Customer Reviews

A Revolution Remembered: The Memoirs and Selected Correspondence of Juan N. Seguin (Fred H. and Ella Mae Moore Texas History Reprint Series)

5 star:		(2)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

Name the 3 most honorable men involved with the Texas Revolution and you might get: Sam Houston (an American), Lorenzo de Zavala (a Mexcian) and Juan Seguin, a Texian/Tejano. Seguin was invaluable to Houston before the Battle of San Jacinto and he carried messages for Travis from the Alamo. His only failing was that he was a Tejano in a land being overrun with Anglos who were hungry for land and power. Seguin's service during the revolution was quickly forgotten and he was abused by the Johnny-Come-Latelies who filled Texas and San Antonio after all the fighting was over. This volume tells his story and sheds light on his contributions to the Revolution, his abuse by the Anglos and later the Mexicans. He may have been a man without a country but never without honor.

Juan Seguin was a great Texas patriot and he is finally getting some credit for his activities, both assisting the colonists and with handling the government (Mexico). Good primary source.

This book gave a fine summary of the life of Juan Seguin and his ancestors in the life of San Antonio before and after the Alamo and San Jacinto, including his participation in the Texas Revolution and subsequent possible betrayal of the cause by returning later to invade Texas with Mexico's General Woll. The appended letters to and from Juan Seguin show that he was apparently left by the Anglo revolutionaries to hold San Antonio following the fall of the Alamo, with insufficient support from the new Texas Government, forcing Seguin to fend for himself in recruiting volunteers from the not-so-willing San Antonio population, forcing him to frequently retreat with his small army to the outskirts of San Antonio in the face of pending threats by the Mexican Army to return to San Antonio, and ultimately, sadly, to align with the Mexicans for a time. He claims he was forced into this latter action under threat of death or imprisonment by the Mexican Government. He may have also been forced to the Mexican side, temporarily at least, by the actions of new Anglo settlers and by neglect from the Texas Republic. His closeness to Sam Houston and other Texian leaders at San Jacinto would earn him the slack he needed to come back to live in Texas. He seems to have harbored no resentments toward either side in the conflict. This is a study in survival.