Dear Mr. Miranda: Love the play, but it's missing Texas

You’ve heard of Lafayette. You’ve heard of Hamilton

But what about the namesake of a town called Galveston?

‘Ran the Brits out the Gulf, a proud son of Spain

His story is victorious, now get him in the play!

My dear Mr. Miranda,

Your rip-roaring musical "Hamilton" has entered its final week here in Austin. We love it. But Texas is missing from the script. The easiest way to rectify this is to write in Bernardo de Galvez — you know, the Lafayette of the southwest. You could start by adding a scene that begins something like this:

What’s up mon amigos, I’m Don B de G

I’m friends with Thomas Jefferson and Patrick Henry

‘Cut my teeth in Texas, manning frontier raids

So I knew a thing or two when the Revolution came

It’s got potential right? During the Revolutionary War, Galvez smuggled beacoup supplies to the Patriots from his base in New Orleans. Then he raised an army and booted the Brits out of the deep South.

It’s ’76, B’s the guv of ‘ouisiana

He takes his orders from El Rey de España

Like a Frenchman you mention—Marquis de Lafayette

Galvez is a Lancelot of the ‘lutionary set.

Galvez was sent to Texas in 1769, to captain a frontier force. In 1779, the King of Spain tasked him with invading “the Floridas,” lands that today we call Mississippi, Alabama and — you’ve guessed it — Florida. Those lands had been poached by the British from Spain in the 1760s, so the revolution was an opportunity to get them back.

Galvez, who at the time was governor of Louisiana, faced a major issue: how to feed his forces. This is where Texas comes in. According to documents at UT Austin’s Briscoe Center for American History, over 10,000 head of cattle were driven from San Antonio to New Orleans between 1779 and 1782 — a mammoth undertaking. With his forces beefed up, Galvez captured Mobile, Natchez and Pensacola. By the summer of 1781 — 6 months before Cornwallis surrendered— British power had been destroyed along the Gulf of Mexico.

Galvez may not have dreamed of life without the monarchy, but he certainly made the enemy panicky with his shot. In fact, his actions ensured that the Patriots couldn’t be encircled early in the war and that Cornwallis couldn’t be reinforced at its end. The founders understood the significance of this. “The weight of your powerfull and wealthy Empire, has given us, all the certainty of a happy Issue to the present Contest,” Thomas Jefferson wrote to Galvez. But remember, Galvez couldn’t have done it without the vaqueros of San Antonio de Bexar. In other words, longhorn beef won the Revolutionary War.

Cleary, Mr. Miranda, you can see the error of your ways. I look forward to you correcting these oversights in all future performances of "Hamilton." Have a look at the lyric below and have your agent call mine.

Ben Wright

Aged 37 and a half

1-7-7-9, King Carlos drops a line

“Don B, get those Brits out the south”

So I muster force: every man, gun and horse

I can find west of Mississippi’s mouth

Now the weather’s kinda balmy and you gotta feed an army

But the closest steaks are down in San Antone

While the British are conniving, my vaqueros start a drivin’

All the bulls and mother heifers to my zone

From Bexar to New Orleans, is a trek fraught and mean

Still, Tejanos drive thousands of cattle

The weather is atrocious, there’s disease in Nacadoghes

But the meal train arrives in time for battle

With my troops fully fed, pesky Brits are getting bled

We capture Mobile and Pensacola

With the French on the coast, it’s a full British roast

To the world’s newest nation, we say hola

[Cannon sounds. Dancing.]

Wright is a writer, curator and researcher at the Briscoe Center for American History at the University of Texas.