Tl,e Struggle for Independence, I835-I836
Tlze first clasli. Opinion was hopelessly divided. In the spring of 1835 the majority was against a break. The frantic warnings of the speculators were minimized. The quarrel between Monclova and Saltillo, the activities of the land speculators, and the interference of Federal troops added to the confusion but did not precipitate the break. The determination of Santa Anna to reoccupy Texas, however, was no secret. Austin had been told by Santa Anna in 1833 and again in 1834 that 4,000 men would be sent at the first opportunity to protect the colonists from the Indians. Under such a paternalistic pretext General Cos had been appointed commander of the Eastern Interior Provinces in October, 1834, and Colonel Domingo Ugartechea had been sent to San Antonio two months later in anticipation of the transfer of a sizeable force to Texas. Steps had been taken at the same time to reestablish the customhouses. Ugartechea had pointed out the week after his arrival in San Antonio that the smuggling going on through Galveston, Brazoria, and the mouth of the San Bernardo exceeded the legitimate trade through Matamoros. In January, 1835, therefore, Antonio Tenorio arrived in C6pano with a detachment of forty men, a customs collector, and two deputies. Jose Gonzalez, the collector, went to Velasco, where he restricted his activity to the collection of tonnage duties, while Deputies Martin de Alegria and Gil Hernandez, accompanied by the soldiers, established themselves at Anahuac. Trouble soon developed. The deputy collectors at Anahuac demanded full payment of all duties. Their attitude contrasted with the more lenient policy of Gonzalez at Velasco. Andrew Briscoe, a leading merchant of Anahuac, protested the unequal enforcement of the tariff law. Others joined him, but the City Council showed no sympathy for the aggrieved parties and publicly reprimanded them by declaring that if the tariff laws were unfair or unwise, it would be "more unwise and ill timed than the laws themselves" to resist them by force. On the advice of the City Council of Liberty, Briscoe and his friends sent a memorial to the Governor, in which they asked him to intercede with the National Congress for a repeal of the tariff. But the petition closed with an ultimatum. Briscoe and his friends would pay no more duties until action was taken on their request. A few days later, June 12, the inevitable clash occurred: a Texan was accidentally wounded by a soldier in an argument over smuggling. and Briscoe and DeWitt C. Harris were arrested and put in the guardhouse. News of the incident reached San Felipe on June 20, during court
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