The Texan Scouts A Story of the Alamo and Goliad

The Texan Scouts is one of Joseph Alexander Altsheler’s books in his Texan series, the connected sequence of historical adventure novels for boys that took young protagonists through the major events of the Texas Revolution against Mexico in 1835 and 1836. Altsheler had built his reputation writing historical adventure novels for boys, particularly the Young Trailers series about the Kentucky frontier and his French and Indian War sequence, and the Texan series extended that approach to the Texas Revolution that had dominated the southwestern American memory in the decades after the events occurred.

The Alamo and Goliad of the subtitle refer to two of the most famous episodes of the Texas Revolution. The defense of the Alamo by a small Texan force against the much larger Mexican army under Santa Anna in February and March 1836, ending in the death of all the defenders. And the massacre of Texan prisoners at Goliad several weeks later, when Mexican forces executed several hundred Texan soldiers who had surrendered under the impression that they would be treated as prisoners of war. Both events became central to the Texas Revolutionary mythology that Altsheler was working with.

Altsheler put a lot of effort into rendering the actual military history with reasonable accuracy for a young readers’ adventure novel, with attention to the specific terrain, the various factions involved, and the military culture of the period. His battle scenes capture something of the chaos and the moral weight of what nineteenth century combat in the Texas borderlands was actually like for the young men who fought in it. The wider series across which the Texan books recur gives Altsheler room to develop a connected cast across multiple novels.

Altsheler’s prose is brisk and his action sequences move at the pace his young readers expected. The moral lessons about courage, loyalty, and the costs of war are delivered through the narrative rather than imposed in lectures. Modern readers should be aware that the period assumptions about race, region, and the moral character of the various participants in the conflict, particularly the Mexican forces and the wider Mexican population, are very much present in Altsheler’s fiction in ways that have not aged well.

For scholars of early twentieth century American children’s literature, of how the Texas Revolution was translated into adventure fiction for the young, or of the wider career of Joseph Alexander Altsheler, the Texan series is essential. The Texan Scouts is a representative entry. Many of his books are now in the public domain.