The Alamo’s Forgotten Defenders

The important contributions of the Irish in winning the struggle against Mexico and establishing a new republic are noticeably absent from the Alamo and Texas Revolutionary historiography. Phillip Thomas Tucker breaks new ground by rectifying the oversight with The Alamo’s Forgotten Defenders: The Remarkable Story of the Irish During the Texas Revolution, now available in paperback.

The Irish embraced a lengthy and distinguished Emerald Isle revolutionary tradition—a distinctive cultural, political, and military heritage reborn during the Texas uprising of 1835-1836. Unbeknownst to most readers, the Irish comprised the largest single immigrant group in Texas during that time, and were among the most vocal and passionate of liberty-loving revolutionaries in all Texas. The largely Ireland-born garrison of Goliad raised the first flag of Texas Independence months before the Alamo’s fall. More than a dozen natives of the Old Country fought and died at the Alamo, and the old Franciscan mission’s garrison primarily consisted of soldiers of Scotch-Irish descent. Irish Protestants and Catholics made invaluable and disproportionate contributions in the struggle for Texas Independence.

Dr. Tucker utilized primary sources, including rare newspaper articles, journals, and diaries, together with quality secondary accounts, to paint the dramatic saga of the Irish in Texas. The result is a broad-based cultural, economic, social, political, and military history of the Texas Revolution from the perspective of its Irish participants. The Alamo’s Forgotten Defenders will stand as a long-overdue corrective to the outdated “standard” views of the story of the Alamo and the Texas Revolution that ignore the distinguished contributions of the Emerald Isle natives, or mention them only in passing.

When read together with the many other outstanding histories available, The Alamo’s Forgotten Defenders fills the vacuum in the Alamo and Texas Revolutionary historiography.