Happy San Jacinto Day! (why have we forgotten) (Alamo, Edna: home, school)

[TxStorm72]

First of all, Happy San Jacinto Day to all Texans everywhere!

Secondly, why am I the only one that seems to remember this battle AND the importance of it? As far as Texas History goes, this day is every bit as important as March 2nd, because in order to declare your independence from someone you will have to eventually win it for it to stick!

I don't know about you guys, but considering the massacres of the Alamo and Goliad I just don't think that "Please Senor Santa Anna.........please let us stay..........we promise to do whatever you say from now on" would have cut it for either the Texas army and her settlers OR Santa Anna!

[SVTRay]

I think most people accociate the Battle of the Alamo with Texas Independence due to it's popularity and know little to nothing about the Battle of San Jacinto.

None the less, Happy Birth Day Texas!

[Willsson]

I associate Texas independence with a marker on top the Washburn Tunnel which marks the approximate site of the capture of Santa Anna.

Otherwise for me, the San Jacinto Monument marks the approximate site of the Battleship Texas.

[CptnRn]

If I lived closer to the San Jacinto Battleground, I would probably consider attending the festival there. But otherwise, Texas doesn't really seem to do much to celebrate San Jacinto Day or Texas Independence Day. Having Texas Independence Day on March 2 sort of muddies the waters as far as which day to celebrate. But Texas doesn't seem to do much for either day.

[skelaki]

"Back and forth in front of the Alamo went the two divisions of the parade, meeting and passing and turning to meet and pass again, all the while pelting each other with flowers, till the plaza where they rode was covered deep with them. And the bands played and the people cheered, till the smallest schoolboy in their midst felt a thrill of gratitude to the heroes whose deeds they were commemorating. He might miss the deeper meaning of it all, but he grasped one fact clearly enough: that had it not been for the grim battle which those brave fellows fought to the death, there would have been no San Jacinto Day for him. No pageant-filled holiday to make one feel that it is a great and glorious thing to be a son of the Lone Star State." MARY WARE IN TEXAS by Annie Fellow Johnston (one of the books in my favorite childhood series). So San Jacinto Day was celebrated at one time long ago.

[doctorjef]

So, obviously the 4th of July isn't forgotten by Americans generally, but isn't it likely that for almost everyone it is simply a commercialized, trite, hedonistic observation. Makes me think of the poem by Edna St Vincent Millay, "For Jesus on His Birthday" : "...a bit of tinsel, a day at home for me...The stone the angel rolled away with tears/Is back upon your mouth these thousand years."

'Twas ever thus.

[crone]

Looks like Mexico won after all.

[sxrckr]

It's probably forgotten because it's not considered politically correct to remember, these days. Sad, really.

[Trainwreck20]

I guess in hindsight, it is hard to say that either side really had the moral high ground :P

[doctorjef]

What Trainwreck said. The politics on both sides were rather bad. A military dictator on one side; anglo-imperalist slaveholders on the other. AFAIK, however, the one difference was in the conduct of the war. The general staff of the Mexican Army ordered and led the committing of mass, systematic atrocities, specifically at Goliad and at the Alamo. The former was especially egregious.