The Alamo Was a Lie — Here’s What Really Happened.

March 6, 1836. Half past five in the morning. An army of 1,800 Mexican troops assaulted the walls of the Alamo Mission in San Antonio, Texas. The violence of the following 90 minutes was so extreme that the participating Mexican officers would not speak of it for many years. that the participating Mexican officers would not speak of it for many years.
Several carried the specifics to their own graves. In your schooling, you were taught the Alamo’s defenders fell heroically during the fight. Davy Crockett, wielding his rifle. Jim Bowie, battling from his deathbed. William Travis, sketching his line upon the sand.
That is not the truth, and the genuine testimonies from present witnesses, accounts which historians discreetly concealed for more than a hundred years, will transform your entire understanding of the Alamo. I have devoted weeks to examining the primary correspondence, the Mexican officers’ dispatches concealed within archives, the survivor statements which conflicted with the heroic tale America desired.
What I discovered bore no resemblance to the story in your history textbook. By this video’s conclusion, you will understand why most Alamo defenders did not perish in combat, what the Mexican soldiers truly did to those who yielded, and why a single Mexican officer was disciplined for attempting to offer mercy.
If you desire the authentic history they withheld from you in class, press that subscribe button immediately, for we are going to reveal the truth hidden for nearly two centuries. We shall begin with the true events of that ultimate morning. For twelve days, 189 men defended the Alamo against Generalanta anna’s forces they understood no reinforcements were arriving they understood they were encircled and by march the fifth they understood they would perish letter, not the celebrated victory or death document from weeks before. This one was distinct,
private, filled with despair. He wrote to a friend, Travis knew. They all knew. But this is what your history instructor never revealed. The men inside had choices. They might have fled. There existed several chances to depart unnoticed throughout the siege. Certain men did indeed leave. A messenger called John Smith escaped on March 3rd.
Travis dispatched him with communications, but in reality he was granting him an opportunity for survival. The majority remained, not due to a lack of fear, not because they wished to become martyrs. They stayed because they held a belief that someone would arrive. Colonel Fannin, along with his 400 troops. Sam Houston with the main army.
Someone. No relief force arrived. On the evening of March 5th, the occupants inside could hear the Mexican forces readying for the ultimate attack. The noise of cannons being repositioned. Thousands of troops assuming their posts encircling the mission’s perimeter. Bugles rehearsing the deguelo. The deguelo.
Allow me to clarify its significance, for it is critical. In Spanish, degueler signifies to cut a person’s throat. The de guello was a military signal originating from the Spanish conflicts against the Moors. Whenever an army sounded the de guello, it communicated a single edict. No surrender accepted, no captives taken, no compassion shown.
Every individual within the Alamo heard that trumpet call practicing through the night. They understood its implication perfectly. Santa Ana intended not merely to conquer them. He intended to exterminate them. At 5.30 a.m., the deguelo was played in earnest. 1,800 troops advanced on the walls from every side at once.
The northern barrier, the southern barrier, the east, the west. Santa Ana aimed to overpower the defenders so rapidly they would be unable to mount a coordinated resistance. For the initial 15 minutes, the battle proceeded precisely as the defenders had prayed. The Texans held the elevated position. They possessed long guns. They directed heavy fire down upon the Mexican formations. Mexican troops dropped by the score.
Certain records state more than 100 perished in those opening moments. The charge faltered. Commanders shouted at their troops to continue advancing. Some soldiers fractured and fled backwards. But then the Mexican army executed a move both cunning and horrifying. They ceased assaulting the fortified sections and concentrated their entire force on the north wall, the most vulnerable point, the segment with the smallest number of guards. The wall collapsed. Mexican soldiers flooded through the opening
like water through a fractured dam. And this is the moment where every film you have viewed errs completely. The history volumes from Hollywood desire your belief that the defenders battled until the final survivor. Davy Crockett swinging his long gun, old Betsy like a cudgel. Davy Crockett swinging his long gun, old Betsy, like a cudgel.
Jim Bowie discharging his weapons from his mattress. Travis firing his scattergun until he fell.Yet that is not what numerous first-hand witnesses described. Mexican Lieutenant Jose Enrique de la Pena was present. He was within the Alamo throughout those closing moments. His journal’s entries challenged nearly all of America’s accepted narrative regarding the engagement.
