[XX.]
OFF FOR TEXAS
Davy is defeated for Congress—Another scalp for Old Hickory—Davy’s defeat is a crushing blow—He decides to go to Texas—Takes a sad leave of his family and sets forth in hunting suit with “Betsy” over his shoulder—On board the Mediterranean to Helena—The eighty thousand dollar fund, of which Bowie, Fannin, Travis, and Crockett are named as trustees—More about Texas affairs—Davy starts from Little Rock for Fulton, on the way to San Antonio—The travelling parson and the Washita—Davy’s faith in God—Meets with Thimblerig, the gambler—The gambler enlists with Colonel Crockett.
“I begin this chapter,” says Davy’s account of the campaign, “at home, in Weakley County. I have just returned from a two weeks’ electioneering canvass, and I have spoken every day to large concourses of people, with my competitor. I have him badly plagued, for he does not know as much about the ‘Government,’ the deposites [referring to the United States Bank], and the Little Flying Dutchman [Van Buren], as I can tell the people; and at times he is as much bothered as a fly in a tar-pot to get out of the mess. His name is Adam Huntsman; he lost a leg in an Indian fight, they say, during the last war, and the Government run him on account of his military services. I tell him in my speech that I have great hopes of writing one more book, and that shall be the second fall of Adam, for he is on the Eve of an Almighty thrashing. He relishes the joke about as much as a doctor does his own physic. I handle the administration without gloves, and I do believe I will double my competitor, if I have a fair shake, and he does not work like a mole in the dark. Jacksonism is dying here faster than it ever sprung up, and I predict that ‘The Government’ will be the most unpopular man, in one year more, that ever had any pretensions to the high place he now fills. Four weeks from to-morrow will end the dispute in our elections, and if old Adam is not beaten out of his hunting-shirt, my name isn’t Crockett.”
This was Davy’s state of mind in July, 1835. The election took place about the 1st of August, and he had yet to learn that many of the fair words received, and many of the promises, were of no more value, to use his own words, “than a flash in the pan when you have a good shot at a fat bear.”
Under the special directions of Andrew Jackson, every means of beating Davy Crockett was put in practice. Copies of the Globe, franked by his opponents, accused Davy of collecting excess mileage, of being a traitor to the interests of his State, of fawning upon the aristocrats of the Eastern States, of everything that could be urged against him. When the die was cast, he writes, in the gloom of defeat, these words:
“August 11, 1835. I am now at home in Weakley County. My canvass is over, and the result is known. Contrary to all expectations, I am beaten two hundred and thirty votes, from the best information I can get; and in this instance, I may say, bad is the best.... I have been told by good men that some of the managers of the Union Bank [at Jackson] were heard to say, on the day of election, that they would give twenty-five dollars a vote for enough votes to elect Mr. Huntsman. This is a pretty good price for a vote, and in ordinary times a round dozen might be got for the money.
“As my country no longer requires my services, I have made up my mind to go to Texas. My life has been one of danger, toil, and privation, but these difficulties I had to encounter at a time when I considered it nothing more than right good sport to surmount them. Now I start anew upon my own hook, and God only grant that it may be strong enough to support the weight hung upon it. I have a new row to hoe, a long and rough one, but, come what will, I’ll go ahead!”
At a general meeting in his district Davy spoke for the last time to the voters of western Tennessee. Recounting his services, and the unfair methods by which he thought himself to have been beaten, he made a pretty strong talk, and concluded by saying that he could not think it a fair fight; but that he was done with politics for the present, and that he was going to Texas.
In all stories of Davy’s life, the poem said to have been written by himself, on the eve of his departure for Texas, is given a prominent place. In his own story he says that it was as “zigzag as a worm fence” when first written, but was overhauled by one Peleg Longfellow, who could hardly have been a relative of H. W. Longfellow. After this and much lopping of some lines and stretching out of others, Davy says he wished he might be shot if wasn’t worse than ever. This is the concluding verse of the poem: