Some of the buildings inside the walls were of adobe, and they were soon shattered by the cannon balls.  The Texans, covered with smoke and dust and the sweat of battle, were forced back by the press of numbers into the convent yard, and then into the church and hospital.  Here the cannon and rifles in hundreds were turned upon them, but they still fought.  Often, with no time to reload their rifles, they clubbed them, and drove back the Mexican rush.

The Alamo was a huge volcano of fire and smoke, of shouting and death.  Those who looked on became silent again, appalled at the sights and sounds.  The smoke rose far above the mission, and caught by a light wind drifted away to the east.  The Mexican generals brought up fresh forces and drove them at the fortress.  A heavy column, attacking on the south side, where no defenders were now left, poured over a stockade and crowded into the mission.  The circle of cavalry about the Alamo again drew closer, lest any Texan should escape.  But it was a useless precaution.  None sought flight.

In very truth, the last hope of the Alamo was gone, and perhaps there was none among the defenders who did not know it.  There were a few wild and desperate characters of the border, whom nothing in life became so much as their manner of leaving it.  In the culminating moment of the great tragedy they bore themselves as well as the best.

Travis, the commander, and Bonham stood in the long room of the hospital with a little group around them, most of them wounded, the faces of all black with powder smoke.  But they fought on.  Whenever a Mexican appeared at the door an unerring rifle bullet struck him down.  Fifty fell at that single spot before the rifles, yet they succeeded in dragging up a cannon, thrust its muzzle in at the door and fired it twice loaded with grape shot into the room.

The Texans were cut down by the shower of missiles, and the whole place was filled with smoke.  Then the Mexicans rushed in and the few Texans who had survived the grape shot fell fighting to the last with their clubbed rifles.  Here lay Travis of the white soul and beside him fell the brave Bonham, who had gone out for help, and who had returned to die with his comrades.  The Texans who had defended the room against so many were only fifteen in number, and they were all silent now.  Now the whole attack converged on the church, the strongest part of the Alamo, where the Texans were making their last stand.  The place was seething with fire and smoke, but above it still floated the banner upon which was written in great letters the word, “Texas.”

The Mexicans, pressing forward in dense masses, poured in cannon balls and musket balls at every opening.  Half the Texans were gone, but the others never ceased to fire with their rifles.  Within that raging inferno they could hardly see one another for the smoke, but they were all animated by the same purpose, to fight to the death and to carry as many of their foes with them as they could.