It's part of the myth - the Mexican General Santa Anna was bedding Emily West just before the Battle of San Jacinto, and thus was distracted when he should have been alert. So says the legend of the "yellow rose of Texas."
But Santa Anna had already taken a mistress.
Earlier, during the siege of the Alamo, Santa Anna’s eyes fell on one Melchora Barrera. A beautiful young señorita, Melchora was the daughter of a Mexican army officer, living with her mother in San Antonio. Santa Anna saw her at a dance and determined that she should become his mistress.
Melchora’s mother thought otherwise. Señora Barrera, a good Catholic, insisted that her daughter could be given only in marriage performed in the church.
General Santa Anna searched among his troops and located an Irishman who was a former actor. Dressed in a cassock, the trooper pretended to be a priest and performed a church ceremony wedding Melchora to Santa Anna. Mother was satisfied. Santa Anna was delighted.
Santa Anna took his Melhorita with him when he marched north toward his destiny at San Jacino. But the weather turned bad, cold and rainy, so he sent his bride back to San Antonio.
Eventually, the girl and her child rode to Mexico City in the carriage of the infamous Mexican General Juan Almonte, to join her husband who already had a wife.
Or so Almonte’s journal suggests. Personally, I like the other ending of the story. Did the Irish trooper regret his role in the farce, return to San Antonio, and wed Melchora himself?
As they say – thereby hangs a tale.
Dac Crossley
January 26, 2013
“All that makes earlier times seem simpler is our ignorance of their complexities. – Thomas Sowell.