Lone Star (142 page)

Louis J. Wortham,
A History of Texas
(5 vols., Fort Worth, 1924) is very readable but lacks index and some accuracy in details. Clarence R. Wharton's
Texas Under Many Flags
(Chicago and New York, 1930) consists of two volumes of history and three of Texan biography. H. S. Thrall,
Pictorial History of Texas
(St. Louis, 1879) is also valuable for biographical sketches.

General histories on the later periods of Texas history are few. Ralph Steen, edited by F. C. Adams,
Texas Democracy
(4 vols., Austin 1937) is primarily a political study; Steen's
Twentieth Century Texas, An Economic and Social History
(Austin, 1942) covers only the early decades. The most modern, and widely used, general history is Rupert Norval Richardson,
Texas, The Lone Star State
(Englewood Cliffs, N.J., 1943; rev. 1958).

PERIODICAL LITERATURE

There is widespread agreement that the best, and most useful, writings on Texas history have been published in the
Quarterly of the Texas State Historical Association
(Vols. I–XVI, Austin, Texas, 1897–1912) and its successor
, The Southwestern Historical Quarterly
, continuing from July 1912. These articles and monographs cover every field and period, and in innumerable cases each is the definitive work on the subject. Unfortunately, these gems of research and writing are scattered over the years and have reached too small an audience. Similar valuable Texas material is included in
The Journal of Southern History
(Lexington, Ky., quarterly since 1934), and the quarterly
Mississippi Valley Historical Review
, (Lincoln, Neb.) issued from 1914.

Newspaper archives provide perhaps the best reflection of contemporary attitudes. Editorial writing in the 19th century was both a florid and a violent art and probably revealed genuine sentiments and ideology much more clearly than the bland dissertations of today. Newspapers, scattered about the state, also contain an enormous amount of historical trivia for the student inclined to search it out.

The Texas Almanac
, which first appeared in January 1857, and had a combined antebellum distribution of perhaps 100,000 copies, has been and is the single most valuable reference work on Texas. Suspended between 1873 and 1904 and published irregularly from 1904 through 1925,
The Texas Almanac
is now issued biennially by the
Dallas Morning News
. Of special interest to student, historian, and general reader is a compendium of the years 1857–73 published by the Texian Press (Waco, 1967), placing heretofore rare material in easy access.

MANUSCRIPT AND OTHER PRIMARY SOURCES

There is a trend among professional historians to seek out more and more original sources, producing a tremendous flow of antiquarian mosaic-fitting. Manuscript material, in several languages, is plentiful. The archives of Spain and Mexico are rich, but unfortunately not easily accessible even to on-site research by bilingual students. Like early Texas newspapers, manuscripts of the Spanish-Mexican period are highly colored, reflecting strong clerical or anticlerical bias. It is possible to explore material on the Texas missions, for example, which utterly ignores their secular situation and purpose. These must be balanced with the equally fervent—but often brilliant and incisive—reports of civil and military officers.

The best (and certainly most accessible) Hispanic library on Texas is at the University of Texas at Austin. This, with the University of Oklahoma at Norman, is the richest repository of unpublished source material on the Southwest.

Important source material on Texas in the German language has generally been translated into English and published in this country.

One of the most heartening trends of recent years has been the continuing publication either of manuscript material or the reprinting or reissue in facsimile of old, and often quite rare, writings. These projects have been carried out by Texas publishers such as the University of Texas Press, Texian at Waco, Steck at Austin, and by the Rio Grande Press of Chicago and others; in this way an enormous amount of firsthand information has been made available not only to the student but also to the general reader and Texas history buff.

Usually avoided, but clearly important for the serious student, are the several government archives. Those of Texas and the United States hold civil and military reports, data, and pertinent information available nowhere else. Not only for accuracy but also for enlightenment, official data may be compared against newspaper and other published accounts. U.S. Army records, for example, often contain facts and figures contemporary Texans ignored, such as the death rate from yellow fever on the coast.

For the 20th century, the historian must use much fragmentary material. Subjects such as industrialization, agricultural revolutions, immigration, race relations, politics, and the like are rarely covered adequately in general accounts. Here specialized writings, in newspapers and periodicals (and ethnic periodicals, such as the League of United Latin American Citizens bulletins, as well) must be searched out; a clipping file is basic. Until the focus of Texan historical interest moves beyond the 19th century, students and historical researchers will have to draw heavily on scattered and specialized material and synthesize it through their own outlooks and experience.

