The walls of the fort are of stone and lime, and bear in many places the marks of the storms of an hundred winters, but are still proof against any thing less than the batterings of heavy artillery.
A long forced march brought the van guard of the colonists to the San Antonio river ford, below the town, at 11 o'clock on the night of the ninth of October. Here they halted for the main body, and to make arrangements for the attack. A very small party were sent into the town, and they brought out, with the utmost secrecy, a worthy citizen friendly to the constitution of 1824. And by his assistance guides were produced perfectly acquainted with the place.
The main body of the colonists missed their road in the night, and before they found out their mistake, were at the upper ford, immediately opposite the town. They then struck across, for a short cut, to the position occupied by the van guard. The route lay through a muskeet thicket. The muskeet is a tree of the locust family, full of thorns, and at a short distance resembles the common peach tree in size and appearance. While the parties were treading their way in this thicket, the horse of one of them started in affright at an object beneath a bush. The rider checked his horse and said, who's there? A voice answered in Spanish. One of the party supposed that he recognized in the voice an old acquaintance of Goliad, asked if it was not he, mentioning his name. "No," was the reply, "my name is Milam."
Col. Milam is a native of Kentucky. At the commencement of the Mexican war of independence, he engaged in the cause, and assisted in establishing the independence of the country. When Iturbide assumed the purple, Milam's republican principles placed him in fetters—dragged him to the city of Mexico, and confined him in prison until the usurper was dethroned. When Santa Anna assumed the dictatorship, the republican Milam was again thrust into the prison at Monterry. But his past services and sufferings wrought upon the sympathies of his hard-hearted jailors.
They allowed him the luxury of the bath. He profited by the indulgence and made arrangements with an old compatriot, to place a fleet horse suitably equipped upon the bank of the stream, at a time appointed. The colonel passed the sentinel as he was wont to go into the water—walked quietly on—mounted the horse and fled.
Four hundred miles would place him in safety. The noble horse did his duty, and bore the colonel clear of all pursuit to the place where the party surprised him. At first he supposed himself in the power of his enemy—but the English language soon convinced him, that he was in the midst of his countrymen.
He had never heard that Texas was making an effort to save herself. No whisper of the kind had been allowed to pass the grates of his prison.—When he learned the object of the party, his heart was full. He could not speak for joy.
When the company arrived at the lower ford, they divided themselves into four parties of twelve men each. One party remained as a guard with the horses. The other three, each with a guide, marched by different routes to the assault.
Their axes hewed down the door where the colonel commanding the place slept—and he was taken a prisoner from his bed. A sentinel hailed, and fired. A rifle ball laid him dead upon the spot.—The discharge of fire arms and the noise of human voices now became blended. The Mexican soldiers fired from their quarters, and the blaze of their guns served as targets for the colonist riflemen.
The garrison were called to surrender, and the call was translated by a gentleman present, who spoke the language. They asked for terms.