Stephens County Commissioners approve placement of ‘Travis letter’ plaque at courthouse

March 03

14:06 2025

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By Carla McKeown/Breckenridge Texas

The Stephens County Commissioners Court voted Monday, Feb. 24, to approve the installation of a bronze plaque featuring the words of William Barret Travis’s famous Alamo letter on courthouse grounds.

Kenneth Raney, a Dallas attorney with deep ties to Stephens County, presented the proposal on behalf of the Alamo Letter Society, a 501(c)(3) organization aiming to place the plaques of the letter at all 254 Texas county courthouses.

“I stand here today in a couple of capacities, three or four, to be exact,” Raney told commissioners, explaining his connection to the county dates back about 65 years to his first hunting trip there. He currently owns property in southwestern Stephens County. “… we feel like we have a vested interest (here).”

His wife, Carolyn Raney is the past president general of the Daughters of the Republic of Texas, and he is the current treasurer general of the Sons of the Republic of Texas, as well as the Stephens County Chair of the Alamo Letter Society. Carolyn is also involved with the Picketville Chapter in Stephens County as an associate member.

Raney described the significance of the Travis letter, written February 24, 1836 — exactly 189 years from the date of the county commissioners’ meeting — noting “as school children, we see the letter in the books. It’s two pages. It was written on one piece of paper, front and back.”

On the Alamo Letter Society’s website, the letter is described as follows:

“February 23, 1836, was the first day of the 13-day siege of the Alamo. On that day, the 26-year-old Alamo Commander, Lt. Col. William Barrett Travis of South Carolina, had only 157 men under his command. He was surrounded by thousands of Mexican soldiers commanded by Mexican President Antonio López de Santa Anna.

The next day, February 24, 1836, he wrote the 220-word Alamo letter addressed ‘To the People of Texas and All Americans in the World.’ This letter, a pleading for reinforcements became known as the ‘Victory or Death’ letter. It is one of the most notable pieces of literature in the English language. It was heroically carried through the Mexican lines by Capt. Albert Martin.

The Travis letter to Texas President Sam Houston brought results, but not enough to turn the tide. At dawn on March 1, 1836, Capt. Albert Martin, with 32 men (himself included) from Gonzales passed the lines of the Mexican Army and entered the walls of the Alamo, never more to leave them.

These 32 citizen soldiers were Texas men, husbands and fathers, owning their own homes and guns, voluntarily organized and trained, determined to change the government that ruled over them. They passed through the lines of an enemy of four thousand to six thousand strong, to join 157 of their countrymen and neighbors, in a fortress doomed to destruction.

Does American history, or any history, ancient or modern, furnish a parallel to such heroism? The Travis letter motivated these men to willingly enter the beleaguered walls of the Alamo, to swell the number of determined citizen soldiers who resolved ‘never to surrender or retreat.'”

The original letter is now housed at the Texas State Library and Archives Commission in Austin.

The proposed plaque in Stephens County will be a copy of the plaque that is on the lawn in front of the Alamo chapel. The monument will feature a two-foot by three-foot, 204-pound bronze reproduction of Travis’s plea for reinforcements during the siege of the Alamo. Kenneth and Carolyn Raney have raised the $4,500 needed for the bronze plaque and will raise the funds for whatever is needed to display the letter, he said at last week’s meeting.

“The Texas Historical Commission has already issued a letter that they have sanctioned this at courthouses,” Raney said, adding the commission recommends placing the monument on courthouse grounds rather than on the building itself. According to Raney, the Alamo Letter Society has already placed similar monuments at 15 or 16 other county courthouses throughout Texas.

The commissioners unanimously approved the proposal, agreeing to add “Stephens County Commissioners Court 2025” to the monument. They will decide on how and where to display the plaque at a later date. A dedication ceremony will be planned once the installation is complete.

At the same meeting, the commissioners also approved a request by J.D. Wilson to support the placement of a historical marker at the site of the former Booker T. Washington School in Breckenridge. Click here to read that story.

This picture from the dedication ceremony of an Alamo Letter monument at the Reeves County Courthouse in Pecos, shows one way that Stephens County could choose to display a similar plaque in Breckenridge. (Photo courtesy of the Alamo Letter Society)

Cutline, top photo: Kenneth Raney speaks to the Stephens County Commissioners Court on Monday, Feb. 24, about installing a monument featuring the words of the letter that Lt. Col. William Barret Travis sent to Texas President Sam Houston on Feb. 24, 1836, asking for help in protecting the Alamo from the Mexican army. The commissioners approved the monument. (Photo by Tony Pilkington/Breckenridge Texan)