Astonishing Victory, Answered Prayers

SAM HOUSTON: AN EAGLE FLYING UP AHEAD (Part 3)

Leaving politics behind him, Sam Houston turned his back on a potential presidential campaign, cut connections with his Native American allies, and made his way to the wild frontier in the sparsely settled Mexican province of Texas. There, his background as a one-time war hero and Governor of Tennessee, led to his selection as "General in Chief" of a rag-tag army of American settlers willing to risk everything to overthrow Mexican rule. Despite a bloody disaster at the Alamo and mass slaughter at Goliad, the Yankee rebels hung together just long enough to confront the Mexican dictator, Santa Ana, who styled himself "The Savior of the Motherland" and "The Napoleon of the West." At San Jacinto, this vainglorious ego-maniac not only managed to lose the battle but found himself captured by Houston who, despite serious wounds in the course of leading his long-suffering troops, won a decisive, seemingly impossible victory. Within a generation, that triumph ended up increasing the land area of the United States by more than a third. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices [https://megaphone.fm/adchoices]

SAM HOUSTON: IT WAS DONE BY THE GREAT SPIRIT (Part 2)

Sam Houston, the dashing young Governor of Tennessee, looked like a solid bet for the presidential election of 1840 as the protégé of President Andrew Jackson, but some mysterious mishap on his wedding night with his teenaged bride blew up his promising marriage and career. He ran away from politics and rejoined the Cherokee band that had long ago adopted him as a former son. On the way, he burned his gubernatorial clothing in a ritual bonfire, but he began drinking heavily and self-destructively, and in fact took the Indian name meaning "Big Drunk." A brief trip to Washington to try to re-establish his political contact led to a brutal confrontation with a member of Congress who accused Sam of corruption, but wouldn't accept a duel to the death to settle the matter. Instead, Houston beat the corpulent Congressman with a Hickory walking stick he had carved at Andrew Jackson's home, the Hermitage. The resulting trial, in an open session of the House, became a national sensation but afterwards Sam decided to follow Davey Crocket's example and run away to Texas --- where he became a militia commander who won one of the most significant and unlikely military victories in all American history. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices [https://megaphone.fm/adchoices]

SAM HOUSTON: "BIG DRUNK" DISCOVERS LONE STAR LUCK (Part 1)

Texas might still be part of Mexico today if a rising Tennessee politician hadn't proven profoundly unlucky in love. Had Governor Sam Houston's infamous wedding night proceeded as planned, he would have become a credible candidate for president -- escaping dark years of depression and drunkenness, and avoiding the status of alcoholic exile that took him South of the border. As an adoptive member of the Cherokee tribe, he became the most unlikely and indispensable founder of the independent if short-lived Republic of Texas. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices [https://megaphone.fm/adchoices]

"Dirty Shirts" vs. "Wellington's Heroes"

The British captured the American capitol in Washington and burned its public buildings in the War of 1812, but when they invaded the Mississippi Valley and attempted to seize New Orleans, they faced an improvised, multi-lingual army that combined volunteers from frontier settlements, nearly 1,000 well-armed and prosperous pirates, "freemen of color", former slaves from Haiti, and a convent full of earnestly prayerful nuns. The resulting battle led to a bloody British disaster with the American "dirty shirts" illogically protected and suffering only a dozen reported casualties in a confrontation that struck participants on all sides as an open miracle. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices [https://megaphone.fm/adchoices]

Astonishing Victory, Answered Prayers

Politician and militia general Andrew Jackson barely survives a bloody brawl in a Nashville hotel that threatens his life and the amputation of his arm. A month later, and still far from fully recovered, he's called to the front to battle rebellious Creek Indians and their British allies in the climactic battle of the War of 1812, that prevents the dismemberment of the young Republic with an attempt to seize the city of New Orleans and the entire Mississippi Valley. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices [https://megaphone.fm/adchoices]