Henry Teal fancied himself a leader of men and hoped to direct Texas troops to victory against the Mexican Army at San Jacinto.

However, the East Texan came down with the measles and missed the April 1836 battle. Then he was captured by Mexican officials. Finally, on May 5, 1837, a disgruntled Texas soldier ingloriously ended Teal's life with a pistol shot.

Henry Teal was born around 1800 (we're not sure where) and by 1826 had settled near San Augustine in deep East Texas. When the Texas War of Independence broke out, Teal joined the Texas Army and helped take San Antonio from Mexican troops in December 1835.

He was commissioned a captain, traveled to San Augustine to raise a company of East Texas troops and rejoined Gen. Sam Houston's army. When the Texans caught up with Mexican troops at San Jacinto, Teal figured the battle would be an opportunity for glory and a higher rank in the army.

But Teal got the measles and was laid up on a pallet when Texas won the battle and independence from Mexico.

Thrown in jail

Teal got a second chance for recognition when he and Henry Wax Karnes were ordered to Matamoros, Mexico, as Texas commissioners to negotiate the exchange of prisoners with Mexican officials.

In Mexico, Teal and Karnes heard rumors that Mexico was planning another invasion of Texas. Mexican officials feared Teal and Karnes knew too much and had the Texans thrown into jail. During their incarceration, the men wrote secret letters telling of the invasion. The letters were hidden inside a hollow buggy-whip handle and smuggled out of Mexico.

When the letters reached Texas officials, there was widespread panic. Many Texans fled their homes. Entire villages were deserted by residents fearful of another invasion. Militia units were raised and hundreds of Texans marched to the Mexican border, ready to do battle.

In the meantime, Teal and Karnes managed to escape their captors and return to Texas.

No Mexican invasion occurred. Many Texans believed no invasion was ever planned and blamed Teal and Karnes for creating unnecessary chaos.

One contemporary Texan called Teal "a half-instructed martinet, with none of the tact and discrimination so essential for the command of soldiers among whom mutiny is chronic. The result was that he became the object of hatred to his men."

Assassination

On May 5, 1837, that hatred turned into violence. Teal, by now a major, was with the Texas Army at Camp Independence (also known as Camp Bowie), an encampment in present-day Jackson County near Victoria. That night, in the middle of a thunderstorm, an angry Texas soldier tiptoed to Teal's tent and shot Teal to death while he slept.

(The murder occurred only weeks after Felix Huston and Albert Sidney Johnston fought a duel at the same camp over who would command the Texas Army. Huston shot Johnston, who recovered to win fame as a Civil War general.)

Angered by the shooting incidents and lack of discipline in the camp, Sam Houston, now president of the Republic of Texas, furloughed most of the army and several hundred soldiers went home.

In late May 1837, a Texas soldier named Joshua Davis wrote Kentucky kinfolk from Camp Bowie:

"In the last (letter) I wrote I think I spoke of the murder of Col. Teal. Since that time to the present the Army has been quiet. No enemy is expected in Texas this summer."

Van "Campfire" Craddock's e-mail address is vancraddock@sbcglobal.net