enrolled agreeably lo your proclanrnlion, to calculate on the probabilily of another call lo this frontier. Should I have occasion for volunteers, as 1 apprehend l shaJI, those enrolled under your proclamation shaJI have a preference to all olhers. Accept, I pray you, renewed assurances of my respect and friendship. Edmund P. Gaines, maj. gen. com. His exceUency governor Cannon [of Tennessee I (3303) [HARDAWAY to COLLINS]
Macon, June 6, 1836.
Dr. Robert Collins-
Sir: As you were principally instrumental in sending out the company of Volunteers to Texas, under the command of Colo- nel Ward, and furnishing the means of the expedition, and as there is no officer remaining of the company lo tell their fate, and being myself the last man of the original company who made an escape from the enemy previous lo the capture and massacre of Lhe Geor- gia Battalion, I think it proper to give you a plain history of the expedition so far as I am able. It is known Lo you that we marched from here in the latter part of November of last year, aud proceed- ed to New Orleans; by the usual route from there we embarked on the schooner Pennsylvania, and after being out eleven days, were landed at Velasco, a port of Texas on the Gulf of Mexico, about 400 or 500 miles from New Orleans. Mere we remained about a month; nothing extraordinary occurring beyond the usual camp duty, there being al that Lime but few Mexicans in the country. From here we sailed to Copano, which is another port still f urlher on the coast towards Matamoras. There we landed and marched up to the Mission, as it is commonly called, 12 or 15 miles from the coast. Here we remained about three weeks, and then went up lo Goliad, about 27 miles further iulo the interior. Here we took possession of the Fort and remained in it until the 13th March, when Colonel Ward and Lhe Georgia Battalion were ordered lo march in haste lo the Mission lo relieve Captain King, who, with about 30 men, was down there endeavouring lo protect some families, but who had been surrounded by Lhe enemy, and his situation had become desperate. We marched al 3 o'clock in the
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