382
WRITINGS OF SAM HOUSTON, 1836
24th. I have examined the spies, and they represent the enemy much weaker than all former reports. They say Sesma has not more than seven hundred men, and one says six hundred. I truly hope you will appoint Major Lewis~ agent for the Chero- kees, and do it directly. Why do you keep more than a sergeant's or lieutenant's guard at Washington? Men are flocking to camp, and I expect, in a day or two, to receive two hundred volunteers and regulars. Forty-eight muskets and a supply of ammunition came opportunely last night. In a few days my force will be highly respectable. I am writing in the open air. I have no tent, and am not looking our for the luxuries of life. I am only look- ing out to be useful to my country and the cause of liberty. Do devise some plan to send back the rascals who have gone from the army and service of the country with guns. Oh, why did the cabinet leave Washington? I wish you would send A. M'Laughlin to the ·united States. Write to the board and ratify the treaty. We must act now, and with great promptness. The country must be saved. Oh, curse the consternation which has seized the people! I must make many appointments for the present- all special I will refe1· to you. I am so busy, I must close. May God bless you! This morning I hear of men from the mouth of the river; they are on the march-you wi_ll hear from us. Sam Houston. 1 Executive Letter Book No. 9, Texas State Library. Yoakum, History of Texas, II, 482--484. Morphis, History of Texas, 228-232. 2 Benjamin Beeson owned and operated a ferry at a well-known crossing on the Colorado River at the site of the present town of Columbus. His wife, Elizabeth Beeson, kept a sort of inn or boarding house to accommo- date travelers. Houston's main army was encamped on the east side of the Colorado at Beeson's from March 19 to 26. When his army moved on toward· the Brazos the Beeson family were forced to leave their home as the Mexican army approached. It seems that Mrs. Beeson was an enter- prising woman, for on April 10, 1836, we find her writing Burnet for permission to open a boarding house at Harrisburg for the support of the family until they could return to their home. A son, Leander Beeson, was in Houston's army in Captain Thomas J. Rabb's company. The name of this ferry is found spelled both Beason and Beeson. Mrs. Elizabeth Beeson herself spelled the name with two e's. See Dixon and Kemp, Heroes of San Jar:into, 206; Elizabeth Beeson to D. G. Burnet, April 10, 1836; Domestic CorrespO?ulence, Texas State Library, Co1nptrolle1· M·ilitarl/ Service Records, ibid (Leander Beeson's service record), and also The Texas Historical Qua,·terly, IV, 244-245. . . ~Thomas Jefferson Rusk (December 5, 1803-July 29, 1857), soldu?,.Chief Justice of Texas, Senator. For biographical sketches see the D1ct1onarJ1
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