The documents include 11 from the Texas revolutionary period, such as an 1836 receipt for supplies signed by Alamo commander William Barret Travis, and 37 financial documents relating to claims paid by Texas in the 1840s and 1850s, the Associated Press reported July 16. The commission learned that the documents were missing when they were put up for auction more than a year ago.
“These are state records and as such they belong to the people of Texas,” said State Archivist Chris LaPlante. The defendants, however, say that the documents were created before Texas became part of the United States in 1845 and therefore are not records that the state can legally seize. They did not dispute having the items or explain how they acquired them.
LaPlante believes the materials were stolen from the archives in the early 1970s, before security was tightened. Nearly 1,000 items were taken from the archives during that period, including an 1836 letter in which Travis vowed not to surrender or retreat from the Mexican army. The letter was sold by Sotheby’s auction house in New York in 2004.
Posted July 21, 2006.