As recorded by De La Pena, after the Mexican troops broke through the walls, the combat was brief. The majority of defenders were overrun in mere minutes. The Mexicans possessed superior numbers. They had fixed bayonets. They had unstoppable force. The slaughter was swift, disordered, and savage. But here is the segment they suppressed, the part incompatible with the heroic legend.
Certain defenders attempted to yield. De La Pena wrote explicitly of encountering several defenders who had cast aside their arms and were pleading for mercy. He stated they cried out that they were captives, that they surrendered. Other Mexican officers verified this. Colonel Fernando Urritza noted it.
Sergeant Francisco Becerra, who was also inside the compound, did as well. These men were not without courage. These were individuals who had resisted for 12 days, who had repelled a force 50 times their number, who had witnessed their comrades fall. And when the walls were breached and hundreds of enemy soldiers flooded in with bayonets, some of them made the profoundly human choice to attempt survival.
Santa Ana had issued unambiguous commands. No clemency, no captives taken mexican soldiers shot the killings were troubled by their orders. One defender specifically became infamous for the manner of his death, or more accurately, for the falsehood spread about it. Davy Crockett, the myth, the pioneer, the man Hollywood transformed into a demigod.
De La Pena’s testimony states Crockett was among those who surrendered, that he was discovered alive after the fighting ceased, taken before Santa Anna with other prisoners, and put to death on the General’s command. At this point I must be precise. This testimony is contested. Some scholars believe De la Peña fabricated or embellished it.
Others emphasize that his diary’s details align with separate Mexican sources that were never cross-published. What is indisputable is this. By 6.30 that morning, every defender was deceased. The main assault lasted roughly 60 to 90 minutes, not multiple hours, not a noble final resistance where men fought until absolute physical collapse, ninety minutes of pandemonium, horror and butchery. Yet Santa Anna’s work was not complete.
After the fighting concluded, he issued an order that his own commanders deemed needless and barbaric. He commanded that every corpse be incinerated, each and every one. The bodies of 189 men heaped into mounds and set ablaze. A Mexican officer named Francisco Antonio Ruiz, serving as the alcalde, mayor of San Antonio, was commanded to oversee the burning.
He later documented his observations, and his report stands among the most unsettling firsthand records of the entire Texas Revolution. Ruiz wrote that the corpses were arranged in tiers with kindling placed between, similar to a funeral pyre. However, there was insufficient fuel, so the remains failed to burn entirely. They simply smoldered for hours.
The stench became so potent that Mexican troops were sickened. The townspeople of San Antonio remained inside their houses with closed windows for three days. Ruiz claimed he could not sleep for weeks afterward. The vision of what he had overseen tormented him. This leads to the inquiry seldom posed.
Why would Santa Anna command this? Under established Mexican military custom, one honored defeated foes. One interred them, even Texian rebels. Even those deemed traitors to the Mexican Republic, which was Santa Anna’s view of the Alamo defenders. Republic, which was Santa Ana’s view of the Alamo defenders. But immolation? Denying them burial? This was a calculated profanation. It was designed to deliver a message.
Santa Ana sought to paralyze the remainder of Texas with fear. He wanted everyone to understand that rebellion resulted not only in death, but in disgrace. No burial site, no memorial, nothing. And for a considerable time, this tactic succeeded. When reports from the Alamo spread through Texas, they sparked widespread dread. Families abandoned their homes, fleeing eastward toward the U.S.
frontier. The Texian army almost disintegrated due to desertions. Remember, the Alamo later evolved into a battle cry. However, in those initial weeks, it functioned as a grim admonition. It signified, this is your fate for defiance. But not every Mexican officer condoned these actions.
A specific episode, largely overlooked by historians for complicating the story, involves Colonel Francisco Javier Portillo. Portillo was a seasoned officer in Santa Ana’s forces. He participated in the assault on the Alamo.
He was present during the final attack,and as per several records, upon witnessing troops killing men who had yielded, he attempted to intervene. He literally placed himself between the captives and the soldiers tasked with their execution. He disputed the orders with other officers. He insisted that military honor demanded the humane treatment of prisoners. Santa Ana learned of this. Some sources state Portillo was arrested on the spot and shot for insubordination other versions claim he was cashiered from the army in disgrace and returned to mexico city regardless of the exact punishment