Most people in America and even a goodly number of people around the world know the phrase, "Remember the Alamo!" Few people outside of Texas know "Remember Goliad!" Both of these phrases were shouted by the Texan forces on Aril 21, 1836, as they launched a surprise attack on the Mexican forces who were enjoying their siesta. Although outnumbered, the Texans, led by General Sam Houston caught General Antonio Lopez de Santa Anna's army totally unprepared for battle and completely routed them. Only 9 Texans were killed and 26 wounded in the engagement while there were 630 Mexicans killed, 208 wounded, and 703 captured, including the president of Mexico, Santa Anna. Texas won its independence and became a nation on that day.
What gave the Texan troops such a thirst for revenge that they showed little mercy even when Santa Anna's troops were running away? There was, of course, the Alamo, where Santa Anna proclaimed there would be no mercy shown to Davy Crockett, Jim Bowie, William Barret Travis, and the other 179 Texas defenders. He commanded his men to put to death everyone and when his men brought him a handful of captured male survivors, he ordered they be bayonetted to death. He then ordered all 182 bodies to be burned in a huge pyre and let a couple of women, children, and one male servant survive in order to spread the word that nobody should stand against him.
After the fall of the Alamo, a Mexican force of 1,400 men led by Santa Anna's chief lieutenant, General Jose de Urrea, continued to march east toward the Presidio in Goliad where Colonel James Fannin commanded 400 men. Sam Houston ordered the Texans to move to Victoria, a more defendable position on the other side of the Guadalupe River. For some reason, Fannin hesitated for several days, and then when he did begin the move, they ran into the main body of the Mexican troops while crossing an open prairie. After fending off four separate attacks on the first day, the Texans spent that night digging trenches. However, in the morning they found they were now totally surrounded by the enemy. Almost out of ammunition, Fannin asked for a parley to prevent his troops from being massacred. General Urrea promised the Texans would be treated as prisoners of war and given clemency. Upon surrender, the Texans were marched back to the Presidio at Goliad and placed under the watchful eyes of Nicolas de la Portilla and his detachment of men while Urrea and his remaining troops continued their march south.
Santa Anna, however, was determined to fight a war of extermination and ordered Portilla to execute the prisoners. Having conflicting orders from General Urrea and General Santa Anna, Portilla chose to follow Santa Anna's orders.
On March 27, the prisoners were divided into quarters. While the sick and wounded remained in the chapel, the other three groups were escorted on different roads out of town. The three groups were told they were on missions to gather wood, drive cattle or sail to safety in New Orleans. Believing their captors, the rebels joked and swapped stories as they walked along. When they were ordered to halt a half-mile from the fort, however, the Texans realized their fates. The Mexican guards opened fire as some of the men began running for their lives. Those not killed by gunshots were slaughtered with bayonets. Back at the presidio, the Mexicans stood the wounded against the chapel wall and executed them. Those too wounded to stand were shot in their beds. Fannin, who had been shot in the thigh during the original engagement, was the last to be killed. His three dying wishes were to be shot in the chest, given a Christian burial, and have his watch sent to his family. Instead, Portilla shot Fannin in the face, burned his body with the others, and kept the timepiece as a war prize. In all, nearly 350 men were killed at Goliad.
Santa Anna's treatment of the captured soldiers had the opposite effect of what he intended. He was no longer seen as a brilliant military strategist but a cruel despot. The Goliad Massacre hardened attitudes toward Santa Anna throughout the United States and inflamed and unified the Texas resistance. Less than a month later at the battle of San Jacinto, Sam Houston's men won independence for Texas with the battle cries of "Remember the Alamo" and "Remember Goliad" ringing throughout the Mexican camp.
Today, almost 185 years later, the old presidio and its adjacent Chapel of our Lady of Loreto still stand. Given the horrific events that happened within and around the site, is it any wonder the walls sometimes echo with the mournful sounds of spirits returning from that troubled and turbulent time?
Visitors often report feeling "cold spots" and uneasy feelings as they walk around the grounds where Fannin and his men were executed. In 1992, a man named Jim reported strange goings-on. As a former deputy sheriff and a security guard for a number of years, Jim was not a man easily frightened or prone to make up wild stories. Hired for a few nights to watch over some equipment at the presidio that was to be used for the Cattle Baron's Ball, he expected quiet routine nights. On his first night though, just before midnight, the silence was broken by the "eerie, shrill cries of nearly a dozen terrified infants." He swore the sounds indicated "pain and suffering." Although understandably frightened, he tried to find where the sounds were coming from. After several long minutes, he finally determined they were coming from one of the dozen or so unmarked graves that are located near the Chapel of Our Lady of Loreto.
As he shined his flashlight on the spot, the cries abruptly stopped but were immediately replaced by the singing of a women's choir. It sounded like it was coming from the back wall of the old fort, but the beam of his flashlight revealed nothing there. After two or three minutes, the singing stopped and silence returned for the rest of the night. When Jim reported his experience, he was teased by his co-workers, but he is convinced what he saw and heard was real and besides, he is not the only person to report strange things in and around the presidio.
Numerous people have reported seeing a strange, 4-foot-tall friar who suddenly appears by the double doors leading into the chapel. His robes are black, tied around his waist with a rope and his face is concealed with a hood. He then walks barefooted to each corner of the church and seems to bless it before walking to the center of the quadrangle and begins to pray in Latin.
A woman in a white dress has been reported kneeling and crying by the graves of the children. When seen, she then turns and looks directly at the person before gliding over to a wall and vanishing. A beautiful soprano voice is often heard emanating from one particular room, but upon investigation, there is nobody in the small space. Visitors who stay late often come back from the fort and comment to the staff about the historical reenactors even though there are no reenactors on the property that day.
It seems there are many restless spirits here. Who are the crying babies? Are they the little lost souls of pioneer infants killed by Indians in a raid or was there an epidemic that took their too-short lives. The woman in white - is her own child buried in one of the unmarked graves? Why does the short friar keep returning? Is his soul in turmoil over so many brave men who were brutally executed? Whose souls are eternally singing beautiful hymns in a choir, unable to leave this chapel? Caught in a timeless web, so many lost souls searching, sorrowing, singing, praying, unable to let go of the life they briefly lived in a little town named Goliad.
