However, his forces continued to invade the Republic of Texas with the goal of regaining control, particularly of the territory between the Rio Grande and Nueces River.

After a separate favorable Texian engagement earlier in the day, a reinforcement company of 54 Texas militia, mostly from Fayette County, under the command of Nicholas Mosby Dawson, began advancing on the rear of the Mexican Army.

More men joined the Texan's force at La Grange; they then Marched to Ciudad Mier under the command of William S. Fisher.

The Mexicans army took 243 Texans as prisoner and marched them toward Mexico City via Matamoros, Tamaulipas, and Monterrey, Nuevo León.

On February 11, 1843, 181 Texans escaped but, by the end of the month, the lack of food and water in the mountainous Mexican desert resulted in 176 of them surrendering or being recaptured.

By this time, diplomatic efforts on behalf of Texas by the foreign ministers of the United States and Great Britain led Santa Anna to compromise: he said one in ten of the prisoners would be killed.

A witness recalled that Cocke held up the bean between his forefinger and thumb, and with a smile of contempt, said, "Boys, I told you so; I never failed in my life to draw a prize.

[3] Captain Ewen Cameron had drawn a white bean, but was ordered executed anyway by Santa Anna a month later while being held at Perote Prison.

[citation needed] The survivors who picked white beans, including Bigfoot Wallace and Samuel Walker, finished the march to Mexico City.

They were later imprisoned at Perote Prison in the state of Veracruz, along with the 15 survivors of the Dawson Massacre and about 35 other men captured by General Adrián Woll in San Antonio.

Captain John E. Dusenbury, who was a white bean survivor, returned to El Rancho Salado and exhumed the remains of his comrades.

La Grange citizens retrieved the remains of the men killed in the Dawson Massacre from their burial site near Salado Creek in Bexar County.