We learn about Davy leaving home at 12 because his father is perpetually in debt and continues to lease his children out for six months at a time to work off his financial difficulties. Davy finishes his obligation and just continues to move on, although for personal reasons he chooses to work off two more of his father’s debts.
Davy marries young, leaves his family often and is most happy hunting bears. He is a renowned shot, but for some perverse reason he was the black bears worse foe killing well over a 100 a year.
His young wife dies, he thinks he should have another wife for the kids, knows there is a local widow who lost her husband in the same Creek Indian wars that he fought in and he marries her. There is no romance and this may contribute to the fact that he is gone weeks and months at a time with little remorse.
He fights under Andrew Jackson and moving to Western Tennessee he gets the itch to get elected and as a story teller, drinker, and loveable character he succeeds first in the state and then as a representative in DC. He goes with one bill as his goal and he never succeeds in passing it. This law was one that recognized the common man and their land holdings – the one thing that was consistently true was that Crockett fought the robber barons and rich aristocracy in favor of the man of the field, woods and homestead.
He becomes a foe of Andrew Jackson and my favorite aspect of his career was the fact that he was the lone vote against the Indian Policy that created the Trail of Tears. He was not popular, even at home, for this vote, but he felt it was a matter of good conscience.
Through a play that is written using him as the basis for the main character and then some books he gains fame, but not wealth. Even an autobiography did not help get him out of debt and by the time he loses his seat he has long lost his second wife who he abandoned. She and the children were not even part of his autobiography. In fact the coon skin cap was a myth created by these publications and the Davy Crockett Almanac.
His boast when he ran for election in Tennessee the last time was that if he lost they could go to Hell and he would go to Texas. After losing that was the direction he went, not because he wanted to fight, but his acquaintance with the drunk Sam Houston convinced him that was where there was land and opportunity and he thought perhaps he could get elected once again. The book also demonstrates that slavery that was outlawed by the Mexicans was the driving force, as well as land greed. In reflection the bad portrayals of Mexico in this unjustified war and land grab do not do justice to the truth. General Santa Anna, president of Mexico said, “Shall we permit those wretches to moan in chains any longer in a country whose kind laws protect the liberty of man without distinction of cast or color?”
Crockett and Houston split as well since Houston was an Andrew Jackson man and this caused Crockett to go to San Antonio where he would be welcomed by the whig faction of Texas. We also learn that James Bowie’s reputation has also had a lot of alteration. He profited by helping Lafitte bring his load of slaves to New Orleans and sell them. Then he sold fraudulent land claims in Arkansas before moving to Texas. There, when his wife died, he became an alcoholic. In fact, it was his brother that commissioned his famous knife. And the third famous name at the Alamo was Travis who came to Texas to avoid bad debts and prison. He abandoned his wife in Alabama and became part of the slave trade in Texas.
Of the three, only Crockett actually deserved a historical recognition and his activities at the Alamo boosted the morale and showed him to be courageous and still charismatic. At one time a candidate for possible presidential nomination until he skipped an entire session of Congress: His land bill was finally passed when his son was in Congress, after Crockett’s death. His life is a mix of reality and myth and the lines and the facts blur when you look too close.
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