A Gallant Little Army Read online

  A Gallant Little Army

  MODERN WAR STUDIES

  Theodore A. Wilson

  General Editor

  Raymond Callahan

  J. Garry Clifford

  Jacob W. Kipp

  Jay Luvaas

  Allan R. Millett

  Carol Reardon

  Dennis Showalter

  David R. Stone

  Series Editors

  A Gallant

  Little Army

  The Mexico City Campaign

  Timothy D. Johnson

  University Press of Kansas

  © 2007 by the University Press of Kansas

  All rights reserved

  Published by the University Press of Kansas (Lawrence, Kansas 66045), which was organized by the Kansas Board of Regents and is operated and funded by Emporia State University, Fort Hays State University, Kansas State University, Pittsburg State University, the University of Kansas, and Wichita State University

  Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

  Johnson, Timothy D., 1957-

  A gallant little army : the Mexico City Campaign, 1847 / Timothy D. Johnson.

  p. cm. — (Modern war studies)

  Includes bibliographical references and index.

  ISBN 978-0-7006-1541-4 (cloth : alk. paper)

  ISBN 978-0-7006-2716-5 (ebook)

  1. Mexican War, 1846–1848—Campaigns. 2. Mexico City, Battle of, Mexico City, Mexico, 1847. 3. Scott, Winfield, 1786–1866. 4. Mexico City (Mexico)—History—American occupation, 1847–1848. I. Title.

  E405.6.J64 2007

  973.6′2—dc22

  2007017872

  British Library Cataloguing-in-Publication Data is available.

  Printed in the United States of America

  10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

  The paper used in the print publication meets the minimum requirements of the American National Standard for Permanence of Paper for Printed Library Materials Z39.48-1992.

  For Jayne

  Contents

  Acknowledgments

  Prologue

  1. Veracruz: The Gibraltar of Mexico

  2. Veracruz: The Slow, Scientific Process

  3. The Army Advances: Olive Branch and Sword

  4. Cerro Gordo: A Brilliant Affair

  5. Cerro Gordo: Tomorrow Will Settle the Affair

  6. Jalapa: Garden of Mexico

  7. Puebla: Waiting All Summer

  8. Puebla: Between the Devil and the Deep Sea

  9. Into the Valley of Mexico: No Room for Error

  10. The Battle of the Pedregal: Padierna and Churubusco

  11. Mortification and Mistake: Armistice and Molino del Rey

  12. God Is a Yankee: The Capture of Chapultepec

  13. A Devil of a Time: Belén and San Cosme Garitas

  14. The Preoccupations of the Occupation

  Epilogue

  Appendixes

  Notes

  Bibliography

  Index

  Acknowledgments

  A project like this can not be completed without support, both technical and financial, and I have been fortunate enough to benefit from both. I am grateful to Yale University for a 2005 research fellowship that allowed me to mine the rich resources of the Beinecke Library. George Miles, Una Belau, and the rest of the Beinecke staff worked to ensure the success of my tenure there as a research fellow. In addition, I am indebted to the Virginia Historical Society for a 2002 research fellowship, and I especially wish to thank Charles Bryan, Nelson Lankford, Frances Pollard, and Greg Stoner for their valuable assistance. My home institution, Lipscomb University, also provided financial support and I am grateful for help with travel to distant repositories made possible by a David Laine Memorial Award. I especially wish to acknowledge the support of my college dean, Valery Prill.

  Other individuals have rendered valuable assistance that warrants recognition and thanks. Kit Goodwin in the Special Collections Division of the University of Texas at Arlington Library, John White in the Manuscripts Division of the University of North Carolina Library, and Ann Lozano and Monica Rivera with the Benson Latin American Collection of the University of Texas at Austin Library made my work in those repositories pleasant and rewarding. To Carolyn Wilson and the following staff members at Lipscomb University’s Beaman Library, I extent a heartfelt commendation and thanks: Judy Butler, Pam Eatherly, David Howard, Stacy Lusk, Susan Phifer, Rachel Pyle, Eunice Wells, and especially Marie Byers. The aforementioned Beaman staff members have often and graciously helped me locate resources and allowed me special privileges with noncirculating material. I also thank Robert Johannsen for his valuable role as an adjudicator in the early stages of this project. In addition, I am particularly indebted to Richard Bruce Winders for his careful reading of the entire manuscript and for his perceptive and constructive criticism. Few people know as much about the conflict with Mexico as Bruce, and his keen insights saved me from several pitfalls. Al Austelle rendered cordial and crucial aid in his capacity as Director of Instructional Technology at Lipscomb, and Jamie Johnson reproduced the maps and illustrations contained in this book. Maps are crucial to the reader of military history, and all of the maps in this book were reproduced from Donald S. Frazier’s excellent encyclopedia The United States and Mexico at War (New York: Macmillan, 1998), which were reprinted by permission of the Gale Group. Finally, for guiding me to places relevant to the Mexico City Campaign during a 1999 visit to Mexico, I thank David Brye, Andres Palacios Garcia, and Leopoldo Lagunes Figuera.

