Tl1e Struggle for Independence, 1835-1836
299
common grave just outside the walls of the presidio. In 1852 Dr. James H. Barnard, one of the survivors, marked the place of their burial. During the weary week of imprisonment in Goliad the Texans came to know a kind lady who did everything she could to alleviate their suffering. She was Francisca Alvarez, the wife of Colonel Alvarez, better remembered as "Panchita, the Angel of Goliad," the same lady who tried to befriend Brown at San Patricio. When the day of execution arrived, she hid several of the younger men in her quarters after her pleadings to delay their execution proved useless. As the second detachment under Colonel Holzinger was setting out, she noticed a fifteen-year-old boy trudging along. She begged Colonel Holzinger to let the boy step out of line and be left in her care. Her request was granted. The youngster, Benjamin F. Hughes, from Kentucky, died sixty years later in Dallas. Survivors of Goliad. Colonel Garay, in charge of another detachment, saved Alfred Boyle, whose sister had graciously given him a meal while he was in San Patricio. Four doctors were spared that they might tend to the sick and wounded in the Mexican army: James H. Barnard, a Canadian; Jack Shackle- ford, a Virginian, whose son and nephew were killed with the other pr:soners; Dr. Field, and Dr. Hall. Four hospital attendants were like- wise spared: Bills, Griffin, Smith, and Sherlock. William L. Hunter, one of the New Orleans Grays, was shot, bayo- neted, stripped of his clothes and left for dead. He revived, however, and wandered to a nearby ranch where a Mexican woman befriended him, nursed him back to health, and gave him clothes to enable him to escape. John C. Duval, a Kentuckian, was knocked over by companions fall- ing mortally wounded, lay still as the dead. He was the last of the survivors of the massacre to die, in Fort Worth in 1897. John Holliday, another Kentuckian and of the same company as Duval, was shot and left for dead. He, too, revived to make good his escape. His harrowing experience did not dull his adventurous spirit, however, for in 1843 he was in the Santa Fe expedition, was captured and taken to Perote, Mexico, and a second time made good his escape from the Mexicans. Herman Erhenberg, the German-Jew who chose to remain with Fannin at Coleto when his two companions galloped away, lived many years
Powered by FlippingBook