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Rusk, along with friend and fellow Texas patriot Sam Houston, became one of the state's first U.S. senators.
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Gen. Thomas Jefferson Rusk
Soldier Who Fought For Texas Liberty Later Served As State's First U.S. Senator
By Bethanne Kelly Patrick
Military.com Columnist
General of the Army of Texas Thomas Jefferson Rusk had just escorted the defeated Mexican commander on the famous "Filisola's Retreat." He wished to make sure that Filisola did not stop in Goliad -- and there, Rusk and his men were confronted with the ghastly sight of the remains of the men in Fannin's Command, who had been massacred by the Mexicans. Bodies had been dumped and burned in partially covered trenches. Bones gnawed by coyotes and wild dogs were found on the ground.
Rusk immediately gave orders for a formal military burial of the bodies, and on June 3, 1836, the ceremony took place with a procession, a gun salute, and solemn mourners, including "those of [Fannin's Command] who were in the army [and] who have so miraculously escaped." Rusk himself provided the eulogy, saying, "we have a consolation yet to offer [the fallen]; their murderers sank in death on the prairies of San Jacinto …"
On April 21, 1836, the "Texian" army, under "Old Sam Jacinto" Houston and with Gen. Rusk in control, had met the Mexican Army at San Jacinto in a clash of frontiersman versus conquistador. Their victory at San Jacinto on April 21, 1836, is considered one of the most decisive battles in history, for it resulted in Texan independence from Mexico, followed by Texan statehood, and led directly to the Mexican War of 1846-48, from which the United States gained the lands from the Rockies to the Pacific.
Rusk eventually became Sam Houston's secretary of war during the days of the Texas Republic. Both men had signed the Texas Declaration of Independence in 1836, and together they took their seats in 1846 as the first two U.S. senators from Texas. Rusk was still serving in that body when, despondent over his wife's death, his took his own life in 1857.
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