  I also benefitted from the moral support of many people whose friendship I cherish. For their advice, encouragement, and in some cases for reading portions of this book in manuscript form, but most of all for the relationships we share, I thank the following people: Bill Collins, Jerry Gaw, Richard Goode, Bonnie Hooper, Robert Hooper, Glenn Johnson, Jennie Johnson, David Lawrence, Marc Schwerdt, Guy Swanson, Dwight Tays, Paul Turner, and Mark Williams. I continue to profit from the wise advice of my friend, Nathaniel Cheairs Hughes. During my periodic visits to Chattanooga, Nat is often gracious enough to sit with me over a cup of coffee and engage in discussions about our respective research projects. I am always the beneficiary of such meetings. Several students in my military history class read and commented on a portion of the manuscript, and I gratefully acknowledge their interest in this project: Finn Breland, Daniel Culbreath, Shaun Grubbs, Ben Ledger, Emily Nix, Gantt Pierce, and Robert Stevens. And thanks also to two more students, Grant Mullins and Reagan Thomas, whose enthusiastic interest in history is infectious.

  There are also a host of individuals from my past who probably do not realize the formative influence they have had on me, and although all of their names cannot be mentioned here, their impact is remembered. I especially want to acknowledge four of my former professors and mentors who, despite the passage of two decades, continue to inspire. Howard Jones, Forrest McDonald, James Lee McDonough, and Grady McWhiney were and are scholars worthy of emulation. My parents, Hollis and Bea Johnson, and my sons, Garrett, Griffin, and Graham, have combined to be a great source of encouragement and inspiration. And once again it was a pleasure to work with Mike Briggs, Susan Schott, Larisa Martin, Susan McRory, and the rest of the staff at the University Press of Kansas. They are unfailingly cordial and professional, and especially sensitive to the peculiar quirks of authors—or at least to mine.

  I have saved my deepest expression of gratitude for the person to whom I owe the greatest debt. Jayne is my friend, companion, confidant, and wife of twenty-eight years. I have benefitted from her insight, forethought, and wisdom, and I continue to be amazed at her unlimited capacity to love, nurture, understand, and forgive. Thro
ugh her example, she exerts the kind of influence that makes those around her better. For her support and understanding and for her selfless sacrifices, I say an inadequate thank you. This book is the result of seven years and countless thousands of hours of work, and I dedicate it to her.

  Prologue

  Let our people not altogether forget the ten thousand American soldiers who landed at Vera Cruz, the victorious and triumphant march to the capital of Mexico, and which never retreated an inch.

  —J. Jacob Oswandel, First Pennsylvania Infantry Regiment

  Standing atop a hill called El Telégrafo, camera in hand, I scanned the countryside to the northeast. An adjoining hill, La Atalaya, rose directly in front of me, its rounded crest but a few hundred yards from where I stood. Behind it and as far as the eye could see were rows of hills and ridges, all of them green with vegetation. The panorama inspired awe and amazement—awe at the beauty of the landscape, and amazement in contemplating how 5,000 American soldiers with artillery in tow traversed that terrain to attack the left flank of the Mexican army. Some of the hills were so steep that the cannon had to be pulled up one side and let down the other by hand with ropes. I was standing at the critical point, the exact location of the Mexican flank on the Cerro Gordo battlefield, site of one of the most important engagements in the United States’ war with Mexico. Here, on April 18, 1847, a desperate hand-to-hand struggle with muskets and bayonets drenched the crest of the hill with blood and sealed the American victory.