SUGGESTIONS FOR FURTHER READING

This list, from most of which I have drawn in some degree, by no means forms a complete bibliography. I have deliberately restricted it to recent works, books in print, or volumes easily found in good Texas libraries; and I have excluded the often definitive publications of the historical quarterlies, which are highly specialized and scattered. This selection does offer an enormous insight into the Texas past, and should provide any serious reader with more material than he can easily exhaust.

PART I. COMANCHES AND THE KING'S MERCIES

The land of Texas is well laid out in Frederic W. Simonds's
The Geography of Texas
(Boston, 1914), a standard.
The Natural Regions of Texas
(University of Texas Bulletin 3113, Austin, 1931) clarifies the sharp differences between east and west. Roy Bedicheck,
Adventures with a Texas Naturalist
(Garden City, N.Y., 1947; Austin, 1966) remains a popular and interesting book.

The best archeological reference on Texas is contained in Dee Ann Suhm and A. D. Krieger,
An Introductory Handbook of Texas Archeology
, published by the Texas Archeological Society, Austin, 1954. E. H. Sellards,
Early Man in America: A Study in Prehistory
(Austin, 1952); H. M. Wormington,
Ancient Man in North America
(rev., Denver, 1957); and Fred Wendorf, A. D. Krieger, Claude C. Albritton, and T. D. Stewart,
The Midland Discovery
(Austin, 1955) reveal some of the excitement and controversies concerning the mysterious first settlers.

There are countless books on Amerinds: Clark
Wissler's Indians of the United States
(Garden City, N.Y. 1940, 1966); Mary Jourdan Atkinson's
Indians of the Southwest
(rev., San Antonio, 1963), also general; the best one-stop source is W. W. Newcomb, Jr.,
The Indians of Texas
(Austin, 1961). The Comanches are thoroughly explored in E. A. Hoebel,
Comanches, Lords of the South Plains
(Norman, Okla., 1952). The industrious will find useful the
Handbook of American Indians North of Mexico
, Bureau of American Ethnology Bulletin No. 30 (2 vols., Washington, D.C., 1907, 1910).

The early European explorations of Texas are well covered in Paul I. Wellman's narrative history of the Southwest,
Glory, God, and Gold
(Garden City, N. Y., 1954), Bancroft's history (cited under "General Histories," above), and Herbert E. Bolton,
Spanish Exploration in the Southwest, 1542–1706
(New York, 1925). Because of the glamour that attended these searches for glory and gold, an enormous literature exists.

Spanish Texas is comprehensively covered by Carlos Eduardo Castañeda,
Our Catholic Heritage in Texas
(6 vols., Austin, 1936–50). Castañeda also translated Fray Juan Agustín Morfi's
History of Texas
, 1673–1779 (2 vols., Quivira Society, Albuquerque, 1935); this, with Charles W. Hackett's edition of Pichardo’s
Treatise on the Limits of Louisiana and Texas
(3 vols., Austin, 1931, 1934, 1941), opens a mine of Spanish information. For a thorough treatment of all aspects of the time, see Herbert E. Bolton's scholarly but superb works,
Texas in the Middle Eighteenth Century
(Berkeley, 1915) and
Athanase de Mezières and the Louisiana-Texas Frontier 1768–1780
(Cleveland, 1914). Walter P. Webb,
The Great Plains
(Boston, 1931) and Max L. Moorhead,
The Apache Frontier
(Norman, 1968) throw light on the Spanish Indian Problem.

PART II. BLOOD AND SPOIL: THE TEXANS

Theodore Roosevelt's
The Winning of the West
(4 vols., New York, 1889–96) reflects the views of a westward-looking President at the flood tide of American imperial thought. A paperbound volume of excerpts, edited by Harvey Wish, (New York, 1962) presents the student with a brilliant picture of the Western frontier through the Louisiana Purchase.

