Texas Independence

The Texans captured a fort called the Alamo in San Antonio. This made Santa Anna mad, so he took an army to San Antonio.

The Texans took shelter in the Alamo when they saw Santa Anna's incoming army.

They surrounded the Alamo and Santa Anna demanded they surrender. A man by the name of William Travis responded by firing a cannon at them.



The Mexicans responded with 12 days and nights of cannon fire. Eventually the Mexicans stormed the Alamo and killed all 200 of the defenders inside.

The Alamo is now a tourist attraction in San Antonio...and Pee Wee Herman traveled to this location in his movie, Pee Wee's Big Adventure.

Anyway....

While the Alamo was happening, a group of Texans were writing up a Texas Declaration of Independence and Constitution. They were really over being part of Mexico.

After a lot of fighting and retreating, the Texans and Mexicans met at San Jacinto. The Texans were victorious while shouting...


Not only did the Texans win at San Jacinto, they also captured Santa Anna and forced him to sign a treaty that ended the war and would also recognize Texas's independence. Also, for good measure, a regiment from Illinois took Santa Ana's fake leg.




Even though the Texans won, Mexico would not honor the treaty because Santa Anna was a POW (prisoner of war) at the time.

If you are wondering, Santa Anna never got his leg back, it is still in Illinois and can be viewed at The Illinois State Military Museum in Springfield Illinois!

The Texas Revolution

Mexico decided it was time to get a better handle on Texas.

Mexico halted immigration, put a high tariff on American imports, and banned slavery. Troops were sent in to collect taxes.



Even though the United States had previously dropped its claim to Texas, the Mexicans did not trust the United States.

The United States offered Mexico $1 million for Texas, Mexico refused. It was now apparent that the United States really did want Texas.

Things became tense, Stephen Austin was jailed, people were killed and to make things worse, new president Antonio Lopez de Santa Ana banned militias and then things got crazy.

The war started over a cannon. It was Mexico's cannon, it was probably a very nice cannon so Mexico wanted their cannon back. Texas refused to give it back and they decided to taunt the Mexicans with a flag like this...



The Mexicans attacked and the Revolution had begun.

Something Strange Afoot in Texas

The United States was growing and more places were being settled. Another place Americans were settling was Texas, but Texas didn't belong to us, it belonged to Spain.

Moses Austin approached the Spanish and asked if he could set up a colony in Texas, they agreed. Before the colony was officially set up though, Moses died. His son Stephen Austin (his friends called him Stone Cold) finished the colony for him.

The population of this colony was 1,800 which included 400 slaves.

Eventually, Mexico earned its independence from Spain so Texas was controlled by Mexico. They had no problem with these Americans settling in Texas as long as they did a few things. First, they had to give up their American citizenship, then swear allegiance to Mexico. They were also required to become Catholic and hold their land for at least seven years.

Of course, no one really did these things, how silly?

The Mexican government was a bit nervous about the settlers loyalty to America, so they sent in General Manuel de Mier y Teran to check things out.


The General went back to Mexico and told the government that they might want to do something about Texas.

The Gold Rush and the Pony Express!

Another event that sent people west was the Gold Rush. In 1848 gold was discovered at Sutter's Mill.



Word spread and in 1849 there were 80,000 people looking for gold in California.

Remember the Rush-Bagot Treaty? The one that settled issues over the Great Lakes and boarders? Well since then the United States and Canada both controlled Oregon, but Polk wanted all of Oregon. So he came up with a catchy slogan, "54 40' or Fight!"

This meant that Polk wanted all of the Oregon Country and would fight to get it. No fighting occurred and the boarder between the United States and Canada was set at the 49th parallel, which is still the boarder today!

So, when that many people are flocking out west, how would they communicate with friends and family?! Well the Pny Express of course!


Unfortunately the Pony Express became a little obsolete due to the telegraph, an invention by Samuel F.B. Morse. This made it possible for people to communicate by tapping out messages and sending them through electricity!!!

