There  was  a  Colonel  Benjamin  R.  Milam,
known  through  Texas  as  "old  Ben  Milam,"  who
was  determined  to  prevent  such  a  fiasco.  Milam
had  been  imprisoned  at  Monterey  as  one  of  the
leaders  of  the  Texas  war  party,  but  he  had  escaped
and  joined  the  forces  before  Bexar.  A  Mexican
deserter  had  brought  word  of  the  real  weakness  of
the  defenses  and  the  discouraged  mood  of  the
garrison  —  most  of  whom  wrere  convicts  and  none
too  enthusiastic  to  begin  with.  Thinking  this  to
be  a  most  opportune  moment,  Milam  gained
Burleson's  authority  to  call  for  volunteers,  and,
waving  his  hat,  shouted  out,  "Who  will  go  with
old  Ben  Milam?"

Everything  was  now  animated  and  astir.  On
the  morning  of  December  5,  the  Texans  entered
the  town  without  any  sharp  opposition  —  thus
proving  the  truth  of  what  the  deserter  had  said.
They  made  their  way  along  from  street  to  street,
from  house  to  house,  shooting  from  loopholes
and  windows,  picking  off  every  Mexican  who
ventured  above  the  barricades.    On  the  evening


102


SAM  HOUSTON


of  that  day,  Milam,  as  he  stood  in  the  entrance
of  Veramendi  Palace,  the  official  residence  of
Colonel  Bowie's  father-in-law,  was  shot  down  by
a  sharpshooter  concealed  in  a  cypress  tree.  There
is  a  monument  to  him  in  Milam  Square  in  the
modern  city  of  San  Antonio.
This  "sniping"  kind  of  warfare  went  on  until  the
9th,  when  Cos  began  negotiations  for  surrender.