  The small village of Cerro Gordo remains, but not much else. No signs designate it as the location where a Mexican army fought a bloody battle with the North Americans. A small stone marker sits on the southwest slope of El Telégrafo honoring Brigadier General Ciriaco Vásquez, who died there, but the vines and bushes that covered it hid even that memorial from public sight. The result of the battle probably explains why the locals choose not to honor the events that occurred in their backyards; nevertheless, the complete lack of commercialism on or around the battlefield surprised me. After all, as a Southerner who grew up in the shadow of Lookout Mountain and Missionary Ridge, and who has visited places like Shiloh and Stones River, I was accustomed to the losing side hallowing the locations of its greatest defeats.

  Mexicans have not forgotten the battle or the disappointing results of the war; they simply prefer not to embrace such a national calamity. Most Americans, however, have forgotten this two-year war, or perhaps they have only a vague recollection of it, even though it resulted in the transfer of a sizable portion of the continent from Mexico to the United States. In forgetting the war, Americans also forget the sacrifice of approximately 13,000 American soldiers who died in it. One can go to places like Omaha Beach on the coast of France or to Bastogne, Belgium, and visit neatly manicured American cemeteries. There, thousands of white marble crosses and stars of David are routinely cleaned and respectfully maintained, as they should be. But what about men like Samuel Lauderdale from Tennessee, who died at Cerro Gordo and whose friends laid his body to rest on the bank of a nearby stream? Or William Eurick from Pennsylvania, who was killed during the Siege of Puebla and was buried in the city near the Plaza de San José? No one even knows the location of their final resting places.

  This historical amnesia is unfortunate, for the Mexican War offers abundant intrigue and drama and produced its own anecdotes and heroes worth remembering. One of the most captivating stories from the war is a military campaign that, despite its relative obscurity, is one of the most brilliant operations in American history. It is typically called the Mexico City Campaign, and my interest in it is what compelled me to travel to Mexico in 1999 and retrace the route of the American army. During my journey across central Mexico, and through reading hundreds of pages of letters and diaries in manuscript repositories throughout the United States, I developed a fascination with this army. Following its path made me feel a certain bond with it, perhaps because of the knowledge that few others had visited the sites related to this great campaign. I wondered why no historian had ever written a book about it, and my visits to these locations created a growing sense of obligation to tell the army’s story. Walking Collado Beach near Veracruz where it came ashore conjured images of a horizon cluttered with steam and sail naval vessels. I trudged up the hill to the Castle of Chapultepec with increased admiration for the soldiers who stormed the castle on September 13, 1847. On the morning of September 30, 1999, I experienced my first earthquake while sitting in an outdoor plaza in Puebla, and suddenly I could relate to the strange, disorienting feeling that many of the soldiers described in their letters after experiencing their first earthquake on October 2, 1847.

  Numerous books that deal with this time period contain brief accounts or chapter overviews of the Mexico City Campaign. I first became interested in it in the 1990s while working on a biography of General Winfield Scott, who commanded the American army. In fact, that biography contains one of those “chapter overviews.” However, the campaign and its participants deserve a book-length study. Many of the soldiers believed that they were participating in the greatest event of the nineteenth century and that their exploits would be forever remembered by their countrymen. But alas, they comprised an army whose conquest is largely forgotten. This is the story of that army and its quest.

  In March 1847, an army of about 11,000 under Winfield Scott landed on the east coast of Mexico, and during the next six months, it marched over 250 miles, fought and won five major battles, inflicted enormous casualties on the Mexican army, captured that country’s capital, pacified the countryside, and created favorable conditions for peace negotiations. It accomplished all of these things in the face of overwhelming odds. Unforeseen obstacles threatened the army’s success, and some of them even emanated from the administration that sent it to war. The challenges included a president who distrusted his army commander and sought to replace him throughout the campaign, a constant lack of supplies and transportation, half the number of troops promised by the administration, an enemy army that at least doubled and sometimes tripled its numbers, and a potentially hostile foreign population on whom the army depended for its survival. Those factors were external, but the army also faced internal liabilities that had the potential to affect outcomes. They included animosity between regular army and volunteers, the termination of service for short-term enlistments two months into the campaign, disease that drained the life from thousands of soldiers and threatened to debilitate the army, and an ambitious officer corps competing with each other for glory and recognition.

