On the 20th of December, 1835, there was a spirited meeting of citizens and soldiers at the old town of La Bahia (Goliad) on the San Antonio River.  
La Bahia—which means “the bay”—was already old when Austin laid off his town on the Brazos. Captain Alonzo de Leon, on his way to attack La Salle at Fort St. Louis in 1689, stopped there; and in 1718 Don Domingo Ramon with his troopers and friars built there the Mission of Espiritu Santo (The Holy Ghost) for the benefit of the fierce Carankawae Indians.
 
The town had seen stirring times during the century and a half of its existence. There had been many Indian fights in and around the mission church, when the garrison was weak and the priests could not control their red-skinned converts; it was in the same church in 1812 that Magee’s army was besieged, and from its doors his Republicans sallied forth to their victorious hand-to-hand conflict with the Spaniards. Here, too, in 1819, General Long surrendered to the Mexicans and was carried away to a treacherous death.
 
And here in October, 1835, the Mexican commandant Sandoval had been surprised in his sleep by the Texans, his soldiers made prisoners, and the fort and its stores handed over to his captors.
 
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The General Consultation at San Felipe in November, 1835, had thought it more prudent to declare their adherence to the Mexican republican constitution than to issue a declaration of independence.
 
The citizens and soldiers of Goliad, on the 20th of December following, boldly set their names to a document resolving “that the former state and department of Texas is and ought to be a free, sovereign, and independent state.”
 
Among the signers were several boys fifteen and sixteen years of age.
 
This paper was sent to the governor and his council at San Felipe by whom it was disapproved and suppressed. They thought it premature. But it was a straw that showed which way the revolutionary wind was blowing.
 
Captain Philip Dimitt, who was at the head of this movement, was commandant at the fortress at Goliad with about eighty men under his command.
 
Over at San Antonio at this time, there was much dissatisfaction among the volunteers remaining there. They were more restless than ever, with their own flag waving above the Alamo and no enemy in sight. They had left their homes and firesides for a purpose. It was fighting they were eager for, not idling around a camp-fire.
 
They were, therefore, delighted when an expedition was set on foot for the capture of Matamoras on the Rio Grande River. General Houston, who had fixed his headquarters at Washington on the Brazos, wished to place Colonel James Bowie in command of this expedition; but in the confusion arising from the quarrels between Governor Smith and his council at San Felipe, an English physician, named Grant, assumed the leadership (January, 1836).
 
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Dr. Grant had taken part in the storming of San Antonio; he was brave and gallant, and a favorite with his fellow-soldiers. Two hundred volunteers gathered under his standard; he helped himself without leave to arms and ammunition from the fortress stores, took clothing and provisions from the townspeople, and started for Matamoras.
 
He halted at Goliad. But only long enough to seize and press into service Captain Dimitt’s drove of army horses.
 
Here by order of the council, who had decided to sustain Grant, he was joined by Colonel Frank W. Johnson, and they marched away, leaving Captain Dimitt indignant and angry.
 
The citizens and soldiers at San Antonio were likewise indignant and angry; and with far better reason. Colonel Neill, left by Johnson in command of the Alamo with only sixty men, sent to General Houston a report describing the helpless and suffering condition of that place after the high-handed raid of Grant and his volunteers.
 
Houston was much disturbed by this report. He enclosed it to Governor Smith, requesting him to refer it to the council. The commander-in-chief denounced the action of Grant in strong terms and added:
 
“Within thirty hours I shall set out for th............