CUNNINGHAM: I recently dedicated a handful of posts to my Maryland Cunninghams. Today my other Cunningham family. Like the Marylanders, the immigrant Robert Cunnigham, an Ulster Scot, was a sea captain. He was based out of Philadelphia. He married Lucy Morris about 1783 and fathered three children. Captain Cunningham died at sea in 1791. The widowed Lucy married John Simmons Jr. in 1792.
The eldest son of Lucy and Robert, David Cunningham, married Anna Jennison; sister to Dolly Jennison, who married John W. Simmons Jr. John was the eldest son of John Simmons Jr. and his first wife, believed to be Mary Nelson. The eldest of the Cunningham boys, Robert W. and the eldest of the Simmons boys, James Morris were born days apart in October of 1804.
David and brother-in-law Rufus Jennison operated the first ferry connecting Cincinnati and Covington [KY]. David died from cholera in 1835 or 1836.
Young Robert adapted to river life. Born in Chenango Co., NY, he moved with his family to the river town of Jeffersonville, Indiana during the 1820s. Cunningham worked on flatboats serving the Ohio and Mississippi River towns. He wrote the family in 1832 that he was going to settle in New Orleans. That decision was short-lived. On 4 March 1833, Robert acquired a league of land on Skull Creek in Austin's Texas Colony.
He was probably at Concepcion in late 1835, when the Texas militia moved to San Antonio de Bexar. Cunningham was a sergeant and second gunner in Captain T.L.F. Parrott's artillery company.
On 4 December 1835, the Texans attacked General Cos' garrison at Bexar. On the 10th, Cos surrendered after moving into the old mission-fortress called the Alamo.
Robert wrote his parents in early 1836 that he had joined the Texas Army. By late February, the Texans numbers were at about 150. Among the men stationed at Bexar were Lt. Col. William Barrett Travis in command of the "regulars," Col. James Bowie leading the volunteers and former Tennessee Congressman David Crockett, with a handful of volunteers. Cunningham had been reassigned to Captain Carey's artillery company as a private. Carey's company was assigned to the southwest corner of the Alamo compound.
After a 13 day siege, Generalissimo Santa Ana ordered a pre-dawn attack on the Alamo. The number of defenders had "swelled" to at least 183 by the 6th of March. [It is possible that an additional 25-50 reinforcements joined the fray on the 4th or 5th. By daylight, the battle was over. The Alamo garrison had been put to the sword. There were rumors that 5-7 men had surrendered and were executed on the spot. Travis had fallen early at the north wall. Bowie, near death with typhoid, was killed in his bed, Crockett was killed at the southeast barricade or the small fort at the main gate.
Robert W. Cunningham was probably killed at his post, the SW battery of the Alamo.
No comments:
Post a Comment