Ole Devil at San Jacinto (Old Devil Hardin Western Book 4) Read online

  xlvii One of the problems when charging a muzzle loading rifle was to ensure a tight enough fit to make the barrel’s rifling grooves take effect. Ramming home a bullet large enough to achieve this was difficult and caused a decrease in accuracy due to the distortion of its shape. So a ball slightly smaller than the size of the bore and wrapped in a ‘patch’ made from a small, well greased piece of soft cloth, or thin hide was used.

  xlviii The yanagi-ha corresponds with such utilitarian Occidental arrow points as the Bear 4-Blade Razorheads described in the ‘Bunduki’ series.

  xlix Seppuku: ‘disembowelment’, a ritual suicide, also vulgarly called hari-kiri, ‘belly-slitting’. If a Samurai transgressed in certain ways against the code of bushido, he was under an obligation to take his own life and usually did this by a ritualized form of disembowelment. The reason for Tommy Okasi having to have Japan did not fall into such a category. See APPENDIX TWO.

  l According to Presidente Santa Anna’s official communiqué, over six hundred Texians were killed at a cost of ‘about seventy Mexicans dead and three hundred wounded’.

  li During the final assault on the Alamo Mission, General Manuel Fernandez Castrillón showed hesitation when Presidente Santa Anna ordered him to shoot six prisoners who were taken. Wishing to demonstrate their devotion to duty, the members of el Presidente’s staff—who had taken no part in the actual fighting—drew their swords and carried out the ‘executions’ with such vigor that they almost included Castrillón among their victims.

  lii In General Houston’s opinion, the ‘Runaway Scrape’ had a worse effect on morale than any of the misfortunes which had befallen the Texians. He informed the Government via its Secretary of War, ‘Your removal to Harrisburg has done more to increase the panic in the country than anything else that has occurred in Texas, except the fall of the Alamo’.

  liii Unfortunately, for political reasons, Major General Houston was advised to make no reference to the trick which had been played on Presidente Santa Anna. So neither Ole Devil Hardin nor Lieutenant Dimmock could be given the credit they deserved. All that could be said was the latter had died showing great courage during a patrol which encountered a large body of Mexican soldiers.

  livHow is told in OLE DEVIL AND THE MULE TRAIN.

  lv Ole Devil Hardin's summation was correct. Presidente Santa Anna had left General Ramirez Sesma and a thousand men at Thompson’s Ferry, hoping to trap the Republic of Texas’s Army between them and the force led by General Vincente Filisola which was escorting the baggage train if they responded to his insulting message.

  lvi As is explained in GET URREA, there was a far more sinister reason for the departure of the Tamaulipa Brigade.

  lvii Colonel Juan Almonte fled from the field of battle unscathed, but on discovering that all avenues of escape were blocked, returned after the fighting was over to surrender ‘with honor’.

  lviii For details, read GET URREA and THE QUEST FOR BOWIE'S BLADE.

  lix Ole Devil Hardin never attained the skill of another member of the clan to whom Tommy Okasi imparted the secrets of ju-jitsu and karate. This was Captain Dustine Edward Marsden ‘Dusty’ Fog, C.S.A., details of whose career are given in the author’s Floating Outfit and Civil War series. Ole Devil's 'granddaughter', Betty Hardin, also acquired considerable ability in both these martial arts.

  lx Some researchers claim that James Bowie’s oldest brother, Rezin Pleasant, was the actual designer of the knife.

  lxi The dimensions have been duplicated by master cutler William D. ‘Bo’ Randall, Jr., of Orlando, Florida, in his Model 12 ‘Smithsonian’ bowie knife, one of which is carried by James Allenvale ‘Bunduki’ Gunn, see: BUNDUKI, BUNDUKI AND DAWN and SACRIFICE FOR THE QUAGGA

  GOD and FEARLESS MASTER OF THE JUNGLE.

  lxii Jonathan Browning’s eldest son, John Moses (1855-1926) became the world’s most prolific and, arguably, finest designer of firearms. He makes a ‘guest appearance’ in: CALAMITY SPELLS TROUBLE.

  lxiii While engaged in manufacturing the Slide Repeating rifle, Jonathan Browning also developed a rifle which could be discharged six times in succession. The ammunition was held in a cylinder similar to that of later revolvers, but there was no mechanism and it had to be rotated manually after each shot. While the same caliber—approximately .45—and almost ten inches shorter, it was more bulky and weighed twelve pounds, two ounces. It was not offered for sale until he had settled in Council Bluffs, Utah, in 1852. By that time, due to the ever increasing availability of Samuel Colt’s mechanically superior rifles and revolvers, it too had become redundant.

