In late 1833 Mexico began to have serious fears that its 
northeastern territory in Texas would be lost to North American 
colonists. To determine the actual state of affairs, Mexico sent Col. 
Juan N. Almonte to Texas on an inspection—the last conducted by 
a high-ranking Mexican official before revolution separated Texas 
from Mexico. Upon his return to the Mexican capital in November 
1834, Almonte wrote a secret report of the measures necessary to 
avoid the loss of Texas—a report that has been unknown to scholars
or the general public.

    Here it is presented in English for the first time, along with more 
than fifty letters that Almonte wrote during his inspection. This 
documentation offers crucial new insights on Texas affairs and will 
change the way historians regard Mexico’s attitudes toward the 
foreign colonists and their revolution of 1835–1836.

    When Santa Anna marched an army north to crush the Texas 
rebellion, Almonte was by his side as a special advisor. He kept a 
journal, lost at the Battle of San Jacinto, which is presented here 
with full annotation. Almonte’s role in the 1836 campaign is 
examined, as well as his subsequent activities that relate to Texas. 
Through Almonte’s Texas we gain an overdue appreciation of this 
man who played a leading role in the history of Texas and Mexico.

    As James Crisp said in his review of this work: “This is a 
fascinating, revelatory, and highly satisfying book for anyone 
interested in the real meat of the story of the Texas Revolution—in 
all its political, military and diplomatic dimensions. The editors have 
put Almonte in the center of this story of Texas in the 1830s and 
40s, and that’s exactly where he belongs. Bravo!”

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The late JACK JACKSON was an award-winning scholar and 
illustrator. He authored numerous books and articles, including 
Imaginary Kingdom: Texas as Seen by the Rivera and Rubi Military 
Expeditions, 1727 and 1767. JOHN WHEAT, archives translator
at the Center for American History at the University of Texas at 
Austin, is the translator of numerous historically significant 
documents of borderlands history.


What people are saying about this book


“This is a highly significant, major contribution to the documentation
of early Texas history, and greatly adds to the broadening 
understanding of the roots of the Texas revolution.”— Dale Farris, 
Review of Texas Books

“. . . stunningly original, sound in scholarship, important to 
specialists in the field, and makes magnificent use of a very wide 
variety of sources. Moreover, the first publication in English of one 
of the most important documents in Texas history—Almonte’s 1834 
‘Secret Report’—is a significant event in itself . . . . [This book 
makes] the editors’ case for the central importance of Almonte
to . . . Mexican policy towards Texas in the years immediately 
surrounding the Texas revolt.”—James W. Crisp