Dick the Drummer at the Battle of San Jacinto Dick the Drummer was a freed slave from New Orleans whose true name remains unknown. He served on General Sam Houston’s staff during the Texas Revolution and participated in the decisive Battle of San Jacinto in April 1836 as a musician, which armies employed to beat communication signals. A month before the battle, no one in the ill-trained Texas army knew how to beat morning reveille on the drum, so Houston performed this task himself though Dick would later assume the duty, including the morning of April 21 when he awakened the troops who would later that day engage the Mexican army at San Jacinto. That afternoon, he beat the signal for general parade to assemble the troops for battle. Dick and five other musicians, another drummer and four fifers, marched near the center of the advancing Texas army. By most accounts, they marched silently until they were within about 200 yards of the Mexican camp. When the enemy observed the Texans and began firing, the musicians began playin gIrish poet Thomas Moore’s “Will You Come to the Bower.” The battle quickly escalated into a rout with the Texans slaughtering Mexicans attempting to flee through the marsh of Peggy Lake. The Texan soldiers resisted efforts by officers to stop the massacre and take prisoners, and ignored the drummers beating the signal for assembly. Dick later served as a drummer for the United States Army during the war with Mexico at the battles of Monterrey and Buena Vista. He attended a memorial dinner for veterans of the Battle of San Jacinto in May 1850 at which he reportedly “seemed to live his early days over again when witnessing the ceremonies of this joyous occasion.” Contributed by L.W. Ledgerwood III, Sam Houston State University Bibliography:
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