American Ulstermen
Sam Houston and Davy Crockett were great men, great warriors and
incomparable champions of Individual Freedom, Independence,
Self-Reliance and Republican Liberty.
Pictured right ( from our Texas state archives in Austin and depicting the day when the Republic of Texas, known forever after as The Lone Star Republic,
became in fact as well as aspiration a Free and Independent nation) --- see the world-famous painting of the American Scotch Irishman General Sam Houston
accepting the surrender of the brutal, corrupt and bloody Mexican Dictator Generalismo Santa Anna immediately following the Battle of San Jacinto
along the banks of the San Jacinto River at present-day Houston Texas.
This battle --- following the courageous 13-day rear-guard holding action against
Santa Anna's army of over 5,000 troops fought by Col. Davy Crockett, Col.William B. Travis, Col. Jim Bowie and 196 volunteers at the Alamo, (an
abandoned Spanish mission turned into a fortress by Travis and his men and known today as The Shrine of Texas Liberty) --- forever ended the
military threat to American Freedom posed by the chaotic, corrupt and
despotic regimes of Mexico and opened up the western American continent to settlement by the "Third Wave" of American pioneers.
Indeed, the Republic of Texas at one time stretched from the mouth of the Rio Grande River at the Gulf of Mexico to what is now the state
of Wyoming and the U.S.-Canadian border, and included large areas of modern-day Mexico, New Mexico,
Colorado, Oklahoma and
other present-day U. S. states.
Born as well along with the Republic of Texas is the Texas Declaration of Independence, the Texas Cowboy, the Colt-Walker revolver
or "six shooter," and one of the most astounding mounted guerrilla fighting forces in military history, the Texas Rangers.
From among the Scotch Irish of America came some of the greatest of all American warriors and leaders shaping these incredible events.
Tom Tyler
Houston, Texas