Denise McVea's Speech wanted to keep their slaves.

International Woman's Day March

During the height of the
Plaza del Zacate, San Antonio,
Revolution, the framers of the
Texas
Texas Constitution drafted this
March 5, 2011
provision:
___________________________________

Greetings, Brothers and Sisters, "No free person of

African descent shall be
And congratulations on your permitted to emigrate
continued commitment to human and reside in the
rights, and women's rights in republic, unless by
particular. special act of Congress,
which must specify the
My name is Denise McVea. I am the person by name. This
director of the Auris Project and article shall not be
author of MAKING MYTH OF EMILY, construed to prohibit
a history book that explores the life emigrants from
bringing their slaves
of the woman who inspired the
into the country...and
Yellow Rose of Texas legend, Emily no free people of color
West de Zavala. shall ever be admitted
to reside in this
As you know, this year marks the republic after the
175th Anniversary of the Battle of ratification of this
the Alamo and the Texas constitution."
Revolution. On this date in 1836,
Texas belonged to Mexico, but the On April 21, 1836 the Texan rebels
Texans were rebelling. They sought massacred a Mexican Army that
independence from Mexico for outnumbered them by the
three primary reasons: thousands. The Battle at San
Jacinto lasted less than 20 minutes
1. Santa Anna, Mexican president and is considered one of the most
and general and notorious decisive battles in the history of
mujeriego, had just named himself the world. Texas had won its
emperor; independence from Mexico.
2. The Texans were unhappy with Historians have marveled at the
high tariffs, Texans' unlikely victory in 1836.
How did this ragtag militia of
3. And -although you will rarely see
poorly trained rebels overcome
this in history books- Mexico had
a massive invading army?
abolished slavery, and the Texans
According to the Yellow Rose of
Texas legend, a beautiful yellow-
skinned black American
slave/servant/prostitute/spy named
Emily West seduced and distracted
Santa Anna in his battlefield tent.
Esa mulata kept him so occupied
with her sensual wiles that he
forgot he was fighting a war. That
is the gist of one of the most
enduring historical myths in the
United States.
But is it true?
I spent more than 10 years
researching that question, and
eventually I found the answer: no,
the legend is not true. But, I DID
find the Emily West they talk about
and she WAS black. BUT she was
not a slave, or a servant, or a
prostitute or a spy.
She was the wife of the interim
vice president of Texas, Lorenzo de
Zavala.
Yes that's right: the second lady
of Revolutionary Texas was a
black woman.
She followed her husband to Texas
in 1835. Partly because she arrived
in the company of her husband's
business partner, James Morgan,
and because she was black,
historians thought she must
have belonged to Morgan. She
did not. Still, for more than a
century she was called Emily
Morgan.
According to the historical record,
Emily was unwelcome here in
Texas. She and her husband never
intended to stay here. But he died
in his home at Buffalo Bayou just a
few months after the Battle of San
Jacinto. Emily, bless her heart, died
in Houston at the reported age of
70. Lorenzo and Emily's
granddaughter, Adina de Zavala,
became well known in 1908 as the
"Savior of the Alamo" when she
barricaded herself inside to prevent
developers from razing it. But her
experiences are telling, too:
Alamo custodians insisted that a
plaque in her honor be placed off
Alamo grounds.
As my research progressed, I found
in the original records what were
clear signs of a family responding
to great official repression, despite
their high station in life.
And I found something else: a
contemporary historical community
in Texas that twisted itself into
knots to avoid the obvious: that
one of Texas' most prominent
female pioneers was black.
In Texas, I learned, there are two
historical records.
1. There is the historical
record that is carefully
preserved by
thoughtful custodians
in archives across the
state. And
 historical record itself. If it
happened to reveal something that
2. There is what I call the
contradicted the sexy legend,
"incoherent
then it was routinely ignored,
patchwork" historical
misrepresented, or unconvincingly
record. This is the
explained away.
record certain
prominent white male I saw the routine dismissal of
historians construct to authentic, original documents. And
preserve a world view I saw numerous documents that
that is acceptable to were created and inserted into
them. (Now, not all Texas archives by people who
white men, given the had no connection to the actual
authority to falsify event. I saw a Texas university
historical accounts, pay $25,000 for a fraudulent
would do so. ) I am document that clearly had no
saying that the ones provenance, then present it to the
that I encountered here public as authentic, original text.
in Texas did, and they
But most disturbing: I saw how
did so in the most
passively and unquestioningly
arrogant and
we the general public consumed
superior fashion.)
the incoherent patchwork record.
My experiences with top historians
I saw how little honesty we
in Texas during this project can
required from the people who
only be described as harrowing.
tell us about ourselves. I still get
These historians frequently
embarrassed when I think of how
scheduled panels about Emily at
often I told the sexualized and false
every opportunity to tell their side
account of Emily's story.
of the story, the story that
insisted that Emily was a Take Arizona, for instance. The
whore, but were careful not to incoherent patchwork record
inform or invite me. As an says that immigrants are the cause
investigative journalist, I expected of economic problems in Arizona,
to find some disagreement and therefore harsh discriminatory anti-
skepticism regarding the immigration laws are needed. But
premise of my book, and even the actual, valid record reveals
some hostility towards me. that those laws were hatched in a
motel meeting room in 2009 as a
What I did not expect to find was
way to create new revenue
the hostility towards the actual
streams for Exxon, Big Tobacco,
and members the NRA. Jails for
women and their children.

Our history is richer, more

nuanced, and more varied than we
have been allowed to see. We as a
people are more connected, more
related, more powerful than we
fully understand. If Emily's story
taught me anything, it is that
our history is more than just
battlefields, and forts and
dying. And women's part in it was
more than just knitting, and
milking and birthing. We as
women, and as people who love
women, have to do a better job of
tending to the historical record. We
must be vigilant in determining
what is true about us and our
past and what is false.

We have to pay attention. We

have to ask questions.

We have to follow up. We have to

stay awake.

If you'd like to learn more about

Emily, please visit us at the Auris
Project table.

Thank you!