Forget the Alamo review: dark truths of the US south and its 'secular Mecca'

As the ancient American struggle over how much truth to tell about the traditional oppression of minorities bubbles over, with arguments over everything from the teaching of Critical Race Theory to the mention of anything gay in the presence of anyone under 18, this engaging new book about the history of the Alamo arrives at the perfect moment.

Or, as Bryan Burrough, Chris Tomlinson and Jason Stanford assert: “If there’s ever been a moment for a spirited discussion about what the Alamo really symbolizes, we’d suggest it’s now.”

Burrough is the author of six books; Tomlinson an accomplished journalist; Stanford a successful political consultant. In their collective opinion, it’s “not an overstatement to say the Alamo is the secular western wall” of Texas, “its secular Mecca. Somewhat as Jews and Muslims have struggled over the Temple Mount, so Anglos, African Americans, Mexican Americans, Tejanos and Native Americans are now debating the future of the Alamo and its meaning.”

Almost 200 years after the battle which killed 200 Americans at an old Spanish church outside San Antonio, the essential argument remains the same: were these settlers fighting for their “freedom” against the oppression of a Mexican tyrant, Antonio López de Santa Anna, or were they mostly interested in preserving the slavery a recently independent Mexico opposed but they considered essential for the success of their burgeoning cotton farms?

Burrough, Tomlinson and Stanford leave no doubt about the correct answer. Slavery.

https://www.theguardian.com/books/2021/aug/29/forget-the-alamo-review-texas-slavery-mexico-burrough-tomlinson-stanford