<P> Garrison commander James C. Neill went home on family matters February 11, 1836, leaving James Bowie and William B. Travis as co-commanders over the predominantly volunteer force . When the Mexican Army of Operations under the command of Santa Anna arrived in Béxar with 1,500 troops on February 23, the remaining Alamo garrison numbered 150 . Over the course of the next several days, new volunteers arrived inside the fortress while others were sent out as couriers, to forage for food, or to buy supplies . </P> <P> A fierce defense was launched from within the walls, even as Bowie and Travis made unsuccessful attempts to negotiate with the Mexican army . Travis repeatedly dispatched couriers with pleas for reinforcements . Although Santa Anna refused to consider a proposed conditional surrender, he extended an offer of amnesty for all Tejanos inside the fortress to walk away unharmed . Most Tejanos evacuated from the fortress about February 25, either as part of the amnesty, or as a part of Juan Seguín's company of courier scouts on their last run . </P> <P> In response to pleas from Travis, James Fannin started from Goliad with 320 men, supplies and armaments, yet had to abort a day later due to a wagon breakdown . Final reinforcements were able to enter the Alamo during March 1--4, most of them from Gonzales which had become a recruitment camp . Others who had left intending to return were unable to re-enter . At 5: 30 a.m. on March 6, the Mexican army began the final siege . An hour later, all combatants inside the Alamo were dead . The bodies, with the exception of Gregorio Esparza's, were cremated on pyres and abandoned . Esparza's brother Francisco was a soldier in the Mexican army and received permission from Santa Anna for a Christian burial . </P> <P> Juan Seguín oversaw the 1837 recovery of the abandoned ashes and officiated at the February 25 funeral . The March 28 issue of the Telegraph and Texas Register only gave the burial location as where "the principal heap of ashes" had been found . In the following decades, the public wanted to know the location of the burial site, but Seguín gave conflicting statements, perceived as due to age - related memory problems . Remains thought to be those of the Alamo defenders were discovered at the Cathedral of San Fernando during the Texas 1936 centennial, and re-interred in a marble sarcophagus . Purported to hold the ashes of Travis, Bowie and Crockett, some have doubted it can be proven whose remains are entombed there . </P>

What happened to the bodies of the alamo defenders
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