I remember that the KT, Donovan, and Cash had significantly different versions of the words and music, but I haven't heard any of them in a long time. For some reason I remember Donovan singing "Jim Bowie lay dying, his blood and his powder were dry", which is pretty weird, rather than the words posted in this thread.

Regular armies of that time never seemed to understand how effective American irregular forces, with "their superior technology, careful control of their rate of fire, and higher lethality of fire" to borrow Guest's words, really were. The British marching into the combined rifle and artillery fire of Jackson and Lafitte's men at New Orleans is an obvious example.

Texas ranging companys were assigned to the US Army in Mexican War. Regular American officers initially dismissed them as ill-disciplined and disrespectful, but as the war progressed the Texan irregulars played somc key roles. The Mexican army was well on the way to defeating Taylor at the Battle of Monterrey until the Texans, along with some US Infantry, captured the Mexican heavy artillery on the high ground. And at Cerro Gordo Santa Anna (remember Santa Anna) had a commanding position across the road to the City of Mexico until the Texas irregulars found a path through the mountains that allowed Scott flank Santa Anna.

Regular armies of modern times still have problems with irregulars such as the French Resistance, the IRA, the Viet Cong, or Mahdi Militias, don't they?

- Phil

One more story then I'll shut up. In the Mexican War one of the reasons the regular army officers thought the Texan irregulars were rude was that the irregulars addressed all commanding officers, regardless of rank, as captain.

As mentioned earlier in this thread, Spanish infantry units based in Presidios were unable to protect the frontier. The Anglos, all the way back to Austin's colonies, instead organized mobile, mounted ranging companies for frontier defense. Each company was commanded by a captain, as is a company in most armies. Since captain was they highest rank used by most Texans, it may be that they were using the word captain as a synonym for the guy in charge, rather that being disrespectful. I doubt it, though. I prefer to think that the Texans were perfectly aware of the US officer's actual ranks but preferred to be disrespectful.