“So — I will close with these thoughts: Remember the men of the Alamo. For we will never surrender. We shall fight to the last man, until the last breath is gone from the last defender. And these final words I dedicate to the men who wait to die outside this warm room. They are gallant men. Brave men. Free men. And they are dying for you.
“These words come from a garrison valiant and steeped in courage. And our last word must be — farewell.
“Farewell.”
“Goodbye, Jim,” Jamie whispered. “You won’t be forgotten. The men of the Alamo will never be forgotten. For I shall tell my children, and they will tell their children. And the world will know that on that awful bloody day, men of more courage than most possess fought to the last man. They died for God and for Texas.”
Here’s a sneak preview of DREAMS OF EAGLES — The next book in the series...
In the late summer of 1837, Jamie Ian MacCallister, one of only two survivors from the battle at the Alamo, his wife, Kate, and a small group of friends had pushed deep into uncharted country that would someday be called Colorado. They kept on pushing until Jamie, who was scouting far ahead of the wagons, came to a long wide valley — a respectable creek running right down the middle of it, the valley nestled amid towering mountains. Jamie dismounted and jammed his hands into the earth. The earth was dark and rich. The pass he had used to enter the valley was wide and not likely to be blocked, at least for very long, by snow. The valley was lush with timber. Jamie rose, still holding the handfuls of rich earth and looked all around him. His long shoulder-length blond hair fanned under the breath of wind. He nodded his head and put the earth into a cloth sack. Then he mounted and rode back to the wagons. He tossed the sack to the big man called the Swede.
“How about that, Swede?”
The man smelled the earth, then fingered it. He grinned. “It will grow good crops, Jamie.”
Jamie rode back to his wagon, driven by Kate. “We’re almost home, Kate. Just a few more miles. It’s beautiful, it’s lovely, and it’s lonely, but I think you’ll like it.
She smiled at him. “If you like it, I like it.”
A few miles further on, Jamie halted the small wagon train and pointed to the long valley. “Yonder she lies, people.”
The children piled out of the wagons and ran forward, the tall grass waist high on the youngest.
“Jamie, it’s the most beautiful place I have ever seen!” Kate whispered.
“It’s our home, Kate. We’ve come home at last.”
Notes
1
Actual wording of letter. Victory or Death was underlined three times.