Siege of The Alamo - March 3

March 3

Bonham arrived near Bexar around 11 am on March 3. Wearing a white bandana in his hat to notify the Texians that he was one of them, he spurred his horse and rode, unmolested, through the Alamo gate as the ring of Mexican soldiers looked on in surprise. Bonham's news, that Fannin was not coming after all, reportedly demoralized the Alamo garrison. Travis sent a courier that evening to the Convention with news that the Texians had thus far survived the siege with no losses. He warned, however, that: "I look to the colonies alone for aid; unless it arrives soon, I shall have to fight the enemy on his own terms. I will, however, do the best I can under the circumstances, and I feel confident that the determined valour and desperate courage, heretofore evinced by my men, will not fail them in the last struggle, and although they may be sacrificed to the vengeance of a Gothic enemy, the victory will cost the enemy so dear, that it will be worse for him than a defeat." Travis ended his letter with news that despite the dearth of ammunition, his men would fire the 18-lb cannon three times each day as proof that they still held the fort. Travis then wrote several private letters and entrusted all of the communications to John W. Smith, who volunteered to sneak through the enemy lines.

According to Lindley's research, other Texians were also determined to join those at the Alamo. He identified up to 50 of Fannin's men, most of whom had been in Thomas H. Breece's company of New Orleans Greys, who left Goliad to go to the rescue of their former mates. Lindley believes that on March 3 these men likely joined the advance unit under Chenoweth and Desauque, as well as Seguin and his Tejano unit. That afternoon, the entire group joined the group waiting at Cibolo Creek, 35 miles (56 km) from the Alamo. At this point, Lindley calculated that the Alamo should have had approximately 164 effective men.

On the afternoon of March 3, reinforcements arrived for Santa Anna's army. The Zapadores, Aldama, and Toluca battalions arrived between 4 and 5 pm, after marching steadily for days. The Texians watched from the walls as approximately 1000 Mexican troops, attired in dress uniform, marched into Bexar's military plaza. The Mexican army celebrated loudly throughout the afternoon, both in honor of their reinforcements and at the news that troops under General Jose de Urrea had soundly defeated Texian Colonel Frank W. Johnson at the Battle of San Patricio on February 27. Most of the Texians in the Alamo had believed that Ramirez y Sesma had been leading the Mexican forces during the siege, and they mistakenly attributed the celebration to the arrival of Santa Anna. The reinforcements brought the number of Mexican soldiers in Bexar to almost 2,400.

During the day, the Mexican army had erected a battery on the north side of the Alamo, within musket shot of the complex walls. Unlike previous bombardments, each shot from this battery impacted the walls, causing them to begin to crumble. By nightfall, part of the wall had begun to collapse, and Jameson kept the men working all night to shore up the walls with pieces of lumber.

Almonte's journal reported that there was an engagement after dark on March 3, but that the Mexican troops had repulsed the assault. Several historians, including Walter Lord, speculated that the Texians were creating a diversion to allow Smith to escape. However, in 1876, Susannah Dickinson said that Travis sent three men out shortly after dark on March 3, probably in response to the arrival of the Mexican reinforcements. The three men, who Dickinson believed included Davy Crockett, were sent to find Fannin. Lindley stated that just before midnight, Crockett and one of the other men found the force of Texians waiting along Cibolo Creek, who had advanced to within 20 miles (32 km) of the Alamo. Just before daylight on March 4, part of the Texian force managed to break through the Mexican lines and enter the Alamo. A second group was driven across the prairie by Mexican soldiers. Lindley based his assumptions on two newspaper reports published within a month of the Alamo's fall that stated that 50 men had reinforced the Alamo a few days before the final assault.