Condensed History of the Mexican War and Its Glorious Results

It has been the custom of veterans of the war with Mexico to celebrate the fall of the capital of that Republic before the prowess of American soldiers on the 14th day of September, 1847.

Hence are assembled around this festive board in this magnificent Hotel Continental the few veterans of that war whose far-wandering footsteps have brought them to the “elbow-touch” once more on a foreign soil. We meet to-night in this splendid capital of France, yet with the radiant folds of our country’s flag above us, that flag honored of the nations:

“For grace and beauty and order draw Around that symbol of light and law.”

In thus assembling, we commune in the sacrament of a common memory with our comrades across the seas, who on all their homestead hills are celebrating the same glorious event. With them we exult in the proud consciousness that by doing our duty as American soldiers in the days of our youth, we not only gave renewed lustre to the martial annals of our country, but through the triumph of our arms we added greatly to the sum of human happiness, by widening the area of the world’s civilization.

The occasion permits me to glance but briefly at the events of that war which to some are still vivid memories, while others must either glean them from the historic page or hear them recited by the men who then acted history.

That war had its origin in the invasion of the soil of the United States by the Army of Mexico.

On January 10th, 1845, the Congress of the United States passed an Act providing for the annexation of Texas.

The Act was ratified by the Congress of that Republic on July 4th, 1845, and Texas with its two hundred and sixty five thousand square miles of territory, an area greater than that of the German Empire or of Austria, thus became an integral part of the American Union.

Texas had already maintained her independence for ten years against Mexico, the parent country.

Those who have questioned the political morality of the act of annexation may be fully answered by reference to the fact that England, France and Spain had all formally recognized the independence of the Republic of Texas three years before her admission into our Union. Mexico resolved to nullify that act by force of arms.

In view of her aggressive attitude, Major General Zachary Taylor, U. S. Army, was ordered to the Rio Grande, the Western boundary of Texas, with a force of about four thousand men, chiefly regulars, where he arrived July 20th, 1845, establishing his headquarters at Corpus Christi, within four miles of the Mexican Army, then encamped ten thousand strong, under the command of General Ampudia, on the South side of that river. In January, 1846, General Taylor moved his command to a point opposite Matamoras, Mexico, and erected an earthwork which he termed Fort Brown.

On the 24th of April, 1846, Captain Thornton, U. S. Army, while marching at the head of seventy men of the 2nd Dragoons in Texas, fell into an ambuscade of Mexican regular troops, numbering between three and four hundred, and after a gallant resistance, during which he had sixteen of his command killed, and thirty-eight wounded, was obliged to surrender. Six days later the Mexican forces attacked Fort Brown, and were handsomely repulsed. On May 8th General Taylor with 2,300 men met and defeated the Mexican Army 6,000 strong, under the command of Generals Ampudia and Arista, at Palo Alto. On the following day, the Mexican Army having received a reinforcement of 1,000 men, made a stand at Resaca de la Palma (Ravine of Palms) and was there again defeated by General Taylor, the Mexican loss being 975 and ours but 110 killed and wounded.

It is a noteworthy fact that those battles were fought without a declaration of war on either side. Indeed no declaration of war was ever made by either of the two contending Republics.

On May 13th, 1846, the Congress of the United States passed a resolution declaring that war existed between the United Stales and Mexico, and further resolved, that the war should be prosecuted, until we obtained “indemnity for the past, and security for the future.”

In response to the call of the President (Jas. K. Polk) for thirty thousand volunteers, sixty-five thousand volunteered promptly. The quotas furnished by the respective States were as follows:

Alabama 2,981, Maryland and district of Columbia 1,372, Arkansas 1,274, Florida 289, Missouri 6,441, Georgia 1,987, North Carolina 895, Illinois 5,791, South Carolina 1,120, Indiana 4,329, Ohio 5,334, Iowa 229, New Jersey 420, Kentucky 4,094, New York 1,890, Louisiana 7,341, Pennsylvania 2,117, Michigan 1,072, Tennessee 5,392, Massachusetts 930, Texas 7,394, Mississippi 2,235, Wisconsin 146.

To these must be added about seven thousand regulars of the United States Army, and one thousand marines, making an aggregate force of about seventy-three thousand rank and file, constituting that gallant army, charged with the duty in connection with our grand old historic navy of enforcing from Mexico “indemnity for the past and security for the future.”

That demand, history attests, they translated into action.

The Republic of Mexico consisted of twenty-four states, with a population of about six millions. It had but twenty years previously achieved its independence against the veteran army of Spain.

It had a standing army of fifty thousand, and had called into the field an additional force, chiefly volunteers, of nearly two hundred thousand.

