![]() ![]() forces gathered at Indianola for evacuation, Fort Sumter was attacked and a state of war proclaimed. Herbert and his men were slated to leave on March 1, but were not needed after David Emanuel Twiggs surrendered all his troops in Texas, as well as their arms and supplies. In February 1861, one citizen wrote the Colorado Citizen to encourage the county to buy arms and ammunition "in case of invasion by any foe," adding, to ensure that his request would be taken seriously, that such weapons would also be useful "in case of a servile insurrection." Shortly after the secession referendum, Herbert gathered about eighty Colorado County men to again go to Brownsville, this time to help expel the same United States forces that they had attempted to help little more than a year earlier. Though the Colorado Guards had expired, the men who had formed the company remained eager for military action. Tatum and John Samuel Shropshire had replaced Bullington and Hartsfield as lieutenants. By the time of their last parade, Howal A. BRIGADIER GENERAL TATUM 3 MINUTES TO MIDNIGHT FULLThey had paraded in Columbus, in their full dress uniforms, for the last time in February 1860. The now defunct Guards, perhaps hoping to be enrolled as one of the new state militia companies, evidently did not comply with the request for several months. In March, the government called for the return of the rest of the precious pistols for use elsewhere. In February 1860, the state reorganized its militia, eliminating the legal basis for the existence of the Colorado Guards. Whether or not they were involved, Cortina had been effectively defeated before the end of 1859, and the Guards had certainly returned to the county by the following month, in time for four of the modern revolvers with which they had been furnished to be stolen. It is quite possible that they never made it to the subsequent engagements with Cortina, for no record of any glorious exploits on the border by the Guards seems to have survived. Two days after the ball, on November 20, the Guards, numbering about fifty men under Captain Herbert and his lieutenants John Cunningham Upton, James H. Two days before the ball, they met and appointed seven of their members to gather the necessary arms, ammunition, and horses so that the company could go to Brownsville and participate in the fight against Juan Nepomuceno Cortina. By then, they had found a battle to fight. The peaceful existence of the Colorado Guards continued long enough for them to parade again through Columbus, and to conduct another ball, this one on November 18, 1859. The patriotic fervor of the evening would soon ring hollow. To conclude the festivities, that evening, the Guards sponsored a ball at the courthouse. The barbecue featured more speeches, and a special recitation of the United States Declaration of Independence by local schoolteacher Philip Riley. Before the barbecue, a number of Columbus women who had purchased a flag for the unit presented it to them, amidst the requisite speeches, at the courthouse, and the Guards responded with a demonstration of their military prowess. On that day, the Colorado Guards were the focus of a barbecue held in the grove of old, majestic live oaks north of Columbus that would soon become known simply as "the grove" and would regularly host such events. On the Fourth of July, they leaped into even more social prominence. ![]() On April 21, 1859, for instance, they marched through Columbus to commemorate the anniversary of the Battle of San Jacinto. Thereafter, though they began taking target practice, they remained mostly a ceremonial unit. Herbert, had gone to Austin and secured armaments for his men. ![]() In March 1859, the unit's captain, William J. There had been a militia unit, called the Colorado Guards, in Columbus even before the war. As usual in Colorado County in those days, the march to war was greeted with some enthusiasm. President Abraham Lincoln would order all Confederate ports blockaded and the Confederate government would declare that a state of war existed between the two countries. On April 12, 1861, Confederate forces attacked the fort. Shortly after the creation of the Confederate States of America, the new nation took up the effort, begun by South Carolina, to expel the United States garrison from Fort Sumter in the harbor at Charleston. ![]()
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