Texas Emigration. Caution [manuscript caption title]

London: June 16, 1842. Good.. [4]pp., totaling approximately 1,250 words, on a single folded quarto sheet. Browned and somewhat brittle around the edges, with several small chips resulting in minor loss of a few letters. An anonymous and vitriolic manuscript diatribe arguing against emigration to the Republic of Texas, repeating many of the complaints heaped upon the newly-independent nation by N. Doran Maillard in his The History of the Republic of Texas (published this same year). The author describes himself as "one of three survivors out of 97 Englishmen who were induced to emigrate to the inhospitable swamp called Texas in 1841." The author proceeds to warn potential future emigrants against falling for promotional pitches by "a base set of Yankee Texan Land Sharks," asserting that "certain sickness, if not death, awaits those who may be tempted to emigrate to that land of fevers and disease of all kinds." Most of the message repeats or echoes stories found in Maillard's work, which John Jenkins describes in Basic Texas Books as "the most vitriolic denunciation of the Republic of Texas, written with absolutely no regard for the truth."

The author of the present manuscript certainly adds his own flair to his denunciation of Texas emigration, lambasting Texas as a destination, and decrying the efforts of "Texas land jobbers" for encouraging emigration. The manuscript reads in part: "The country is open but at the same time desolate, being thinly peopled and most unhealthy. In the winter season the whole of that portion of the country now in possession of the Texans (which comprises only the low swamps on the sea coast) is under water, and in summer the power of the Sun renders the climate sickly, a nd consequently labor impossible. The pasturage is as coarse and worthless as the 'sattings' on our English marshes.... The prospect of the Emigrant in Texas is war with the Mexicans & the savage Indians, and a revolt on the part of the African Slaves who will take advantage of the first opportunity offered them to rid themselves of the cruel bondage in which they are now held. Let the public beware of this scheme! Let them but read with moderate caution the tempting baits held out to them and they will at once detect that the Texan Emigration Scheme is too good to be true, but should any poor Englishman fall into the Texan trap, let him not forget this caution from a returned Emigrant."

Railing against the notion that the soil of Texas is fit for European cultivation and that horses and cows can be acquired cheaply, the author uses the same word each time: "false!" He further complains that "the wild horses of the country are nothing but worthless ponies" before pointing out that the danger of the many "venomous Insects, which together with Rattlesnakes, Scorpions, & many other Reptiles whose poison is mortal to the human race, renders every moment of a man's life insecure." He further points out that Texas land speculators "not only want to sell the land, which they, the slave holders of Texas have stolen from the Republic of Mexico, but they want to gt Englishmen into the country in the war now raging in Texas between the Republicans of Mexico and the slave holders of Texas." The author then makes perhaps his most damning assertion: "The object of this war on the part of the Texans is not to fo away with a system of despotism & to establish a form of Government better suited to the advance of civilization & civil & religious freedom. No, the object of the Texans is to murder the natives of the country in order to possess themselves of their lands and to force Slavery in its worst form, on the Republicans of Mexico in order to secure cultivation! This design the Texans cannot execute of themselves, and therefore they want Englishment to do it for them."

The author of the message refers to Maillard's book several times, closing with a promotional pitch of his own: "Those who want historical & general information on Texas can obtain it in almost every Coffee Shop & at any circulating library, by asking for Maillards History of Texas. Many copies of which work have recently been distributed gratuitously by the author for the benefit of the working classes." By employing such language, the author also positions the present manuscript as a de facto book promotional as well as an interesting entry in the history of book promotionals relating to early Texas. It is also interesting to note that the present manuscript was written at the height of the British debate over the recognition of the new Republic of Texas. As such, the present text may have been intended to be printed as a broadside arguing against such recognition, though we are unable to find the text of the work in any known source. Regardless, the British government formally recognized the Republic of Texas on June 28, 1842, less than two weeks after the date on this manuscript. A unique, immediate, and passionate reaction to the prospect of early emigration to the Republic of Texas. (Inventory #: 5475)