290
WRITINGS OF SAM HOUSTON, 1844
of the President of the United States being preceded by proposi- tions of that Government to renew negotiations on the subject of annexation were sufficient to induce the head of the Govern- ment to accede to the propositions, and to that effect General Henderson was despatched to Washington City. You will at once perceive, my dear Captain, the delicacy as well as the necessities of my situation. The nations to whom we had appealed had given us no pledge that Santa Anna should not again harrass our frontiers, and we had no reason to hope that the great powers, from the relations in which they stood to each other, would be willing to make common cause in behalf of Texas and against Mexico, so as to prevent all further annoyance to us. Had the independence of Texas been recognized, or had she possessed a guarantee that Mexico should not again have harrassed her borders, I am well satisfied that the subject of annexation would not have been so cordially received by the people. If you will advert,to my letter to you of January, 1843 (if I am not mistaken in the date) you will there find that I anticipated at some future day a condition of things not very different from the pres~nt. At all times when communicating with you in relation to Texas, I have treated you with the most perfect candor and on the subject of our independent national existence and the part which England could, and I hoped would, take in relation to our affairs. I was candid and sincere. I believed that national independence for Texas, if she could have peace, would place her in the most desirable attitude that she could possibly enjoy, and whether that is not yet to be her situation is, in the minds of many, quite problematical. The course pursued by Santa Anna has done more to produce the feeling in favor of annexation than any other man whose existence had any connection with Texas. Had he acceded to the reasonable expectations growing out of an armistice, our affairs would have presented a different aspect. Had he really desired annexation, I cannot conceive any means by which he could have contributed more effectually to its consummation. I need not tell you how harrassing and distressing my situa- tion has been, and your own observation and int~rcourse with the people here, will convince you of their great anxiety for a condition of things in which they will .be placed at rest. Much the larger portion of them having enjoyed that situation under the Government of the United States, necessarily recur to that country when their privations in this are presented to their
Powered by FlippingBook