In 1832, the Anglo-American settlers were involved in a conflict with Mexican commander John Davis Bradburn (also an Anglo-American) near the northern extent of Trinity Bay at Anahuac, Texas. The settlers were opposed to control of their daily affairs by the centralist government. They were primarily at odds with the administration over the subject of tariffs on imports and exports and over the presence of conscripted criminals in the Mexican garrison at Anahuac located at the confluence of the Trinity river and bay four miles south of the Turtle Bayou crossing, whom the colonists blamed for a number of local crimes. The simmering conflict reached a head when Bradburn took in two escaped enslaved people from Louisiana. Though slavery was officially illegal in Mexico, the Mexican authorities wanted to encourage Anglo-American colonization of the frontier and tolerated indentured servants for ten years, among the colonists. Among that population included three previously enslaved people who escaped from Louisiana and were given asylum by Bradburn. Two local lawyers, William B. Travis and Patrick C. Jack, attempted to return the freed people to the American who claimed to own them but were arrested and held in the Anahuac garrison after they had forged a letter to Bradburn threatening armed intervention from Louisiana militia.[1]
The original site of "Fort Anahuac" is now part of a public park in Anahuac, Chambers County Texas.
The Anglo militia skirmished with Bradburn's troops before retreating north to the crossing on Turtle Bayou near James Taylor White's ranch house to await the arrival of artillery.
The settlers received word that the anti-administration Federalist army had won a significant victory under the leadership of Antonio López de Santa Anna.