Manifest Destiny

After Jackson's presidency came Martin Van Buren, he was known as the Little Magician. After Van Buren was William Henry Harrison, he wasn't president for long because he thought it would be a good idea to give a very long inauguration speech in the cold without a coat or a hat.





Harrison got sick...and died.

Then there was John Tyler, he....ummm...?

After Tyler was James K. Polk and he had the urge to head west.

Many settlers also got itchy feet and wanted to head west. Why? Because of Manifest Destiny!

this was the idea that it was the God given right for the United States to stretch from sea to shining sea!

Other reasons were to convert Indians to Christianity, to make money, and in the case of the Mormons, to find a place where people would leave them alone.

There were three main trails that people used to cross the Rocky Mountains. The first was the Santa Fe Trail. This trail started in Independence Missouri and ended at Santa Fe, New Mexico. It took about two months to get there.

The Oregon Trail was the longest and most famous [51]. This trail also started in Independence, Missouri and ended in Willamette Valley in Oregon. This was 2,000 mile journey and took around six months. During these six months, settlers found themselves in some bad situations such as, bad terrain, bad weather, and their ox dying of dysentery.




The Mormon Trail got its name because it was the Mormons who traveled on it. The Mormons were not a popular bunch and were pretty much chased away from everywhere they lived.

From New York to Ohio....




From Ohio to Missouri...



and from Missouri to Illinois...



In Illinois they built up a town called Nauvoo, but the Illinois residents were not friendly neighbors. A mob marched into Nauvoo and killed Joseph Smith, leader of the Mormons and sent the Mormons searching for a new home.

The Mormons headed west under a new leader, Brigham Young. They eventually settled in Utah, where they could practice their faith and avoid lynch mobs!



Migrating west was not an easy task, many died from disease, froze to death, or starved. One such unlucky group was known as the Donner Party, they got stuck in the Rocky Mountains during a snow storm. They resorted to eating members of their group who had died. Yup, nothing says fun like cannibalism!

[51] All the other trails were jealous.

The Trail of Tears

Of course, when talking about Jackson, the Indian Removal Act should be mentioned. Jackson felt that the Indian Tribes in the Southeast U.S. should be moved. Where to? Oklahoma.

The Choctaw, Creek, and Chickasaw went, it was a long trip and many of them died.

The Seminoles in Florida decided to fight back.

They hid in the swamps and had hit and run attacks. Some were moved to Oklahoma, but many stayed and are still in Florida to this day.

The Cherokee Indians decided to use the court system to fight the removal. They argued that they had a right to be respected as a foreign country. The Supreme Court disagreed.

16,000 Cherokee were forced to leave, 4,000 died on the way to Oklahoma. This becomes known as the Trail of Tears.

The Nullification Crisis

If you think Andrew Jackson was elected president, then you are correct! Jackson was seen as an "every man". He could relate to the common people, after he won he held a keggar on the White House lawn for all to attend.


Jackson did have some problems in his presidency. A big issue was tariffs. A tariff is a tax on imported goods, in case you were wondering. The issue was coming from the southern states. The south was mostly farms and not a lot of factories. Because of this, the south imported a lot of their goods. They felt this tariff was too much. They thought the federal government had too much power over the states.

Vice President, John C. Calhoun issued a statement on the subject of nullification, or the idea that states could ignore federal laws they didn't agree with. This put Jackson and Calhoun at odds with each other.


South Carolina took this nullification to another level. They declared Federal Tariffs null and void. Calhoun resigned as Vice President and returned to his home state of South Carolina and support nullification.

Jackson was having none of this. He was fully prepared to send an army down to South Carolina and show them what was up.



Jackson believed that nullification went against the whole idea of the Union and it would not be tolerated.

Because Jackson was a scary guy, a compromise was met and their was no need for the army to go to South Carolina. Congress said they would lower tariffs and South Carolina was ok with it, even though, once nullification was in their head, they wouldn't forget about it.