When James Bernsen isn’t working on his family’s farm west of San Antonio and at his job with a state agency, he analyzes top-secret information and interprets spy reports as a Navy intelligence officer.
It’s the kind of work that helped him figure out what really happened in Texas’ first revolution.
The Castroville native used his skills to research a two-century-old insurgency, commonly known as the Battle of the Medina, with the precision of a modern-day intelligence officer, resulting in a book, The Lost War for Texas: Mexican Rebels, American Burrites, and the Texas Revolution of 1811.
Bernsen was working in Dallas as a press secretary for U.S. Sen. Phil Gramm (R-Texas) on Sept. 11, 2001.
“The staff was evacuated, but I was kept on because I sent out the press releases by fax,” he said. “I realized, this is my generation’s challenge. So I decided to join the military.”
Shortly after, Bernsen was commissioned into the Navy Reserve, a program that allows service members to serve in the Navy while also maintaining a civilian life.
In the two decades since, the lieutenant commander has served in Iraq and Afghanistan and aboard the aircraft carrier USS Ronald Reagan in the South China Sea.
“A lot of what I was doing in Iraq particularly was keeping troops safe by providing information that helped protect the force,” he said. “So I feel really blessed to have done that.”
Two years ago, Bernsen’s mother died and he bought the family farm near the town of Qhihi, an opportunity afforded by his fully remote job with the Texas Workforce Commission. “Covid saved our farm,” he said of the ability to work from home.
During that time, Bernsen also went back to school and earned a master’s degree in history at Texas State University so he could fulfill a longtime goal of not just reading about history but writing about it as well.
“I’ve always been passionate about history, and, actually, that’s one of the things I love about intelligence in the Navy … you’re kind of studying history and studying current events and that intersection between them,” he said.
But writing about history felt daunting to him.
“I took these classes and really learned how historians do their job of writing and researching history, and it was eye-opening,” he said.
He started the research for his book as part of his master’s thesis on a topic that’s always “fascinated” him.
“Everybody knows about the second Texas Revolution — in 1836, the Alamo and San Jacinto and all that,” he said. “But 25 years before that, there was a major war fought in Texas.”
It was a series of battles few people spoke about, he added. “And I thought that was really odd, that such an important event was overlooked.”
After reading a book about attempts to find the lost battlefield of the Battle of Medina, which was the largest battle ever fought in Texas and occurred south of San Antonio, Bernsen wanted to know how the conflict came about.
(Learn more about the search for the battlefield by listening to this San Antonio Report podcast by Brandon Seale, “Finding Medina.”)
Through his own research, Bernsen found that there were some similarities between the armies of the early 19th century and the modern-day wars during which he served. Like in his intelligence role, Bernsen looked for patterns in what he uncovered online, using genealogy sources and 400 years of archival information.
“Getting those archival documents, those old letters from people who were involved, getting all that together and just piecing together led to … some interesting conclusions that I think is going to change how this has been seen by most,” he said.
What he uncovered about the Texas Revolution of 1811 has ramifications for how Texas’ second revolution is understood, he explained. “Basically, this first revolution created the conditions that led to the settlement, and then the later second revolution in 1836,” he said.
“We teach that Texas history starts when Stephen F. Austin showed up,” he said, but there’s more to that story. “Nobody in San Antonio even knows this, you had hundreds of people killed, even drawn and quartered right there on the River Walk, and nobody knows this history.”
Bernsen started the book project in 2017 while deployed to Afghanistan and the book was published by Texas A&M University Press in July.
In addition to teaching history at Texas A&M University-San Antonio, Bernsen is continuing to research and write. His latest project is an article soon to be published in a historical journal about one of the Alamo defenders whose name appears twice on the Cenotaph, and how that came about.
Bernsen hopes to continue his role in the Navy Reserve for a few more years but also is looking ahead to staying home to spend more time with his 12-year-old son.
“It’s really kind of been an honor and a privilege to be able to serve. It was one of those things that I didn’t know I would ever do this until that moment [on 9/11],” he said.
“I can talk all day long about history, but when that moment comes that you’re called … I realized at that point that I could either sit back and complain about the world … or I can be a part of the solution.”
