The Southwestern Historical Quarterly, Volume 37, July 1933 - April, 1934 Page: 39

                                
A Critical Study of the Siege of the Alamo

The following report written by Francisco Ruiz, the alcalde of
San Antonio, is also of interest and value.80 The report reads
as follows:
On the 6th of March 1836, at 3 a. m., General Santa Anna at
the head of 4,000 men advanced against the Alamo. The infantry,
artillery and cavalry had formed about 1000 varas from the walls
of the same fortress. The Mexican army charged and were twice
repulsed by the deadly fire of Travis's artillery, which resembled a
constant thunder. At the third charge the Toluca battalion com-
menced to scale the walls and suffered severely. Out of 830 men
only 130 of the battalion were lift alive.
When the Mexican army entered the walls, I with the political
chief, Don Ramon Musquiz and other members of the corporation,
accompanied by the curate, Don Refugio de la Garza, who by
Santa Anna's orders had assembled during the night at a temporary
fortification on Protero Street, with the object of attending the
wounded, etc. As soon as the storming commenced we crossed the
bridge on Commerce Street, with this object in view and about
100 yards from the same a party of Mexican dragoons fired upon
us and compelled us to fall back on the river to the place that we
had occupied before. Half an hour had elapsed when Santa Anna
sent one of his aides-de-camp with an order for us to come before
him. He directed me to call on some of the neighbors to come
with carts to carry the (Mexican) dead to the cemetary and to
accompany him, as he desired to have Colonels Travis, Bowie, and
Crockett shown to him.
On the north battery of the fortress convent, lay the lifeless
body of Col. Travis on the gun carriage, shot only through the
forehead. Toward the west and in a small fort opposite the city,
we found the body of Colonel Crockett. Col. Bowie was found
dead in his bed in one of the rooms on the south side.
Santa Anna, after all the Mexican bodies had been taken out,
ordered wood to be brought to burn the bodies of the Texans.
He sent a company of dragoons with me to bring wood and dry
branches from the neighboring forests. About three o'clock in the
"This report as translated by J. H. Quintero was published in the
Texas Altcanac, 1860, pp. 80-81. In his Memoirs, 10-14, R. M. Rod-
rigues tells that Francisco Ruiz, or "Don Pancho," as he was familiarly
called, was a staunch "Texan Sympathizer," but as alcalde of Bexar he
thought he should remain "neutral." His father was a delegate to the
Convention and one of the first to sign the Texas declaration of inde-
pendence. Santa Anna, who knew these facts, doubted the neutrality
of the alcalde and kept him under the strictest espionage. Rodrigues
furthermore states that the reason Santa Anna ordered Ruiz to perform
the grewsome task of preparing the funeral pyres for the Texan.s and
of burying the Mexican dead, was to retaliate for the disloyalty of the
Ruiz family to Mexican centralism, and because of their sympathy for
the Texans.