Susanna Dickinson
Susanna Wilkerson Dickinson (c. 1814 – October 7, 1883) and her infant daughter, Angelina, were among the few American survivors of the 1836 Battle of the Alamo during the Texas Revolution.
The Dickinsons then constructed a blacksmith shop there and made investments in fellow colonist George Kimbell's Gonzales hat business.
[5] As the Mexican soldiers began to yell and their buglers sounded, the Texan defenders awakened and rushed to their posts.
Almaron Dickinson briefly slipped from his post manning a cannon in the chapel to join Susanna in the sacristy.
Dickinson, Gregorio Esparza, Bonham, and the remaining Texians grabbed rifles and fired before being bayoneted to death.
[13] As soldiers approached the sacristy, one of defender Anthony Wolf's sons stood to pull a blanket over his shoulders and was killed.
[12] Possibly the last Texian to die in battle was Jacob Walker,[14] who attempted to hide behind Susanna and the other women; four Mexican soldiers killed him in front of them.
Susanna refused; the offer was not extended to fellow Alamo survivor Juana Navarro Alsbury for her son of similar age.
[19] Each woman received $2 and a blanket and was allowed to go free and spread the news of the destruction that awaited those who opposed the Mexican government.
[19] When the small party of survivors arrived in Gonzales on March 13, they found Sam Houston, the commander of all Texian forces, waiting there with about 400 men.
[24] This began the Runaway Scrape, in which much of Texas' population, including the acting government, rushed eastward to escape the advancing Mexican army.
She married a fourth time on Dec 7, 1847, to a man named Peter Belles, but they divorced in 1857, allegedly due to her having an affair.
On Dec 9, 1857 she married a fifth and final time to a man named Joseph W. Hannig, a cabinet maker, and with whom she remained for the rest of her life.
[28] Susanna's daughter Angelina married at age 17, to a farmer supposedly hand-picked by her mother, but later the marriage ended in divorce.
Other important events dramatized in the film include her being captured in the chapel at bayonet point, and her electing to stay as Santa Anna allows the other women to leave the fort before the battle.
After the battle, Col. Black (David Ogden Stiers) enters the room where the women and children are hiding and says that Santa Anna wishes to meet with her.
