Abstract
These notes comprise explanations and clarifications related to the content of the translated work, and include supporting data and historical maps. The following topics are dealt with: the Methodist pastor and the traveling salesman, the murder of the Alsatian, Houzeau’s Big Bear shooting, Trasimond Landry’s sugar plantations, the Indian raid at the Post Oaks farm, the lynching of Bob Augustine, the mass conscription, the escape of Charles Anderson, the secret memorandum for Washington, Houzeau’s escape route, the Mexican cowboys, and the report of the U.S. Consul at Matamoros to Secretary of State William H. Seward.
Grand and generous as she was in her principles, America has thrown the door open to every poor and oppressed. But not the poor sufferer alone, noble-minded and righteous, but the disgraced pauper has taken hold of her. And if unchecked, the spirit of this rabble will reign supreme, and the ship launched by the pilgrims and the quakers will sink on a corrupt bottom. Exceptional emigration has sent America – a glorious America – far ahead of the Old World. Vulgar emigration would break her down ...if liberty had not its balance in itself.
Jean-Charles Houzeau to Nicolas-Constant Schmit [1, letter 33B, August 26, 1863]
This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.
Access this chapter
Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout
Purchases are for personal use only
Notes
- 1.
There was one Rev. John Jasper (1812–1901) of Richmond, Virginia, who could not possibly have been the pastor that Houzeau described: first of all he was a person of color, and he later became very famous because of his “The Sun Do Move!” sermons about the Sun orbiting the Earth, an Aristotelian concept that was opposite to Houzeau’s Copernican and Darwinian world views. John Jasper reasoned that “If he [Joshua] stopped it, that proves that the sun was moving” [2, p. 8]. It was Edward Walter Maunder (1851–1928) who was the first astronomer to examine this biblical story from the point of view of the late nineteenth-century astronomical knowledge [3]. Maunder’s book was published in 1882, the year of Houzeau’s second sojourn in San Antonio.
- 2.
The typesetter misspelled Post Oaks as Post onks.
- 3.
The word “slut” that Kendall used in the Texas Republican is arcane, and refers to a female dog.
- 4.
Brother of Major Robert Anderson (1805–1871), commander at Fort Sumter.
- 5.
Now Weedy Creek.
- 6.
“A la Jamaique, ils ont importé leurs petites selles incommodes, où l’on ne peut prendre qu’une seule attitude, et leurs étriers en anneaux qui obligent à tenir la jambe toujours tendue.”
References
Schmit, N.-C. Brussels: Archives Université Libre de Bruxelles, BE.ULB-A&B-ARCH. 014PP.
Jasper, J. (1882). The Sun do move! New York: Brentano’s Literary Emporium.
Maunder, E. W. (1908). The astronomy of the bible. London: T. S. Clark & Co.
Cornetto, H. (2011). Religion in the early republic: Circuit riders on the American frontier, William Paterson University. https://www.academia.edu/413195/Religion_in_the_Early_Republic_Circuit_Riders_on_the_American_Frontier.
Powell, W. A. Jr. (1977). Methodist circuit-riders in America, 1766–1844, University of Richmond Master’s Theses Student Research.
Mills, H. F. (1953). The methodist circuit riders in Texas 1865–1900. Master of Arts Thesis, The Rice Institute, Houston.
Spellmann, N. W. (2017). Handbook of Texas online, “METHODIST CHURCH”. http://www.tshaonline.org/handbook/online/articles/imm01. Accessed 13 Feb 2020.
Graves, H. A. (1886). Reminiscences and events in the ministerial life of Rev. John Wesley de Vilbiss (deceased): Formerly a member of the West Texas annual conference. Galveston: W. A. Shaw & Co.
Smyrl, F. H. (1964). Houzeau de Lehaie, Jean-Charles. Paper read to the San Antonio Historical Association, March 20, 1964. San Antonio: The Alamo Library.
Nesmith, S. P., et al. (1975). The Belgian Texans. San Antonio: The University of Texas.
Gardner, C. (1861). Gardner’s New Orleans directory for 1861, including Jefferson City, Gretna, Carrollton, Algiers, and McDonogh, with a new map of the city, a street and levee guide, business directory, an appendix of much useful information, and a planters directory containing the names of the cotton and sugar planters of Louisiana, Mississippi, Arkansas and Texas. A summary of the commercial history of New Orleans, continued. New Orleans: Charles Gardner.
Norman, B. M. (1858). Norman’s chart of the lower Mississippi River, by A. Persac. Engraved, printed & mounted by J.H. Colton & Co., New York.
McDonald, A. P. The civil war and the lone star state: A brief overview. In K. W. Howell (Ed.) The seventh star of the confederacy: Texas during the civil war. Denton: University of North Texas Press.
Barnes, C. M. (1912). “Rolls of Honor of San Antonio’s Defenders Found in the City Hall Vaults”, San Antonio Express, Sunday morning, June 23, 1912.
Smith, T. T., Thompson, J. D., Wooster, R., & Pingenot, B. E. (Eds.). (2007). The Reminiscences of Major General Zenas R. Bliss, 1854–1876. From the Texas Frontier to the Civil War and Back Again. Austin: Texas State Historical Association.
Fox, A. A. (1977). The Archaeology and History of the Spanish Governor’s Palace Park, Center for Archaeological Research, the University of Texas at San Antonio Archaeological Survey Report no. 31.
Rogers, L. W. (1998). A Texas sampler: Historical recollections. Lubbock: Texas Tech University Press.
Ball, R. H. (Ed.) (1994). Belgian Texans. University of Texas Inst., Pamphlet Published by The University of Texas Institute of Texan Cultures at San Antonio.
Texas Historical Commission. (2020). Tax credit program highlight: Menger hotel. https://www.thc.texas.gov/content/tax-credit-program-highlight-menger-hotel. Accessed 2 Feb 2020.
Dixon, D. T. (2015). The Lost Gettysburg address: Charles Anderson’s civil war Odyssey (p. 256). Santa Barbara: B-List History.
Kryszewski, B. M. T. (2010). Oakville, TX (Live Oak County). Handbook of Texas Online. http://www.tshaonline.org/handbook/online/articles/hlo04. Accessed 24 Feb 2020.
Houzeau, J.-C. (1868). “La Jamaïque et le Système Colonial”, Revue trimestrielle Vol. 60.
Nelson, A. (1980). Description of saddlery in the Renwick exhibition. In R. E. Ahlborn (Ed.), Man made mobile: Early saddles of Western North America (pp. 1–147). Washington: Smithsonian Studies in History and Technology No 39.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Rights and permissions
Copyright information
© 2020 Springer Nature Switzerland AG
About this chapter
Cite this chapter
Sterken, C., King, A.A. (2020). Explanatory Remarks. In: Jean-Charles Houzeau's Escape from Texas. Springer Biographies. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-46538-4_4
Download citation
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-46538-4_4
Published:
Publisher Name: Springer, Cham
Print ISBN: 978-3-030-46536-0
Online ISBN: 978-3-030-46538-4
eBook Packages: Physics and AstronomyPhysics and Astronomy (R0)