Were Alamo defenders ‘heroic’?

Lt. Col. William B. Travis was nine days from his death at the Alamo, alongside about 200 others, when he wrote a desperate appeal for help in the struggle of Texas independence from Mexico.

Mexican Gen. Antonio López de Santa Anna had laid siege to the mission, he wrote, and Travis had already declined to lay down his arms. “I have answered the demand with a cannon shot, & our flag still waves proudly from the walls — I shall never surrender or retreat.”

There was no retreat. The defenders were killed within two hours on Mar. 6, 1836, and the few survivors were executed. Initially forgotten, the battle site later became a shrine of Texan pride, with the defenders often likened to Greek warriors tragically bested at Thermopylae.

But were the defenders heroes?