2. On March 2, 1836, Grant's party, twenty-six men (twenty-three Americans and three Mexicans) were surprised by Urrea and Garay at the forks of the Agua Dulce. Grant, Morris, Llewellyn, and twelve other Americans were killed; five Americans and one Mexican (Placido Benavides) escaped; and two Mexicans and four Americans were captured. The Americans who escaped made their way to Goliad.

3. As all available carts and teams had been taken for the use of the army, several families at Refugio were unable to leave that place. On March 11, 1836, Fannin dispatched carts and teams with a guard of twenty-eight or thirty men commanded by Captain Amon B. King to remove the families to Goliad.

On his arrival at Refugio, on the evening of March 11th, Captain King learned that some of the local Mexicans had been plundering the deserted homes of the Irish colonists, and undertook to punish them. In so doing he stirred up a nest of enemies, including local marauders, Indians and Mexican soldiers, in such numbers as to oblige him to take position in the old church and send to Goliad for help.

His messenger, an Irish lad from Refugio, reported King's situation to Fannin at one a.m. on March 13th; and within two hours, Lieutenant Colonel Ward, with the Georgia Battalion and about twenty men, under Captain Bradford, from Wyatt's Company, was on his march to relieve King, which he did at 3 p.m. on March 13th. Believing his men to be too fatigued to return that night, Ward encamped at the Mission.