From Republic to Early Statehood

After the Treaty of Velasco required Mexican forces to withdraw south of the Rio Grande, Mexican troops destroyed much of what remained of the Alamo before leaving, and the structure stood deserted for years while the new Republic of Texas conducted its affairs elsewhere. Following victory at San Jacinto, the republic was led by presidents David G. Burnet, Sam Houston, Mirabeau B. Lamar, and Anson Jones, while continued problems with Mexico drew members of the Texas Army, Navy, and Texas Rangers into the defense of Texas. Juan N. Seguin, who had served as an Alamo courier, delivered an oration at a memorial for the defenders on February 25, 1837, and in 1841 William Nangle sculpted an Alamo monument from the stone ruins. On February 19, 1846, Anson Jones formally turned over the government to J. Pinckney Henderson, the first governor of the state of Texas, and as the Texas flag was lowered, Jones declared that the Republic of Texas was no more. After Texas joined the United States in 1846, the U.S. Army leased the Alamo grounds in 1848, cleared rubble, repaired the ruins, and added a second floor, windows, a gabled wooden roof, and the distinctive church parapet that came to symbolize the Alamo, while the Long Barrack served as a quartermaster depot, medical store, offices, a saddler's shop, and a horse shed. When Texas joined the Confederacy in 1861, federal military facilities including the Alamo were surrendered, and both U.S. and Confederate armies used it as a quartermaster depot or military warehouse; after the war, U.S. troops returned and remained until their move began in 1877. In 1876 all property except the church was sold to private interests for commercial use, the Catholic Church sold the Long Barrack to Honoré Grenet in 1877, the state bought the church in 1883, and the growing city of San Antonio gradually absorbed the former battlegrounds into a thriving business community.

San Antonio, Texas · United States