The filibuster and early Anglo-Saxon colonial periods are adequately covered in most general histories. Eugene C. Barker,
The Life of Stephen F. Austin
(Nashville and Dallas, 1925) and
Mexico and Texas, 1821–1835
(Dallas, 1928) give in-depth treatments of the empresario age. The best descriptive book of the period is
Mary Austin Holley Texas
(Baltimore, 1833); the author was a cousin of the great empresario. Noah Smithwick,
The Evolution of a State
(Austin, 1900) is rich in firsthand experience and observed detail.

The general histories devote enormous space to the Texas Revolution; all 19th-century historians considered this event the heart of Texas history. Further detail is endlessly presented in the historical quarterlies. The student will find interesting the
Diary of William Barret Travis
(Waco, 1966); Marquis James,
The Raven
(New York, 1929), and John Myers Myers,
The Alamo
(New York, 1948). Antidotes not without merit to the Texan mythology are Carlos Castañeda,
The Mexican Side of the Texas Revolution
(Dallas, 1928) and Richard G. Santos,
Santa Anna’s Campaign Against Texas, 1835–1836
(Waco, 1968).
The Eagle: The Autobiography of Santa Anna
(Austin, 167), edited by Ann F. Crawford, presents another differing view.

PART III. STAR LIGHT, STAR BRIGHT

The compendium of the
Texas Almanac 1857–1873
(Waco, 1967) contains the bulk of eye-witness reports and documents of the 1836 campaign; the student will find these nowhere more accessible. Llerena B. Friend,
Sam Houston: The Great Designer
(Austin, 1954, 1965) and
The Writings of Sam Houston
, A. W. Williams and Eugene C. Barker, editors, (8 vols., Austin, 1938–43) reveal the often enigmatic mind of Texas's first President.

For a complete view of the Republic, see Stanley Siegel,
Political History of the Texas Republic 1836–1845
(Austin, 1956); William R. Hogan,
The Texas Republic: A Social and Economic History
(Norman, 1946); and Joseph W. Schmitz,
Texan Statecraft, 1836–1845
(San Antonio, 1941). Mary Austin Holley,
The Texas Diary 1835–1838
(Austin, 1965) is descriptive. The adventurous may want to explore
The Papers of Mirabeau Bonaparte Lamar
(6 vols., Austin, 1921–27) and
Memoranda and Official Correspondence Relating to the Republic of Texas, Its History and Annexation 1836 to 1846
, by Anson Jones (New York, 1859; reprinted, Chicago, 1966). Almost all of the biographies of the men of this period are useful.

Again, the 19th-century general histories deal adequately with the early statehood period. Valuable information is contained in the Houston papers. The boundary controversy is explored in W. C. Binkley,
The Expansionist Movement in Texas, 1836–1850
(Berkeley, 1925).

For information on immigration, see the Texas Almanac for 1857, 1858, and 1859;
German Seed in Texas Soil
, Terry G. Jordan, (Austin, 1966); and the U.S. Census, 1850 and 1860. The historical quarterlies richly supply information on settlers and colonies.

There is a huge total of writing on the life and institutions of Texas between 1836 and 1861, both published and unpublished. The following contemporary accounts are recommended: Mary A. Maverick,
Memoirs
(San Antonio, 1921); Frederick L. Olmstead,
A Journey Through Texas
(1857); Ferdinand Roemer,
Texas 1845–1847
(Bonn, 1849; San Antonio, 1936); August Santleben,
A Texas Pioneer
(New York, 1910); Francis R. Lubbock,
Six Decades in Texas
(Austin, 1900); J. C. Duval,
Early Times in Texas
(Austin, 1892; facsimile, Austin, 1935); Melinda Rankin
, Texas in 1850
(Boston, 1850; reprinted, Waco, 1966); Gustav Dresel’s
Houston Journal
, translated and edited by Max Freund (Austin, 1954); William Bollaert’s
Texas
, edited by W. E. Hollan and Ruth L. Butler (Norman, 1956). Also useful are Joseph W. Schmitz,
Texas Culture 1836–1846
(San Antonio, 1960); Marilyn M. Sibley,
Travelers in Texas 1761–1860
(Austin, 1966); Samuel Wood Gerser,
Naturalists of the Frontier
(Dallas, 1937); D. W. Winfrey,
Julien Sidney Devereux and His Monteverde Plantation
(Waco, 1966); and Dorothy R. Bracken and Maurine W. Redway,
Early Texas Homes
(Dallas, 1956).