by J. T. Edson
Keener sighted than his companions, the sergeant noticed that the pairs right forefingers emerged from the trigger guards, went forward to cock the hammer—which was below the frame instead of, as was more usual, on top—and returned to their original positions. However, he failed to see what the actions had achieved as the rifles had already been fired once and had not yet been reloaded. To the sergeant’s way of thinking, small though he might be, the third member of the rescue party could pose a much greater threat than either of his larger companions. At least he had a weapon that was capable of being discharged almost immediately.
Having advanced a further half a dozen strides, the third of the party came to a halt. Standing erect, with his torso turned sideways to the direction of his spread apart feet, he raised the bow to the perpendicular. Then he began to draw it in a manner that was unlike anything the sergeant had ever seen, even though he had fought against Indian archers on several occasions in Mexico and was sufficiently impressed by their capabilities to have studied their methods. xi
That was, although the non-com had no way of knowing, only to be expected. Some people thought that Tommy Okasi was Chinese. In fact, he came from the— at that time xii —virtually unknown Japanese islands and was well trained in all his nation’s very effective martial arts. The Japanese archery techniques differed in some respects from those commonly known, such as the position of the handle on the stave xiii and the way of making the draw. xiv
Deeply alarmed by what he regarded as Ole Devil Hardin’s and Mannen Blaze’s stupidity, Dimmock tried to yell some kind of abusive advice at them. With his lungs so depleted of air, the words would not come. Nor, as they were engrossed in taking sight along the barrels of their empty and useless rifles, could they see the distress and torment on his face.
Rage and frustration tore at the lieutenant. Once he was dead, even if the pair of would-be rescuers survived, they would not learn of the massacre at Goliad. So his desertion of his comrades-in-arms would have been in vain.
Even as Dimmock was struggling to register his feelings vocally, he saw the two men’s forefingers tightening on the triggers.
Up flipped the under-hammers!
While the Mexicans were still too far away to see as much as their proposed victim could, they soon found out. Once again, although it was impossible as far as their knowledge went, the rifles cracked and spat out lead with deadly effect.
Struck between the eyes, the man with the scratched cheek was killed outright and never knew of the phenomenon. Almost at the same instant, one of the bareheaded riders lost more than the shako which had been swept from him while following Dimmock through the woodland. A bullet struck him in the center of the throat and slammed him, spurting blood from the torn open jugular vein, backwards off of his horse. Hissing through the air faster than the eye could follow, the arrow loosed by Tommy Okasi impaled the left breast of the second man to have lost his headdress. Although he did not fall from his mount immediately, the lance slipped from his grasp and he involuntarily reined the animal away to the right before death claimed him and he toppled to the ground.
Once again, pure chance had kept the sergeant alive. So swiftly had everything happened that he still had not regained the ground lost when the shock of nearly being shot had caused him to slow down. The three victims had been ahead of him and had taken the brunt of the attack.
It was more than just the sight of his three companions being killed that caused the last of the Lancers to lose his nerve. Like all of his party, he had believed that the Texians were holding empty rifles. Discovering that they were able to fire a second time without reloading, in some way which he could not understand, he was filled with superstitious dread. Wishing that he had a free hand to cross himself and ward off what he felt sure must be evil spirits, he swung his horse to the left. It was his intention to flee before one of the magical weapons was turned in his direction.
Conscious of his last companion’s desertion, the sergeant was made of sterner stuff. Having come so far, he meant to finish what he had set out to do. He had no more idea than the Lancer of how empty rifles were able to deal out death to two more of his men, but he refused to let that sway him from his purpose. Ignoring the two Texians, who were still lining the weapons, he aimed his lance at the back of his kneeling victim.
The second shots had surprised Dimmock just as much as the Mexicans. For a moment, he thought that his rescuers must be using double barreled rifles. Then he realized that was not the answer. Each weapon had but a single barrel.
Surprise and puzzlement caused the lieutenant to forget his deadly peril. Staring at the rifle in Ole Devil Hardin’s hands, he noticed that it was different in at least two respects from the more conventional arms with which he was familiar. In the first place, no provision had been made for carrying a ramrod suspended below the octagonal barrel where it would be readily accessible for reloading. If he had been able to see he would have noticed that. Although the position of the hammer—which the satanic-faced Texian’s forefinger was once again drawing to full cock—was not common, it had been utilized by more than one gunsmith.
The most important and significant departure from normal was a rectangular metal bar with rounded ends which passed through the rifle’s frame above where the head of the hammer would strike when released. There were holes drilled into the face of the bar. Dimmock noticed that the three on the right were apparently plugged with grease, but the one at the left was clear yet blackened like the muzzle of a pistol when a shot had been fired through it.
Even as Dimmock became aware of the bar, it began to move, seemingly of its own volition. Creeping to the left, it exposed a second empty and powder blackened hole and one of those which were blocked with grease disappeared into the frame. He could not make out exactly what had happened, or why.
The lieutenant’s lack of comprehension was understandable. There were comparatively few people in Texas, or the United States for that matter, who would have recognized and been aware of the full potential of Ole Devil Hardin’s and Mannen Blaze’s weapons. They were, in fact, a fairly successful attempt by the Mormon gunsmith, Jonathan Browning, to produce an arm capable of firing more than one shot without the need to reload in the conventional manner.
