Remember the Alamo! It’s also a burial ground.

I took a trip to Texas recently and had the opportunity to stop in San Antonino TX. A friend who I was traveling with mentioned they had never visited the Alamo. I had visited it many years ago. Being a history buff I thought it was important to go back again to educate my friend, and re-educate myself. A lot had changed since my last visit, with and without the current Covid environment. But it was awesome to be back.

It was fun to walk around the outside space, and then into the old monastery itself. We also opted for the history presentation. It was great. There was a lot of renovation in progress so we didn’t have a lot of pictures.

We were amazed to find out that there had been many burials in the monastery itself. It’s for this reason that renovations and excavations are controversial. With all the defenders that were known to have been in and around the original structure during the famous battle March 6th 1836, they had never found many bodies. The Mexican army buried their soldiers nearby the Alamo, and the defenders bodies were burned in funeral pyres, leaving a lot of rumors about some of the famous defenders. Davy Crocket being one. It was said in the later 1800’s that a man named Seguin had taken bodies near the funeral pyre area and buried them near by, the urn and ashes were rumored to have been found and placed in San Fernando Cathedral. There were 3 bodies found in the Monks room in the monastery later, they were thought to have been a family and were to young to be the defenders. But during a 1979 excavation, a scull was found that could have been the remains of one of the original defenders. Lot’s of mystery.

Then while undergoing another excavation, 2 human femurs were found next to some wood and nails about 3ft below the surface. It’s believed these remains could have been defenders as well. More testing will be needed to make that determination. However since the testing needed could cause damage to the remains, this could cause legal issues do to different cultural burial beliefs. Hopefully some day we will know.