Respectfully Quoted: A Dictionary of Quotations. 1989.
| NUMBER: | 32 |
| AUTHOR: | Thomas Jefferson Green (1801–63) |
| QUOTATION: | Thermopylae had her messenger of defeat—the Alamo had none. |
| ATTRIBUTION: | Attributed to Green is said to have included the sentence in a speech he helped Edward Burleson prepare. While Burleson has often been credited with originating the sentence as well as using it, he lacked the classical education necessary to have made the allusion. The sentence became popular after it was engraved on the first monument to the Alamo, which is located in Austin, Texas. The 10-foot-high statue, made of stones from the Alamo, was destroyed by fire when the Capitol at Austin burned. Another monument subsequently erected on the Capitol grounds also included the sentence.—J. Frank Dobie, “The Alamo’s Immortalization of Words,” Southwest Review, summer 1942, pp. 406–10. |
| SUBJECTS: | Alamo |