"Let me tell you what is coming. Your fathers and husbands, your sons and brothers, will be herded at the point of the bayonet. You may, after the sacrifice of countless millions of treasure and hundreds of thousands of lives, as a bare possibility, win Southern independence...but I doubt it. The North is determined to preserve this Union." - Sam Houston, quoted in The Raven, by Marquis James These remarks best reflect Sam Houston's belief that -

O the South would be victorious over Northern troops
O a Northern victory was impossible​