  The German chronicler of war, Carl von Clausewitz, called them the frictions of war—those unexpected obstacles that affect the course of a military campaign. In his famous study On War, he wrote about the difficulty of comprehending the problems associated with a military campaign for people who have never experienced war: “Everything looks simple; the knowledge required does not look remarkable, the strategic options are so obvious.” Yet Clausewitz informs his reader that despite appearances, “the simplest thing is difficult” in war, and these “difficulties accumulate and end by producing a kind of friction” that ultimately reduces that army’s level of performance.1 In retrospect, the success of the Mexico City Campaign seems inevitable. It was not.

  Scott’s army encountered frictions in 1847, and one of the themes of this study is how he overcame them as he guided his small army deep into the enemy’s country and all the way to its capital. It was a fascinating journey and a remarkable accomplishment. Despite the difficulties he encountered, some caused by his own men, Scott came to love his little band. Late in the campaign, after a particularly daring attack that routed the Mexican army, Scott, bursting with pride, exclaimed, “Glory to this gallant little army.” Later, in a letter to Secretary of War William L. Marcy, he again referred to it as “this most gallant army.” His affection for his men was obvious, and that affection was reciprocated.2

  In January 1848, an American soldier named N. H. Clark arrived in Veracruz, Mexico. Ten mon
ths had passed since Scott’s army landed and captured the coastal city. When Clark arrived, the United States Army occupied a line of posts from the coast stretching inland to Mexico City, and military action had ceased except for mounted troops that patrolled the roads in search of guerrilla bands. Although Clark was a latecomer to the theater of operations, his initial impression of the foreign country could easily have been written by any of the soldiers who arrived months earlier. “Every thing is new and novel to me, climate, people, habits, manners, customs, laws, religion, buildings, food etc.,” thought Clark, “and to one who has never been out of his own country before, it fills him with curiosty and interest.” It was indeed a new experience for all Americans who participated in this war far from home.3

  However, the typical American soldier brought opinions with him to Mexico that were usually rooted in a belief in Anglo-Saxon superiority. Some of their opinions were preconceived, stereotypical, and prejudiced. They loved the beauty of the landscape and were intrigued with the differences that surrounded them, but they were often unimpressed with the people. “It is too good a country and too delightful a climate for so worthless a race,” wrote Lt. William M. Gardner of the Second Infantry Regiment.4 Many of the soldiers viewed their Mexican counterparts as ignorant, backward, and shiftless, a people kept in that state by the tyranny of a corrupt government and the oppression of a morally bankrupt Catholic church. To many American soldiers, the Catholic church in Mexico was but a manifestation of Old World corruption—a view that caused some to see the war as a redemptive crusade. They saw themselves as defenders of a better way of life, on a mission to expand the geographical boundaries of liberty and enlightenment.5

  The war with Mexico was a turning point in American military history in at least two respects. One has to do with fighting a war outside the United States’ borders. It was this country’s first foreign war. There had been brief small-scale incursions into Tripoli in 1805 and British Canada during the Revolution and the War of 1812, but never before had U.S. forces attempted to operate at this level, distance, and duration in another country. All American wars since the one with Mexico, excluding the Civil War, have been expeditionary in nature. Some might contend that for the Union army, even the Civil War was expeditionary in nature. Waging war in a foreign country presented different and unprecedented challenges that American commanders had never before faced, and the questions that arose were manifold. How to maintain order and discipline in an army when the soldiers are beyond the reach of civil law? How to treat civilians in occupied areas? How to provide for punishment not just of offending American soldiers but of Mexican civilians as well? What rules will govern the gathering of supplies in a foreign land? Scott addressed all of the questions that tend to pose a dilemma for an invading army, and the way he confronted them makes the Mexico City Campaign unique. The army’s ability to march through enemy country depended on discipline within its own ranks and the acquiescence of the Mexican population. This study argues, as did my 1998 biography of Scott, that the commanding general devised a sophisticated pacification plan that was ahead of its time. Furthermore, this effort to placate the people, coupled with Scott’s willingness to stop military operations after major battles in the hope that the enemy would seek to negotiate, indicates that Scott had adopted a strategy of moderation. Although he ultimately captured Mexico City, he repeatedly showed an inclination to halt his campaign short of the capital if only the Mexicans would concede. In other words, his intention was not to wage an unlimited war of destruction. Rather, it was to apply only as much pressure as was necessary to end the war.