TEXAS SUPREME COURT HISTORICAL SOCIETY

ased on oral tradition, of Mrs. Eberly firing the cannon. 53 Gray suggested in his account in the Texas Scrap-Bookthat a woman fired the cannon. If so, there were few other women left in town who would have had an opportunityto set the charge. No woman’s name other than Angelina Eberly appears in the primary records.According to one account, Angelina first shifted the cannon’s aim a bit to the left, and then set off a chargeof a canister of grapeshot to a chorus of shouts of “Blow the old house to pieces!” 54 Eberly’s charge resulted inthree to eight small holes in the wooden Land Office structure, but no injuries to the wagoneers or their stock. 55The few remaining citizens of Austin, alerted by the sulfurous blast of the cannon and the clatter ofgrapeshot or canister, began to pour into the streets to come to her defense, only to see the backs of Houston’sdelegation as they hurried out of range on the muddy road north.Journal map by David Kroll, reflecting the path that Angelina Eberly’s howitzer shot took toward the wagoneers loadingboxed land records at the General Land Office, based on Dorman H. Winfrey’s article analyzing the Archive War.53Skinner, “Mrs. Eberly,” 4, citing Gray, Scrap-Book; Frank Brown, Annals of Travis County and Austin, X, 3, and Judge Joseph Lee,the latter of which only mentioned that “a lady brought a brand from a dwelling and gave it to the men to fire the gun.”54Kerr, “Embattled.”55Skinner, “Mrs. Eberly,” 4; Gray, Scrap-Book, 143. Gray reports the number of holes as three.47