  lxiv Samurai: a member of the Japanese lower nobility’s elite warrior class, who usually served as a retainer for the Daimyos, the hereditary feudal barons. A master-less Samurai who became a mercenary was known as a Ronin. From the mid-1800s, increased contact with the Western Hemisphere brought an ever growing realization that the retention of a hereditary and privileged warrior class was not compatible with the formation of a modern and industrialized society. Various edicts issued by the Emperor between 1873 and 1876 abolished the special rights of the Samurai and, although some of their traditions, concepts and military skills were retained, they ceased to exist in their original form.

  lxv The various members of the Hardin, Fog and Blaze clan with whom I discussed the subject while visiting Fort Worth, Texas, said that, because of the circumstances and the high social standing of the people involved—all of whom have descendants holding positions of influence and importance in Japan at the time of writing—it is inadvisable even at this late date to make public the facts concerning the reason for Tommy Okasi’s departure.

  lxvi Traditionally, the daisho was carried thrust into the sash about the Samurai’s waist; in which case, the longer sword was called a katana. As Tommy Okasi spent a considerable amount of his time on horseback after he arrived in the United States, he found it more convenient to wear his suspended by their sheaths on either side of a leather belt.

  lxviiAfter the blade had been shaped by fusing together numerous layers of steel, it was ready to be tempered. A clay-like material, for which every master swordsmith had his own secret recipe, was applied to the whole of the blade apart from an inch or so at the.tip and along the entire cutting edge. After heating the blade to the correct temperature—which by tradition was commenced in the half light of the early morning — it was plunged into a tub of cold water. The exposed metal cooled instantly and became very hard. Being encased in the clay sheath, the rest of the metal lost its heat more gradually and, remaining comparatively soft, was given a greater pliancy. To prove that the finished product was capable of carrying out the work for which it was intended, the smith beat it against a sheet of iron and hacked to pieces the body of a dead criminal before handing it over to the owner. This is, of course, only a simplified description of the process.

  lxviii Unlike Occidental ‘self’ bows of the period, with the stave formed from a single billet of timber, the Japanese weapon was built of three bamboo strips sheathed on two sides with mulberry wood. This formed a core which was encased by further lengths of bamboo, the whole pasted by fish glue and painted with lacquer. By laminating the bamboo and the softer, more pliable, mulberry wood, a great strength and flexibility was achieved.

  How Tommy Okasi strung his bow is described in: OLE DEVIL AND THE MULE TRAIN and a comparison with one Occidental method when using a modern recurved—where the ends of the limbs are bent back from the straight line—composite hunting bow (with some form of fiberglass limbs and a wooden handle-riser) can be made by reading: SACRIFICE FOR THE QUAGGA GOD.

  lxix The traditional Japanese arrow was made from mashinodake, a very hard, straight and thin species of bamboo. After being cut in the winter, the bamboo was left to dry out of doors until spring. After it had been further dried and hardened by being placed close to afire, the joints were carefully smoothed down. When the shaft had been polished with emery powder and water, it was once more exposed to the fire. Finally,
it was fletched with three feathers from a hawk, falcon or eagle and had its

  nock and some form of metal arrowhead affixed.

  The karimata, ‘forked arrow’ point—which Tommy Okasi did not find cause to use on the assignment described in this work—was a two-pronged design with extremely sharp cutting edges. Originally intended to sever ropes and leather armour lacings, it was also an extremely potent weapon. The width varied from one to six inches between the tips of the prongs. Because of the terrible injuries they were capable of inflicting, the larger sizes—none of which Tommy had in his possession—were also called ‘bowel rakers’.

  In conclusion, the author feels that a brief description of the Japanese technique called yabusame—translated literally, 'shooting from a running horse’—may be of interest. In competition, the mounted kyudoka rides at a gallop over a course two cho—roughly two hundred and thirty-eight yards—in length, along which are placed at approximately thirty-eight, one hundred and eighteen and one hundred and ninety-three yards, two foot square wooden targets on posts between thirty-six and forty-eight inches high. Passing them at a distance of around thirty yards, the kyudoka discharges an arrow with a forked head that shatters on impact.

  lxx Although early types of firearms had been known in Japan since the arrival of Portuguese explorers in 1543, the Samurai had small regard for them as weapons and spent little time in learning how to use them.

  lxxi Until the visits by a flotilla under the command of Commodore Perry, United States’ Navy in 1853-54 paved the way, there was little contact between Japan and the Western World.