Responding to the Santa Fe Expedition, the Mexicans made several raids into Texas. In September 1842, General Adrian Woll occupied San Antonio for nine days and carried off several prominent Texans when he withdrew. Angry Texans hurriedly answered President Houston's reluctant call for volunteers to punish the raiders. General Alexander Somervell led them as far as the Rio Grande but finding that the Mexicans had retired to the other side of the river, he ordered the expedition home. About three hundred of his men, however, refused to obey, chose Colonel W. S. Fisher as their leader, and started down the river toward Matamoros. On December 26 they lost a desperate battle at Mier to General Pedro Ampudia, and were started as prisoners toward Mexico City, but at Salado, south of Saltillo, they escaped. After nearly starving in the arid mountains, 176 of the 193 to escape were recaptured and returned to Salado. Only three reached Texas. Seventeen black and 159 white beans were placed in a vessel and each man required to draw Out One. Those drawing black beans were summarily shot. Ewen Cameron, who had engineered the escape, drew a white bean but was afterwards executed by special order. The survivors were taken to Mexico City and imprisoned in Castle Perote with the prisoners of the Santa Fe Expedition and from San Antonio.
The following account of the drawing of the bean, is
from the pen of General Thomas J. Green, a participant.
Soon after they arrived [at the Salado on March 25,
1843], our men received the melancholy intelligence that they were to be decimated, and
each tenth man shot. It was now too late to resist the horrible
order. Our men were closely ironed and drawn up in front of all their guards, with arms in
readiness to fire. Could they have known it previously, they would have again charged
their guards, and made them dearly pay for this last perfidious breach of national faith.
It was now too late! A manly gloom and a proud defiance prevaded all countenances. They
had but one alternative, and that was to invoke their country's vengeance upon their
murderers, consign their souls to God, and die like men . . .
The decimator, Colonel Domingo Huerta, who was especially
nominated to this black deed after Governor Mexier refused its execution, had arrived at
Salado ahead of our men. The "Red-cap" company were to be their
executioners; those men whose lives had been so humanely spared by our men at this place
on the 11th of February.
The decimation took place by the drawing of black and white
beans from a small earthen mug. The white ones signified exemption, and the black death.
One hundred and fifty-nine white beans were placed in the bottom of the mug, and
seventeen black ones placed upon the top of them. The beans were not stirred, and had so
slight a shake that it was perfectly clear they had not been mixed together. Such was
their anxiety to execute Captain Cameron, and perhaps the balance of the officers, that
first Cameron, and afterward they, were made to draw a bean each from the mug in this
condition.
He [Cameron] said, with his usual coolness, "Well,
boys, we have to draw, let's be at it;" so saying, he thrust his hand into the mug,
and drew out a white bean. Next came Colonel Wm. F. Wilson, who was chained to him; then
Captain Wen. Ryan, and then Judge F. M. Gibson, all of whom drew white beans. Next came
Captain Eastland, who drew the first black one, and then came the balance of the men. They
all drew their beans with that manly dignity and firmness which showed them superior to
their condition. Some of lighter temper jested over the bloody tragedy. One would say,
"Boys, this beats raffling all to pieces;" another would say that "this is
the tallest gambling scrape I ever was in," and such remarks. Poor Major Cocke, when he first drew the fatal bean, held it
up between his forefinger and thumb, and with a smile of contempt, said, "Boys, I
told you so; I never failed in my life to draw a prize;"
Just previous to the firing they were bound together with
cords, and their eyes being bandaged, they were set upon a log near the wall, with their
backs to their executioners. They all begged the officer to shoot them in front, and at a
short distance; that "they were not afraid to look death in the face." This he refused; and, to make his cruelty as refined as possible, fired at several paces,
and continued the firing from ten to twelve minutes, lacerating and mangling these heroes
in a manner too horrible for description . . .
During the martyrdom of these noble patriots, the main body
of our men were separated from them by a stone wall of some fifteen feet high, and heard
their last agonized groans with feelings of which it would be mockery to attempt the
description. The next morning, as they were marched on the road to Mexico, they passed the
mangled bodies of their dead comrades, whose bones now lie bleaching upon the plains of
Salado, . . .