CROCKETT, DAVID (1786-1836), American frontiers man, son of an Irish immigrant, was born in Greene county, Tenn., on Aug. 17, 1786. His education was obtained chiefly in the rough school of experience in the Tennessee backwoods, where he ac quired a wide rep'utation as a hunter, trapper and marksman. In 1813-14 he served in the Creek War under Andrew Jackson, and subsequently became a colonel in the Tennessee militia. In 1821 24 he was a member of the State legislature, having won his elec tion largely by telling stories. In 1827 he was elected to the na tional House of Representatives and was re-elected in 1829. At Washington his shrewdness, eccentric manners and peculiar wit made him a conspicuous figure, but his opposition to the Presi dent's Indian policy led to administration influences being turned against him with the result that he was defeated for re-election in 1831. He was again elected in 1 83 2, but in 1835 lost his seat a second time, being then a vigorous opponent of many distinc tively Jacksonian measures. Discouraged and disgusted, he fol lowed his usual remedy of emigration, this time to Texas. There he lost his life as one of the defenders of the Alamo at San Antonio on March 6, 1836.
A so-called "autobiography" (1834), which he very probably dictated, is typical of the crude but racy humour of the frontier, a work purporting to be a continuation of this autobiography and entitled Colonel Crockett's Exploits and Adventures in Texas (Philadelphia, 1836) is undoubtedly spurious. There have been several editions of these works in combined form. Numerous pop ular biographies have been written, the best by E. S. Ellis (Phila delphia, 1884). See also D. C. Seitz, Uncommon Americans (1925) and the article by C. T. Crowell in the American Mer cury (Jan., 1925).