed brigs and two armed schooners bearing down evidently to attack us . . . prepared for action and headed directly for them, the crews of both vessels (Austin and Wharton) giving three hearty cheers, but before we could get within long gun-shot range of this formidable fleet, headed by their redoubtable steamers and armed with their renowned Paixhans guns, they evinced a disposition to be off by going about under a heavy pressure of steam and heading directly from us. Commodore Moore crowded sail in pursuit, when the Mexican fleet concentrated and awaited our approach and so soon as within long range opened their fire upon us from their steamers to which the Commodore paid no attention but kept endeavoring to close with them. This, however, the enemy was determined to avoid, their steam enabling them to select their distance, when the Commodore finding he could not bring them to close quarters opened his fire from
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Courtesy “National Republic”
PRESIDENT LAMAR OF THE TEXAS REPUBLIC
both vessels and the action became general and lasted for something over an hour, the steamers then hauling off to windward entirely without the reach of our guns, and remained there until it became calm, when they recommenced their attack, which continued for nearly half an hour and they again hauled off and have kept to windward ever since. As for their brigs and schooners, they approached near enough in the first action to get one broadside from the Austin and never came near us afterward, but have kept at a distance of from some five or ten miles to windward outside the steamers ever since.
In this action the brig Wharton lost two men killed and four wounded. The Austin had none killed or wounded, but one shot struck her which caused no damage. . . .
We have understood since the action that the captain of the Montezuma, steamer, and twenty or more of their men were killed and a number wounded. Commodore Moore has never been able to bring them to close action since. They keep to windward out of reach. We have driven the fleet from Lerma, raised the blockade of Campeche and placed General Ampudia with his besieging army in a very perilous situation, as he cannot now communicate with his fleet. His soldiers are deserting and coming into Campeche in considerable numbers daily.
Moore’s two engagements stand among the few instances in which sailing men-of- war were successfully fought against steamers. In his own account, he mentions 68-pound shot from the Montezuma, 42-pounders from the Guadeloupe, and 32-pounders from one of the Mexican sailing ships, the Eagle. He speaks of the Montezuma as mounting seven guns and the Guadeloupe four, some or all of which were 68-pounders, but he makes no mention of shell being fired in any action by either steamer, though they were credited with carrying Paixhans (shell guns).
The favorite shell gun of that time was the 8-inch, which fired a projectile weighing approximately 68 pounds. Moore does not state the caliber of the Wharton’s battery, but referring to his flagship, the Austin, he records engaging with long 18- pounders when the medium 24’s did not reach the enemy. He did not have the Zavala for service off Yucatan. She remained in the possession of Texas, but without funds to operate her after 1841.
Steamers were much more costly to keep in commission than sailing ships and steaming coal was not then an ordinary article of commerce. In United States waters, wood was the main source of fuel for steamers until 1834, and in 1837, the year before the Zavala’s purchase, fuel for the Fulton II’s trial trip was a mixture of wood and coal, averaging 1 cord of wood and 400 pounds of coal per hour for a speed well over 10 knots.
After being driven off the Yucatan coast by Moore, no evidence is available of any hostile action by the Montezuma or the Guadeloupe against either Yucatan or Texas. They visited New York in 1844, where they refitted and some additions to their armament were made, and when war between the United States and Mexico began, without formal declaration, in 1846, they were at Vera Cruz, where Commodore Connor was observing Mexico’s actions, ready to frustrate any attack on American commerce.
At that time, the only active steam warships in our Navy were the Mississippi and the Princeton, both of which, then or later, formed part of Commodore Connor’s command. It has been stated that the Montezuma and the Guadeloupe were somewhat larger than the Princeton. They were considerably smaller than the Mississippi, but properly manned and officered, they would have been dangerous antagonists, so that as far as available steamships were concerned, the two navies were practically equal.
Far from attempting to contest control of the sea with the Mississippi and the Princeton, the Montezuma and the Guadeloupe escaped from Vera Cruz in a calm and put in at Havana, where they were transferred to British registry. There is some evidence to indicate that the Mexican government had never fully paid for them and some that it was intended to fit them out as privateers to prey against American commerce, but their further history is unrecorded.
About this time the East Indian Company had an iron side-wheeler called the Nemesis which had been in action on several occasions against the Chinese forts, defending Canton. The war services of the Nemesis in China and the Guadeloupe in the Gulf of Mexico had attracted much attention and had been communicated to the British Admiralty in all details. In 1846, the merits of iron for men-of-war was a live subject in England. British tests carried on by the Excellent, gunnery ship, were unfavorable to iron, although the captains of the Nemesis and the Guadeloupe testified to their preference for iron over wood. Captain Charlewood, R.N., who commanded the Guadeloupe until he was recalled and relieved by a relative of his not belonging to the British Navy, gives particulars of five holes made in the Guadeloupe by 24-pound shot of the Austin which the ship’s force had no difficulty in plugging.
Commodore Moore returned to Galveston after his victorious cruise and sent to President Houston this unique letter:
Texas Sloop or War Austin Galveston Bay
July 14, 1843
Sir:
Having been proclaimed by the President of Texas an outlaw and a pirate, and all the nations in Christendom in amity with Texas having been called upon to seize and bring me to this port for trial, I herewith inform you that I have voluntarily returned here and surrendered myself to you for the purpose of meeting the penalties of the law.
I am
Very respectfully
Your obedient Servant
He was brought to trial by court-martial in May, 1844, on charges of willful neglect of duty, misapplication of money, disobedience of orders, contempt and defiance of the laws and authorities of the country, treason, and murder. The charge of murder was based on the execution by Moore’s order of two of his men for mutiny. Commissioner Morgan was a valuable witness for the defense.
The court found him guilty only of disobedience of orders. The findings were disapproved by President Houston because of their leniency, no punishment was assigned, and Moore was not informed of the findings until June, 1845.
In the meantime a joint resolution of the United States Congress was adopted March 1, 1845, providing for the annexation of Texas. The Texas Congress approved the terms of annexation on July 4, 1845, and on that day Texas became one of the states of the Union.
An earlier resolution of Congress had provided for annexation of Texas as a territory, and Captain R. F. Stockton’s biographer states that Stockton was selected by President Tyler to carry the annexation resolutions to Galveston in the Princeton, for transmission to the President of Texas. The records show that the Princeton was in Galveston in 1845 and that Stockton was active in persuading the Texans to accede to the terms of the resolution. But it appears that the latter was actually sent overland by the hands of Mr. Waggaman, via the “Hermitage,” Andrew Jackson’s home in Tennessee, to New Orleans and thence to Galveston.
The terms of annexation provided that Texas should cede to the United States all public edifices, fortifications, barracks, forts and harbors, navy and navy yards, and all means pertaining to public defense.
Beside Moore, several other officers of the United States Navy had resigned and joined the Texas Navy. A claim was made that the personnel, as well as the material, of this service should be transferred and the officers should carry their Texan rank with them. This naturally aroused considerable opposition and the attempt failed.
The vessels taken over were the Austin, the two 18-gun brigs, and one schooner. Of these, the only one considered of any value was the Austin, which was sent to the Pensacola Navy Yard and there determined to be unfit for further service.
Thus ended the Texas Navy, after an honorable and eventful career of seven years.
IT IS HARDLY POSSIBLE to discuss the spirit of an army apart from that of its Commander. If in strategy wholly, and in tactics in great part, success emanates from a single brain, the moral of the troops is not less dependent on the influence of one man. “Better an army of stags,” runs the proverb, “led by a lion, than an army of lions led by a stag.”—Colonel Henderson.