13. James Bowie and the defense of the Alamo
James Bowie, often referred to as Jim Bowie, was an American smuggler, slave trader, frontiersman, and land speculator who remains famous as the designer of the famed Bowie knife. He wasn’t, the knife was designed and first made by his brother Rezin, according to Rezin’s own claims and the support of family members who witnessed him do it. By the 1830s Bowie, who had formerly worked with the pirate Jean Lafitte smuggling and dealing with stolen goods in Louisiana, relocated to Texas, took the requisite oath of allegiance to the Mexican government, and established himself near San Antonio de Bexar. Bowie married the daughter of his business partner, who was also vice-governor, and by 1833 was living comfortably with his wife and two children. His wife and both children died later that year, during an epidemic of cholera.
Bowie was in command of some of the Texas Volunteers in the Alamo in February 1836, while William Barrett Travis was in command of the members of the garrison dispatched by the Army of Texas, and another contingent of volunteers from Tennessee was led by David Crockett. All three men died and are venerated in Texas, but Crockett and Bowie were already folk heroes before they died, and their fame exceeds that of Travis today, Bowie for his knife and Crockett for his reputation with a rifle. Bowie became more famous when fanciful tales of his adventures began to appear in print in the 1850s, written by his brother. The Bowie legend as a gallant soldier who died heroically supplanted the known facts of his life by the time of the Civil War, and he remains a folk hero in Louisiana, Arkansas, and Texas in the twenty-first century.