of the twain. It was Brooks who designed a half moon battery, designed to cover the sally port, or entrance to the fort; and it was Brooks who invented an "infernal machine," mounting, in a wooden frame, a hundred old muskets which Collinsworth had captured, in October, which could all be fired with a single match; an early nineteenth-century version of the principles of machine gun fire.

10.   FANNIN'S GOLIAD CAMPAIGN

Before the Goliad fortifications were completed -- about the time, indeed, that the volunteers had become really interested in that work -- there came a courier from Colonel Travis with the report that the enemy in overwhelming numbers had invested Colonel Travis in the Alamo, after retaking the town of Béxar. Colonel Travis called, urgently, for help. Colonel Fannin made an instant gesture of responding, but his heart was never in the movement and it ended on the north bank of the San Antonio, two miles from the Goliad fort. Colonel Travis' message was received on February 25. Colonel Fannin's gesture toward San Antonio began next day. Captain Westover's regulars and Captain Guerra's company were left in garrison at Goliad, and Captain King's company was recalled from its outpost duty at Refugio to join them, while Captain Chenoweth with the available mounted men went forward to cover the crossing of the Cíbolo, on the Béxar-Goliad road. Colonel Fannin took with him all the other volunteers. A cart broke down, and oxen strayed, and the day was spent at the San Antonio ford. A "Council of War in the bushes" ended the movement next day. It was thought best to return to Goliad and continue rebuilding the fort.

Johnson and Grant, after a horse-buying visit to Rancho Santa Rosa and beyond, had separated; Johnson returning to San Patricio with a hundred horses, so acquired, and thirty-four men; while Grant wandered toward Camargo, with twenty-six men, for more horses. General Urrea, after a forced march from Matamoros, attacked Johnson at San Patricio, amid cold, rain and darkness, at 3 a.m. on February 27 -- the same morning that was spent by Colonel Fannin's command on the north bank of the San Antonio, at the end of their futile movement toward Béxar. Johnson's men were encamped in five separate parties, without sentinels, and were asleep. There was no opportunity for resistance, and they were