Despite the difficulty of transporting it with the magazine in place, Browning had developed a rifle capable of continuous fire unequalled by contemporary weapons. xv The metal bar was, in fact a five shot magazine; this having been the number he had considered most suitable for convenient handling. After a bullet had been discharged, operating the lever with the right thumb caused the magazine to pass through the aperture in the receiver until the next loaded chamber was in position. Then the mechanism thrust the magazine forward to make a gas-tight seal against the bore of the barrel and locked it firmly. As a further aid to operation, the proximity of the under-hammer to the right forefinger permitted it to be cocked without the need to remove the butt from the shoulder.
With the mechanisms of the rifles operating, Ole Devil and his cousin realized that the next loaded chambers would not be in place sufficiently quickly to stop the sergeant. Already he was very close to the man on the ground and he showed no sign of turning aside from the threat of their weapons.
Tommy Okasi was equally aware of the danger and just as helpless to avert it. After loosing the arrow, his right hand had flashed upwards and was drawing another shaft from the quiver. Swiftly as he was acting, he would not have time to nock it to the string, make his draw, sight and release it in time to stop the Mexican killing the man they were trying to save.
Suddenly the rapidly approaching thunder of hooves recalled Dimmock to a remembrance of his situation. A glance to his rear showed him just how grave it still was. The sergeant’s horse was so close that it seemed to loom right above him and the head of the lance was rushing with terrifying speed towards the center of his back.
Self-preservation, that strongest of human emotions, caused Dimmock to react without the
need for conscious thought. He threw himself to the right in a desperate rolling motion—and not a moment too soon!
The lance’s head missed its mark by such a narrow margin that the lieutenant felt it scrape lightly across his back before spiking into the ground.
Realizing that his weapon had missed its intended target, the sergeant allowed it to turn and plucked its head free. He was swinging it forward, hoping to take one of the Texians with him, when both of the rifles roared and hurled bullets up into his body. Almost as soon as the loads had been expelled through the forty and five-sixteenths inch long barrels, Ole Devil and Mannen sprang aside, allowing the horse to carry its dying rider between them.
Having set up his bow, Tommy saw it would not be needed to help deal with the sergeant. So he pivoted and, after taking aim, sent his arrow through the back of the fleeing Lancer.
Finishing his evasion action face down, Dimmock lay sobbing for breath, full of relief at his deliverance from what had appeared to be certain death.
Lowering the Browning rifle, Ole Devil looked at the lieutenant and identified the uniform of the Brazos Guards. However, he gave a quick and negative shake of his head when Mannen Blaze was on the point of advancing. Despite his general air of lethargy, the burly redhead was anything but the slow-witted dullard he liked to appear. Realizing why his cousin had made the prohibitive gesture, he too stood still. They waited until Dimmock had recovered something of his composure before advancing to hear his news.
Chapter Five – They’ll Have to Go Unavenged
Sitting at an ancient, rickety, collapsible table in the large umbrella type tent which was serving as his temporary office and headquarters, Major General Samuel Houston listened to the conclusion of Lieutenant Paul Dimmock’s report on the massacre of Colonel James W. Fannin’s command at Goliad. Then he slowly swung his gaze to where Captain Jackson Baines Hardin was standing, ramrod straight, despite having received permission to be ‘at ease’.
Ole Devil returned the scrutiny, trying to ascertain from the General’s Indian-dark face how he was taking the news that close to four hundred Texians had been murdered in cold blood. As on a previous occasion, when the young captain had attempted to deduce how Houston regarded some of his apparently irresponsible—although actually justifiable under the circumstances—activities, he learned nothing from the grimly impassive features. For all that, Ole Devil realized the information must have come as a terrible shock.
More than any other person—even Governor David G. Burnet, Lieutenant Governor James W. Robinson, or any other member of the Provisional Government that had been assembled and elected at Washington-on-the-Brazos on March 2, 1836—Sam Houston held the responsibility for the future of the Republic of Texas in his hands.
Appointed to command the hastily recruited Army, Houston had found himself leading what was for the most part a horde of rugged individualists. Capable fighters, highly skilled in handling weapons of various kinds, such men had only the slightest idea of accepting discipline and even less about the value of cooperative and coordinated efforts for the common good. Some of the senior officers, Colonels Fannin and Frank Johnson for example, had been blatant opportunists who were more concerned with schemes for their personal aggrandizement and profit than in conforming to a sensible strategic policy. Others had been made over confident by the previous year’s successes at San Antonio, Gonzales, and other sites of action where the Mexicans had been defeated without difficulty; failing to realize that these had been against inferior troops and that the real tests were still to come.
Houston had a better understanding of the situation and had planned his strategy accordingly.
What the General set out to do did not meet with everybody’s approval. He had ordered a withdrawal to the east instead of attempting to make an immediate stand. At their own insistence, Colonels William Barrett Travis, James Bowie and Davy Crockett had remained at the Alamo Mission with less than two hundred volunteers. They had promised to hold their ground and gain time in which the General could build up a force capable of meeting Presidente Antonio Lopez de Santa Anna’s army in open conflict with some hope of success.
