Burial Ground Under the Alamo Stirs a Texas Feud
The New York Times
Native Americans built the Alamo and hundreds of converts were buried there. Descendants are now fuming because Texas has rejected efforts to protect the site.
SAN ANTONIO — Raymond Hernandez was a boy when his grandfather would take him on walks to the Alamo, pointing at the grounds around the Spanish mission founded in the 18th century.
“He’d tell me again and again, ‘They built all this on top of our campo santo,’” said Mr. Hernandez, 73, using the Spanish term for cemetery. An elder in San Antonio’s Tāp Pīlam Coahuiltecan Nation, he added, “All the tourists flocking to the Alamo are standing on the bones of our ancestors.”
On a busy day, thousands of visitors explore the Alamo, the site of a pivotal 1836 battle in the Texas Revolution where American settlers fought to secede from Mexico and forge a republic that would become part of the United States.
