Ex-Gov. Sam Houston hasn't used opium in well over a century. Still, political foes' rumors that he was a hophead do crop up.

Presidential hopeful Gov. George W. Bush has indicated that he's been squeaky clean for a quarter-century. But the drug-crazed media won't give the subject a rest.

If Texas' greatest hero couldn't make the rumors go away, what chance does Mr. Bush have? Like Big Sam, he can only shrug it off and move on.

Be it said, Gov. Bush's "youthful indiscretions" wouldn't have raised a jaded eyebrow of Gov. Houston, whose past was the stuff of big black headlines in a supermarket tabloid.

Scandalous past

Despite Houston's political successes and brave war record back in the States, he was burdened with a steamer trunkload of gossipy baggage: a delinquent boyhood, a spectacularly failed marriage and a lengthy besotted stay with the Cherokees. The Indians gifted him with a name, Big Drunk, and a wife, who was a decent one by all accounts.

Scandalously, the Big Drunk physically whipped a political adversary, Congressman William Stanberry of Ohio, in a Washington, D.C., street. Congress verbally scalded Houston.

So go the sins of Sam - too many to tell here.

The opium thing had its beginning, I guess, during Houston's long retreat before the advancing forces of Mexican Presidente and Generalissimo Santa Anna in the spring of 1836.

A spy in Houston's camp gave it an early start. James Hazard Perry (1811-1862), a New Yorker and former West Pointer, was a spy not for the Mexicans but for Houston's arch political rival, an all-around scoundrel named Robert Potter (1799-1842), interim secretary of the Texas navy.

Chance discovery

Potter's creature Perry was acting as aide to the general until unsuspecting Houston, randomly censoring mail on April 9, 1836, opened a Perry-to-Potter letter. Houston steamed when he read Perry's report:

"We are in striking distance of the enemy and there are no signs of moving. Our men are loitering about without knowing more of military tactics at evening than they did in the morning.

"While the general either for want of his customary excitement - for he has entirely discontinued the use of ardent spirits - or as some say from the effect of opium is in a condition between sleeping and waking which amounts nearly to a constant state of insanity."

Aide reprimanded

Houston reprimanded his aide. But when Perry, 25, on occasion a fanatical preacher, walked off from the army, Houston had him arrested. Nevertheless, he restored Perry's arms in time for him to fight at San Jacinto, where Houston's troops annihilated Santa Anna's soldiers and won independence for Texas.

That Houston didn't immediately address the opium charge may have been a mistake.

The first detailed account of Houston's campaign, preceded only by Houston's own official report, was a savage defamation of the general titled Houston Displayed: Or Who Won the Battle of San Jacinto? The author, according to the 1837 pamphlet's cover, was "A Farmer in the Army." But the attack on Houston was revealed to be the work of another of the general's aides, Maj. Robert M. Coleman (1799-1837), with editorial help from Algernon P. Thompson (1818-1871).

The little book, in reprint editions, haunted Houston all his life and beyond. The latest reprint was 35 years ago by the Brick Row Shop in Austin, edited by the bookman John H. Jenkins (1940-1989). The Dallas Public Library has a copy.

Houston Displayed was packed with dirty lies and just enough truth to keep a reader wondering.

For example:

"[Houston's] whiskey and opium gave out, and none could be procured; so that, from disappointment and the want of those stimulants, he became deranged. In one of his moments of delirium he drew a pistol and attempted to blow out his brains, but was prevented by the untimely interference of [Jim] Bowie."

And:

"The commander-in-chief of the army of Texas was spending his nights in the grog shops of Washington [on-the-Brazos] in company with the gamblers and dissipated multitude which the session of the convention had collected at that place; and his days were devoted to sleep."

And:

"[Houston] had the unblushing impudence to acknowledge to the bystanders that he did not recollect to have set out from any place sober or free from intoxication during the last five years; but on that occasion he considered himself sober."

The book is filled with trash, but some of it does sound like Houston. Most of it - accusations of cowardice and adoration of Santa Anna - are preposterous.

Now Santa Anna (1794-1876) - there was your real hophead. After his capture, the Texans had to give him a fix before he could parley. Sadly, I note that the opium given to Santa Anna to clear his head was part of a plug of the stuff that Houston was chewing to numb the pain of his wounded ankle.

Historian Margaret Henson of Houston told me that opium was a common military treatment for pain and "camp fever" (diarrhea). Moreover, it was sold over the counter in 19th-century Texas.

Another report of Houston's opium use is that of Anson Jones (1798-1858), Texas army surgeon, who wrote in an 1855 letter that Houston was "stupefied and stultified with opium during the San Jacinto campaign."

For years, Houston's enemy David G. Burnet got political mileage out of Houston Displayed.

When Houston (1793-1863) and Burnet (1788-1870) faced each other in the 1841 contest for president of the Republic, neither liked what he saw.

Former interim President Burnet called the hero of San Jacinto a cowardly incompetent and a drunk.

Houston was seeking a second presidential sitting after skipping a term as required by law. He tagged Burnet with an Indian term - wetumpka - meaning hog thief.

Unprintable exchanges

Some of their exchanges were unprintable; others made it into print.

Burnet said of Houston:

"When the whole truth shall be known, then this reputed hero [of the Battle of San Jacinto] will be despoiled of his furtive laurels; and be depicted as a quailing, irresolute braggadocio who fled by instinct and fought by compulsion.

"Oh, fugitive fame, got by accident, retained by fraud, and merged in bestial debaucheries . . . with his robes of office dabbled in intoxication and the foul and most bloated blasphemies trembling on his tongue."

Said Houston of Burnet:

"Even some of the soldiers facetiously remarked that the letter G. in your name stood for Grog. [Footnote: G. was actually for Gouverneur.] You prate about the faults of other men while the blot of foul unmitigated treason rests upon you. You political brawler and canting hypocrite whom the waters of Jordan could never cleanse from your political and moral leprosy."

Houston won, inspiring a left-handed compliment from one editor:

"Old Sam H. with all his faults appears to be the only man for Texas. He is still unsteady, intemperate, but drunk in a ditch is worth a thousand of . . . Burnet."

Angry? Burnet wanted to kill Houston. He challenged the hero of San Jacinto to a duel.

Back in Tennessee, Houston had fought a duel and won by wounding his opponent. He said he always regretted the affair.

Houston's response to Burnet was the same as his response to other challengers - and there were many of them.

Burnet would just have to get in line and wait his turn.

Kent Biffle is a regular contributor to Texas & Southwest. He can be sent e-mail at hkbiffle@aol.com.