Her soldiers were well armed and equipped, the muskets of her infantry all bearing the English Tower-stamp, and the cartridges being of the best British manufacture. Her troops were, in the main, magnificently uniformed, and we could say with literal truth that her “Cohorts were gleaming with purple and gold.” Her coast defences were provided with good armaments, her principal sea-port, Vera-Cruz, being guarded by the Castle of San Juan d’Ulloa, built of white coral rock, and mounting three hundred heavy guns. No country was better adapted by its topography for defensive warfare.

Abounding with mountain ranges, and rocky hill-slopes, the true citadels of freedom, that commanded all practicable roads to the interior, while she had a formidable ally in the deadly climate of her coast, where the tropical sun, shining upon the ever-decaying masses of rank vegetation, breeds the fatal malaria which burns up the blood with fever, alternating with the icy “norther” that within an hour will often vary the temperature from summer’s heat to an almost Arctic cold.

Three lines of operation against Mexico were now determined on:

1. General Taylor was to operate from Matamoras, along the line of the Rio-Grande.

2. A column under General Kearny was to conquer the Mexican territories of New Mexico and California.

3. A column under General Wool was to enter the Northern States of Mexico and conquer Chihuahua, and the adjacent country.

In pursuance of this plan General Taylor advanced upon the Mexican Array, then in position at Monterey, on September 5th, 1846.

His army numbered 6,600 of all arms, composed of 3,200 regular troops of the 1st, 2nd, 4th, 5th, 7th, and 8th, infantry; 4 companies of the 2nd Dragoons, and 5 batteries (30) guns of field artillery, and 3,400 volunteers, consisting of the first regiments from Kentucky, Mississipi, Ohio and Tennessee, two Texas regiments commanded by Brig. Gen. Henderson, including Jack Hay’s famous Texas Rangers, and one battalion from Maryland and the District of Columbia.

The Mexican force consisted of 7,000 regulars and 3,500 volunteers, with 84 pieces of artillery in strong works covering every approach to the city. Their principal works were designated as Forts Diabolo, Teneria, Soldado, Independence, the Bishop’s Palace and the Citadel.

Our army attacked in three divisions, commanded respectively by Generals Worth, Twiggs and Butler of Kentucky.

The enemy made a desperate resistance. The firing was incessant from the windows and flat roofs of the dwellings, and from barricades in the streets when our troops had entered the city after carrying all the outer defences by assault.

The attack began on September 20th, and ended on the morning of the 23rd, with the surrender of the enemy. Our loss was about 950 killed and wounded.

Early in December, 1846, all of the regular infantry was withdrawn from General Taylor’s army and ordered to report to Major-General Winfield Scott, the Commander-in-Chief, who had assumed command in person of the fourth great column of attack, whose objective point was the Capital of Mexico, and which was entitled, “The Army of Mexico.” General Taylor’s army was thus reduced to only 4,500 men consisting altogether of volunteers, except three batteries of the regular army, and two squadrons of the 2nd Dragoons. Its numerical weakness invited attack, and General Santa Anna, the most renowned and skilful of the Mexican Commanders, and President of the Republic of Mexico, who had won a decisive victory over the French Army of invasion nine years before, moved his army against it. That army, according to the Mexican official reports, numbered twenty three thousand, two-thirds regular soldiers.

General Taylor decided to accept battle, and selected a position admirably adapted for defence at the Rancho Buena Vista. The position was marked by narrow defiles, and rugged and high ridges, that commanded the valley below. The battle began at daylight on February 23rd, 1846, by the attack of the enemy in force on our left flank. It was gallantly repulsed by the fire of the second and 3rd Indiana Riflemen, and a company of Col. Yell’s dismounted Arkansas Cavalry, with Bragg’s and Shermann’s splendidly served batteries, diverged to our left, where the enemy was concentrating for a decisive attack. The extreme left of our line was posted on a high and broad plateau and was composed of the 2nd Indiana, and 2nd Illinois regiments of infantry.

The tremendous impact of that attack forced those regiments to retire in considerable disorder after they had sustained for some time a severe cross-fire of artillery, and a heavy fire on their front, by a greatly superior force of infantry. At that crisis of the battle the 1st Mississipi Rifles, the only regiment of that army that was armed with rifles having percussion locks, commanded by Colonel Jefferson Davis, promptly interposed between the retreating regiments, and the charging Mexican cavalry, and doubtless saved the day by their rapid and effective firing, before which the enemy recoiled. There are veterans of Buena Vista, who, though in after years they still remained true to the flag of their country, and struck in its just defence on fields “shot-sown and bladed thick with steel,” do not feel that they sully their loyalty in respectfully saluting Jefferson Davis, as he was, recalling him to memory as with tall heroic form he so gallantly upheld the starry ensign of the Union upon the steady and blazing line that sheltered the brave but broken columns of Illinois and Indiana, from the uplifted sabres of a merciless foe.