The Development of Friction, r820-r835
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Antonito and the other Indian leaders. Hardly was the ink dry on this treaty before delegates of the Wacos and Towakoni made profuse promises of good will to Colonel Francisco Ruiz, the new commander in Nacogdoches. They were escorted to San Antonio, where a formal peace was signed. While the delegation was in the city, a group of Comanche chiefs came for the same purpose. 26 For the next two years relative peace and quiet was enjoyed by the entire Department. The Indian menace continued, nevertheless, to be a very serious threat to Anglo-Americans and Mexicans. Goliad, San Antonio, and DeWitt's settlement at Gonzalez suffered serious depredations even after the peace treaties of 1827. The A yuntamiento of San Antonio in December, 1832, protested in the name of the people of the Department as a whole against the fail- ure of the Government to furnish adequate protection, a matter that developed into a serious grievance. For four months the Comanches and their allies had been on the warpath and had renewed their raids. Summarizing past losses as a means of estimating the damage to be expected, the Ayuntamiento stated that from 1821 to 1832 ninety-seven men, not including soldiers, had been killed by Indians in Goliad, San Antonio, and Gonzalez. "The troops that garrison this part of the frontier have not received more than one-twentieth of their pay during the entire year; it has, therefore been necessary to grant them furloughs that they may earn sufficient to keep alive. There are, con- sequently, only seventy men under arms in all of Texas to defend its miserable inhabitants."· 17 DeWitt wrote the Governor in the fall of 1830 that, unless troops were sent, his settlements would disintegrate. Since the Governor was unable at this time to give any aid, the colonists, as usual, had to fend for themselves. In 1831 the Government finally sent fifteen men to help defend DeWitt's colony. A six-pound cannon was loaned at this time to the Indian-ridden new town of Gonzalez. This piece was destined in the course of a few years to play an eventful role, because possession of it caused a fight resulting in the first bloodshed of the Texas Revolution. 21 Mexican fear of American ex,pan.sion. The genuinely liberal and generous impulse of the revolutionary leaders of Mexico that opened 26Barker, Li/11 of Stepne11 F. Austin, 166; Filisola, lt/81110rias, I, 131-132. 2.7Filisola, ltlemorias, I, 27 5-276. 28Richardson, Tera.r, Tl,11 Lone Star State, 88.
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