From Boston Elite to Tragic Texas Filibuster: Augustus Magee and his Republican Army of the North

Abstract

From Boston Elite to Tragic Texas Filibuster:Augustus Magee and his Republican Army of the North James Aalan Bernsen (bio) Click for larger view View full resolution Augustus Magee's grave marker, La Bahía, Texas. Courtesy of Presidio La Bahía. [End Page 172] In June 1812, with war on the horizon between the United States and England, Augustus William Magee, a young U.S. Army lieutenant on the Louisiana frontier, threw away a promising military career and cast his lot with a Mexican revolutionary, José Bernardo Gutiérrez de Lara, in a bold attempt to liberate Texas from the Spanish Empire. The Gutiérrez-Magee Expedition, which resulted from this partnership, has long been neglected by historians, and no aspect more so than the background of its first commander. Onto this blank canvas, historians have painted assumptions, illusions, and fantasies that have led to far more generalized—and equally incorrect—dogmas about the origins and motivations of the largest and most successful filibuster in early Texas history. Stripping away these inventions and provable errors, and considering newly discovered family and army records among other sources, we can piece together Magee's route to Texas and throw important light on the broader question of what motivated Americans to fight in a war of choice on the side of Mexican revolutionaries. Augustus Magee has long been mired in obscurity. Previous histories have uncovered scant biographical information; they have noted that he was from Boston and had graduated from West Point, but not much more. [End Page 173] The one attempt at a biography of the officer reduces his entire pre-expedition background to a mere sentence. Furthermore, these accounts are riddled with errors. Magee is variously described as second or third in his class at West Point despite the fact that class rankings were not implemented until seven years after his graduation (his "rank," therefore, was a mere coincidence of the calendar). Various accounts state emphatically that he was stationed at Fort Jessup on the Louisiana frontier, even though this fort was not established until 1822—nine years after Magee had died.1 These inaccuracies are compounded by the paltry historical footprint of a man who left few letters, has no known likeness, and died young. What has previously been known about him came from the pen of American special envoy William Shaler, who described Magee as "very tall, very robust, of a handsome person, and countenance, a very commanding appearance as an officer, and of prepossessing manners." Shaler also said Magee was "one of the best-informed officers of his age in the American army, and as far as I have been able to judge of his acquirements he is qualified to add lustre to the American name in the cause he has chosen." Newly discovered family and army records, among other sources, can expand on this otherwise paltry account of a man so crucial to the history of early Texas.2 Augustus Magee was born in Boston in 1789 to James and Margaret Magee. The elder Magee had been born in County Down, Ireland, in 1750, emigrated to North America, and while still in his twenties became a ship's captain. He sailed as a privateer in the American Revolution until his capture in 1781. After the war, he prospered as a trader and married Margaret Elliot, the Bostonian daughter of a successful tobacco dealer. They had nine children. Augustus was the third and youngest son.3 James Magee's life took a prosperous new turn after his wife's niece married Thomas Handasyd Perkins, son of one of the city's great mercantile families. Magee and Perkins formed a partnership and soon became among the leading American merchants in the growing China trade. [End Page 174] Young Augustus was born shortly after his father left on a four-year trip to the Pacific Northwest and the Orient, during which James Magee became the first American to visit Hawaii. The expedition turned an enormous profit, and Magee returned a wealthy man. When Augustus was nine, his father purchased the opulent former mansion of Massachusetts royal governor William Shirley, which sat on thirty-three acres in...