Persuading the Texians, particularly those whose homes and businesses were in the west, to retire from the scene of battle had not been easy. While it had been achieved, Houston was compelled by the weight of adverse public opinion to abandon his militarily sound idea of laying waste to the country as they left it. To have done so would have increased Santa Anna’s already difficult task of feeding and supplying the other needs of his army.
The news of the Alamo’s fall, with what was believed to have been the death of every defender, xvi had come as a not unexpected yet still deeply disturbing and alarming blow. Nor had morale been improved by what was already being referred to as the ‘Runaway Scrape’, when—on March the 18th, 1836—despite the nearest enemy being many miles away, the members of the Provisional Government had deserted Washington-on-the-Brazos. They had fled eastwards with, so they claimed, the intention of establishing a ‘temporary capital’ at the small town of Harrisburg.
It had taken the full force of Houston’s personality and the backing of his most loyal supporters to hold together the main body of the Army when the news of the Government’s flight had been received. To do so had called for a concession on the General’s part. Many of the men had only remained because there seemed to be a chance of imminent and more positive action than withdrawal.
Having learned that there was much bitterness and dissension among Santa Anna’s force because of their heavy losses during the thirteen days’ siege of the Alamo Mission, Houston had reluctantly agreed to make a stand on the eastern bank of the Colorado River. However, he had warned his men that they would have to have Fannin’s assistance if they were to succeed. The colonel had the largest, best equipped and, arguably, finest trained single outfit in the Republic of Texas’s Army and their numbers might easily spell the difference between victory and defeat. Accordingly, Houston had sent orders for Fannin to destroy Fort Defiance—as his well defended base at Goliad had been named by a popular ballot of its then enthusiastic garrison—and join the rest of the Army at their camp on the Colorado River.
Days had slipped by without the Mexicans putting in an appearance, but neither did Fannin and his men. So Houston had sent Ole Devil, who had recently brought another important mission to a successful conclusion, to find out what was delaying them.
Seeing Dimmock heading in their direction and being chased by the Lancers, Ole Devil and his two companions had made ready to rescue him. Leaving their horses concealed in the post oaks’ grove, they had waited at its edge in the hope that he would lead his pursuers to them. The failure of his horse to keep going had caused them to take action sooner than they had anticipated, but the unexpected qualities of the Browning Slide Repeating rifles and Tommy Okasi’s archery had saved the lieutenant’s life.
On learning of the massacre, Ole Devil had told his companions to range in the direction of Goliad and watch for any other members of Fannin’s ill-fated command who might have escaped. Then he had caught a couple of the dead Mexicans’ horses. After allowing the animals to rest and recover as far as possible from the strain of the chase, he had set off with Dimmock to report to the General. Riding relay, as he, Mannen Blaze and Tommy Okasi had been doing when they had first seen the pursuit, the two young men had reached the camp on the Colorado River during the late afternoon of March 28.
Their arrival had aroused considerable interest, but Ole Devil had managed to avoid answering the many questions which had been thrown at them. The lieutenant’s disheveled appearance and haggard, woeful attitude had been excused on the grounds of his having ridden from Goliad at high speed, but his reason for having done so was not mentioned. Fortunately, the unofficial interrogation had not been prolonged. Hearing that they had come and sensing that something must be seriously wrong, Houston had wasted no time in having them brought to him. In addition, he had insisted that the i
nterview be held in the privacy of his quarters and with nobody else present.
‘So Fannin’s damned incom—Fannin and his whole command have been killed,’ Houston said, half to himself, stopping just in time from giving a bitter condemnation of the dead colonel. ‘Almost four hundred men butchered without a chance.’
‘I—I didn’t run because I was afraid, sir,’ Dimmock declared hastily, as the General’s blue eyes—which were strangely young-looking in such a seamed and leathery face—returned to him.
‘Any man who says you did is a liar and a fool, mister,’ Houston replied, studying the lieutenant’s drooping posture. It was redolent of exhaustion and deep distress in case his motives should have been misinterpreted. ‘And anyone who says so in my hearing will wish he’d been born deaf and dumb as well as stupid.’
Listening to the softly spoken, yet vibrant words, Ole Devil could see how much they had been appreciated by Dimmock. There was nothing in them to show how deeply the news had affected Houston, despite it having been such a serious blow to his plans for the future. A lesser man might have taken out his disappointment on the bearer of the bad tidings, but that was not the General’s way. From the beginning, he had shown a sympathy which had done much to draw out the lieutenant’s hesitant story of the massacre. It was an example which Ole Devil would remember and put to use in later years, when he found himself holding a high military rank under difficult conditions. xvii
‘It’s possible there were other survivors, sir,’ Ole Devil commented, wanting to help relieve Dimmock’s anxieties as there were further details that needed explaining, one of which was what had happened at Goliad prior to the garrison being marched out to its death. ‘We only waited for about two hours, which didn’t give Cousin Mannen and Tommy much time to find them and rejoin us. Mr. Dimmock wanted to stay longer, but I considered his information was too important to be delayed.’
