British Intrigue and the Texas Revolution

Stuart Reid. The Secret War for Texas. 2007. Texas A&M University Press.
"Could the British have stopped Manifest Destiny in its tracks in 1836? A Scottish doctor named James Grant was the agent who tried to make it happen and Texas was the stage on which the secret battle was fought." (Dustjacket)
James Grant is one of those figures in history who make an appearance, seemingly out of nowhere, and who disappear almost as quickly, a cipher if you will. Was he an agent of the British Foreign Office? Did his scheme of a Northern Mexico Federal Republic have a realistic chance? Or was it a method concocted by Grant to advance some land claims that he had? Most historians of this period believe it was all about the land claims and thus Dr. Grant does not rate very high in the estimation of Texans. He was a distraction. Unfortunately for the reputation of Dr. Grant, this monograph of Stuart Reid does little to change that estimation to this historian's eyes. There exists in this work too much "what if" and "only if", especially in regards to the attack on Matamoras, which never happened. The author sees the eventual annexation of Texas by the United States as inevitable once the Northern Federation fell apart. Inevitability is hindsight not history.